She was Daniel’s mentor in SG-1, and was an instigator to some of the most pivotal moments in the series. Now actor Mel Harris joins Dial the Gate to discuss her role as the omnipresent Oma Desala! Come join us and get your questions answered LIVE.

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Timecodes
00:00 – Opening Credits
00:50 – Welcome and Episode Outline
02:29 – Guest Introduction
03:00 – Mel’s Stargate Memorabilia
04:26 – Mel’s Dreams and Goals as a Young Person
05:36 – Personal and Professional Heroes
10:03 – Woolworths Commercial
12:24 – Mel’s First Pilot
12:59 – Thirty Something’s Legacy — Did hope help you understand yourself?
17:51 – A Role That Stretched You
20:24 – Oma Desala
22:30 – From Meridian to Maternal Instinct — Impressions of Oma
24:30 – Most Powerful Entity Mel Ever Played
25:31 – How Important Meridian Would Become
27:17 – Challenging Dialogue
28:54 – Working with Michael Shanks
30:37 – Returning Three Years Later
33:02 – Interpretation of the “stop along the way” Diner in Threads
36:23 – What happens after we die?
37:40 – Upcoming Projects
39:40 – Enlightenment — If You Immediately Know the Candlelight is Fire…
42:52 – Was the way you portrayed Oma influenced by your role of the domestic goddess?
44:41 – Will Oma ever win the war with Anubis?
45:02 – Oma Was Fooled by Anubis
45:58 – Watching SG-1, Atlantis and Universe at Home
46:43 – Would Mel return for a new Stargate?
47:54 – Thank you, Mel!
48:40 – Post-Interview Housekeeping
52:43 – End Credits

***

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TRANSCRIPT
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David Read
Welcome to Episode 38 of Dial the Gate. My name is David Read. Thank you so much for joining me. We’ve made it to another Sunday. We have a wonderful guest in store today. One of my favorite all time, guest stars from Stargate SG-1, a character that is very important to me, and someone that I’ve just been ecstatic to get. Before we bring Mel Harris in, I just want to let you know how the show is going to run. So first, I’m going to have questions for Mel. At the same time the YouTube chat, which is happening right now at youtube.com/dialthegate is the place where you can ask your question to Mel as well. I have moderators standing by. Just a big thank you to Summer, Ian, Tracy, Keith, Jeremy, and Rhys, all those people who make the show possible. So, go ahead and submit your questions now, and we will get to them near the end of the show. But before we get started, if you like Stargate, and you want to see more content like this on YouTube, it would mean a great deal to me if you click that like button. It really makes a difference with YouTube’s algorithm and will definitely help the show grow its audience. We’re still three months young. Please also consider sharing this video with a Stargate friend. And if you want to get notified about future episodes, click the Subscribe icon. Giving the bell icon to click will notify you the moment a new video drops, and you’ll get my notifications of any last minute guest changes. And keep an eye out for a clip of this episode, and much more to be appearing on the Gateworld.net, and Dial the Gate YouTube channels. Mel Harris, welcome to our show. Hello.

Mel Harris
Hello, David, thank you so much for having me. I’m delighted to be here.

David Read
I’m delighted to have you. How are things in upstate New York?

Mel Harris
They are, they’re calm and peaceful, which is nice, and a little bit snowy. We’ve had a lot of snow, and cold.

David Read
Please give me, in Phoenix it’s like

Mel Harris
We’re all sitting here wishing we could go out and warm vacation. So, we’re even.

David Read
You have some memorabilia if I’m not mistaken.

Mel Harris
I do. I have actually one of my favorite pieces of memorabilia from all things I’ve done, but it happens to be from Stargate. Would you like to see it?

David Read
Please, and thank you. And it has your signature on it!

Mel Harris
Yes, because they asked me to sign these. They were doing some, I don’t know, some sort of promotion or giveaway or, I don’t know. Do I look anything like her?

David Read
Yeah, I think it was Letter Box or someone like that, SkyBox, I think. They do every season. Yeah, season cards.

Mel Harris
Yeah, yeah, I was like, I’m never gonna get one for playing baseball, but this works. This works.

David Read
That is so cool.

Mel Harris
Yeah, it’s really fun.

David Read
And you posted a card from one of the role playing games, as well, on one of the social media feeds. So, anytime that Oma Desala enters everyone gets ascended. I forget what the exact

Mel Harris
Yeah, they get ascended, and they get skills, or something like that. I don’t know. I’m a very giving character, you know? She likes to give. She makes the path hard for people to learn, but she likes to give.

David Read
What a history with this character. It’s so hard to believe that this was 2001 just right around the time was September 11, when you stepped foot on that stage, but I want to get to that in just a minute here. I wanted to know a little bit about your formative years. Who was Mel as a young person, and what were her dreams, and goals?

Mel Harris
Yeah, I was a basically an athletic tomboy from, you know, middle class New Jersey. That’s where I grew up. My dad was a football coach at Princeton University, and my mom taught at the high school, taught science. And yeah, I mean, my dreams and aspirations, I never thought I would be doing this, or being an actor. I actually was going to, I wanted to be the female F. Lee Bailey, when that was something to aspire to. And if I insult anybody by saying that I’m sorry, but you know, to be a criminal defense attorney, and I have a very legalistic mind. So, that was sort of what I set out to be. But that’s not the path that life handed me. So, it changed and I’m very grateful for it.

David Read
So, do you think that you could have practice law?

Mel Harris
Oh, absolutely. Absolutely. Yeah, anybody in my family that I’ve ever argued with would probably confirm.

David Read
I can see it. Absolutely. So, who are some, by extension of that, who are some of your personal, and professional heroes? Who were the people who helped to shape you into the person you are now?

Mel Harris
Yeah, well, I start with my mom. My mom hands down, taught me that I could do whatever I wanted to do if I wanted to work for it. It didn’t matter, she didn’t really see gender all these many, many years ago. And she was fabulous, because I went to the high school where she taught. So, many of my friends, and things had my mom. So, my mom absolutely is first and foremost. And then, I was really attracted, in terms of historical figures, I was attracted to women who did things that were different, and unusual. Like, for instance, so funny because we watched Madame Curie the other night. It’s fantastic. But women of that ilk who did things that different Florence Nightingale, and Clara Barton, and Madame Curie. And in real life it was, you know, Peggy Fleming when she skated and, you know, Olympians being an athlete and a tomboy. That was always something that I pretended to be I don’t, I can’t say that I aspired to be that. But certainly, we grew up near a place where you could go ice skating at night. And we went and, we all pretended we were Peggy Fleming, or, you know, Dorothy Hamill, or whoever that was at that time. So, and mentor wise in our real, in a real world, those are certainly real world people. I learned from a lot of different levels of people. I learned from peers that I worked with. I learned from people that I worked for, or under, I guess would be a better thing. And I really learned a lot in my life. Before I was an actress, I was a model. And I’m a middle class girl from New Jersey. I think maybe we went to New York City three times as a child. And at 18, I ended up moving to Europe, and modeling, and such an awakening of what the world was, and that there were different cultures, and what that means. And to this day, I’m an avid traveler. I haven’t traveled this year. Yeah. But I’ve been all over the world, through work, or just personally. And that’s incredibly formative to me, along with my mom’s influences as to how I view the world, how I view people, how I treat people. It’s a really interesting, educational thing. And I don’t understand why everybody doesn’t want to do it.

David Read
I could not agree more. I spent the better part of a year in the Philippines.

Mel Harris
Oh fantastic.

David Read
It’s amazing how displacing yourself transforms your identity, if you allow it to. And not necessarily like, well in some cases some of your views for sure, but just broadens your palate, and helps you to realize that no, it’s not all just about us. You know, there’s a different place out there with a bunch of different cultures that don’t behave like we do. I remember, getting the door slammed in my face, and no one turned around in the Philippines to hold the door for you. And it took me forever to get over that. It’s little things like that that I think help you grow as a human being.

Mel Harris
They are an incredibly gracious, and kind people.

David Read
And happier than we are. And they look up to us. And it’s like, you’re the ones to be envied.

Mel Harris
But that’s it, those things that cultural differences in our world that make our world interesting. Whether we agree with all of them or not, is a whole other story.

David Read
That’s exactly right. But you have to give yourself the opportunity to experience those things yourself.

Mel Harris
I think so. And I think that’s even true in the United States. I think that we could all be well served by opening ourselves up to what other areas of our country are like, and I’ve been very lucky by virtue of my work to travel a lot in the States and work in the States, as well as Canada. And you know, when you work somewhere, you get a different view of things because you work with locals, you work with crews, you work with how they live and what that means. You know, we’re very big country. And, you know, given everything that’s going on, I think we could all use some sort of inter-country travel programs to acquaint ourselves with what other people deal with.

David Read
Get a little down to earth perspective, you know, because it’s so easy to just say, “Why aren’t you thinking like me?” Well, I don’t live where you live. That can mean a lot. So, you go to Europe to model, is that when you discovered acting? Was that somewhere around that time?

Mel Harris
You know, no, I didn’t discover it till later. You know, it’s so funny, I did a commercial for a company called Woolworths, which was like a dime store, a five and dime store. And I did this commercial I worked one day, and I made I was 19-20 years old at the time. And, you know, very blessed in terms of the kind of money I was making. I was never like super supermodel, but I still made a very nice living. But I did a commercial, a national commercial, and I made a lot of money. And I thought, “Now this is the way to go.” And then I realized that if you could talk a certain way, and do the commercials, you could make even more. So, I really focused on learning to talk. I started taking voice lessons, and I started studying acting with Lee Strasberg, not really intending to be an actor. I just didn’t have that in my brain. I’d done high school plays, and things like that, but that was more social aspect than, “Oh, I want to be an actor.” And through a series of events I ended up, many years later, I just had my son who’s now 36, hope I got that right. He’ll probably kill me. And I ended up in LA, I just had my son, I’d taken a year off. And a friend of mine who used to be the receptionist at Wilhelmina Models in New York, called me up, she was working for a Hollywood manager. And she said, “Have you ever thought about acting?”, and I said, “No, not really. I’ve got this great commercial career going, and my baby is a year old. I don’t know.” She said, “Well, let’s meet and have lunch.” So, we met at lunch, and she’s a lovely person. And so we did. And she said, “Well, you know, if you want we’d like to represent you. Let’s, you know, see. ” So, we kind of started that. It took me seven or eight months to find an agent, at the time I think I was 27 when one agent in particular said, “Well, you know, I mean, we like her, and she’s nice and stuff, but she’s a little old to be starting. And we already have two just like her.” Now, to me, that’s just fuel for the fire for me to say “I’ll show you. I’ll show you honey pie.” And you know, when I did that, I found an agent that was really, really lucky, very blessed. My first job was a pilot, when the pilots were two hour movies of the week, which was in the 80s. And with David Sol, and this amazing cast, it was an Aaron Spelling production in Hong Kong. I got to go to Hong Kong for five or six weeks. I mean, it was fabulous. And then it just took off after that. In the following pilot season I got Thirtysomething, which completely changed my life. But it was, I don’t want to say it was a lark, because I certainly had studied acting for a while I was very serious about it, but I just never thought of it as a profession or career.

David Read
Are you ever surprised at Thirtysomething’s enduring legacy? I mean, like Stargate, it’s just one of those things. You can’t stamp it out. You know, people continue to reach back to it with fondness and say, “You know what, this was a show that gave me comfort.” And I remember as a young man. I’m only just a couple years older than your son. It was a show that we put on in the house, and it made us all feel good, and feel “secure” is not the right word, “safe” is not the right word. But there was something, there was something really wholesome about it. Did Hope help you understand anything about yourself over the course of the show’s run, or later in life?

Mel Harris
I always say that Hope and I look a lot alike, but we’re not the same people. But no, you know, I don’t know if it’s so much the character. I was so blessed to work on that group with the Thirtysomething gang, with the writers, and the directors, and the seven original actors, as well as others that came. I mean, we’re all still friends to this day. And I’m so blessed by that. It’s very unusual in my business anyway. The whole process of working on an hour show, and what that meant. I remember the very first time someone recognized me, and I’m a pretty private person. I was at the gas station with my son who was maybe, he was maybe three, and someone came up to me at the register, and I was so shocked. I was just like, yeah, yeah, but people were really nice. So, there’s a whole learning process. You know, I didn’t go to college. I deferred from Barnard to model, and make money to go to college. And I deferred for a couple of years, and then the way life took me I just never went back. So, I have always considered the work that I’ve done, particularly as in Thirysomething, you know, I always think that Thirysomething was my bachelor’s degree in work, and life and other things. So, subsequently come to do sort of my masters as I go on and on. Pretty soon I’m gonna have about 20 doctorates at this level. All worth nothing. But it was the whole gang, the whole process was so wonderful. I remember sitting at the Museum of Arts and Sciences. They do these panels, and you go and see it, and we were all lined up. There were about 20 of us on stage, writers and actors. And I was up at the end next to Kenneth, and then Ed and Marshall, Ed Zwick, and Marshall Herskovitz, who were the creators, and writers, and directors of Thirysomething. Everybody came up, and they were all telling their stories. I was very green when I did Thirtysomething very, very green. And everybody up along the whole line is talking about how green they all were. And when they got to me, I said, “Well, hell, man, if I knew that you were all as green as I was, I wouldn’t have been so nervous about being with you all.” So, it was just that wonderful kind of troop. You know, we were a troop, and we supported each other so much, had each other’s backs, occasionally fought about something but, you know. To this day, if I called anyone up from that experience, that group and said, “I need this, I need a favor. Can you help me?” In a heartbeat. In a heartbeat.

David Read
Yeah, the caliber of actors, Patricia Wettig. You know, I mean, it’s crazy the quality of actors that that show produced. You know, you really are blessed if you have an opportunity like that.

Mel Harris
Oh, beyond blessed

David Read
because they don’t come around every day. And to be remembered for something so positive, that in itself is a blessing. Oh, you were the murderer in such and such or whatever. No, no, I’ll probably known for this, and that’s okay.

Mel Harris
No, and it’s crazy, and it follows you everywhere. I was in Spain, not recently, but Spain last year, and I was in the Prado. And I have a baseball cap on. I don’t wear makeup unless I’m on screen. I’m just walking around, and I’m recognized in the Prado, in the middle of the day with my baseball cap on. And my husband and I, we just walk away and go, “That’s crazy.” It’s just crazy. But you get that, you get these characters who come in, they form a group. You know, not unlike the Stargate group. You love those four central people, characters, that core. Some you like more than others. You identify one way or another. I mean, Amanda was great, because it was a chick in there, and doing badass stuff. And yet, she had a lovely soft side to her that they showed. So, yeah, you’re really, really lucky to be able to do that.

David Read
Before I get into Stargate, I always like to ask the actors about a role which stretched you in ways that you didn’t perhaps think were possible, or more challenging than appeared on the surface. Can you tell me about one?

Mel Harris
Yeah, some are more than others. Certainly, Thirtysomething was because it was such a long span of taking that character and living with it. I have two others. Following Thirtysomething I did a comedy, which I’d always wanted to do. You know, I turned down a lot of shows after Thirytsomething that were similar kind of dramas I wasn’t really interested in, but the comedy came along. And that was really fun, and really stretched me. It’s a totally different production process. It’s in front of a live audience. They tape. It’s totally, totally different. So, that was great. And the other was, I did a movie of the week, when they were still being done, about a woman who survived a hurricane in a lifeboat, and she was five months pregnant. And there being an athlete, I really loved it, because there were a lot of stunts. And so you had to do emotional characteristics of this person, and yet you had the physical of it. I remember we shot in Australia, and the day we went into the set that had a tank, big water, huge water tank. And I’m standing there with like a ripped sweater, and sweat pants on. That’s all the character has left that she survived this hurricane, she ended up in a lifeboat. And around me all the grips, the crew everybody is putting on like full body wetsuits, and I thought, “Oh man, I’m in for it now.” And it was it was incredibly arduous, hard shoot. And to continue to play your character, and how much of your own personal hurt, angst, sores, bruises, whatever it is, bringing in how you meld that together. So, that was very challenging. And I loved it. It was great, because you know, they say, “Oh, no, we’ll bring the stunt girl in,” and I’m like, “No, I don’t want you to bring the stunt girl in.” So, I would have lots of fights with people. All through my career II’ve had a lot of discussions with people who said, “Okay, it’s time for the stunt girl.” I did one I wanted to take a burn. I’d never taken a burn. And they were of no, no, no, no, no. I said, “I just do it lightly, and then you can all stand there and do it.” And I’m very good at persuading people to let me do that.

David Read
Insurance, Mel, insurance.

Mel Harris
I know, I know, I know, I know. I said, “You’ll just get another brunette. Don’t worry about it.”

David Read
Oh my God, that’s great. Were you offered the row of Oma Desala? Did you audition for her?

Mel Harris
You know, I thought about this the other day. I think I was offered the role, but the real reason that I ended up on Stargate is because of my son. Major, major Stargate fan. It used to be appointment television for us to watch together along with the Seinfeld show.

David Read
You watched with him.

Mel Harris
Oh, we watched together which is how I even knew about it. And I think that I was going up to Canada to do work on another show. And I think I wangled an invite to go and visit the set. And, and I think out of that, then they offered me the character. It’s something like that, or we visited the set while I did the character. But my son, we still have pictures of us standing in front of the gate together, which is really, really yeah, because he was probably about, when I first started, maybe 12 or 13, or something like that. So, I really owe Oma Desala to my son. All Byron’s fault.

David Read
It’s all Byron’s fault. Yeah, you guys knew who Daniel was, and, like his, the journey that he had gone on.

Mel Harris
Yeah, we had been following the show. You know, it was it was something that we did when you made appointment TV, or something was on Friday at 10pm, or whatever time it was. Wasn’t like now where you can just sit down stream all ten seasons?

David Read
Oh, that’s true. We binge all of it. Did you rewatch Maternal Instinct?

Mel Harris
I did. I did.

David Read
What did you think of that episode?

Mel Harris
I liked it.

David Read
A quiet show?

Mel Harris
It’s a quiet show. No, absolutely. And I also watched, I watched Threads, and I watched the whole sort of grouping.

Mel Harris
Before you were hired?

Mel Harris
Because I had seen every, we watched it every week.

David Read
Right? Right. Okay.

Mel Harris
So, we watched it every week. Yeah. So it’s, yeah.

David Read
What were your impressions from that character in Meridian, who she was and, who she was in Maternal Instinct? She’s obviously fostering Shifu, the harcesis child, but by the time that we see her he’s gone, and done his own thing. And she’s back alone again, kind of watching over us on the astral plane.

Mel Harris
Yeah, I mean, for me, Oma has always been, you know, I’ve always called it a wonderful part, because I got to play an eternal goddess, as I call her. And, the enlightenment and it all feeds into when I’m on camera with her, being her, what that plays with. I always thought that the dialogue for Oma was incredibly challenging, because the cadence I didn’t feel, not that it wasn’t human, but it wasn’t normal. It wasn’t like trip off your tongue, boom, boom, boom, kind of thing. It was, other than the double meaning to it, the actual order of words, and verbiage was was very, very different and very challenging. And, you know, you could do everything. You can wear, like I wore my Oma blue, I don’t know if you noticed. I wear my Oma blue today. And, but you could do that, and the light, and all of those things that they put on you, and you can make the formation. But then, especially in the scenes, they’re so important. The words that are being spoken are so important. And yet you come away when you’re watching it, and you go, “What the hell is she talking about?” And so for me, it was all, they did such a great job of putting that into a character that for me, made me pay attention to what she was saying, because she was so different, and so much of her own. So, all of the things that you bring from the back into the forward, when you’re you’re actually on camera, are really important.

David Read
Was this the most powerful entity you’d ever played?

Mel Harris
Yeah, probably other than myself in the morning when I wake up, but…

David Read
She controls the weather, man!,

Mel Harris
Yeah. No, absolutely, because she’s, otherworldly. She’s enlightened. She’s eternal, incredibly powerful, wise as hell, and, I liked all that. It was great.

David Read
I loved that, and we’ll get to this in a minute, there were chinks in her armor. She was not perfect, and in fact, she is the resulting cause of one of our greatest adversaries from trying to do something good. She created something that was

Mel Harris
She made a little bad choice.

David Read
Right? Exactly. Yeah, ascension it’s not for everyone, lady. How aware, because you’d watch the show, how aware were you of the gravity of Meridian at the time you were shooting it? I mean, Michael’s leaving. This is a big deal.

Mel Harris
It is a big deal. But the other thing is, for the normal fan, the average fan I think that that’s incredibly powerful, and impactful. But I, for my business, deal in reality and fantasy. What I do is not reality. It’s fantasy. I’m making it up. I’m making my performances up. I’m bringing them from somewhere. I’m not, as much as I love playing Oma Desala, I’m not Oma Desala in the real world. I play these characters. So, for me, I think that it may not have been as impactful, because I probably thought, “Oh, he’s probably got a great job lined up somewhere.” You know, in the practical world, but in the series world, in the show’s world, it’s very impactful.

David Read
Absolutely. Yeah. People will go on Facebook, to this very day, in the Stargate groups, and be like, “I’m a new fan. I just saw it for the first time. I bawled my eyes out. I was devastated.” Did you, and your son watch the episode together when it aired later?

Mel Harris
Yeah, we did. We did.

David Read
Was it the big deal too?

Mel Harris
It was all a big deal. It’s like, well, you know, he may have said, “Why are they getting rid of them?”

David Read
Yeah.

David Read
You know, my kids were raised on a set. So, my kids have a really good sense of fantasy and reality. More than the normal person, kid anyway, young person, so.

David Read
So, the dialogue proved to be a challenge.

Mel Harris
Oh, absolutely. Absolutely. If you listen to the words, they’re different. And, so not only is the cadence different in the way that they wrote them, but you also realize that she’s imparting to Daniel clues, and some of her knowledge without giving away what she’s not, by the rules, allowed to give away.

David Read
Yeah, so walking on a minefield.

Mel Harris
Yeah, exactly. But she doesn’t play it that way. You don’t sense that from her, maybe a little bit in Threads at the end. BBut that comes as a surprise, which is nice, because the writers did a great job with that.

David Read
Absolutely. I always wondered, how hot were those lights?

Mel Harris
I don’t remember them being terribly hot. Well, but I’m on a stage, and stages are giant.

David Read
It’s a big space.

Mel Harris
It’s a big space. And, so, you might be in there in that concentrated moment while you’re shooting. But then you can go off and do it, so the reality of isn’t like you’re standing there for years, and years, and years. And also, I’m really, really good at just tuning out the world as I need to, turning up the noises on a set, or anything that goes, and using the lights or, whatever it is that I’m given to work with, to put that into my character, whatever that means. So yeah, yeah.

David Read
How was working with Shanks?

Mel Harris
Fabulous.

David Read
You shared one scene with Rick.

Mel Harris
Yeah.

David Read
But Michael was really who Oma was there for.

Mel Harris
The whole group was great. But the whole group was great. They were so welcoming, and so lovely, which is really nice. Some sets you go on, and people are like, “Yeah, hey, whatever, your turn.” Others, they were like, and I don’t know what their interpersonal stuff was at all. I don’t know any of them off the set, but they were so, they seemed so together, and so cohesive. I think what you see on screen is a really wonderful troop of actors that have worked together, and know each other’s ins and outs, and all of that. And it comes across on the screen as people who care and support each other as the characters they’re playing.

David Read
You can fake it. You know, you hear of these stories of troops that are just like, “You know, we really didn’t get along, but when it was on screen, we made magic.”

Mel Harris
Yeah, well, that It is our job. I am an illusionist by trade. So, that’s your job.

David Read
Abolutely, but it’s nice if, in your case with Thirtysomething you can actually, you know, fall in love with the people that you work with too.

Mel Harris
No, no, it really is lovely. But also I’ve worked with a few people, I’ve been very lucky, but there’s a few people that I hope I never, ever have to work with again.

David Read
Like any of us in our jobs, it’s like, “Well, I’m staying away from them, man! Oh, my gosh, oh, here he comes. Dammit.” You returned to the character three years after Meridian. Did you see that one coming?

Mel Harris
No, I didn’t it was sort of a nice little bennie that kind of came out of nowhere. Because first of all, I love Vancouver where they shot. Love, love Vancouver, it’s one of my favorite cities. And, you know, I mean, once again, I did this job because of my son. And I knew of it, and I don’t know if I would have done it without him, because I probably wouldn’t have known the show, and I wouldn’t have known the characters. And I wouldn’t have said, “Hey, you want to go hang out on the set with me,” which is, you know, a lovely thing to do. So, that it continued was great. I loved her as a character. She’s one of those indelible characters in my little bag of people I’ve carried along. And so, to go back and revisit that, that’s a lovely thing.

David Read
And to be able to talk normally, in this one. Robert Cooper created, I think was Rob that created Threads. He gave an environment change that allowed you to have…

Mel Harris
But she didn’t completely talk like a normal person the whole time.

David Read
No. How big is the ocean so you can’t see the bottom? Or something like?

Mel Harris
Yeah, but even like how she takes a waffle order.

David Read
That’s right. You can go online, and find all the translations for those.

Mel Harris
That’s funny. That’s great.

David Read
Mystery in the alley. I forget what that was. It was like eggs over easy or something? Those are those are real world translations.

Mel Harris
Oh, my first job other than babysitting was waiting tables.

David Read
Oh, well, there you go.

Mel Harris
In New Jersey, a little place down the Jersey Shore called The Hut.

David Read
Ah, were you good at it?

Mel Harris
I was really good at it.

David Read
Oh, I sucked.

Mel Harris
I was really good. As a matter of fact, if you look, here you go, okay, guys, here’s a little thing. If you look during Threads at the back of Oma’s hair, there’s a pencil in it for taking her orders. And that came from me working at The Hut in New Jersey. I would keep my pencils in my hair. I had long, long, long hair. I either had braids or a ponytail, but most of the time it was a ponytail, and I would keep my pencils in my hair.

David Read
Well, because you always lose them. When you need a writing implement you never have it. So, that was always my problem too. So, I remember the pencil.

Mel Harris
You might have trouble putting it in your ponytail.

David Read
No, I kept them in my pocket. I am fascinated by this episode, because we see, how do I want to put it? We see like a metaphor of her world, of where it is that she’s been operating. And in this case she is serving other beings that are just kind of chillin’, and enjoying whatever kind of afterlife that they have. Did you have any personal interpretations for what was going on there? Because it seemed to be like she was the only one who gave a crap, and was doing anything other than her opponent.

Mel Harris
Right? Well, my interpretation of the cafe was that they hadn’t reached full enlightenment at that point. So, they were at like a, I always saw it as a way station. That was my thing. And she was there as guide, and as an advisor if she chose to be, and that kind of thing. So, I think that the serving people, and taking care of people I think showed a reflection of what I felt was a nurturing side of Oma without being, without negating who she was, and without being too maternal.

David Read
Interesting. So, those people were also potentially candidates, as far as you’re concerned.

Mel Harris
That was my thought, should they choose to be or should I think that they had potential enough that I would do that. You know, when you watch Threads, and you see the end of it, you wonder if she’s working on trying to absolve her guilt over some of the choices that she’s made. And you know, almost own personal reparations for what she’s done.

David Read
In eternity of combat, eternal combat, I mean, what a sacrifice. I loved this character, and she meant the world to me. And it’s like, even though we’re not going to get to perhaps more than likely see her again, it really is kind of a fitting conclusion for her role.

Mel Harris
It was great. Once again, to see a woman portrayed in a female form, she could have been a guy, lord knows there’s enough guys on Stargate in all sorts of forms, and figures. That’s why I liked having Amanda there, because it’s just to see a chick in that role was fantastic. But that she has that power, and the choice to do what she does at the end of Threads, I think is great. And, you know, this was a few years ago. You know, the movement has gained speed.

David Read
Absolutely. And it’s such a strong character that you’re not playing because of her. She doesn’t exist because of her female characteristics. She exists because of who she is. I think it’s really refreshing. It was a refreshing part.

Mel Harris
I agree. I agree.

David Read
Do you believe something happens to us after we die? Could there really be a great path for us to walk?

Mel Harris
Well, yeah. I do believe in reincarnation. It’s not really something I had ever thought about it. And then I read, I’m not gonna remember this, I read a book called Many Lives, Many Masters a number of years ago written by, I believe, a Harvard psychiatrist. And it’s chilling. It’s really, really chilling. And I’m a very spiritual person. And so, I do believe that I don’t know what we come back as, or how we do. I don’t know if it’s always in a what we consider a human form. But I think that our spirits continue to exist.

David Read
I wasn’t ever a big fan of ghosts, or anything like that, until my mother experienced something, and convinced all of us and it was like, “Something’s happening. Some something is going on.” The electromagnetic spectrum is huge, and we, in our technology, can only see a little piece of it. What is next for you? Any upcoming projects we should be on the lookout for? Are you hanging back through COVID?

Mel Harris
Well, yeah, I’m hanging back and I’m not out much at all. I’m trying to not be a statistic, needless to say. Well, at the beginning of the year, and COVID kind of mess this up, we were doing a Thirtysomething reunion show.

David Read
I was gonna ask about this. Yeah,

Mel Harris
Yeah, with an amazing cast. The kids had grown up. It just, you know, such a great cast, and we had done read throughs. We’d done a read through for ABC, and we were all supposed to have dinner that night, and it got canceled. Literally this was the 12th or the 13th of March and, a lot of people talked about the travel industry, and how decimated is, and the small businesses, and the dining industry, and they absolutely have been. But not as much focus on to the entertainment business, and how decimated it has been. Broadway, forget about it. It’s so hard and many, many people are struggling. And in the acting business too. I mean, they’re just shutting down production in California yet again. So, it’s really, really been a tough time for the entertainment business, really tough. So, we’ll see. But I do, right now, have a movie out on Apple TV and Amazon Prime called King of Knives.

David Read
King of knives.

Mel Harris
Yes. And it’s about “One happy, crappy family,” is the tagline on it. And, so please go and see it. If you like it, review it. But I had a wonderful time doing it. I did it two summers ago. We shot it in New York, with Gene Pope, and Roxi Pope, and Emily Bennett. It was just a lovely, wonderful cast. It’s an independent film, which I always think it’s wonderful to support them. So, that’s what I have out right now.

David Read
Okay. No, King of Knives. I’ll link to it in the description after I go find it.

Mel Harris
That would be lovely, thank you.

David Read
Absolutely. I have some fan questions ready for you here.

Mel Harris
Uh oh, let’s go.

David Read
JohnFourtyTwo. Oh John, I didn’t want to ask her this…

Mel Harris
Uh oh. I’m a big girl. I can handle it.

David Read
Oh, no, it’s not that. It’s the ongoing question with these Zen koans. If you immediately know the candlelight is fire, the meal was cooked a long time ago. Mel, do you know what that means?

Mel Harris
No, but I didn’t have to know. I just had to say it really, really well.

David Read
That’s right. And we asked you that I think, like 15 years ago or something, and you said, “I don’t know, but I mean, the meal probably wouldn’t be any good.”

Mel Harris
There you go. Exactly.

David Read
Claire Burr, “The very famous line, you know which one, did you ever attribute any,” So, I guess the one that was just stated, “did you ever attribute any meaning of your own to it? Or were you told by the writer what it was supposed to…” Were you told by Rob what it was supposed to mean? I wouldn’t imagine it means anything. I think it’s just a non sequitur.

Mel Harris
Well, it could be a non sequitur, but could you also put the definition to it that,. You know, so funny, I was having a discussion the other day with my husband about what fire must have been to people when it first came to be. That they probably thought it was godlike. And if you look at the difference between a candlelight, which is a tiny, little fire, and “fire” the word in general, it’s a much bigger thing. And therefore, if you’re cooking with it, then it’s probably overloaded, and it’s done. That’s kind of a logical explanation one could put to it. But I think that Oma’s dialogue was important. And like I said, before, it had clues in it, and was meant to be spoken in a way, because they wrote it that way, that made you listen, really, really listen. And in that way, it was important. Clearly, everybody listened to that line.

David Read
Absolutely. Terry Chen first spoke it in Maternal Instinct, and it’s just like, kind of one of those that has slowly burned its way, pardon the pun, through the series. And, I think also to your point, she’s opening doors for people, but she’s not pushing them through those doors. She’s saying “This is what’s possible.” And Daniel’s like, “Glow me! Do your thing.” And she’s not going to show him how to do it. She may tell him, I mean, eventually she tells them, “Okay, they’re trying to revive you. Tell them to stop.” And he intrinsically kind of is aware of how to do that. But she’s always been a door opener. She’s never been one to push people along their path, because that’s not the point.

Mel Harris
Well, it’s not the point, but it’s also not how it works. Because if you want true, and lasting entitlement

David Read
Enlightenment.

Mel Harris
Enlightenment, I’m sorry, entitlement is a whole other thing, enlightenment, then you have to want it yourself. You have to do the work for it. It’s not a given. You have to earn it

David Read
William Ahrens, “Was the way you portrayed Oma influenced in any way by your years in the role of the domestic goddess in Thirtysomething?”

Mel Harris
You know, domestic goddess, eternal goddess, once a goddess, a goddess, you know? You know, as I said before, Thirtysomething so informed so much of what I did, because it was such a wonderful troop of learning, acting, producing, directing, writing, all of those things that we could do, or that we were blessed with having wonderful things. So, that experience followed everything that I did thereafter. I mean, certainly learning eight page scenes of dialogues, mostly which could have a three page monologue in it, was absolutely beneficial for learning Oma’s dialogue, because it was hard, because it’s not my normal, not even close to the way I think normal people speak.

David Read
No, and it’s not meant to be, you know, she is alien. She is, I believe, was human, the Ancients were human, but they aren’t us, you know, and to get to attribute an otherworldliness to a character, you know, has always got to be fun.

Mel Harris
Oh, it was a total gas, because it’s how do you take that, especially knowing the show, being a fan of the show, because of watching it with my son, to take that and, it’s a big responsibility to take a character like that, who is so different. And such a focal point for where they’re moving, and make her work. Now, very blessed that the writers gave me things to work with, but I felt it was a responsibility. I didn’t take it lightly at all.

David Read
Terry McGinnis, “Do you think Oma will ever win the war with Anubis?”

Mel Harris
Of course.

David Read
You think so, huh?

Mel Harris
You doubt otherwise, young man? If Terry’s a boy.

David Read
I think Terry’s a guy. Yeah. That’s great.

Mel Harris
There’s no doubt, Terry. I can’t believe you even question it.

David Read
Akos Tamas Novaki, “Was it a challenge as an actress to add a vulnerable, almost shameful side, to a near perfect, almost angelic character after the revelation that even she was fooled by one of our greatest enemies?”

Mel Harris
Right, I think it just made the character that much richer, and put a side to her that I did not see coming. I remember reading the script, and going like, “Oh, got me.”

David Read
That’s great.

Mel Harris
And I love that. I love to not know something’s coming.

David Read
Absolutely. Henchman314. I think you kind of already answered this a little bit. “Did playing Oma affect your spiritual outlook at all?”

Mel Harris
I brought my spiritual element to Oma.

David Read
That’s fair. Spinfusor “Have you seen? Stargate Atlantis to Stargate Universe?”

Mel Harris
No, I have not.

David Read
Okay. Did you finish watching SG-1?

Mel Harris
I did. I did. We watched the whole thing together. I mean, we were such devotees by then.

David Read
It’s like, “Ah, we’re on board.” How did you feel about the ending, losing the Asgard?

Mel Harris
I mean, there were so many ways it could have gone, and so many ways to wrap something up as with every show, so not being in creative control of that. I just thought it was good. I was surprised to even ended.

David Read
Yeah, yeah. It’s just all good things, right? Teresa MC, finally, “Mel, would you return to a new Stargate series?”

Mel Harris
Absolutely. What fun?

David Read
Yeah, Brad Wright is working with MGM on potentially coming out with a fourth series. So, nothing’s beyond the realm of possibility.

Mel Harris
No, but I mean, there’s such appetite for things. I mean, who sits down and watches the show once a week anymore? I don’t. I want to binge it. I want it to be out there. I want to watch it all. And I just think we have some voracious appetites for good stuff.

David Read
Absolutely. I think we’ve really entered the golden age of much of television, now that so many of these are serialized. It’s like we get to watch chapters of a novel week after week. There’s a lot of good stuff out there.

Mel Harris
Yeah, yeah. I mean, which is great. It’s a complete turnaround. There was a time when you couldn’t sell an hour drama that was serialized, because people wouldn’t watch it. People wouldn’t follow it. They want to comedy, want the half hour they could syndicate through it. I mean, it’s just completely changed,

David Read
Completely changed. Well, thank you for sharing your upcoming project with us. And I’m definitely gonna go and check it out. And this has been, this has made my week. So, I really appreciate it.

Mel Harris
So sweet. Thank you for having me. It’s really lovely.

David Read
I want to, at some point down the road, do episode commentaries. And I would love to have you back and I hope you consider

Mel Harris
It would be my pleasure. Absolutely. Of course.

David Read
Thank you so much, and I appreciate your time. You can go ahead, and disconnect, and I will speak to you again at some point here soon.

Mel Harris
All right, be well, thank everybody

David Read
Thank you for coming bye, bye.

Mel Harris
Pleasure.

David Read
Mel Harris, everybody. Oma Desala. So, we have a new announcement to make for trivia giveaways. Let me pull this up here. One of these communication stones is a screen-used prop, and one is a screen-accurate replica. For the month of January, Dial the Gate is giving away the replica. And in order to win it, you will need to use a desktop or laptop computer, and visit dialthegate.com. Scroll down to Submit Trivia questions. Your trivia may be used in a future episode of Dial the Gate, either for our monthly trivia night or for our special guests to ask me in a round of trivia. There are three slots for trivia: one easy, one medium, and one hard. Only one needs to be filled in, but you’re more than welcome to submit up to three. Please note the submission form does not currently work for mobile devices. Your trivia must be received before February 1, 2021. If you are the lucky winner, I will be notifying you via your email right after the start of the new year to get your address. And congratulations to Batmal for winning the 3D printed Stargate, and Ancient keychain giveaway from the January contest at 3dtech.pro. I have artwork, ascended artwork to share as well. This is by Nebulan, and this is Nebulan’s. It says “Ascension Series: Stargate. Between Babylon 5, and Stargate is what made me want to do this ascension series. Unfortunately, the layout of this one kind of sucks,” he says, or she says, “I know I shouldn’t have given Daniel glasses, but I wasn’t sure if you’d know it was him without them. Oma represents the good ascended beings, the Doci represents the Ori. The city of Atlantis is to represent the Ancients, or Lanteans, or Alterans in general. And then there’s the giant aliens in Crystal Skull. We don’t know if they’re actually ascended, but they are energy beings, which is more of the concept of this drawing. My sister and I, even after 200, the episode 200, still think Quetzalcoatl is a Furling. For this coming week, we have an announcement for this coming week it’s going to, our next shows are going to be on the 17th, Sunday the 17th at 11am. Gary Jones is going to be back for another fan interview. And at 1pm Pacific Time, we’re going to have our third Stargate trivia challenge, and there will be much more audience participation in this one. So, if you have been a fan of our past trivia challenges, I completely recommend that you come around for this one, because this one’s going to be a hoot. There’s going to be a lot more participants, and it’s going to be a little off the wall. And then 3:00 Pacific time on the 17th, we will be returning to the briefing room. We haven’t had a briefing room episode since episode number one. But we’re going to be returning to news updates. So, we’re going to talk a little bit, Darren and I from Gateworld, are gonna be talking a little bit about the news that Brad provided that he’s still working on another Stargate series. We’re also going to discuss the move in content to Netflix, and the Blu-rays that have come out as well and any of the other Stargate news that’s fit to print. Later on today, starting in just about one hour at 1pm Pacific Time we’re going to be joined by Mr. Corin Nemec, who played Jonas Quinn in Stargate SG-1. And then at 3pm Pacific Time, Dan Shea, stunt coordinator for Stargate SG-1, and Sergeant Siler as well. I appreciate you all joining me for this episode, and we will be back shortly with Corin. My name is David Read. Thanks again to Mel Harris. We’ll see you on the other side.