The WRAITH are finally invading the Milky Way! We are privileged to sit down with the two people with the highest “Wraith body count,” as it were, James Lafazanos and Andee Frizzell, LIVE to take your questions. And hopefully not drain out our life force.

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Timecodes
0:00 – Splash Screen
00:09 – Opening Credits
00:40 – Welcome and Episode Outline
02:41 – Catching up with Andee and James
05:48 – Memories of Atlantis
10:11 – Contact Lenses and Makeup
13:47 – AI and Technology
24:52 – Science Fiction and Artificial Intelligence
31:27 – Souvenirs, Props and Costumes
34:24 – Talking Through Wraith Teeth
37:12 – James Leaving Atlantis
44:55 – Andee Without Wraith Makeup
46:10 – Prince Edward Island
51:39 – First Day on Set
54:57 – Getting Out of Makeup and Costume
58:38 – James and “The Defiant One”
1:00:56 – Wrapping Up with Andee and James
1:07:25 – Post-Interview Housekeeping
1:08:22 – End Credits

***

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TRANSCRIPT
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David Read
Hello everyone and welcome to episode 224 of Dial the Gate, the Stargate Oral History Project. My name is David Reed. I am going to bring you a very, and my group today, Andee Frizzell and James Lafazanos, we’re gonna bring you a very special episode today. As the show has continued to move forward people have been asking “when are you going to have more guests on for dual interviews?” That’s always been the intent; to kind of move the show into more of a pseudo-convention space where we have groups of cast and crew come on and share their stories together. When you’re in a group it changes the dynamic and it changes the memories that come up. I am privileged to welcome my first two guests for one of these kinds of episodes; Andee Frizzell who played the numerous way Wraith Queens over the years and James Lafazanos who played Wraith Commanders and Lieutenants. These two, they know the Wraith better than anyone else. Before I bring them in, if you enjoy Stargate and you want to see more content like this on YouTube, please click the subscribe icon. It makes a big difference with our numbers and will help the show continue to grow. Click Like as well and if you want to see more episodes like this, I did that out of order. If you want to see more episodes like this, click the Subscribe icon and if you want to get notifications when we have new content available click the bell icon. It will notify you the moment a new video drops and you’ll get my notifications of any last minute guest changes. Clips from this live show will be released over the course of the next few weeks on both the Dial the Gate and GateWorld.net YouTube channels. As this is a live show I have my moderating team of Jeremy, Tracy and Antony standing by to take your questions for Andee and James. But in the meantime we’re all going to catch up here on Dial the Gate. Guys, thank you so much for being here. It is a pleasure to have you both. How are you guys doing? What’s going on?

Andee Frizzell
Thank you, so good to see you. I’m also trying to grow my mustache like James. I see he’s winning. But I’m trying.

James Lafazanos
I got a head start. We were just talking off camera and we both discovered we’re both in Toronto right now.

David Read
Really?

James Lafazanos
Thanks for having us, David.

Andee Frizzell
Yes. Thank you so much, David.

David Read
I am privileged to have you both. I think that you guys were so key for making the magic happen on Atlantis. The show isn’t anything without its antagonists and I think that you guys brought that in like a raging bull, in Atlantis. But before we get to that, James, you just started Cameo. I think Andy, you had it for a little bit longer. Tell us about cameo and what this whole thing is?

James Lafazanos
Yeah, Cameo as I understand it, I’m still new to it. It’s an interface through an application where you can connect with me. I can send you a birthday wish, I think that is the main thing that happens with Cameo. Send a little video or something like that, get a personalized message for a special occasion. Or just for whatever; just a little pick me up in these very interesting times. I’m connectable through Cameo so if you go and search my name, James Lafazanos, I’m sure you’ll find me and we can connect.

David Read
Andy, you’re on there as well. You were stuck in the woods,. I think you found your way out.

Andee Frizzell
I was stuck in the woods, yeah. I was trying to do my own sort of Blair Witch Project/cameo. Yes, I was in the woods, I am out of the woods now. I would love to do birthday wishes. I saw someone did a gender reveal one as well so I thought that was kind of fun. Of course, being a yoga teacher I also could do a two minute meditation if you like, if you’d like to listen to this voice to lull you to sleep.

James Lafazanos
I think we should remind the viewers that it is a much safer way to do a gender reveal than fireworks.

David Read
Setting a fire.

James Lafazanos
Fire. Starting a forest fire.

Andee Frizzell
Yes, see. This is us doing safety. This is us doing public safety

James Lafazanos
We are the safety department here as well as give a public service.

Andee Frizzell
Absolutely we are here for your service.

David Read
Absolutely. “Let’s announce a life by threatening some others.”

James Lafazanos
Exactly. I never understood the logic of that.

David Read
Oh, man. Well, if you guys in the audience, you refresh the YouTube page in the description, both of your Cameos are visible there underneath “share this video.” I’m thrilled to have you. James, can you take me back to launching Atlantis and the first day that you met Andy and getting involved in this thing? We had seven seasons of a previous show, did you have any idea what kind of train you were getting on?

James Lafazanos
What kind of train? It’s a fast train, it’s a bullet train, it’s like a Japanese speed train let me tell ya. When you’re in it, it’s like “whaaat?” and then when you’re outside of it, you’re like, “oh, that’s what it was.” Seeing Andy for the first time, it was kind of relief. I was like, “Oh, another species like me. It’s great to have someone else who understands what it’s all about, being green and all the rest of it.” Obviously Andy is so warm and nice and fine and all those things just glowed through that very interesting latex [inaudible]. That’s the whole thing, right? It’s like when you’re on set and you look like that, people, they don’t know you from Adam. I remember going after set one time, when I finished early, which was not usual. I went and said hi to the first AD who I talked with and communicated with daily on numerous episodes. He’s like, “who are you?” I’m like, “I’m James, I play the Wraith.” He’s like, “Oh, my God,” first time he’s ever seen me out of makeup and this is going into season two.

David Read
Because the makeups that good.

James Lafazanos
Because it was that good. We had an amazing makeup department and then just being there early and then being there late so that sometimes you just wouldn’t see people out of makeup.

David Read
Wow. Andee.

Andee Frizzell
I told you before David, this story. No one had seen me because when they shot the female Wraith I was the first one on set and then we just shoot me out. I was the first one on and last one to leave so people hadn’t seen me the entire first season. For the wrap party, you’re laughing because you remember this. The wrap party, at that time there was also these fashion shows, I was doing the fashion shows in Vancouver. I ran across to Bridges, that was the restaurant they were having the wrap party. I came running in all like big hair, big makeup and I was like, “Hey everybody” and they’re like, “who is this party crasher?” She’s coming in. I was passing on the stairs and I passed Beverlee, she did mics, she passes right by me and I was like, “hi Beverlee” and she just kind of blew me off. I was like, “Oh, I see how it is. Two days ago you had your hands down my pants and now you won’t look me in the eye.” Everybody started laughing and was like, “Who is this woman?” I was like, “I’m the Wraith” and it was hilarious. So first season, no one had ever seen me out of makeup and I would forget what they were looking at. I’m looking at them…

David Read
It’s so comfortable on, you’re in it.

Andee Frizzell
Yeah. I’ve told you this story before, sitting across from Torri, giving her tofu recipes with those cat eyes and a wrangler coming in and putting my eyeballs straight. Im like, “yeah, then you fry it,” you’re forgetting what she’s looking at. So yes, whenever I got to work with James, it’s awesome. It was like, “Yay, someone that looks like me, has an entourage of people, has glued bits falling off you constantly.”

David Read
Like a science experiment.

Andee Frizzell
Yeah, at least you were like, “oh phew, someone else has got a team of people that have to put them together every second.” So yeah, I loved working with you and of course you’re hilarious so the days blew by. We had so much fun on set.

James Lafazanos
Yeah, the days went quicker when we were together for sure.

Andee Frizzell
Yeah.

David Read
James, were the contact lenses, were they just a pain in the ass?

James Lafazanos
I was in the business sometimes where they would get stuck to my eye by the end of the day. They had to come in with some butter, some olive oil, WD40, whatever they could find to basically unglue it from my eyes. One day in particular I was like, “Oh shit, is it going of come off at all?” My vision was blurry afterwards. “Is this permanent? What’s going on?” It improved in the next next 24 hours but I was worried there for a second. It’s a thing. You can’t really go out in public the next day because of the way that it kind of makes your skin all blotchy and and red and stuff. But you know what? It’s all fun and games. It’s all worth it, especially when it would go into overtime and you get that extra paycheck which is great.

Andee Frizzell
I too, I was driving at the time. I also wear contact lenses so I had four lenses in my eyes.

David Read
I didn’t know you could do that.

Andee Frizzell
So I had my seeing eyes and then I had those on top.

James Lafazanos
Oh you put those on top?

Andee Frizzell
Yeah, so the cat eyes were on top of my actual eyes so I could see. When they took them out I had that tunnel so I couldn’t drive. I had to start getting driven from set because I couldn’t see at the end of the day. Like you said, the muscles then relax, it takes about, I’d say maybe 12 hours or so for it to start. It was clear vision here and around, you couldn’t see properly. It was very interesting. As James said, you create this incredible clique. When you see it all put together it’s just such an incredible thing to have created. I look at them now, I look at the Wraith and just think “wow, that was so incredible.”

David Read
You’re beautiful.

Andee Frizzell
Yeah, when you’re in it you’re just feeling all the things. I always had weird, I don’t know, pokey bits. Remember those gloves?

Andee Frizzell
Do you remember? Oh those were so gross.

James Lafazanos
Yeah.

James Lafazanos
And all the little finger kinda like fingernail attachments and stuff.

Andee Frizzell
Yeah, second season was my fave because they got rid of the gloves and they just glued those finger attachments to our fingers. But the first season, we had those gloves that you had to

your hand in and there was the things at the end.

James Lafazanos
Oh, yeah. You know what? I don’t know if I ever actually did do the gloves. I think they had the gloves too but mine were my were painted and then had the fingernails plus the extra little kind of like, almost finger…

Andee Frizzell
Nubs.

James Lafazanos
So to speak.

Andee Frizzell
Oh, I had gloves. That one where I get Patrick’s…remember in the very beginning, Robert Patrick? Yeah and I lift up that…that’s a glove. They wanted the really extended fingers and everything. Let me just tell you, it just felt wrong in all sorts of ways.

James Lafazanos
I’m gonna make a connection here that’s gonna maybe go off topic, but it’s on topic at the same time. Okay, so you just mentioned Robert Patrick, amazing to work with in the pilot. Obviously he’s well known for his role in Terminator 2. Now David, you had an interview with David Hewlett not too long ago and it was talking about, or at least the way it was advertised initially, about AI. You had a little bit of a Terminator kind of like metal thing on David Hewlett’s face on the screenshot leading into the video. I’ve been going deep into AI this past week and it’s just something that I thought might be interesting to bring up because it’s such a timely topic and I feel like I need to talk about it with somebody after the deep dives.

David Read
We’re here for you, James. We’re here.

Andee Frizzell
Yes, tell us.

James Lafazanos
Seriously, I really appreciate it. It started with this Wikipedia page “Technological singularity” and that’s something that I was like, “Oh are they’re gonna get into the singularity on that,” the one you did with David Hewlett? You also mentioned Stephen Hawking and how he would really appreciate this time that we’re in now so I wanted to share with you a quote by Stephen Hawking about AI. It’s very interesting the way it ties into the kind of characters that we played on Stargate, is his wording. So this is the quote, “facing possible futures of incalculable benefits and risks, the experts are surely doing everything possible to ensure the best outcome.” Right? Wrong! “If a superior alien civilization sent us a message saying, ‘We’ll arrive in a few decades’ would we just reply ‘Okay, call us when you get here. We’ll leave the lights on'” Probably not. But this is more or less what is happening with AI and this is what he said before he died, he died in 2015. He had a clear vision of what was to come already. That’s why I think he would be entertained with the novelty of ChatGPT and all these things, all these different programs that we’re now starting to, “oh, let’s see what it says when we type in this.” But ultimately, I’m concerned a little bit. I think it’s a healthy concern considering that the Center for AI Safety, when they put out that open letter that was signed by all the people like Bill Gates, that mitigating the risk of extinction from AI should be a global priority alongside other societal scale risks such as pandemics and nucular war. This is signed by Demis Hassabis, CEO of Google DeepMind, Sam Altman, CEO of OpenAI.

David Read
What a time we live in.

James Lafazanos
I don’t know how familiar you guys…I’m sure you’ve done your own research. I literally have just been listening to every podcast I could possibly listen to and checking out every site I could check out in the past seven days. It was Tuesday night that I read this article and I just had this deep unsettling realization like, “Where does this go?” I just watched the trailer for the new film by Gareth Edwards, written and directed by, the same writer/director of Rogue One, The Creator which comes out next friday. If you watch that trailer you go, “okay, he’s right on point.” The AI, basically the start of the trailer is they launch a nuclear weapon and then the fallout and then after that. I came up with this analogy myself where I was like, “Okay, so we’re kind of spoon feeding this thing called AI, like it’s a baby and we’re just giving it data and we’re giving it all it needs to grow and to learn for itself, write its own code. We turn around to get another bottle of data and all the good stuff that it needs and it’s already full grown and it’s running away.” It’s just like, “how do we know? When is the point where we realize, ‘oh, this is already beyond us.'” With the letter that came before this letter which was signed by Elon Musk and various people’s, Steve Wozniak, that came in March. They said there should be a six month pause, yesterday was that that six month time period. Has there been a pause? I don’t know. There is pause and reason for concern too like “should we just slow down on this altogether?” But then you have this dynamic of the AI race of people racing to have the fastest, the most intelligent AI ever.

David Read
Yeah, are you gonna get every country to agree to this when some of them perceive the others as being the antithesis of their goals for the future? This is wild. What do you think Andee? You wanna go and have a zen session after this?

Andee Frizzell
I’m just gonna go and jump off the roof. I was like, “God!” I had a couple of jokes lined up and you guys are like “here is the end of the world” and I’m like, “oh, I curled my hair for this?”. Really? Yeah, wow!

David Read
The Ancients created the Wraith and did the same thing and the Wraith turned on them. The Ancients are very good about creating things and having them turn on them because that’s the plot point of the show. I don’t know if you guys knew that, they combined the Iratus bug and and their own DNA to create you. Like James is indicating here with signing their names on the dotted line; you can have all the best intentions when creating something or when standing against something, that doesn’t mean that you have any control over it.

Andee Frizzell
Or how it will be used.

Andee Frizzell
There’s so many technologies that were created with positive intentions and then used for mal use. Pnce you create something and you put it out there, how it will be used is really not in your control anymore. These are big things boys, these are big ideas and I had not prepared myself for this speech. I feel like I’m wearing a sweater and I’m sweating. I’m actually like “Oh my God!” I am sweating now.

David Read
Correct.

David Read
We live in interesting times Andee.

Andee Frizzell
We really do. I mean, we really really do. As someone who’s been traveling extensively for the last few years, in other countries, coming back here, these are the topics, these are things that people are talking about. I’m living in countries where people are talking about clean water, it’s just a very different life. So for me when you’re saying like, “do you have anything to say” I was like, “wow.” That’s pretty much what I have to say.

David Read
It’s gonna help us with those things, too. I was watching a podcast recently, I can’t remember his name, but we’re teaching AI. We now have the technological sophistication to, in certain facilities, give every plant that’s being grown in a certain location a camera. We’re teaching AI to recognize certain appearances in certain plants for what they need; if they need extra water, if they need extra fertilizer, what have you. Russia creates most of our fertilizer, for instance. If we can teach AI to look at a plant that we’re going to later eat and see what it needs, we can potentially cut our fertilizer intake by 85% just by giving individual plants what they need. We couldn’t do that before AI, where we just let them all look at them. It’s a miraculous technology that could truly bring bring wonderful things to our species or it could bring the world to heal. I think with ChatGPT, like James has been going down this rabbit hole, I think it spooked a lot of people in the last 8 to 10 months. It’s like, “Whoa, now we’re beginning to get the picture.” Whereas before it was like [uncertain]. Isn’t that wild?

James Lafazanos
Yeah. Kurtzweil, I guess, was the one to define singularity as far as the Technological singularity. He came up with, this guy Kurtzweil, in 1993 was it? Yeah. He had a book that came out, he was on Jon Stewart at one point in time when Jon Stewart had the Daily Show and he was talking about his book. He prophesized that this time would come around 2045. It almost seems like 2045 is kind of on the later end of that prediction spectrum with the doubling of information, the doubling of technology, just being exponential, right? It just dawned on me and yeah, sorry to drop the bomb. It’s something that really kind of rocked me to my core because I’m like, “Oh?” Here I am, been so concerned with climate change and everything and now there’s this newer thing which is almost even worse that I didn’t really fully become aware of until recently. I go, “okay, so now, I don’t know.” I just feel like it’s something that needs to be talked about, or at least I need to talk about it.

David Read
Yeah. It all depends on what you plug it into. We have another episode with Artificial Intelligence and Stargate. We had Robert C. Cooper on and we had Laurence Moroney on from Google and they talked about that as well. I think Laurence will also settle some of your concerns by putting things into proper perspective about what these things currently can and cannot do, at least what we think that they can. I highly recommend you watch that episode.

James Lafazanos
Okay.

David Read
We give birth to these things and then they transform our lives. The Ancients gave birth to the Wraith and they transformed them qnd they ended their civilization. It’s like Stargate is so good about giving us warnings; don’t let certain things out of the bag. Even if you’re planning on doing something over here for this reason, it doesn’t mean it ain’t gonna go over here and do this to you. You got to be careful.

Andee Frizzell
This is what’s so great about sci-fi, like Black Mirror and all these incredible shows. They’re taking ideas and going in directions that we are like, “Oh that’s fascinating how it can go that way.” Fascinating and terrifying at the same time but it’s developing these…and I think sci-fi has always done that. Is it 10,000 Leagues Under the Sea, all of these books, we’re talking about incredible technologies at a time that…I love sci-fi for exactly what David just said. It’s broadening minds, talking about things that are coming into now everyday things. It’s very interesting.

James Lafazanos
I was just watching Foundation on Apple+ and this show as far as sci-fi meets a dramatic series is…Is just pointing out some of these possibilities, so far into the future. The current storyline of that show is post-war with artificial intelligence. There’s literally just one being left which is the aide to Empire, basically the evil empire that rules the universe in the show. That’s why I love sci-fi; it plays out the possibilities. I like seeing the possibilities played out because it gives us a view and shifts our perspective. I was sharing these things with a friend of mine and he’s like, “well, whatever happens, good or bad, there’s nothing we can do about it.” I’m like, “you think so?” I think as creative people, we can create and be part of creations, stories like Stargate or otherwise, things that we may write and still have yet to come out, that can shift the perspective or bring attention to certain things that we need to look at, as well as being entertaining. That’s the best sci-fi for me; stuff that really makes me think and goes, “Wow. that’s something I’ve kind of entertained but I never really went that far with that particular concept.”

David Read
Yes, science fiction is our dream phase. Go ahead Andee.

Andee Frizzell
It’s like insight and foresight. As you said James, play out things in multiple versions. Like you said, if we can see it can go that way, then setting up small stops to prevent it from going that way, but having it presented in a way that you can see all those moving parts. I think sometimes we can’t conceptualize it so with sci-fi, being able to conceptualize it you get, “okay, I can see where this can go now.” It’s very interesting.

James Lafazanos
AI learns from us. This guy, Demis Hassabis, the CEO of DeepMind, Google DeepMind, I just listened to a podcast with him this past week. He was basically saying, from making this video game called Theme Park back in, I think it was the 80s, where he’s using the very first rudimentary AI. He was like, “Okay, I need to study the brain if I really want to make AI close to how we actually think.” It’s just amazing what he’s done as far as the creation thus far of DeepMind. There’s a point in there that I just lost my train of thought. Oh yeah, maybe it was making me think about another sci-fi series. Come back to me on this. Come back to me.

David Read
Let’s get to a couple of fan questions. Black__Jack, and Andee I’ll start with you, Black__Jack – Did either of you take any souvenirs from the set? It’s been 20 years, fess up!

Andee Frizzell
I know, I was like “fess up.” No actually, I didn’t. I didn’t, no. I think also I didn’t think it was going to end so I didn’t think to take anything.

David Read
James did you take any…?

James Lafazanos
I remember what I was gonna say coming back to my train that was at the station there.

David Read
Okay.

James Lafazanos
Demis created AlphaGo. AlphaGo was a program, AI program, that could play the game Go, which is in some respects even more sophisticated, intuitive than the game of chess. Basically the AI would play itself millions of times and it would get information from playing itself and then it would apply it and then it beat the world champion in Go. This is where I was like, “okay, so this is kind of what we do with cinema and science fiction stories. We play it out, we see where it could go and then sometimes technology actually does go to these…” When you look at Star Trek The Next Generation you see them all carrying tablets, basically they’re all carrying iPads around. When you watch it now it’s like, “oh it looks normal that they have those in their hands.” But it was first seen in that show and then people like Steve Jobs or whatever was like, “let’s do that, let’s get these kind of personal devices that we can have, that we can compute on and that we can make our lives easier.” That’s just what I wanted to say as far as my train of thought there.

David Read
No, absolutely. Jeremy Heiner in our private chat, he’s saying “I for one am excited to meet our robot overlords.”

James Lafazanos
It’d be an exciting five seconds when you meet.

David Read
But James, did you take any Wraith or anything similar?

James Lafazanos
I saw you had a Wraith grenade there, that’s pretty cool. There was some cool stuff on the set of, what was the one we did in the desert where it was like…

David Read
The Defiant One?

James Lafazanos
Defiant One, yeah. The knife that I used was pretty cool, the gun, just some of the stuff in the ship was pretty cool. But I never took anything, I don’t think I took…Oh wait, I did. I didn’t steal it. I asked the costume department if I could take some of the material that was used in my costume. It was the stuff that was black and shiny and bumpy. I was like, “what is this stuff?” They were like, “it’s from a stingray.”

David Read
Yes. It is Stingray. That’s correct.

James Lafazanos
It’s just like the most amazing material and it just looks so alien which is probably why they used it in the costumes. I was like, “can I take some of this material?” and I took some of that raw material that I saw laying around the costume department. I was just so fascinated with it and I think I ended up giving it away as a gift to somebody. That was the one thing, that piece of material for my costume.

David Read
At Propworx I sold all five seasons of the Stargate Atlantis content from props to costumes to set deck. The Wraith needed a special scaffold to hang on because they were so friggin heavy with the leather and the stingray and all this stuff. There were a couple of times where the whole scaffold fell over and I had to get my guys “okay, we need to rebalance this thing because I have too much Wraith on one side.” I don’t know how you guys walked around in it day after day. It was so heavy.

James Lafazanos
I don’t know what the final weight was but it was at least, I don’t know, 10, 12, around 15 pounds.

David Read
At least.

James Lafazanos
It all came together. When you have the contacts in, when you have the teeth in, when you have the makeup done right, the hair, the costumes, all these little details, we’re talking about our hands. It does more than half the work for you for getting into character. You look at yourself in the mirror after that and you’re like, “Oh, I am this!” Then you start getting into that. It just comes out; you know your lines and then you know where you’re coming from species wise. It’s just like, “this is how I perceive that they would move through the world, how they would speak, how they would interact with humans.” It did so much of the work for you in a way. Props to the makeup department and costume department, some of the nicest wardrobe and makeup I’ve ever had on any show.

Andee Frizzell
So creative.

David Read
How much of the dialogue, Andee, was dubbed with the teeth. Was it all?

Andee Frizzell
Well, for me, I had to do ADR because I sounded like Tweety Bird. [muffled words] “I think I saw a puddy tat.” The teeth were quite, especially the first and second season. By the fifth season they had filed them, there wasn’t as much…I’m trying to remember what they were made out of. It was super hard material, not the teeth but the thing that you popped into the mouth. That was super thick and that’s what made our [inaudible] happen.

James Lafazanos
It’s like a retainer.

Andee Frizzell
It was like a retainer but they made it out of some kind of plastic but it was this super hard, hard plastic. I just remember that being very heavy so ADR was necessary. It was around the fourth season they had thinned that out so it wasn’t as bad but I still did ADR for all of it.

David Read
James, I’d be afraid I’d be slobbering all over myself in these long lines. Can you swallow? How do you pull it off?

James Lafazanos
Oh no. I would apologize to people I was in the scene with sometimes.

Andee Frizzell
Me too, yeah.

James Lafazanos
It’d literally be like a spray. It was just like [muffled words]. You said Tweety Bird, I say Sylvester from [muffled words]. It’d be nice if they had just like a plexiglass between me and some of the performers to prevent the spray.

Andee Frizzell
I totally remember that. I had, David, one of the teeth, I was doing my speech and one of the teeth launched out and hit him on the chest. Everyone was like, “Uh!” and I was like, “sorry about that.” That was pretty funny. I totally remember that tooth taking off. That was heavy. It’s funny that you, not get through it, you’re in the moment and you’re performing and of course it’s been 20 years as well. You’re just reminding me of all of these sort of quirks and things that I completely forgot about. That’s so funny.

David Read
Absolutely wild. Did you ever, James, get to the end of the day where you were like…you finished after season two, you were done. Where it was like, “I can’t do this anymore. This has been a great role but I gotta get out of this.” The costume, the makeup in particular, I can only imagine it does only so much to your psyche where it’s like, “I’m good. I’ve explored this.” I think that what you said when you were with me before, it’s like, “I’m good.”

James Lafazanos
I wrestled with it a little bit, I was in therapy at the time. I brought it up my therapist and I was just like, “this is the best opportunity I’ve ever had. This is a dream job for any actor and yet I’m really struggling.” We had that conversation at the end of season one and we really talked about it in depth. I’m like, “okay, I’m gonna give it another season and see what happens.” I did and I’m glad I did season two. As much as I’d like to look back and be like, “Oh, I could have just did the other final three seasons too” but then I would be depriving Christopher Heyerdahl of a great opportunity. I was ready to do something else. It was weird because at the same time, I don’t know if I brought this up the first time, but the Chapelle Show was on at the same time. It was airing the same time. He had this whole thing where he left after season two and he had all these issues. I was seeing this mirror in Dave Chapelle, who was a comedic hero of mine, in my own scenario and I was just like, “maybe he’s onto something there.” For me it was wanting to do more comedy and just to be seen in the flesh and stuff like that. They gave me a great opportunity where I played one character where I was seen out of out of makeup which was…

David Read
Yes, with Andee!

Andee Frizzell
With me!

James Lafazanos
That’s right. He got close with the Wraith scientists as far as how they were working together. I liked that energy in that episode, where I felt like I was working with them. To play like a character like Worf on Star Trek Next Generation, to be a part of the crew and to be an alien species but part of a mainly human crew. I think that would have made all the difference just as far as feeling I was doing good for mankind; being on the other side of the kind of villain versus protagonist kind of line of things.

David Read
You steep yourself into these characters and we as an audience are often like, “Wow, that’s awesome.” We fail to realize, sometimes, the psychological toll that some artists have. Not everyone can just flip it on and off, you’re in this thing for days. That’s a lot of work.

James Lafazanos
The Dark Knight and Heath Ledger, he played his role of the Joker in The Dark Knight and obviously what happened with him with him passing away and stuff. His reportings of his struggle coming out of character, I totally identified with that. I’m glad I just found found the time where it was like, “okay, this is a good time for me to exit stage left.” Sometimes when you get into a character it can be consuming and you start to question things about your own mental health and stuff like that. In that scenario I just felt like, “Okay, I think this is a good time.”

David Read
Andee, did you miss him?

Andee Frizzell
I did, I did, definitely. It was a very different situation for myself because the characters that I played, the Queens were the big business, I didn’t play in the back. James would be put in makeup and then sit for hours and hours without saying anything, just. I can only imagine how difficult that must have been in the costume, not acting in it, just sitting in it. Like you said, the weight of it. Not being part of the, as you said, the human team, but also not being part of a Wraith team. You were “the guy,” you were in so many episodes on your own. I can only imagine, for me it was a very different experience. I did miss having you because we always had such fun. Remember that one where you, probably don’t remember, but I remember it. They turned you into a human and you had the Wraith makeup on and you were messing around with those heart things, remember the sticky, right? Do you remember this? You stuck it to your forehead and it stuck to the mask. You were trying to pull it off and you were like “distract them” and I was like “Oh!”. You couldn’t get it off your face. Oh my god. I still to this day remember. You were like “distract them” and I was like, “how can I distract them?”

David Read
He’s getting red.

Andee Frizzell
Do you remember?

James Lafazanos
It’s coming back to me. What was it that was actually stuck to my forehead?

Andee Frizzell
You were supposed to be laying on that medical bed and they have these heart monitors and they were sticky. You were joking around and you stuck it to your forehead and because you had the mask it was like [pulling the mask off] and you’re like “oh no” and it was just not coming off. Finally they were like “what is happening?” You turned around and you had this thing hanging and they had to come in and they had to remove the alcohol. Remember?

James Lafazanos
EKG like suction cup. They would put them on your temples in the hospital to measure your heart rate or something like that.

Andee Frizzell
Exactly. They had to come in with alcohol and remove the whole thing and you had a big dot and they had to go and spray paint you again.

James Lafazanos
I apologised to the makeup team for that.

Andee Frizzell
Yes. You were like…

James Lafazanos
I was just goofing around, you know?

Andee Frizzell
So funny.

James Lafazanos
That was part of the thing right? I felt like, in makeup, because you’re just so visually so fearsome and freaky looking, just the contacts alone, people would be talking to you but they kind of wouldn’t want to look at you.

David Read
You’re messing with them. You’re messing with them psychologically and you’re not even doing it on purpose.

James Lafazanos
Yeah. I always felt like I had to just be extra extra jokey and just be like, “hey, it’s just a regular person underneath this.”

David Read
That’s crazy. It just goes to show “don’t leave actors alone for too long.”

James Lafazanos
I do remember that now.

Andee Frizzell
Do you remember that?

James Lafazanos
Yeah, I totally remember that now and I probably would do it again to be honest.

David Read
Teresa Mc – Andee, did you ever appear in Atlantis without makeup on? Did we ever get a glimpse of you? You never snuck in there?

Andee Frizzell
No.

David Read
Okay.

Andee Frizzell
It was definitely something I would have loved to have done.

David Read
Be an Atlantis soldier or something?

Andee Frizzell
Yes, that would have been so funny, a little sneak cameo, it would have been an Easter egg. So many people did not know what I looked like. We’ve talked about this before, me going to conventions and them thinking that I was Trisha Helfer from Battlestar. I’m like “no, I’m the Wraith.”

James Lafazanos
I did an episode. I did one episode of Battlestar, yeah. I went out with those Battlestar actors quite a bit. I went to events outside of the show and I would see a boat party or something like this, various events around town, DJ nights and stuff. The shows were filming at the same time in Vancouver, right? Battlestar and Stargate?

David Read
Correct, yeah.

James Lafazanos
That was cool. It was fun. We had this kind of camaraderie of like, “we’re both on new sci-fi shows.” It was fun.

David Read
Absolutely. Andee, Tracy wanted to know, I think you mentioned that you’re from Prince Edward Island, “where in PEI is your most favorite place to visit?”

James Lafazanos
PEI?

David Read
Prince Edward Island.

Andee Frizzell
Look at you dialling in?

James Lafazanos
I was on PEI this past August.

Andee Frizzell
Yes, it’s the picture perfect province.

James Lafazanos
My mother’s from there. I have tonnes of family on PEI. My mother’s from Kincora area, McArdles. I don’t know if you know any McArdles.

Andee Frizzell
McArdles, I don’t. I left when I was quite young and we would go back for summers and stuff.

James Lafazanos
You never told me you were on PEI. That’s so cool.

David Read
Didn’t you guys work on a show, like Stargate Atlantis together for two years or something?

Andee Frizzell
Yeah. This is not what we were talking about. What we were talking about is sticking things to our faces.

James Lafazanos
I didn’t know that. It is cool. I spent so many summers on PEI.

Andee Frizzell
It’s so beautiful there. So yeah, my favorites, I’m trying to remember.

James Lafazanos
I just posted on Facebook this video that was a from SCTV with John Candy playing a version of Magnum PI, but it was called Magnum PEI.

Andee Frizzell
Oh no, that would be hilarious.

James Lafazanos
You see John Candy with the mustache and a Hawaiian shirt and he’s rolling around the ground and he’s trying to stop this guy from stealing potato.

Andee Frizzell
Oh my god, where did you see it?

James Lafazanos
They have these clips on YouTube, SCTV.

Andee Frizzell
I’m totally gonna look that up. I’m gonna totally look it up.

James Lafazanos
Best comedy ever to come out of Canada and of course an amazing cast of performers. John Candy, Eugene Levy, Catherine O’Hara, Martin Short, Andrea Martin, Dave Thomas, Joe Flaherty.

Andee Frizzell
Magnum PEI, that is so funny. What I remember of PEI is that, there used to be, back in the day when you could make jokes, there used to be these New Finlander jokes. I said to my, “well, if everyone makes New Finlander jokes, what jokes do New Finlanders tell?” and my grandmother says “Islander jokes.”

James Lafazanos
Oh, is that right?

Andee Frizzell
We’re the butt of all of those same jokes in New Finland. I was like, “that’s hilarious.” Yeah, that’s so funny, PEI. I loved it there in the summer.

David Read
Tracy’s from Nova Scotia and she’s always wanted to visit. Now I want to visit. It sounds beautiful.

Andee Frizzell
And now there’s a road.

James Lafazanos
A bridge.

James Lafazanos
It’s a pretty long bridge. It’s one of the longer ones.

Andee Frizzell
Sorry, a road. Not like a Moses parthis and then you drive through. No, there’s a bridge, there’s a bridge now. When they became Canada and they went around and said to the other 12 guys, “hey, you want to join?” they promised Prince Edward Island a bridge. They got it in like 2008. They waited like 100 years for this bridge, you know?

Andee Frizzell
Yeah. It’s super super long. For the whole time I was a kid and we would go to Prince Edward Island to see my family, we had to take the ferry. You could only get there by the ferries.

James Lafazanos
I liked the ferries because the fairies had an arcade and I was playing games all the time so I could play some 1942 or some Double Dragon.

Andee Frizzell
1942, that’s so funny. It’s such a stunning province, it’s such a stunning province. So beautiful. All the red sand.

James Lafazanos
Japanese tourists and cows.

Andee Frizzell
Lotsa taters. Lots of taters. I remember there to, they had a lobster, Mc lobster sandwich at McDonald’s. Lobster there is cheap food, you know? Coming out west and people are like, “Oh, it’s a lobster fest and it’s so fancy” and I was like, “my grandmother feeds that stuff.” It’s not considered fancy at all there.

James Lafazanos
[inaudible]. I’m vegan, I don’t eat it.

Andee Frizzell
Myself neither.

James Lafazanos
A lot of my relatives are really into it. That seems like the main thing that they enjoy.

Andee Frizzell
And it’s crazy watching them eat it. There is no nothing like…

James Lafazanos
Oh my god it’s so weird. Talk about alien. They harvest from the bottom of the sea and…

David Read
Bottom dwellers, I’m not crazy about eating bottom dwellers.

James Lafazanos
It interesting. The island is great, I’d recommend the island to anyone.

Andee Frizzell
Anyone, you have to see, especially Canadians. People don’t think out of the Maritimes. It’s so so beautiful. It’s so pretty. Nova Scotia is gorgeous. It’s just a very very pretty part of our country and it doesn’t get seen as much you know?

David Read
But go in the summer I would imagine?

Andee Frizzell
That’s anywhere in Canada. I wouldn’t say to anybody “you know where you should go in December?” Like never.

David Read
I like the snow.

Andee Frizzell
Well, there’s snow and then there’s -30 and snow. I’m like, “yeah, no.”

David Read
That’s fair. Do you guys recall your first day on set? Lockwatcher wanted to know. Were you at the table reading?

James Lafazanos
The table reading? Oh.

Andee Frizzell
Yes. I was.

James Lafazanos
Were we at a table reading? I don’t think I have any lines the first episode.

David Read
No, you hissed a lot James.

James Lafazanos
Yeah, I was hissing and I was doing a lot of hairing waving. Really practising my hair wave, a lot of turns. It was like I was on a catwalk just being like “hiss and turn, hiss and turn.” I must have had one line in the pilot but my look, my look said it all. I don’t think I needed to say anything really.

Andee Frizzell
I just remember…

David Read
Was Martin Wood patient?

Andee Frizzell
I don’t remember him being not patient.

James Lafazanos
Martin was great. Martin was the best. I was one day on set and he had me laying down in this weird kind of contraption. It was not comfortable and I was there for a little while and he’s like, “You know what? After today’s done you can go to a Sutton Hotel, there’s a Spa there, you can get a massage there on me.” He bought me a massage. massages before that but Martin Wood did that for me so shout out to Martin Wood, thank you for that. It was one of the best massages that I have had in my life.

David Read
The Sutton is great.

James Lafazanos
Sutton Hotel in Vancouver, one of the premier places where actors come to stay when they’re in town and people of all different places.

David Read
Wow, that’s a good guy.

Andee Frizzell
I was saying about the first day on set. I just remember everyone was super excited. I think it was just very exciting; it was a new chapter in this story that had been on for seven years. I just remember that. I remember it just being exciting; these are new characters being introduced, new storylines. It was new, everything was new. I just remember that kind of excitement. That’s what I remember of the first day for sure.

James Lafazanos
One of my first days, wasn’t obviously at the line reading, was to get wardrobe fitting. There’s a couple of firsts for me; one, Richard Dean Anderson was also getting a wardrobe fitting in the room next to me. I just hear Richard Dean Anderson, for me, growing up with MacGyver and stuff was just like, “Okay, there’s MacGyver in the next change room.” And then more the part of being like, “you don’t have a cell phone?” I was basically a deliberate Luddite until I was 25. All my friends around me had cell phones, at least with these flip phones and stuff like that. I purposely held out because I’m like, “once I got a cell phone I’m gonna be on it all the time so I’m gonna wait.” Then they said, “you have to get a cell phone. We need to be able to contact you.” I’m like, “Okay, I’ll get a cell phone.” So it was because of the wardrobe department telling me, that’s when I got my cell phone addiction. Is it an addiction now?

David Read
It’s an appendage.

Andee Frizzell
I think it’s an appendage. Yeah. It’s an appendage now.

David Read
James, we’re gonna wrap up here in the next couple of minutes. We talked about applying it, all this stuff, but what is it like finishing your day? When your day is done in this costume, how long does that take?

James Lafazanos
Actually getting out? Getting out of makeup and getting out of costume was actually a lot quicker than getting in. It was anywhere from an hour to an hour and a half, two hours sometimes, to getting in. But getting out could be done relatively quickly. They go pretty fast. Some hot towel were always waiting, there’s this kind of hot towel microwave they got going. You’d always just look forward to the hot towel that goes on your face when finally the mask came off. That would take about 30 ish minutes or so. How long would you say Andee to get out of makeup? It was about…

Andee Frizzell
Oh, for me it was way longer. It took me four to five hours to get in and then it was two hours to get out. I think that I had more body paint than you did. I always had my arms showing, I always had the girl…my tata’s.

David Read
Regardless of the species, even the Wraith, the women…

Andee Frizzell
Then I had all the wigs and everything. I think for me it was the body paint. Were your masks pre-painted? Do you remember?

James Lafazanos
Yeah.

Andee Frizzell
Mine weren’t. Mine went on clear and they painted layer on layer on layer with the little airbrushes. Mine were always, I want to say a different hue. The one in Submersion, I was more green and blue. The one in Allies and No Man’s Land, I was more orangey.

David Read
She was my favourite, she was beautiful.

Andee Frizzell
Oh my gosh, in those shoes! I love those. Our wardrobe was amazing.

Andee Frizzell
Did they do your legs too? Sometimes they had to paint your legs?

Andee Frizzell
Not my legs, always my arms. I had these gorgeous pants and this big coat. In No Man’s Land I’m sitting on that throne and my arms are out so almost always my arms had to be done. The decoupage, is that how they say it? Then my face. Like I said, they airbrushed it from nothing every single time. I think that’s why I also would be shot out as quickly as possible. A lot of times you had to sit around and wait for stuff. They shot me out because they knew “oh, we have to redo this entire thing tomorrow.” Like paint from scratch, right? So it took a lot longer.

James Lafazanos
I think there was only the one character I played where I had to get, I think it was The Defiant One as well where I had my arms showing. So yeah, I think it did take longer to get in and get out on that day for the arm. It’s just that much more paint, it’s just that much more time.

David Read
Was the sand an irritant? The desert scene, did that cause complications, The Defiant One?

James Lafazanos
You know what? Big shout out to Peter DeLuise, he’s the man. He had a separate tent, just a little tent with air conditioning that he would put me in any chance. He knew with all the makeup and everything that I was extra hot. He was just like, “let’s do it again.” He also was very energizing in the way he directs, he’s just a character right? He’s just like, “how would you react if he did that to you?” Give me more of a scream, you know? He was just like coach meets cheerleader meets director. It was awesome having him direct that episode. It was a very physical episode too with all the fighting, the choreography for fighting as well. We had some great stunt men as well. At the end it gets blown up and they have to launch and I remember watching…

Andee Frizzell
Oh yeah.

James Lafazanos
them get the catapult ready and launching a man off that. That’s a serious stunt, they send you flying. All the knife work and stuff like that was stuff that I did. The gunplay, I did all the gunplay as well. I can’t tell you how many times I was shot on that show. I was basically like Kenny. I was “I’m Kenny from South Park. They kill me again, I come back again.” I got squibbed up and shot so many times. So many times I had black blood all over my costume and everywhere. I loved getting squibbed up and getting shot, that was some of the funniest scenes for me. I love reacting to gunshots and stuff. I was just like, “I think I’m a pretty good gunshot, ‘getting shot’ actor.”

Andee Frizzell
That’s your special skill. Your special skill – “I take bullets well.”

James Lafazanos
I was on the harness. One episode I was jumping up one or two storeys, 12 feet in the air. I got so much stunt experience on that show, it was a course in stunts as well. It was great.

David Read
Guys, it has been such a treat having you on. Amazon, MGM, they’re dealing with everything right now with SAG and WGA. At some point they’re going to figure out what they want to do with Stargate. James, I may have asked you this before, I can’t recall. Are you at a different point in your life now where were Atlantis to conclude in some way, given MGM and Amazon’s blessing, would you come back and reprise for an encore?

James Lafazanos
I would. I totally would. 100%. Yeah. I actually was up for a role on Star Trek Discovery which would play the father of Doug. He plays the Commander…

David Read
Yeah. Saru, Doug Jones.

James Lafazanos
Yeah, I was up for a role to play his father which was an alien character.

James Lafazanos
Very interesting looking alien. I was stoked for that possibility. I feel like I was a kid back then. I was mid, early 20s, like 25, 26 when I did that role. I was just still discovering who I was so I feel I would bring a lot more groundedness and life experience to the role now which I think would only make it even better. I would openly welcome that with open arms. I’m writing as well and writing my own sci-fi meets comedy screenplay that I hope to get out there before long. I’m open to any opportunities that come as far as the Stargate Universe.

David Read
Kelpien.

David Read
Andee?

Andee Frizzell
Same, absolutely the same. It was great. Even just watching the progression of the prosthetics from season one to season five, I know they got more and more comfortable. It would be a different experience playing that character now. I’d probably be in a jumpsuit with green dots all over me. I wouldn’t even have those teeth in at all, you know?

David Read
You guys were science experiments. Every episode is like, “Okay, we’re going to try this now okay?”

Andee Frizzell
But at the same time it was kind of like what James said. It wasn’t a big leap to be that character, you just looked at yourself and you were there, you were in that moment. Some other characters you play you had to have your back story and all of this to kind of ground yourself into that character. You just took one look at your own face and you were like, “here I am.” Wearing the prosthetics made it, as James had said, made it so much easier to be present and to be in that character. I wouldn’t necessarily love it if it was done in a suit but that’s probably the way it’s going now. I would love to do another episode or get back in the costume.

James Lafazanos
You mentioned David this is in the hands now I guess of Amazon Prime. I did one episode of The Expanse which ended up moving over to Amazon. I played a Belter in The Expanse which is human but it’s a human that’s born in space and elongated because of the gravity out in deep space and stuff like that. I feel like these kind of roles get attracted to me as far as like alien type characters. Maybe just because I’m weird, I don’t know.

David Read
You’re comfortable with exploring yourself in different ways from more grounded roles, more earthbound roles. There’s nothing wrong with that. I think it makes you flexible as an artist.

James Lafazanos
I do my yoga so I try to be flexible.

David Read
I should try that, I really should.

James Lafazanos
We should do a class, a yoga class for some of the fans here Andee.

Andee Frizzell
Yes.

James Lafazanos
That would be kind of fun.

Andee Frizzell
I would totally teach that class.

David Read
If you’re serious you may have to do something.

Andee Frizzell
Oh my gosh, that will be so funny. I would love to do that. That will be great.

David Read
We’ll talk. We’ll see who would be interested in that.

James Lafazanos
Okay, we’ll do it.

David Read
Guys, this has been a treat to have you both on together. You are two of my favorites of all of the cast. Thank you so much for coming on and spending some time with me.

James Lafazanos
Thank you so much David, you are such a sweetheart. You’re just like a big teddy bear, I want to hug you. Where are you located?

David Read
Nashville, Tennessee.

James Lafazanos
Nashville ey? They’re making the new Volkswagen ID.4 electric cars there. I was looking into getting one of those and I understand that the new plant is in Nashville. You ever come up this way to Toronto? Now you got a few of us here in Toronto.

David Read
I do. I have intentions of coming up to Toronto in the next year, year and a half, so I will definitely hit you up?

James Lafazanos
Yeah, hit us up.

Andee Frizzell
Yeah, that’d be awesome.

David Read
Absolutely, guys. It’s been such a pleasure.

James Lafazanos
Yeah, for sure.

Andee Frizzell
And thank you thank you.

James Lafazanos
Yeah, thanks to all the fans for watching.

James Lafazanos
We love.

James Lafazanos
The purpose of this is to get connected and stuff. I’m excited to be on Cameo again. I saw your bio on Cameo Andee and I was just like, “Oh, that’s so cool.” I started realizing “Am I the only one not on there? Maybe I should get on there.” So yeah, I decided to join. Hopefully once all these strikes are done, in good time we can get back to doing the things…

Andee Frizzell
Yes, keeping it alive.

James Lafazanos
In the meantime I’m writing a little something folks.

David Read
Keep us in the loop James. I would like to talk about it further when you can push it a little bit further.

James Lafazanos
When it’s further along I’ll be happy to talk about it. Yeah.

David Read
All right. In the meantime everyone click the link in the description below for James and Andee’s links to Cameo. Thank you guys.

Andee Frizzell
Thank you.

James Lafazanos
Thanks David.

David Read
Bye bye. I’m gonna wrap up the show on this end.

Andee Frizzell
Bye.

David Read
Bye. Andee Frizzell and James Lafazanos, the Wraith in Stargate Atlantis. This was a treat. This was cool and I can’t thank them both enough. I can’t thank my team enough for making this episode possible. Jeremy, Antony and Tracy, you guys are the best. Thank you to everyone who submitted questions. We’ve got a number of episodes heading your way, got a few new confirmations on dialthegate.com so if you want to look over there to see what’s coming down the pipe, really excited about some of this stuff. My thanks to Frederick Marcoux, my webmaster who keeps the site up and running and Linda “GateGabber” Furey as well. Maria Jose Anceriz – David comment for you – “the coziest chat on the internet and the coolest. Thanks David for all your interviews.” You are welcome. We will be sharing a few more, heading your way really soon. My name is David Read for Dial the Gate. I appreciate everyone tuning in and we will see you on the other side.