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SARAH THOMPSON (Eve)
Playing the mysterious liaison Eve, Sarah Thompson is as different to her backstabbing on-screen alter ego as the two sides of the same coin. Taking to the stage with fellow guests Clare Kramer on Saturday and Jenny Mollen on Sunday, Sarah conveyed none of the treacherous traits that set her up with Wolfram& Hart's elite but instead came across as a fun loving and charismatic actress. Sarah was introduced the Angel-verse in the final season and found herself following in the very evil footsteps of her predecessor Lilah Morgan played by the elegant Stephanie Romanov. As a huge admirer of the show's creator Joss Whedon, she described him as a 'genius' in her audition as she told the audience how it felt to become part of such a well-established show. "I was thrilled to get the job," she enthuses, "I watched the show and liked it a lot and I was a big fan so I was absolutely thrilled. I was a little nervous working with the others and I felt like the new kid on the block but everyone was real warm and welcoming. It's been a wonderful experience." When she first graced our scenes however Sarah admits that the mystery surrounding her presence was as much of a surprise to her as it was to the viewing audience, "I didn't even know very much from episode to episode, you know when I started the show I didn't know how many episodes I was going to be in. We didn't know who Eve was at that point, I knew very little." Sarah cites her favourite episode as the Halloween adventure Life of the Party and not necessarily for the reason that most people sitting before her thought (although the idea of getting naked with Angel behind a sofa is reason enough), "It was just so much fun," she confesses, "we were all on set all of the time and it was just one big party scene. It was fun to watch the actors because J's character was just peeing all over the place and it was just real fun!"
Although Eve may not have been as naturally gifted at evil as her predecessor, she did manage to do the one thing that Lilah didn't and that was to form a close alliance with former Wolfram & Hart golden boy Lindsay McDonald by getting him on her side and in her bed. Although she initially had her own agenda, it was Eve's infatuation with Lindsay and her wish to make his plans succeed over her own that led to her fall from grace as far as the Senior Partners were concerned and a replacement liaison, Marcus Hamilton, who was drafted in to take her job and her immortality. Firefly actor Adam Baldwin filled the rather large shoes of Eve's successor and Sarah was asked on her thoughts about the change, "I think Adam Baldwin is great, I think he's a great actor," she answers, "but obviously I don't think Eve, the character, was too thrilled about it and about losing her immortality but he's definitely a great guy to lose it to!" she laughed. The influence Lindsay had over her probably resulted in Eve's ultimate downfall in the series finale, "The last scene of mine is, I'm stuck in that room pacing and I find out that Lindsay's not coming," Sarah answers when asked directly about her thought's on Eve's fate, "In terms of what would have happened after that, I think Eve was so dependant on Lindsay, her whole motivation was based on Lindsay and so losing him was confusing for her. I don't think it would have ended well for her at all." Still having someone like Lindsay McDonald as a love interests means that you get to share some screen time making out with the very 'pleasing to the eye' cowboy Christian Kane and that can't be bad surely, "You know I've actually known Christian for a number of years," she explains, "we're friends but it was great. It was a little awkward at first especially with someone you've known for a while."
Sarah may have joined an established cast but it was group of gifted actors sadly lacking in members of the softer sex as Charisma Carpenter, the show's lead female for four years, had left the show the season before. Charisma did make a brief return for the 100th episode of Angel but Sarah didn't get the opportunity to work with her as much as she would have liked. "I only worked with her a few days unfortunately as we didn't have too many scenes together but it was a lot of fun and I'd never met her before. She brought her son to work a couple of times and her baby is absolutely adorable. I loved working with her." Angel's fan base is far from diminishing as the tireless Save Angel campaigns have proven. Although Hyperion may have been Sarah's first UK fan event, it wasn't her first encounter with the Angel fans as she had attended the Wolfram & Hart Review, the Angel version of the famous Posting Board Parties, in Los Angeles earlier in the year. "I had a good time out there," she recalls, "it was my first experience meeting a lot of fans of the show and I was so pleasantly surprised at how friendly and kind everybody was. I loved that and I love meeting the people that keep the show on the air so it's cool to meet people that are so supportive." Mementos from the set and wardrobes of Angel have been appearing all over Ebay but Sarah has a different way of capturing her recollections, "I keep scrapbooks of everything," she confesses, " and I love keeping things so I have every script and I have the call sheet from my very first day at work with the call times and who was there that day. I don't have any wardrobe or props or anything like that but I have a lot of memorabilia and a lot of photos in a massive scrapbook."
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"It was fun to watch the actors because J's character was just peeing all over the place."
~ Sarah on Life of the Party
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There was a tenuous tie that linked Sarah to the Buffy-verse before she ever set foot in the corridors of Angel's evil law firm. One of her roles was that of Danielle Sherman in the movie Cruel Intentions 2 and Buffy herself Sarah Michelle Gellar of course appeared in the original film. Although advertised as a prequel to its mother film, Cruel Intentions 2 was supposed to be something different entirely. " It was actually a television show first," Sarah reveals," it was actually a show called Manchester Prep for Fox that was going to be a new series. We shot a few episodes but the show got cancelled right before it was set to premier and the director and the producer had all this footage and they cut it together somehow to make a film and that's exactly what they did. They cut together all the episodes, shot an ending and released it as Cruel Intentions 2." One young lady from the audience commented that the film itself was quite confusing and didn't really make sense setting up the storyline for Sarah Michelle Gellar's version. "I think that probably comes from the fact that it wasn't really intended to be a prequel," Sarah explains, "but it was intended to be a spin-off of the movie so any problems came from the fact it was sort of thrown together from the television show and they stuck a label on it that it was the prequel to the movie." Sarah was happy to talk about her upcoming film project, Tamara. "It's a film I start in about a month and I play the lead role of Tamara. It's sort of along the lines of a really cool kind of thriller horror film principally about a girl Tamara who's kind of an outcast and everything who goes through a transformation and becomes this really sexy and confident villain who is out to get revenge on a lot of people who treated her badly when she was the outcast. It's really fun; it's a great script, really edgy and lots of blood and guts, your typical horror film. I'm very excited about it."
A lot of questions arose during the session asking Sarah about her personal preferences in some things such as what other shows that appear on the television networks would she like to appear in, "I love watching crime shows like CSI and Cold Case and all those kind of crime scene show," she admits, "I would love to work on that and play a CIA agent or something like that because those are the shows that I watch." She was also asked the almost obligatory question about the people in the business she would most like to work with, "I'm a huge fan of Quentin Tarrantino and I love Kill Bill and I love Kill Bill 2 and Pulp Fiction. He's one of my absolute favourite directors and I would jump at the chance to work with him in any capacity." Some actors and actresses make a decision early on in their careers to stick to a certain medium. There are those who are more than happy to make their names on TV in long running soap operas while others feel the lure of the silver screen and prefer to act in movies only, "I like them both," Sarah replies when asked which category she falls under. "I love how you sort of become a family on a television show and it's fun to come to work every day and see the same people and get to work with them several weeks at a time but I love doing films and I love the theatre also. It's really about the project and the role." And if she ever had a chance to swap places and become a fan at a convention, which show would she choose? "I'm not sure if they have conventions for this show but I'd go to a Sopranos convention, it's my favourite show on television." Only because Angel is now off the air!
ED SEVARTIES (Sparky ~ Props)
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"This is Paramount Studios, circa 1919, now those people that you see down there are all dead. However, the stages are still there: Stages 5, 6, 7, and 17, those are the stages that we shot Angel on. This is what Paramount Studios look like today; the trucks that you see are the Angel trucks: grip, electric, special effects, props, Craft Service and the person you see there in the middle is yours truly. One of the main stages at Paramount is Stage 7 and this is the biggest stage they have and where we had our hotel set and is the oldest stages is all of Hollywood. Everything's been filmed there from the Honeymooners to Hunt For Red October, so when you walk in there and you're the only one in there you can feel it. Season One we were on the watchful eye of Fox, for that reason alone I don't have any photos of Season one. However as we continued on and Fox started to realize that we did know what we were doing I did get my camera out and took some of these lovely pictures that I'm going to share with you guys today." Ed requested that no one take photos of the screen during his presentation - as the pictures and videos were his personal collection of his time on Angel - so within this page are some of the CoA staff's personal behind-the-scenes memories from our work with the series. We ask the same consideration that you please do not copy any of the following photos.
IN THE BEGINNING
"The first season we were on Stage 6, we had our old apartment set and office set, but there was hardly any room to work in so we blew them up. We replaced them with a place Joss decides that they should move to a hotel, so they built this lovely set on Stage 7 and this place you could not take a bad picture in, just an absolutely gorgeous set and of our construction department I can not say enough good things about them. The interior of the [Hyperion] was loosely based on the Ambassador Hotel, it has a rich history to it; it was built in 1919, it closed down in 1980, but what is really famous about the Ambassador is the place where Robert F. Kennedy was shot and killed. Towards the end of Season Two we went to Pylea, this is a picture of Amy's first day on the set there, Alexis with his dog Daisy. And for us, going outside was a dream, it was absolute pleasure because for two years we have been on a cold, dark stage, everyday. So for us to go outside, in the country was just paradise, we had a great time. There were actually two crew that were on Angel: there was what we called an old crew and a new crew and that was all based on this man, Herb Davis. Herb was our director of photography for the first two years; now the DP is usually the man who's really in charge of the crew on the set, because he's the head technician so to speak. He brings about the whole mood of the set and Herb was one of the most laidback men you'll ever meet ion your life, he was just a fantastic guy and because of him the set of Angel was surprisingly relaxed. So when Herb decided to leave, he was ready to move on we were all really upset because how could be find anyone better than Herb, but we were wrong, we found this man, Ross Berryman. Ross took over as the DP for Seasons 3, 4, and 5 and everybody loved Ross right from the start. He was just as relaxed as Herb and he was a fantastic guy, very talented and he was also an Aussie so there was a lot of Vegemite on hand. Season three, 9/11 happened and it really brought us all together."
Los Altos Hotel & Apartments
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Dan Kerns, Jim Contner, & Ross Berryman
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Stunt coordinator, Mike Massa
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"A lot of people moved up Season Three, myself included and so did this guy, Mike Massa. Mike is our stunt coordinator, he was doubling David all the way back on Buffy and was also doubling David on Angel of course. But in Season three Mike took over as the stunt coordinator on the show and what that means is that he actually designs the fights, he choreographs the fights; he hires the stunt guys and makes sure everything is safe. He did a fantastic job and in the five seasons no one got seriously hurt on the set of Angel. We had a fire on Stage 6 and the Cordelia apartment burned down, and it was quite a devastating fire, if we wouldn't have gotten to it in time it would have probably taken the whole stage down. But once again, the amazing construction crew, they got in there and within 48-hours we were shooting again. We always have big episodes around Christmas time because we always get a two-week break right after that and Season three was no exception. That was the year we did the ballet episode which was a Joss episode, they are naturally big anyway, but this one was a little above and beyond that. You're talking three hundred extras dressed up in eveningwear, all of the cast, choreographed dances, un-choreographed love scenes, but we didn't mind it because we get the big Christmas day lunch. Anyone associated with the show can come out there, we all get together, I want to stop with here because this is Beau Baker in the middle, [Alexis on the right], and the guy on the left is me. If you're going to ask me what I'm going to miss the most about Angel, is this right here. The three of us were ten years apart, roughly, and we all seemed to have the same interests and same passion and I hate to say it but I haven't seen either one of them since we wrapped but I just wanted to share that with you guys, that I think about them all the time and I miss them a lot."
FOUR EVIL ELEMENTS
"Season Three we Vincent came in and we liked him right from the start, he was just a great kid but I've got to tell you something, he was a pain in the ass when he was a baby. I know that a lot of you out there are writers yourself and you want to be producers some day and I know I'm just a prop guy and maybe some day I'll be working for you but let me give you a little hint on the four elements that use stay away from when you're designing a series. And those four elements are: nighttime, water, animals, and babies. They are four things that you cannot control and they will come and bite you in the ass! I know, because we had all four of them on Angel. Babies are cut but when it's time to do the happy lullaby scene and they're screaming time just ticks away and animals; have you ever tried to wait for a goat to do a scene? But when the Connor baby got sucked into the portal there wasn't such a gasp on the set as there probably was at home, we were kind of thankful that the baby days were over. If you work on a TV show about vampire, of course you'll be working a lot of nights and I knew that when I started. So you have to be a night person, and I am - I am now. I leaned to enjoy it, I absolutely love it, I love the idea of going to work when everybody else is coming home and when everybody else had to get up and battle traffic I'm going the other way because it's morning, can't shoot out, it's light. Working the nights, there was just something about working in a graveyard, this is actually Valentino's grave, right behind Paramount at Hollywood Forever Cemetery - we shot there a lot. It was almost like we were stealing the moment, like we weren't supposed to be there because there wasn't anyone else around."
PRODUCERS, DIRECTORS, & WRITERS
"The entire series wouldn't have happened without this man right here on the cell phone, that is Kelly Manners, now you might have seen his name at the beginning and the end of the television show but to us he's more than a name. He is a voice; Kelly is our field commander when we're there on the set. When you are doing a TV show or anything creative you have the people who come up with the ideas and the people who have to execute these ideas. Now those two land masses have to bridge and Kelly Manners was that bridge, and he was a strong one. And if that connection isn't strong your project's not going to work. So here's a guy who understands the creative side of everything, he understand what Joss is going after, he understands what Jeff Bell's truing to do and he also understands what we have to do to get it done. He was with us every step of the way and because of him you got Angel the way it was, without him it would have been a different show, I guarantee you. Season Four, everybody was back, Andy was putting on his makeup again. All our favorite directors were back; this is one of our favorite directors, Bill Norton. He was too, this is actually Jim Contner, you might know his name, he directed a lot of Buffy and when he came over to Angel he directed a lot of Angel as well. Jim actually worked on the movie Jaws so whenever Jim would direct we would do a lot of Jaws jokes and ask him to tell us a bunch of Jaws stories. He was a former cameraman himself so you always got a great project when you had Jim in there."
Makeup artist Dalia Dokter & Dayne
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The fifth evil element:
Tight Spaces
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David Boreanaz's final battle wounds
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"The writing, season four we started doing what's called the 'story arc'; that means you start here, and by episode 22 you have to here. But to get there you have to take little steps, and each one of those little steps are the episodes, and each one of those episodes have to has little stories within them, and each one of those little stories have to have little subplot stories and they all have to combine together. After season four we were a little apprehensive about getting a fifth season, the writers and Tim Minear and Jeff Bell and the editors got together and they made a demo reel to show to Warner Brothers of what we had done the past four years. Watching the stuff that we did was just absolutely phenomenal so I knew we were getting a fifth season. What do you do when you know you have a job to come back to? Well, of course you pack up all the props onto an airplane and you take them to Blackpool." A show of hands of those who had attended End of Days, "Those of you who weren't, this is what you missed."
LUCKY NUMBER FIVE
"Season Five, the gang was all back, and of course we had some new faces as well to add to the cast of characters. James Marsters came over from Buffy and we've had him on the show before, but now we got him every day, and that was just a pleasure, he is so much fun to watch. And she's a lot of fun to watch too, not hard to look at, at all, Mercedes [McNab]was terrific. So with our new cast ensemble and our veterans we set off to have the gang take over Wolfram & Hart and began fighting evil while working for it at the same time and voila, you have instant drama. And because we had a new storyline we got rid of the old set, we had to build a completely new one. This was going to be the law offices of Wolfram & Hart. We built these sets on stage 5, stage 5 is the longest set that's at Paramount and our amazing construction team had 4-weeks to complete the entire set and they did just an incredible job doing it. On the fifth day, shooting the fifth episode of season 5 of Angel on stage 5, five kittens were born to one of the Paramount cats and the mother abandoned the kittens because we were there so we took it upon ourselves to raise them. I actually took them home for a weekend and nursed them and they all grew up and we adopted them, they became our mascots. This is Julie's cat, she's our wardrobe girl; this little guy's name is Otter. Now Julie actually still works at Paramount, she's on another show so Otter still comes to Paramount everyday, where he was born, to see his mom. This is my cat, of course I'm kidding, this is the black leopard that J. August had to do the scene with in the white room. This is what I'm talking about, look how long it's taking this cat to get on stage. 'Just get on stage, we're ready!'"
Mercedes & Dayne on Life of the Party
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Piano Player Lorne and Alexis Denisof
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J. August Richards enjoying being gutted
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"There were a lot of episodes that stood out in Season five; the werewolf one was a great episode, one of the funniest. There were a lot of new stars born, a lot of guys who weren't stares on paper, but once they said two word, 'Pee-pee', they were overnight sensations. Season five David Boreanaz actually directed an episode, and I can tell you without being a politician he did fantastic. He's a guy who just had knee surgery, who was acting in a show, who was directing a show and he still remained calm and he did a terrific job. The submarine episode we shot in Burbank, it was a lovely set but let me just add one more thing to your four elements that you don't deal with, don't deal with tight spaces. This is a practical submarine. We also did the 100th episode, December 8th, 2003 - that's the whole crew who was there that day. David Fury directed the 100th episode; he also played the puppeteer for our puppet episode. And we were laughing, and it was a good thing we were laughing because things were about to get real serious. The very next episode, our dear beloved Fred became no more, things were about to get even worse on Friday the 13th. It was on that day I looked and I saw Joss, we were shooting this scene, Joss stops by all the time, but behind him I saw Jeff Bell and there's Ben and Drew and what's everybody doing here? They asked us all in a room and Joss got up and he said that he was talking to Warner Brothers and they officially passed on a sixth season of Angel and that we would continue to finish out the season, we would finish up our four episodes and then we'll call it quits. And the next thing you know we were shooting our last episode and it's time to start killing people."
CHECK THE GATE
"I took these pictures for Alexis and I'm going to share them with you guys, this is during the filming of Wesley's death scene and it took us about five-hours to shoot it. I've got to tell you, watching this you could not believe that this was the same guy who five years earlier was tripping over coffee beans on stage 6. He took that character and absolutely metamorphosized him in five years and on that day you saw him turn that character into a shell. It was truly incredible. Here is the actually moment when we said goodbye to Alexis, this was his wrap. And a couple days later it was our turn, this is the very last first shot of Angel, this is the last time we would ever shoot something for the first time that day. It's at a coffee shop which is ironic because our very day, our very first shot was at a coffee shop. That night we moved to the alley, downtown Los Angeles, this is the same alley where Angel fought Faith, season 1 in the rain. It was cold that night, and it was cold this night as well, but this night the rain was a little warmer because in season 1 the rain was real, season 5, the rain was us. And that's how you do it; you just get a guy on the roof with a hose. This is the last time the cameras every rolled on Angel, this is the last time the slate ever went in front of the camera. I just got behind the camera, I knew I needed that moment and got it. This was a Friday night and what they say when the show is done it, 'Check the gate,' check the gate means: the gate's good, we're done, we're going home and usually you get excited about that but on this particular day there was almost dead silence when they said check the gate, we knew what that meant. Kelly and Jeff here got up there and said a few nice words and we packed up and went home and that was it. This is the best I can do of giving you a slide show to sum up what it was like to be on the set of Angel for the past five years. I miss all these people and I hope that a few of them will miss me. It seems like forever since we wrapped. I just want to say on behalf of the crew, I want to thank you guys very, very much for your support over the past five years, because of you guys we got this far, so thank you very much."
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