3 posts tagged “eliza dushku”

FOX has released a three-minute trailer for Fringe -- also known as the show that has me almost as impatiently excited as the Lost pilot -- and you can bet that trumps any personal post from me.

I was freaking out while I watched it. The X-Files wishes it was ever this freaky.

And if that weren't enough, about 72 seconds of the Dollhouse pilot have surfaced.

I believe my exact reaction after watching both back-to-back was something along the lines of -- and I'm trying to get the exact wording and inflection -- HELLS YEAH!

(Also? Tahmoh Pinkett is HOT. I thought so all during my love affair with Battlestar Galactica and I'm just hoping we get to see him lose the suit.)

I'm really excited about Dollhouse, especially since Ausiello just revealed Angel/Alias alum Amy Acker has been cast as well.

Honestly. I'm excited.

My excitement is just not translating to the page. I can't even muster an exclamation point. Or adjectives.

E's Kristin Dos Santos talked to Joss Whedon about the series:

What's the pilot episode called?
"Echo."

What's it about?
The logline don't lie: "Echo (Eliza Dushku) is a young woman who is literally everybody's fantasy. She is one of a group of men and women who can be imprinted with personality packages, including memories, skills, language—even muscle memory—for different assignments. The assignments can be romantic, adventurous, outlandish, uplifting, sexual and/or very illegal. When not imprinted with a personality package, Echo and the others are basically mind-wiped, living like children in a futuristic dorm/lab dubbed the Dollhouse, with no memory of their assignments—or of much else. The show revolves around the childlike Echo's burgeoning self-awareness, and her desire to know who she was before, a desire that begins to seep into her various imprinted personalities and puts her in danger both in the field and in the closely monitored confines of the Dollhouse."

What's it like?
Dollhouse is like The Bourne Identity meets Stepford Wives meets boarding school meets Los Angeles neo-noir meets the Whedonverse. In short, it's rad, man.

If I was writing an eighth-grade book report about Dollhouse, what would I list as the "themes"?
Identity, self-determination, free will is both a blessing and a pain in the ass, The Next Generation's Data is a great TV character, Eliza Dushku is hot. What? Those first three at least are almost certainly themes.

Is Echo just a new name for Faith?
That's a negatory. Echo has a genius for contemplation and self-awareness that Faith couldn't begin to approach. Echo also has about 48 different faces to show the world, which gives her a good head start on Faith, who seemed to vary primarily between rage and desolation. In the first episode, we are shown that Echo is essentially like the Scarecrow from The Wizard of Oz—"If I only had a brain..."—but she's otherwise fully equipped with a soul, a rockin' bod, and a good, fearless heart.

Who's the new boss of us all?
Olivia Williams is going to rock as Adelle Dewitt, a Frigidaire administratrix whose rare brushes with human empathy and compassion are enough to make you suspect she might just be a good guy after all. 

Where's the twist?
The Dolls are programmed to mix up identity and personality with a splash of subterfuge and a dash of dementia—but they're not the only ones. Tahmoh Penikett's FBI agent Paul Ballard is obsessed with opening up the Dollhouse, but he may have more in common with—and already be closer to—the Dolls than he even knows.

Where is the love?
Echo and Paul are going to be hot like fire, no doubt, but I predict that cerebral Doll mechanic Topher (think Kevin Rankin's character in Bionic Woman, but more evil) and blank-slate Kewpie-doll Sierra (Dichen Lachman) might end up being the other pair of opposites that attract.

Who's the Xander?
If I had to guess, I'd pick Victor (Enver Gjokaj).

What does the actress who plays Dr. Claire Saunders need to bring to the table?
Visible facial scars from a razor-blade attack somewhere in her past or a cooperative, calm personality and a willingness to sit quietly in a prosthetic makeup chair for extended periods each day.

Faith

I usually don't post, what, 45 minutes after my last post, but this was way too awesome not to pass on.

Joss Whedon is coming back to television, thanks to Eliza Dushku, and he's bringing the masterful Tim Minear with him. Can I get a frak yeah?

I loved Faith. I saw right through that tough-as-nails exterior and her two-episode arc in Season 4 of Buffy and then her handful of episodes in Seasons 1 and 4 of Angel and Season 7 of Buffy were amazing. I always thought Faith and Angel had way more in common than Buffy and Angel.

I loved Tru Calling, too; well, I did until Jason Priestley came and ruined everything. Are you telling me it's a coincidence FOX pulled the plug shortly after he arrived on set? Hmmm?

From Michael Ausiello:
Short of a Buffy the Vampire Slayer reunion movie, this is just about the best news you could ask for: Eliza Dushku and Joss Whedon are reteaming for a new series! (Told ya it would be worth tearing yourself away from the candy corn to drop by The Ausiello Report.) Here are the five things you have to know about the show, and I mean now:

1. It's a one-hour drama produced by 20th Century Fox to air on Fox. The first of the seven episodes to which the network has committed could premiere as early as spring.

2. It's called Dollhouse because that's the nickname of the high-tech lab where a group of human chalkboards are kept between assignments.

3. Human chalkboards?! Yes! What else would you call characters like Dushku's Echo who can be given new memories, skills and even personalities, then stripped of them just as quickly, leaving them virtual children.

4. Whedon is the creator, head writer and executive producer, and perhaps in part because Dushku convinced him to do the show, she's getting a producer credit. (Fellow Buffyverse alum Tim Minear is also on board.)

5. I just got off the phone with both of them!

Joss

First things first: How in the hellmouth did Dushku get her Buffy and Angel boss to do it? In a word, food. Shortly after she signed a development deal with Fox in August, "I called the one man that I knew I wanted to do [a series] with and had to have to have the best show possible" and invited him to lunch, she says. "And he was seduced!"

Actually, hypnotized, Whedon counters. "Eliza was wearing a hat with a big spiraling wheel on it, and she kept saying, 'Look into the wheel. You want to make television. You want it to be about me… ' It sounds hokey, but it really worked."

And how. Not only did Dushku get Whedon to agree to work on the project, but what she calls their "contagious, freaky, awesome energy" at that very get-together inspired him to create it. "I came up with [the concept] at lunch completely spontaneously, based on my conversation with Eliza," he insists. "It wasn't [an idea] that I was nurturing or that I tailored or I tried to retro-fit to her."

So what is the concept, exactly? Explains Whedon: "Dollhouse is a suspense drama about a girl who can have any personality except her own." So it's part Alias and part Quantum Leap, "because Echo is literally changing who she is," he continues. "She gets into people's lives a little bit."

Even Dushku's. "I relate so much to this character," she marvels. "Echo is essentially the story of my life. I've lived a crazy life the past 16 years, traveling around the world and then tripping and falling into this business. Everyone wants you to transform and be a different person every week."

Great chemistry and intriguing premise notwithstanding, you'd think that after Fox snuffed Whedon's Firefly and hung up on Dushku's Tru Calling, one or both of them would have been more than a little hesitant to get back into bed with the network. "Honestly? Walking back into that building was pretty damn strange," Whedon admits. But "I always had a good relationship with [20th Century Fox], and on the network end, it's a completely new bunch of people, and from what I’ve seen, a fairly impressive bunch."

Dushku seconds that emotion. "I really get the sense that they're committed to [this show]… It feels right."

Besides, as Whedon notes, "I told them I was interested in writing a pilot, and they gave me seven episodes. They’ve already shown more support for it than I have."

Now it's your turn to show the comeback kids some love. And, like Dushku, I don't think you'll let them down. "We have the best fans in the business [in the] the Buffy and Whedon universe," she says. "It’s going to be pandemonium when this [news] hits."

And it's only just begun.