The director of “The Fifth Race,” “Pretense” and ten other Stargate episodes joins Dial the Gate to explore his career and look back on some of the landmark episodes that built the franchise we love!

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TRANSCRIPT
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David Warry-Smith:
How many of these have you done?

David Read:
Welcome, everyone, to Episode 415, had to get it right, of Dial the Gate: The Stargate Oral History Project. My name is David Read. I appreciate you joining me for this mid-week episode. David Warry-Smith, director of several of our favorites, is joining me for this hour. And if you are in the YouTube feed right now, we have moderators in there, Lockwatcher, Antony, Enigma, who are gonna be standing by to assist, and go ahead and submit the questions to them. You can look his details up online and get back to me. But we’re gonna be focusing on three specific ones today. David Warry-Smith, director. Hello, sir.

David Warry-Smith:
Hi. How are you doing?

David Read:
How you doing?

David Warry-Smith:
I’m good. Thank you.

David Read:
I am well. I appreciate you being here with me. We’ve been working a while to make the schedules line up here, and this one, sir, is really one that I’ve honestly been truly looking forward to, especially from some of the earlier seasons. But we’re gonna be taking you back, and I appreciate you willing to walk down that yellow brick road of memories with me here for a little bit, David.

David Warry-Smith:
A pleasure. I only wish that I’d had a little more time to walk further down the road in preparation, but I assume I’m in good hands with you. I’ll let you be the guide.

David Read:
That’s what I’m gonna endeavor to do here. How did you get roped into Stargate, and what was that journey of that dozen episodes like over the course of SG-1 and a little bit of Atlantis? Tell me the story there.

David Warry-Smith:
So, yeah, I was working in Vancouver, had just done a couple of episodes of The Outer Limits. Certainly Jonathan Glassner, who is one of the creators of the SG-1 series, and I think Brad Wright as well, if I’m not mistaken, both were involved in Outer Limits, and we did a couple of great episodes. And then they said, “Do you wanna come on to SG-1?” And I was delighted. So, near the end of the first season, we did an episode, and then they asked me to do another one. And the second one, of course, ended up being the cliffhanger for Season One, “Within the Serpent’s Grasp.” And so then, yeah, was there on and off over the next few seasons, and eventually left. Maybe they wanted me to leave too, but from my perspective, I didn’t do much more after that because it was shot in Vancouver and I’m Toronto-based. Had a young family and we even considered moving to Vancouver at one point, but decided against that for various reasons. Family being the primary reason, and also, at the time, the price of real estate.

David Read:
Oh man, holy cow. In Vancouver now, my goodness.

David Warry-Smith:
Still now. Toronto’s caught up a bit thankfully, but anyway. So, Toronto’s home. We wanna stay home, so I stopped going to Vancouver for a while. So, that was kind of the end of my time on Stargate. But man, I sure liked it while I was there. Great show, great bunch of people.

David Read:
A lot of these episodes are fairly technically heavy. Looking at “Within The Serpent’s Grasp,” there’s a lot of that in that one. “Exodus,” oh my God, there are a ton of effect shots in a lot of these, and a ton of stuff that you have to stage practically. Do you consider yourself reasonably strong in those areas, or is that something that you’re like, “Eh, I’d rather do more of the two person in a room kind of thing?” What’s your personal preference?

David Warry-Smith:
What you need to do sort of visual effects-wise or CGI-wise, to me, it grows out of the material, obviously. And so, my feelings about a particular episode, I hate to use this word, it gets overused, but it’s an organic process. So, I don’t– I’m happy to do lots of technical wizardry. It’s fun. I am a fan of doing as much in-camera as possible, but there’s not as much of that as you can– There’s less and less of that, for lots of reasons. But as a director, I think it’s very important that you understand those technical processes to some extent. But I don’t have to make them happen myself, so there’s tons I don’t know. And to me, it’s just another storytelling tool. Along with performance and shot selection and lenses and all that stuff, it’s just one more tool in the bag that’s become, obviously, increasingly more important as the technology has developed.

David Read:
We had Peter DeLuise on a few days back, and one of the things that he specifically said was, “The crew are going to know that you don’t know everything. The question is, are you going to recognize and acknowledge, in some action or behavior, that you don’t know everything?” So, that–

David Warry-Smith:
Well, no, you have to depend on– It’s a very collaborative process, particularly when you get into a lot of this technical stuff. And so you’re totally dependent on the expertise and creativity, the artistry of the technicians and the artists that you’re working with. And I try to lead that from a storytelling perspective. In the end, the decisions are all based on what’s the story you’re trying to tell, and will A, B, or C choice propel the story? Does it serve the story, or is it just something you’re doing ’cause it’s cool? Which sometimes you do anyway. But it’s mostly about supporting the story, supporting the performances. I think a big mistake that a lot of particularly young directors make is try to pretend they know what they’re talking about in a certain area, whether it’s effects or whatever, when they don’t. There’s lots of help around, and it makes a huge difference, I think, to your success if you can embrace that, but keeping an eye on it. Ultimately, the director has the sort of final say in how these things get applied, or how you do them. So, the technical nuts and bolts aren’t necessarily– It’s handy that a director knows some of that, but it’s not absolutely necessary that you understand all of it. You just have to evaluate the choices you’re being offered in terms of the story and how it serves the story.

David Read:
How much of the hard work is done in the prep? How much of it is planning, and then you execute, and you, your ADs, you handle those circumstances on the day as they come?

David Warry-Smith:
Well, most. A lot of people will tell you that it’s all done in prep, which of course is not quite true. You have to go in with a plan. So, you develop the plan in prep, and sometimes that plan changes based on circumstances, weather conditions, all kinds of things that happen in the filmmaking process. And simply, “Hey, that’s a better idea.” It’s amazing how often little problems and solutions don’t really appear or occur to a group of filmmakers until they’re actually shooting, no matter how much prep you do. Sometimes it’s like, “Hey, wait a minute. What about this? Or what about that?” And so you try to be flexible, but you’ve gotta obviously go in with a plan. And particularly now, on a show like SG-1, massive sets are being built, and a lot of technical work done ahead of time. And more and more now, people are shooting on volume walls and stuff. We didn’t do that on SG-1, didn’t really have that technology then. But all of that stuff, which, you used to shoot something outside the window, you would put in a CG element or whatever, and that would be created later. Now they’re shooting in volume walls where all of that stuff is created ahead of time so that you’re actually interacting with it. So, simple question: Yeah, tons of it is done in prep. Absolutely.

David Read:
And with the technology now, especially with tools like the Volume, a lot of the stuff you can update on the fly in real time on the day using technology like Unreal. It’s like, “Oh, you want this thing over here? We can do that in just a second”

David Warry-Smith:
No, exactly.

David Read:
“Give us a few seconds and I’ll just …”

David Warry-Smith:
Exactly.

David Read:
“… put it in.”

David Warry-Smith:
Exactly right.

David Read:
See what’s working or not.

David Warry-Smith:
Because inevitably you run into challenges or problems that have to be dealt with on set, so inevitably that kind of stuff’s gonna happen, no matter how prepared you are, for sure.

David Read:
Do you have to fight the urge for people to suggest using the new tool because it’s new and shiny, versus, “Let’s figure out what’s the most cost-effective and optimized holistically for solving the problem that we’re gonna attempt to attack?”

David Warry-Smith:
Sure. Obviously, people come in, vendors, special effects vendors, and obviously, they wanna do as much as possible. You just have to evaluate, again, whether what they’re proposing is the best way to handle a situation, the best way to support and propel the story, or not. But I think most people are– Everybody, maybe not absolutely everybody, but most people in the film business sort of at least got into it because inside of them was a filmmaker. And people want to contribute, obviously creatively, to a project, whatever project they’re on. So, you tap into that, but you make everybody a part of the decision-making. A friend of mine used to say, and I think it’s quite right, that a film set, a film company is a very collaborative place, but ultimately, it’s not a democracy. People understand that, by and large. “Hey, we could do this, we could do that.” “Yeah, but I think it’s better if we do this.” “OK, great.” And people understand that as long as you have a point of view, and sometimes you can’t even articulate it, of course. Sometimes it’s a gut emotional reaction, but ultimately, it’s up to you, as director, to provide that instinct, I guess.

David Read:
There is a reason ships have captains.

David Warry-Smith:
Exactly.

David Read:
You can’t row based on democracy, or pilot a ship, or anything. There has to be, at some point, a single entity that takes over, that everyone can lean against and trust that this mission is gonna be fulfilled.

David Warry-Smith:
And you build trust if you’re honest about the things you don’t know about, as opposed to trying to pretend. Then you build that trust, and you can depend on people’s input and their expertise. If you try to fake it, people see right through that pretty quickly, and you’ll find you have less support, ultimately.

David Read:
Certainly true. I have some images that I wanna take you through.

David Warry-Smith:
Please.

David Read:
For each of the three episodes that I want to discuss today, I selected a few of your episodes that mean a lot to me, and to fans, and the first one is one in the first season of SG-1. It was called “There But For The Grace Of God.” Daniel touches some alien piece of technology. He comes back home and everything has been switched, and he has no understanding as to why. And it’s the end of days for this place. But before we go there, we visited this planet first. Does this ring any bells to you? Do you remember this art?

David Warry-Smith:
This is from a previous episode?

David Read:
This is “There But For The Grace Of God.” This was an image created for this episode, where the Stargate was underground. There was going to be, at some point, a shot planned where Teal’c sticks his head up through this thing.

David Warry-Smith:
Yeah, yeah, and goes, “Oops.”

David Read:
And then, yeah. “Beware of the destroyers.” Yeah, thanks, guys. We will take note of this.

David Warry-Smith:
So, it’s interesting. I don’t remember seeing that. Again, it was a few weeks ago. We ended up shooting in an interesting– It was shot in Vancouver, obviously. So, it was a British Columbia hydro, like, research lab or something, this massive hydroelectric research station, I guess. So, very cool looking, and what the warning was, was rather than him opening up a hatch and seeing this destroyed world, was merely a symbol that, of course, only he understood. And I think O’Neill says, “OK, Teal’c, what the hell is that?” And he says, “We should go home right now.” So, that concept changed before I got there. I don’t recall, I mean, I could be wrong. I don’t recall being part of that discussion. I think it was, “Hey, do you wanna shoot at this place? And here’s how we’re doing it.” I was like, “Yeah, great.”

David Read:
Makes a lot of sense.

David Warry-Smith:
We used to, on Stargate, because you’re building really big sets, and they’re high-concept, a lot of this stuff. You’d have, what, 8, 10 days to prep a show. It’s not enough time to decide these things by the time you come into the city, and here’s the script, and away we go. We start having meetings and nine or whatever days later you’re shooting. So, a lot of these things had to be decided ahead of time, in what is commonly in the business called a concept meeting, which is the first time, hopefully day one, you sit down and talk about the concepts of the show and how you’re gonna handle these things. I used to call it the train-has-left-the-station meeting because, not maliciously, but just practically, so many of those decisions had to be made ahead of time, ’cause sets had to be designed and built well before a director was anywhere near the project. And the script might not even be finished, they’re early concepts. So, I don’t remember seeing that, and it took me a second to go, “Wait a minute, what am I looking at?” But in terms of–

David Read:
My apologies. It makes sense now …

David Warry-Smith:
No, no, no, it’s always good.

David Read:
… based on what you’re saying now.

David Warry-Smith:
This is fun. You don’t have to apologize. It’s an interesting story to me that I don’t remember that, don’t think I saw it. “Here’s what was come up with,” and then we carried on from there. And I think it was my very first day of filming on Stargate SG-1, which at the time was a bit of a step up. I’d done Outer Limits and some other shows, but this was a bigger-budgeted, sorta higher-profile thing at the time for me. And my very first day of filming, I think, was shooting in that location, and it was interesting. But that’s the lab they pulled into, right?

David Read:
Well, here’s the lab itself.

David Warry-Smith:
And I guess that was built– I don’t know. I forget if we built that within the facility or if you go through a door, and then you’re in there.

David Read:
There’s definitely a door, so I suspect that this was probably on set, and then you–

David Warry-Smith:
Yeah. I think it was in the studio, I’m sure.

David Read:
Yeah, and then you cut back to the larger space where they actually put the Stargates, but–

David Warry-Smith:
Exactly. Yep.

David Read:
Yeah, this is Ken Rabehl’s art, like the previous ones were.

David Warry-Smith:
Oh, yeah. Ken Rabehl. He was a very talented guy.

David Read:
Oh, man. Absolutely. And in this case, it’s actually just a stone. They didn’t–

David Warry-Smith:
Right. It became more of a frame and a mirror–

David Read:
Exactly. It had a frame.

David Warry-Smith:
That’s right. Yep.

David Read:
Not just something where the surface of the stone would disappear. It was inside of a frame. This is a cool shot.

David Warry-Smith:
I don’t remember if that was a design decision or a practical decision. I suspect it was a practical decision, in that it gives the visual effects team edges to work within, as opposed to a little more amorphous, I suppose. I’m guessing.

David Read:
I would think that I would want a really predefined area as to, “OK. This is the space that I can color in? Good.”

David Warry-Smith:
No, exactly. It helps the actors too, to know how to deal with it when they’re not actually looking at what is gonna be the end result of what the CG element’s gonna look like. It helps if they have– The more they have to work off, the better, obviously.

David Read:
That’s all the concept art I have for it. This is an episode that was the second of two–

David Warry-Smith:
That’s good.

David Read:
Wasn’t it cool?

David Warry-Smith:
It was great.

David Read:
The second of two appearances for Elizabeth Hoffman …

David Warry-Smith:
Yes.

David Read:
… who we lost within the past couple of years. I loved interviewing her and talking with her about her career. Was privileged to do it two or three times, and she loved this character, and according to Michael, she came back to this role simply because of what a good time she had shooting earlier in the season. That role really meant a lot to her, and you guys got her back for this thing. Any, at all, memories or recollections of working with her?

David Warry-Smith:
So, I didn’t do the earlier episode with her, so I can’t take any credit for …

David Read:
That was Glassner.

David Warry-Smith:
… having her so much in love with everybody that she came back. But it was a great place to work. Very collaborative, very smart people, very creative writers, producers, cast, and it became a great family. And I was very privileged to have been a part of it for a few years, and got to do the number of episodes I did. And looking back on it, I was watching some of the episodes just in the last couple of days with my daughter, who at the time was a little baby. And I guess by the end, I remembered as I was watching “Pretense” that she was, I don’t know, maybe two years old, and she came to visit on set and stuff, and a lot of this stuff came back. I hadn’t, of course, thought about a lot of this stuff. Anyway, it was a very particularly congenial group of smart people, and a great pleasure to have been a part of it. I’m not surprised that somebody like Elizabeth would jump at a chance to come back, ’cause it was rare at the time, and still is, to some extent.

David Read:
Let’s approach that for a little bit. Martin Wood and I have had a few conversations on this channel, and one of the things that he has expressed is that when he catches the show on in syndication or is prepping to come on here, and reviews the material, not only what he’s remembering or, in some cases, rediscovering that he had forgotten, or certain shots that he had done. But also, more than that, he’s remembering what was happening in his life at the time. He’ll watch and he’ll see an episode on syndication, he’s like, “My name was not in the tile at the beginning, but that is my shot. I did that shot.” And what they were doing was, if something happens, there’s a family emergency, Season Six, I think a family member had passed away. Someone had– I think it may have been a s– I’m not sure who it was. But then for half of the show–he can only see it–it’s shot with a ton of close-ups and cutaways. That’s the term, cutaways, and it’s shot completely differently. But we, as an audience, we don’t see that at all. But he does, because he remembers his headspace in this time capsule on the television screen.

David Warry-Smith:
The daughter who was watching with me, who was on the set of “Pretense” as a two-year-old or something, was actually born when I was doing Outer Limits. Long story, I won’t bore you with all the details, but they asked me to do another episode of Outer Limits. And I said, “Sure, I’d love to, but my wife and I are about to have our first baby.” So, we’re in Toronto. Now, it so happened my wife had been with me in Vancouver a lot when I’ve been working on some other shows, so she actually had a doctor there and stuff. Anyway, I remember the producer, not one of the guys who went on to be involved in Stargate, but said to me, “Well, when’s the baby due?” Well, her due date was March 24th, and I said, “Oh, she’s due on the 24th.” He said, “Well, you’re scheduled to be done the 22nd. It’s perfect. You’ll be home.” And I said, “Well–”

David Read:
Babies always come on schedule.

David Warry-Smith:
It doesn’t always work that way. So, I said, “Listen, I’d love to do the show, but I’m gonna have to bring my wife with me, and if she goes into labor, I’m leaving, you know? I gotta do that.” And they were, “Yeah, no, no problem.” Sure enough, one night we were staying in a hotel, and her water broke, and in the morning I called and said, “I’m not coming in.” Anyway, missed a couple of days of filming and then went back. So, it was a particularly poignant, memorable time for me. And so, you end up associating images that bring back stuff, watching these shows. So, I watched four of them. You had mentioned four.

David Read:
Yes.

David Warry-Smith:
And now I wish I’d started watching them sooner and watched your show a little bit more just to do a little more research.

David Read:
We’ll have you back.

David Warry-Smith:
I’ll come back. I’m gonna watch more of your shows for sure.

David Read:
Thank you.

David Warry-Smith:
It’s bringing back so many great memories. But I’m watching, and I remembered tons about “There But for the Grace of God” and “Within the Serpent’s Grasp,” and there’s some other shows, you know, we probably won’t be talking about here, “Bane” and some others, that …

David Read:
Oh, “Bane.”

David Warry-Smith:
… I remember a lot about.

David Read:
The bane of Chris’s.

David Warry-Smith:
But I didn’t remember a lot about “Pretense.” So, I’m watching, and going, “Oh, yeah. Right.” And it brought back lots of memories, my daughter being on set. But a lot of personal stuff, but also a lot of professional stuff, like discussions with the DP about how it was gonna look and, anyway, it’s just interesting that some of the shows are much more memorable and sort of meaningful for me than, as it turns out, ultimately, others.

David Read:
You’re never going to know what’s going to click the most with fans because you are a component of that process, as is the writing and the acting, the directing. It all goes together, and those things make the magic. What is not very arguable is what is considered the greatest episode of the franchise, and that is, it’s typically “Window of Opportunity,” which was a DeLuise episode from Season Four, and Peter is like, “I felt like we were having an off week that week. We were not running at our peak, and lo and behold, the episode is a time loop episode.” It is consequently under time because there’s fewer setups and everything else. And they had to shoot some off-the-wall stuff, like when Bill Murray just decides to throw hell to the wind with Groundhog Day and just starts doing anything that comes to his mind. They do that in this episode, and it turned into the greatest episode of the show as far as fans are concerned because it hits …

David Warry-Smith:
What’s it called? “Window of Opportunity?”

David Read:
… all of the emotional beats. “Window of Opportunity,” Season Four.

David Warry-Smith:
I’ll have to watch it.

David Read:
It’s exceptional because it hits all of the highs and lows of Jack. He gets to demonstrate everything, and the villain is not really a villain. It’s not that he’s misunderstood, but he can be swayed. So, it’s an excellent show, and when you’re in the thick of them, you’re getting your day in, you’re making it work, and then it goes on to post-production. You don’t know what’s going to hit and what’s gonna miss. You know the things that you had to deal with that hit and missed, but even as a director, you can’t always tell how the audience is going to perceive a piece of drama.

David Warry-Smith:
No, of course. And as an episodic director, you have your take on it, you discuss it with producers, you’re there, you work it out with the cast. You shoot it, you do your cut, and then goodbye. And depending on the show and your relationship with the producers, next time you see it, it might be completely different.

David Read:
That’s exactly right. They’ve gotta …

David Warry-Smith:
It happens.

David Read:
… trim it down to 44 minutes. Were your director’s cuts typically longer? Did you feel you had a pretty easy time hitting your mark on it?

David Warry-Smith:
There’s some directors I think want to include everything, and let the producers cut it down. I tried to give some guidance from what I felt should be cut, and certainly trim for pace. You don’t want it to wallow. So, I would try to get it down, but I wouldn’t sweat about getting it right down to time, A, because producers want to make their own decisions about some of that. And you wanna leave them something to do, ’cause they’re gonna do it anyway.

David Read:
Can’t do their job for them. That’s my point.

David Warry-Smith:
That’s why it was created. Ultimately, it’s their show. If a show was supposed to be 44 minutes, I guess I would try to get close to it, 46, 45 and a half, or something like that. But it was more about telling the best story and providing some pace, and if it was a little bit long, OK, then they can figure out what story parts, or bits they wanna cut.

David Read:
That’s it. It’s not like, “Oh, this is so good, we’re gonna fight to keep this all in.” It’s like, no, something’s eventually gonna have to go. I would also want to have my say in terms of not what I say goes, but it’s, “This is how I felt about it. This is probably an area where we could tighten here.”

David Warry-Smith:
You’re presenting your vision, and hopefully you’re on the same page as the producers. Hopefully they’re happy with what you’ve done. What you try to do is elevate something, even if it’s maybe not the world’s greatest script. You try to hook onto something in the story and make it fantastic, and hopefully they agree with you. But I think you’ve gotta present your vision as best you can, and not try to second-guess yourself or guess what they might wanna do differently. In the end, they’re gonna do what they’re gonna do. Hopefully, they agree with the director’s vision for the most part. It’s not always the case.

David Read:
Just for practical reasons, you want to get yourself in as close a step as they are anyway, because they’re going to be going a certain direction. And ideally, if you enjoyed the work experience there, you would wanna come back. If it’s another story, then that’s another story. But you wanna make the process as seamless as you can.

David Warry-Smith:
But it’s also, you’re a guest.

David Read:
I guess that comes down to prep. Yes.

David Warry-Smith:
You’re a guest. You’re still a guest, even if it’s– I was lucky enough to be on Stargate. I did a whack of episodes. You’re a very welcome, hopefully, and experienced, comfortable guest. But you’re still a guest. A friend of mine once compared the difference between directing features as opposed to television. It’s in a feature, a director is kind of the architect, but in television, and obviously this is more or less true depending on situations and personalities, but in episodic, you’re more of an interior decorator. There’s a framework in which you have to work within, and maybe you can suggest a different color paint in a room, or maybe move the furniture around, or even change some furniture, but the basic structure is the show, and it’s your job to make the most of that, make the most of what you’re given.

David Read:
It’s like you’re doing one room in a house.

David Warry-Smith:
Sure, exactly. And it’s gotta–

David Read:
And it has to fit into a larger–

David Warry-Smith:
It can’t stick out like a sore thumb and be so completely different from the other rooms that it doesn’t make sense, and yet, you wanna put your own stamp on it too. It’s all about understanding the show, understanding the producers’ vision, what the show is about, what they’re trying to achieve, what’s worked in the past, and then trying to bring your own sensibility, and passion, and vision, all words which are way overused, but, they’re apt.

David Read:
They are indeed. This episode was so intense the first time that I saw it.

David Warry-Smith:
Which one? What are you talking about?

David Read:
“There Before the Grace of God.” And it’s, the world is coming undone, and it’s one of the darker episodes that the show did, if not the darkest. There’s some that are pretty far down there, and Michael lends an extraordinary performance, as does every other member of the cast who are switched around.

David Warry-Smith:
It’s cool.

David Read:
Michael’s really the anchor.

David Warry-Smith:
It was really cool, ’cause that was my first episode, and in many ways, I think it remains my favorite. Just because it was a terrific script, terrific idea. I loved where we were shooting, the way it all worked, and Elizabeth Hoffman, and whoever else was– It just was a pleasure, and the fact that there was a real ticking clock in the story, there’s real jeopardy, and it was one of the great things about science fiction, and I’ve done a bunch of it, is that you can deal with some of these themes that, in a real-world kinda story, could easily be cheesy or corny, and yet you’re dealing with– In one of– I’m sure you’ll remember which episode it is. We were talking about the meaning of life, and it’s …

David Read:
The next one.

David Warry-Smith:
… really part of what– You can get into that stuff in science fiction, that those sort of themes are so much more accessible, I think, and believable, within a science fiction milieu than they might be otherwise. You can do it with some really cool shit. It’s the end of the world.

David Read:
That’s it.

David Warry-Smith:
It’s the end of the world.

David Read:
Let’s go a little bit–

David Warry-Smith:
In that reality that Daniel goes into and comes out of, it is the end of that world.

David Read:
It is.

David Warry-Smith:
It’s not the very end of the episode. It’s funny, I forgot. I remembered, ’cause it was on my demo reel for a while. I thought the very end of the episode was this crane shot we do when Teal’c comes into the Gate room and the whole thing blows up. Boom, and it just kind of went to white, and there was some great music. But of course, there’s a little denouement after that where Daniel comes safely through the Gate, and, “They’re after us …”

David Read:
They’re coming.

David Warry-Smith:
… or whatever he says.

David Read:
“They’re coming.”

David Warry-Smith:
“They’re coming,” exactly.

David Read:
I’m getting chills again. It hits so hard. He’s just gotten hit with a plasma blast, for crying out loud, but–

David Warry-Smith:
That’s right.

David Read:
I wanna go a little bit more optimistic in this direction here. So, this may be concept art you’ve seen, this may not be, so let’s find out. This is certainly the opening …

David Warry-Smith:
There you go.

David Read:
… of this show. This is “The Fifth Race.”

David Warry-Smith:
Sure. They go into the room where it’s like, “OK, let’s get out of here, ’cause there’s nothing here.”

David Read:
Walls are solid.

David Warry-Smith:
Yup, that’s right. Knock, knock. Exactly. It’s funny, watching it I realized, this is the one where O’Neill walks through the circle and then that circle on the wall comes alive, and watching it now, I go, “Why the hell didn’t anybody notice that circle before?”

David Read:
Exactly.

David Warry-Smith:
It seems obvious, but then–

David Read:
Whoops. I went a little too far ahead. I didn’t have the one that I expected to have, but it transforms into something else here. This is not the one that ended up being in the episode, but …

David Warry-Smith:
It grabs his head.

David Read:
… it grabs his head, and he doesn’t have the best of a time. I guess this original concept here was it scans Teal’c and then it quits, and then Jack comes and checks out and it snaps him. Whereas everything really happens all in one go, basically, for Jack. But this is far more complicated than what ultimately went on. And yet, at the same time, it still gets the point across.

David Warry-Smith:
You’re saying the concept art is more complicated than what happened? Is that what you mean?

David Read:
It’s extraordinary, I know. Yes. No, you weren’t being facetious, I was. Yes, it is. There was the thing on the wall, and then it transformed once and then it transformed again.

David Warry-Smith:
It shoots out and grabs him.

David Read:
Exactly. It was …

David Warry-Smith:
Part of that was probably–

David Read:
… like a three-stage– But this thing has an arm and a claw, and a whole thing, so.

David Warry-Smith:
And nowadays, it’ll probably be closer to that. I think what happened in the end was effective, worked great, but–

David Read:
Amazing.

David Warry-Smith:
But the ability to do all of that that’s in all of those frames in the drawings is obviously greater now. I mean, 25 whatever years later, it would probably be closer to that. But that doesn’t take away from, I think, the effectiveness of what was done. It worked great. Thing came out great.

David Read:
And that’s it. That’s exactly right.

David Warry-Smith:
Put all that alien knowledge into his head.

David Read:
The effectiveness of the shot, and the conveying the message to the audience, and at the same time making them go, “Whoa.” If you’ve achieved that, it’s done its job. So, I’ve had a lot of similar conversations with folks who watch the show in different languages. There’s different chestnuts that I go back to about different phrases that O’Neill says in one episode in one language, and then it’s translated into another in another language. And the common thread is the feeling that you get afterwards has to be the same. The circumstances may be a little bit different, but one person’s not gonna laugh at one thing and then go, “Oh” at the other. It’s all designed to leave you with the same feeling. Because there’s only a little bit of overlap between languages.

David Warry-Smith:
I still say it’s funny. I haven’t seen that episode for a long time, but I still occasionally, at least in my mind, there’s nobody to say it to anymore who really would get it except a Stargate nerd—I use the term lovingly—like yourself. Somebody who’s a real fan of the show, but I still say, “Something just popped into my fron.” Which is what–

David Read:
You have no idea how common that is among fandom. I have a friend who says it all the time, “There is nothing cruvis with me.”

David Warry-Smith:
Exactly. Cruvis? And I forgot how wonderful it is. I laughed so much at the wonderful otherworldliness of Teal’c. And Chris Judge’s, “I do not understand, O’Neill.” It was fantastic. I forgot all about that. I say that a lot, …

David Read:
“Are we preparing to dance or do battle?”

David Warry-Smith:
“… it just popped into my fron.” And my wife, “What? What are you talking about?”

David Read:
Trust me, it’s Ancient.

David Warry-Smith:
Yes. Alien knowledge in my head.

David Read:
That’s it. So, this was a CG render. I’m trying to remember if this was Craig Van Den Biggelaar or Kent Matheson. Obviously, they’re much more horrifying than the Asgard.

David Warry-Smith:
It looks like Nazis. Is that supposed to be O’Neill in the foreground?

David Read:
It’s supposed to be O’Neill, yeah.

David Warry-Smith:
He looks like an SS guard, if you don’t mind me saying.

David Read:
They go with what they have.

David Warry-Smith:
Anyway.

David Read:
But this was the basic space.

David Warry-Smith:
It was one of the coolest episodes, story-wise, theme-wise. And I think, as I recall, we had one little animatronic …

David Read:
Puppet.

David Warry-Smith:
… Asgard guy. And the rest were duplicated, obviously. But I know we had at least one. Maybe we had two? I think just one. There was a scene where there’s two–

David Read:
I think there was just one, and they’re side-by-side, and I think that they were doubled in those shots.

David Warry-Smith:
No, they were just duplicated.

David Read:
‘Cause one looks like the other.

David Warry-Smith:
The whole concept of “The Fifth Race” and we are the fifth race. The end, it was very hopeful. “Yeah, well, I got a feeling we might be okay here.” Whatever he says at the end.

David Read:
Exactly.

David Warry-Smith:
It’s great, fantastic. Ah! Ugh! Ugh! I’m not sure that’s true this week.

David Read:
No, I’m getting chills because–

David Warry-Smith:
I don’t feel the same.

David Read:
Humans are going to human. There’s always going to be something. The franchise ends with Thor telling us, “You are the fifth race.” It’s not just, “You’re hopefully going to be it.” Before they push the button …

David Warry-Smith:
No, you made it.

David Read:
… and wipe out their whole civilization right in front of us. And that began with this episode. When the show really hit on the meaning of life stuff and the purpose of why we were created, which is one of these– One of their allies created us, it turned out. And it’s just– Obviously, it’s fiction, but it makes you think about the broader context of who you are and where you are, the things that …

David Warry-Smith:
I know, exactly.

David Read:
… the things that happen in your life. And what are you going to get up and do today, you Fifth Racer? So, yeah.

David Warry-Smith:
That’s what I mean about science fiction being able to get at those kinds of themes and lead you to those kinds of thoughts. It’s more difficult in a contemporary setting, I think. It’s one of the great things I loved about science fiction and this show in particular. I think SG-1 did it as well if not better than just about anybody, and really fantastic stories. Meaningful. I don’t wanna put too heavy a label on it but thought-provoking, for sure.

David Read:
This episode really does hang on this final scene here. And Rick is, in my opinion, never better. He certainly does work that is right there as well. But he is interacting for the first time with the puppet, which ultimately becomes, according to him, his favorite character to act opposite of, to be perfectly honest with you, because he’s so easy to work with. To this day on stage, when people ask him at conventions, “Who’s your favorite character?” he’ll always go through that same loop. “Who’s the little alien guy? What was his name? What is his name? Thor? Thor. Thor. He’s so fun to act with.” Any memories of the puppet acting up, or did everything do what it was supposed to do? This was a puppet that was taken, I believe, from Outer Limits, and …

David Warry-Smith:
Maybe. I don’t–

David Read:
… adjusted a little bit, probably to make him friendlier.

David Warry-Smith:
Yeah, Outer Limits puppet probably would have a little more evil in him. I don’t remember anything bad, weird, particularly challenging. I remember it as just a lot of fun. On that episode, the thing that comes out and grabs him broke somehow, like in filming, and it was like somebody just dropped the Ming vase. It was like, “Oh my God, what are we gonna do now?” It’s like this fiberglass piece that had been built, and I think there was only one of them.

David Read:
One is none in the props department.

David Warry-Smith:
Exactly. Anyway, and I forget what happened. We shot something else and they rebuilt it and we came back next day or something. But in terms of the puppet itself, it was a challenge ’cause it was little, some of those filmmaking challenges, but I don’t remember there being any difficulty with it. My memory is that it went very well.

David Read:
Is Rick the consummate professional? Is he easy to work with? And how often does the producer element have to factor in? Because he has the ability to, to a certain degree, adjust the dialogue in some cases. As an executive producer, he has a higher level of–

David Warry-Smith:
Input.

David Read:
Status isn’t the word that I want, but input.

David Warry-Smith:
Input.

David Read:
Exactly.

David Warry-Smith:
For sure. So, you do this on lots of shows, you have a read-through. And then some shows, it’s kind of a waste of time, quite frankly. Although, it depends. Depends on personalities, depends on the show. In other shows, it’s an absolute must. And it was a really good thing to do on Stargate because all the cast, the main cast got a moment to say, “Hey, what about this? What about that?” And the writers were, I mean, it was all very collaborative and very much a team sport. And so they would take that into advisement. Obviously, Richard had a little bit more say than others, but he didn’t flaunt that. And I don’t remember there being moments on set where a lot had to be changed. Certainly he had the ability if a problem arose, a situation, whatever, because of practical concerns or creative ones, where he could help. But there’s always also one of the writers around, everybody’s very accessible. And I got along great. I think if you didn’t get along very well with Richard Dean Anderson, you wouldn’t be asked back, which, great. That’s the way it should be. But I had the good luck to have worked with Ricky Dean Anderson on three separate projects. I was an assistant director on MacGyver, a couple of episodes of MacGyver when it first moved to Vancouver. So, that’s where I first met him. And then he came to Toronto, and he was a lead on a TV movie that I was also the assistant director on. And so we already had history by the time, and a good history. We liked each other, I think.

David Read:
Was that TV movie Pandora’s Clock by any chance?

David Warry-Smith:
No. It might have– I’d have to look at it. It might be In the Eyes of a Stranger, maybe.

David Read:
OK. OK. Because that was how I really got hooked on Rick, ’cause I wasn’t that big a MacGyver fan. But I just had to ask. I was like, “Wait a second. Were you in that?”

David Warry-Smith:
No, no, I’ll have to look up. It was stupidly, but I– Something like In the Eyes of a Stranger, Justine Bateman and Richard Dean Anderson. Directed by Michael Uno. Shot in Toronto a million years ago. Anyway, by the time it came to Stargate, we’d already spent time together and worked together. And we had a similar sensibility, and again, everybody in the cast was a pleasure to work with, great professionals. And Richard, always prepared, knew what he was about, knew his lines, came in in a good mood. It was a pleasure to work with.

David Read:
All right.

David Warry-Smith:
So, everybody was really–

David Read:
Antony– I’ve got some fan questions for you here. Antony says, “When you were shooting “The Fifth Race,” did you get the feeling that this was going to be a big episode for fandom?” ‘Cause it’s certainly in the top three or four for most Stargate fans. Did you get that feeling through the script or the dialogue or and anything to the opposite of what Peter said, like, “We weren’t feeling it that week, and it was a surprise to us.”

David Warry-Smith:
No. I would just phrase it differently ’cause I– But the answer is yes, that my feeling at the time, and I think generally the feeling was that this was– Not that they’re not all important, and again, I hate to use that word, overused, but that it was a particularly interesting, poignant, important episode, well-written, and big themes. And so, no, certainly at the time, I thought, yeah, that this was a good one. There’s a couple of others, and I won’t name them necessarily. One, maybe two others that are, eh. And the trick for an episodic director is to get past the eh feeling and find some passion in it, and something you really wanna hang your hat on and get you involved in the story and do your best work. And sometimes that’s just a bit more of a challenge than others. And there’s a couple of episodes that I was less enthused about. But again, you’re a pro and you try to do your best. And again, try to find something in it, some part of the story, something that you really wanna tell. But “The Fifth Race,” and certainly “There But for the Grace of God” were two examples of ones that were, these are terrific from the beginning. I was very excited to be a part of it and felt that they were gonna do well, for sure.

David Read:
That’s the thing. These were back in the day of the first seven seasons of the show, 22-episode seasons. They were episodic/serialized, but certainly more episodic than they were serial, whereas now, you know, 8, 10, 12-episode seasons is the norm. And every one of them has to be bangers because typically they’re– It’s a specific single story, often, in cases, and it’s–

David Warry-Smith:
No, no, for sure. But it’s funny–

David Read:
There are positives and negatives to that in terms of the volume of content.

David Warry-Smith:
I actually forgot, stupidly, ’cause again, it’s been a number of years, but that …

David Read:
It’s all right.

David Warry-Smith:
… how much was serialized, how much some of the scripts, not all of them, but some of them depended on what had happened before. And it’s referenced. “Hey, we were just in that other place, and this happened, and that’s why we’re doing this.” And I forgot about that element. And it’s tough. There’s not many shows anymore that are 22 episodes. That used to be the norm. It’s still the norm on some of the classic network CBS kind of shows. But I think, in many ways, SG-1 was one of the few examples of a series that went 10 seasons, or however many episodes–

David Read:
344 total, but it’s–

David Warry-Smith:
There you go, a gross.

David Read:
Yeah, exactly.

David Warry-Smith:
A grocery show. They continued to be relevant and interesting and dramatic, funny, lots of humor in them. But just really well-made shows with that volume was really high. And one of the reasons I think in the last number of years we’ve seen particularly great television is ’cause that burden’s been taken away. On a lot of them, you don’t have to do 22 episodes. It’s 6, 8, 10, and then that’s the end of the season. And so it’s easier to keep up that quality than when you’re doing 22. And so again, hats off to everybody that was involved in SG-1 for keeping up the quality for that many shows. That’s a real credit to the writers and producers, everybody involved.

David Read:
And why it’s coming back, and why they haven’t changed out the mythology or the overall universe, why it’s gonna be maintained is because they created something that people to this day are recognizing is of value. And it’s only been back on Netflix for a couple of weeks now, and within the first week, it had already risen to the Netflix top 10, so something works.

David Warry-Smith:
It’s a great show. There you go. It doesn’t fade.

David Read:
Absolutely. It does not. It evolves with our time, and we see it through a little bit of a slightly different lens, or in some cases, some of the same ones that teleport us back. Lockwatcher wanted to know– And I’m gonna pull you out of the ones that we were gonna talk about. Michael Shanks did an aging makeup. They brought up someone special from LA for him, for Ma’chello, in “Holiday.”

David Warry-Smith:
Sure. That was great.

David Read:
And the first time that I watched it, I didn’t know it was him. I had no idea. It was such an extraordinary transformation. He’s standing there going, “I’m Daniel Jackson.” I don’t see a man. What did he say? Here, where is it? Where did I go? I lost it. Lockwatcher asked, any memories of directing Michael Shanks in that show, where he’s playing opposite himself.

David Warry-Smith:
I’m kicking myself for not taking the time to watch all my episodes even more, because yeah, I remember very clearly, Mar’chello, Ma’chello? Ma’chello.

David Read:
Ma’chello.

David Warry-Smith:
And Daniel playing him. I mean, Daniel– Michael Shanks. I mean, they’re all–

David Read:
Where does one end and the other begin?

David Warry-Smith:
Exactly. All the cast is particularly really great, talented cast. He, of course, I think, and again, I’d have to delve into everybody’s background, but he’s a classically-trained actor. I saw him doing Shakespeare, Merchant of Venice, maybe, or something, years ago–

David Read:
He did Hamlet between Seasons Two and Three.

David Warry-Smith:
But it wasn’t Hamlet I saw. I think it was The Merchant of Venice, way back when at the Stratford Festival here in Ontario. Anyway, he’s a guy who just comes with those chops of real deep acting ability. And I can’t say a lot about that show because it was so long ago and I didn’t review it. I’m sorry.

David Read:
My apologies.

David Warry-Smith:
Not Lockjaw. Sorry, what’s his– I’m sorry. I apologize. Lockstep, someone–

David Read:
Lockwatcher.

David Warry-Smith:
Lockwatcher.

David Read:
I mean, he’s one of my mods. I’m gonna start calling him Lockjaw. Fantastic. Thank you, David.

David Warry-Smith:
I apologize.

David Read:
Oh, that’s great.

David Warry-Smith:
Whoever you may be. Lockwatcher. Sorry.

David Read:
That’s awesome. Do you have 20 more minutes? Are we good? Or do you need to get going?

David Warry-Smith:
No, I’m good.

David Read:
I won’t keep you longer.

David Warry-Smith:
I won’t be there an hour. No, I’m good.

David Read:
I know. One hour with me. This is the last one that I wanted to cover today. This was my favorite episode for a long time. This was “Pretense.”

David Warry-Smith:
“Pretense.”

David Read:
Evidently called Sanctuary here, according to Brent and Herron’s note.

David Warry-Smith:
That’s right.

David Read:
The Tollan invitation device at the beginning. Then this later became a Tollan phaser. They just took out the middle.

David Warry-Smith:
I don’t remember details about that design. I remember that item, that object, that prop. And it was called Sanctuary. I think that makes sense because, obviously, my final cut of things, it’s called “Pretense,” but I forgot that. There’s still tapes, VHS tapes somewhere in a box that say Sanctuary. I think that’s right. Is there a particular question about it, or are you just going–

David Read:
I wanted to know if you have any memories of Garwin Sanford as Narim. This is his second episode back. We have an extraordinary performance by both Marie Stillin, that’s it, and I think, is it Kevin Durand? Kevin Durand played Zipacna. Oh, man.

David Warry-Smith:
Isn’t Kevin Durand a basketball player?

David Read:
Is it? He may be.

David Warry-Smith:
All right, Different guy. I’m just–

David Read:
Canadian actor, and the Chiquita banana, Carmen Miranda hat that he’s got, magnificent …

David Warry-Smith:
When he first comes in, he had a hat.

David Read:
… when he walks into the room …

David Warry-Smith:
I totally forgot that.

David Read:
… and proceeds to walk around with it. I love the shot that you have from above.

David Warry-Smith:
And then he loses it, actually. He doesn’t wear that hat the whole time.

David Read:
Yes. That’s correct. It’s his arrival hat. But I love the shot that you have from above of Skaara in the middle, and then the three seats with the Nox and then the humans and the Goa’uld. That was one of the coolest shots from the show, I thought.

David Warry-Smith:
Thank you.

David Read:
We don’t see a lot of shots like that in this series that’s directly above, like hanging from the ceiling.

David Warry-Smith:
It’s funny, ’cause this is the show that I remember the least about.

David Read:
Did you re-watch it before this?

David Warry-Smith:
Yeah, I did. I watched it earlier today. And I’m like, “Oh, yeah, right.” Because– “Pretense,” too, I was like, “What, which one was that? What was that about?” And if it …

David Read:
Simon Fraser University one.

David Warry-Smith:
… still called Sanctuary, I might have remembered more. But anyway, as I’m watching it, I’m going– It started to come back, whereas some of the other episodes I remembered more of without prompting. And that one, there were some technical challenges that the gun, is it a Tollan gun? Which–

David Read:
The ion cannon.

David Warry-Smith:
The ion cannon was essentially a two-dimensional cutout, as I recall. And I was told, “Oh, yeah, you know, you can’t come around this side, because then we’ll have– You have to make a whole CG thing.” But it would have been really difficult to shoot as a two-dimensional thing. It would have been like proscenium, like two-dimensional. Line them up against a wall and shoot them, and it just didn’t suit it. So, I think I got in some trouble with some of the producers for breaking that rule where I couldn’t go around the corner and see the ends of it, ’cause I felt it needed it, it had to.

David Read:
This is the deus ex machina in the show. This is the thing that finally puts the Goa’uld in orbit out of their misery. The thing that …

David Warry-Smith:
That’s right.

David Read:
… I was looking forward to, in hearing the conversation, the Tollan build their own Stargate, and …

David Warry-Smith:
That’s right.

David Read:
… here it is. This is far more awesome. I forget which crew member this is; I don’t know if it’s Bill Mizel or– I keep forgetting who that is, but–

David Warry-Smith:
I don’t know.

David Read:
This is the original Tollan Stargate, and then this is it integrated into Simon Fraser University.

David Warry-Smith:
Simon Fraser, which is great.

David Read:
It’s a beautiful location. I’ve been. We get it in one shot, where it’s panning, and they have to match it shot frame-for-frame, and that’s the only time that we ever see it.

David Warry-Smith:
They’re coming out of it. It’s a pan as they’re coming out of it and walking away from it, as I recall.

David Read:
Yes. Those are two different shots, but yes. It works. You get the job done, but we don’t really get to enjoy the fact that, wow, there’s another civilization that’s actually built their own Stargate. No one had done that before, or I don’t think since.

David Warry-Smith:
No, and I think story-wise, as I was watching it today and thinking, there’s perhaps a missed opportunity there, and maybe it gets dealt with in later episodes. But the fact that these beings did that, built their own, maybe should have been a bigger deal.

David Read:
They got help with one of our off-world allies in creating it, but it’s one of those cool little pieces. I have a few other pieces here. These were the flags that were in the–

David Warry-Smith:
In the courtroom, sort of, whatever?

David Read:
In the waiting rooms where they were waiting during the triad, the Nox, and then, of course, Earth.

David Warry-Smith:
That’s right, Earth. Of course.

David Read:
So, it’s stylistic.

David Warry-Smith:
Very much so. Richard Hudolin was the …

David Read:
Richard Hudolin.

David Warry-Smith:
… production designer, very talented guy, and his team, Bridget McGuire and Ken, I forget Ken’s last name.

David Read:
Ken Rabehl.

David Warry-Smith:
Ken Rabehl, lot of concept art and stuff. Really great team. The art department’s always a cool place to hang out …

David Read:
It is.

David Warry-Smith:
… with a lot of these shows, full of neat stuff, neat people.

David Read:
I would always be going back between, especially in these earlier seasons, like, “I wanna create everything. I wanna see it all visualized. Oh, we can only do 10% of that? Oh.” And have my tail tucked between my legs and, “OK, I can do that.” It’s like, “Ah!” And now they can produce anything that they want as long as they have enough time to pull it off. There’s so few limits now. Has that been an extraordinary thing to watch rise?

David Warry-Smith:
It’s been incremental. And some of it, too, is like, you’d still have some of those concepts early on, like 20 years ago, but the delivery was, at the time, you go, “Hey, this is great.” And now you look back on it and you go, “It doesn’t look so good anymore. It doesn’t hold up.” But it’s one of the great things about, you know, SG-1, too, is that, you know, most of that stuff that I’ve reseen in the last few days, you know, does stand up. It looks great. And you can’t always say that. I worked on some other stuff that you look back and go, “Ooh.” You know, cringe a little bit, but that was the technology at the time, or the technology that the budget allowed, anyway.

David Read:
Look, you work with what you have.

David Warry-Smith:
Exactly. But kudos to all those, whoever was doing the visual effects, and the initial creative design, Richard Hudolin and his team, and John Gajdecki, maybe, was doing—

David Read:
I think John Gajdecki may have still been involved. Kent Matheson was working on the show at that point. Image Engine had a hand with Craig Van Den Biggelaar. There were definitely a few folks.

David Warry-Smith:
For sure. It’s always a big team of people.

David Read:
Absolutely.

David Warry-Smith:
Were you involved in the show at all, or were you just a fan? I’ve should have asked this before. Sorry?

David Read:
I’m a reporter.

David Warry-Smith:
Nice.

David Read:
But I started up around Season Six. So, I was 14 when the show first started.

David Warry-Smith:
Fantastic.

David Read:
No, it’s been one of the loves of my life. Hannnahh-k wanted to know if you had any memories shooting on the campus there. Simon Fraser University is modern, and the mountains, the view, It’s just gorgeous. One of the prettiest locations to shoot.

David Warry-Smith:
I’m gonna tell you my feelings about Simon Fraser. I’d heard about Simon Fraser University for a long time, designed by Arthur Erickson, one of Canada’s preeminent architects, and it’s built on top of Burnaby Mountain. I think it’s called Burnaby Mountain in Burnaby, BC, just outside of Vancouver. And first, one of the early times, probably when I was doing MacGyver, I thought, “I’m gonna go see this.” And I drove there and got up there, and I was actually disappointed because they built this very interesting modern concrete campus on top of this mountain, but you can’t see anything. You can’t see; it wasn’t built above the trees. I was really disappointed. I thought it was gonna be this architectural masterpiece that looks out over the whole Fraser Valley and the Burrard Inlet and Vancouver, and you could see across to Vancouver Island and the mountains, but I felt hemmed in by the trees. So, a lot of what you’re seeing there, you can’t see past the campus much.

David Read:
This is fake, but there are no mountains and–

David Warry-Smith:
Some of it’s fake. But my recollection was that mostly what you see is trees. And listen, I love trees, but it seemed like you wanna go on top of a mountain so you could have built this at the bottom of a valley. It looked the same. And it was a great place to shoot a science fiction show ’cause it looked otherworldly. And I suppose for our purposes, the fact that it was kind of ensconced in the trees, albeit on top of a mountain, was– I think a lot of that’s fake.

David Read:
Yep. So, these are fake here and then this–

David Warry-Smith:
And I think everything beyond it, the actual mount– I don’t think you can see– Maybe you can.

David Read:
That’s their mountain. This is a later episode, though. And this is the roof of one of the buildings.

David Warry-Smith:
For sure. So, maybe I never got up that high, I suppose, but my memory was that you’re looking at a wall of trees. Anyway. Doesn’t matter. It was a great place to shoot that episode for sure.

David Read:
This is true. All right, David, this has been a treat. Truly, I really appreciate all the time that you’ve taken with us today. I know that we’re really reaching back here. Jackslaw2.0 asked an interesting question, one of the ones that I wanted to leave you with. He asks, “Most of us are old enough to still see ourselves in a strange way built by our jobs. If you could trade that all back and go back to another career, what would it be? Would it still be in this industry or would it be something a little different?” Or, do you really feel like you’re the luckiest guy in the world in getting to do what you’ve done over your career?

David Warry-Smith:
Before I decided I wanted to get in the film business, and I’ve heard this from other people in the film business too, what I wanted to be first, after a cop or a fireman when you’re a little kid. When you first start seriously thinking about it, when you’re a young teenager or whatever, I wanted to be an architect. And then I found out it involved a lot of math–

David Read:
This is true.

David Warry-Smith:
So, that kinda, forget it. Anyway, the next thing I wanted to do was be in the film industry. And I might make some different choices about how I handled the choices I made within the industry, looking back on it. But I’ve had a wonderfully fun career. I’ve got to travel the world telling stories. Still doing it, more or less. And people say to me, “Are you gonna retire?” And it’s like, “Well, I don’t know that I want to retire. I don’t know that I need to.” I sometimes have months off. It’s not like I work in a factory every day, you know? I’m happy to be doing this for as long as they’ll have me, I think. Slowing down and getting a little more selective about projects I’m involved in. But no, I’m very pleased with my choice of the film business. And yes, I feel like I’ve been very lucky. Like Orson Welles said, “Directing–” I mean, he’s talking about feature films, but nevertheless very similar, you know. “Being a director is like having the best train set a boy ever had.” You get to make stuff up, tell stories. It’s great.

David Read:
For sure. I completely agree. That’s a great one. I hope to have you back later this year to talk about more of your shows. This is wonderful.

David Warry-Smith:
I’d be delighted. It was a pleasure to look back on the shows and think about it, and going back down memory lane, revisiting all that stuff and thinking about the strength of the show. It’s been a pleasure, so thank you. And I’d be happy to come back again.

David Read:
Is there anything you wanna shout out? Anything that we need to keep our ear to the ground for? I’ve got your websites in the description below so folks can check out.

David Warry-Smith:
No. Nothing particular at the moment. Got many cooking on many fronts. We’ll see what develops. But nothing particular to shout out at the moment. But thank you. Next time, hopefully, I’ll have something more to say on that.

David Read:
Would you stop beating– OK. I was about– You were about to say, “Next time I’ll be more prepared.” I was like, “No, this is great!” No, this was wonderful. I really appreciate the time that you’ve given us. And absolutely looking forward to talking with you about future projects, so thank you again for your time, sir.

David Warry-Smith:
Keep in touch, David.

David Read:
I’m gonna go ahead and wrap up the show on this end. I will do that. You be well, sir.

David Warry-Smith:
Thanks a lot. You too.

David Read:
Bye-bye.

David Warry-Smith:
Bye.

David Read:
David Warry-Smith, director, Stargate SG-1 and Stargate Atlantis. My name is David Read. You’re watching The Stargate Oral History Project. If you enjoy Dial the Gate and you wanna see more content like this on the YouTube channel, go ahead and click that Like button if you can. It would make a big difference with the show and continue to help us grow our audience. If you enjoyed the content that you saw, leave a comment and express something about it. That really does, at this stage, make the biggest difference. And if you wanna get notified about future episodes, click Subscribe. And please share this video with a Stargate friend if you think that they would enjoy the episode. And clips from this livestream will be released over the course of the next few weeks on both the Dial the Gate and gateworld.net YouTube channels. We’ve got some pre-recorded shows heading your way later on this week, and we’ve got a couple of live shows that are in development as well. Getting everything straightened out. Casting Director Paul Weber is gonna be heading your way in about 10 days. Pierre Bernard is going to be returning to us. He was O’Brien in Stargate SG-1 Season 8’s “Zero Hour” and in “200,” and I’m interested to get his take on the new Stargate TV series. And we’ve got a sit-down with Richard Hudolin, Bridget McGuire, and Douglas McLean, Stargate production designers and one of the art directors, respectively. That’s all heading your way on The Stargate Oral History Project. A lot of things happening in Stargate lately. There’s a lot afoot and fans are gonna be really thrilled with a lot of the developments. So, keep it on Dial the Gate for all of that information. For some of it, and GateWorld for a lot of it. Let’s be honest. We look back, they look forward. My name is David Read. I appreciate you tuning in, and I will see you on the other side. That’s the wrong button.