We’ve never been shy about Rick Worthy being one of our favorite guest stars in the entire Stargate pantheon. We welcome him back to our show to share more of himself from his life and career!

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TRANSCRIPT
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David Read:
Welcome to Dial the Gate: The Stargate Oral History Project. My name is David Read, if you don’t know that by now. Rick Worthy, Kytano, Imhotep, on Stargate SG-1, joined me for a pre-recorded interview. I am AFK for three weeks and I wanted to be able to continue to share with you guys while I’m gone, because everything that you guys have been helping me do with the show means so much. We have not had him on in 350 episodes and this is on me. I apologize. I’m not gonna hold out on him any longer. Let’s bring in Rick Worthy. Let’s catch up with this amazing guy. Rick Worthy, Kytano, Imhotep on Stargate SG-1. Sir, it is a crime that I have not had you back on before now. How are you? How is your world? The last time we were together was 2020 or 2021. How are you?

Rick Worthy:
Man, first, thank you for having me back. I love you, number one. I think you’re a wonderful, wonderful person and really totally genuine and from the heart. Believe me, man, those are the people I like to talk to. I remember that year, I learned how to Zoom and I learned how to reach out to people. At some point you’re like, “OK, this is now my 90th Zoom.” And for you, add a zero to that probably.

David Read:
Man. It was so funny to watch a whole legion of a certain people who do a certain kinda work all say, “Oh, yeah, I’m not technically savvy at all. I can’t push the power button on my computer.” “Do you know how to Zoom?” “Oh, yeah, I’ve got that.” ‘Cause they had no choice!

Rick Worthy:
Exactly.

David Read:
It’s do or die.

Rick Worthy:
It’s literally do or die.

David Read:
Jesus.

Rick Worthy:
I had an ex-girlfriend, she said, “Look, you gotta learn how to do this stuff. You have to learn how to Zoom. You gotta learn how to put yourself on tape. You gotta be your own sound person,” everything, and get it down. I took her advice and went on Amazon and ordered all the stuff I needed. Like everyone, I learned how to use the technology.

David Read:
Can you go personal with me for a little bit?

Rick Worthy:
Yeah.

David Read:
We just had Mother’s Day last weekend. Who’s mom to you, besides Mom?

Rick Worthy:
She’s 20 feet away from here.

David Read:
Let’s be careful what we say.

Rick Worthy:
I’ve said this in other interviews as well, I’m an actor because of her. When I was a kid, she fully encouraged me and my brother to be creative and taught us how to dance back in the early ’70s. I always tell people, “We were moonwalking before Michael Jackson was.” We were so young, man. We were five years old, six years old, when my mom made our costumes for us, taught us how to dance, and then she put us in talent shows at school, and we were winning. We were winning these series of competitions. I just remember she was determined to make sure that we were the best that we could be. I think that’s always stayed with me in terms of any creative thing that I do. Really almost anything I do, I wanna take it to the highest level that I can. You don’t show it to anyone until it’s right. That’s the sort of thing she put in me.

David Read:
Wow. What is her creative source?

Rick Worthy:
You know what? I don’t know. She’s not originally from Detroit, Motown, but that’s how I know my mom, because that’s where I was born and my brother. I grew up there. So, we had the Motown influence of all these amazing groups and that legacy.

David Read:
Diana Ross, Temptations…

Rick Worthy:
All of them.

David Read:
The list goes on and on.

Rick Worthy:
It goes on and on. My mom and dad were high schoolers when the Temptations were… They were all around the same age. They were certainly influenced by them and all the other many groups that a lot of people don’t know about. So, I think that’s probably a good source of inspiration for her and maybe him too.

David Read:
I gotta be honest with you. My mother, who will be listening to this, she’ll be the first to say that she was like, “Get a life, son.” “It’s fine that you do this, but you can’t do this for work.” She still doesn’t understand it to this day, but she supports me. Having parents who believe in you, it is so easy, Rick, to take that for granted. We need it more than we think that we do. When it’s gone or when we didn’t have it to begin with, that’s just sad.

Rick Worthy:
Exactly.

David Read:
For creative people who have that drip that they can’t shut off, it’s a double-edged sword. There are gifts there and there can be depression. There can be aimless, rudderless wandering trying to figure out what it is that you want. So, to have a parent in your corner, it’s important.

Rick Worthy:
Cheers to that because I totally 100% agree. The neighborhood we grew up in, all the kids wanted to be basketball stars. I’m not hating on that, but I wasn’t any good at sports. I stayed in my room and read Spider-Man and watched Star Trek. I knew that I was interested in science and superheroes and whatever was out there in outer space, and Bruce Lee.

David Read:
Wow. Bruce Lee is a class of his own. My goodness. Your Taekwondo background.

Rick Worthy:
He was my superhero. I knew that football and basketball and baseball and all that stuff was great, but it wasn’t what I liked. I wanted to do something else in another galaxy or something, man, or crawl up the wall like Spider-Man. I wanted to be something different and I think that she fully encouraged that creative spark. My dad was a little bit more cautious, though. He was a little bit more like, “Ugh.”

David Read:
More pragmatic. You always got one of those. I have a number of young ones who watch. In a world today where we’re saturated by all kinds of stuff, what do you recommend for kids to really maintain their true north and orient themselves creatively? What do you suggest that they do to filter out the noise and go for something that they want rather than shrouding themselves in vagueness and not doing anything at all? It’s so easy to just coast. If they have a creative spirit, if they have a drive to turn something from nothing, what do you suggest?

Rick Worthy:
Man, that’s an excellent question.

David Read:
OK, let me put it from your perspective here. Reading Spider-Man, watching Bruce Lee, watching Kirk and Spock, how did you find your way?

Rick Worthy:
I think I just stayed true, man. I really think I knew that those are the kind of things that I loved and I didn’t care if kids teased me. I was the kid who had really thick glasses. This was, we’re talking the early ’70s. So, the right eye, which is my worst eye, the lens was so thick. I was smart and I liked Spider-Man in a fantastic way.

David Read:
So you were intimidating.

Rick Worthy:
I didn’t sort of gel in with what the other kids were doing, generally speaking. I liked to draw. I was a creative young kid and I think that I just always stayed true to myself. It’s hard because the kids will tease you and you have to ignore them. Like you said, true north. Your true north is you following your own path and not being afraid. Somebody once told me, I’ll never forget this. I was about 19 and it was my first big TV gig, which was a local after-school special that they aired in schools around Michigan. I was horrible in it.

David Read:
Gotta start somewhere.

Rick Worthy:
I was told that I showed a lot of promise. I’ll never forget, one of the teamsters came up to me and said, “Man, look. Don’t be afraid to do what you wanna do. If you have to drive a truck for a while, or if you have to deliver pizza, whatever it is, so you can get there, don’t be afraid to do it.” I think that really hit me as well ’cause I think a lot of kids have that pressure: you gotta be a lawyer, you gotta be a doctor, you gotta…

David Read:
Support your family.

Rick Worthy:
You gotta bring home the bacon, as they say. Even though I’m a vegetarian.

David Read:
What’s that for?

Rick Worthy:
You gotta bring home the tofu.

David Read:
That’s it. Tofu. The bacon-shaped tofu. That’s funny.

Rick Worthy:
Tofu, yeah. Like you said, that’s the society that we’re in and live in and it really hasn’t changed. It seems like kids are under that pressure to hit it and to succeed, whatever that is. Especially for someone like myself, I don’t come from generations of people who went to college. So, from the parents’ point of view, of course, you can understand. They don’t want you to be hungry.

David Read:
That’s right. They don’t wanna take care of you forever. I’m being facetious. I guess what we’re trying to say is listen to yourself and do what it is that makes you happy.

Rick Worthy:
I think you’re betraying yourself if you don’t. It’s wonderful now because, speaking of technology, I was one of the last people in my sort of circle of friends to get the smartphone.

David Read:
Congratulations.

Rick Worthy:
I remember a friend of mine sitting me down. She’s about 20 years younger than me and she said, “Rick, you have to get on board with this technology because it is the future, and believe me, you’re gonna need it.”

David Read:
It’s tough.

Rick Worthy:
She taught me how to get a Blackberry and then she signed me up with a Twitter account and then Facebook and Instagram and all that. I think nowadays, young people have this technology. They can create their own podcasts. They can create their own content. They can make their own movies and stuff. We didn’t have all that 30 years ago. You gotta have the right connections. You gotta have the right money to get the technology. Everything’s now so affordable.

David Read:
In the palm of their hands.

Rick Worthy:
In the palm of their hands.

David Read:
Now, the reverse is that you have to poke your head out of it every now and then and see what’s outside of it. In terms of trusting yourself and taking a chance on yourself, two weeks ago, I had no choice, if I wanted to continue to do this channel, but to set up a Patreon. 500 people came out of the woodwork to support me. Now I’m able to do about 150% of the work I was doing before, all because I took a chance on myself to walk away from Ubering and focus full time on what I loved and to be humble enough to ask for the help. I’m not gonna make this all about me, but the overall message from the emails that I’ve gotten inside of the app has been, “Thank you for finally allowing us to help lift you up.” When you have a community that loves what you do and that supports you, you ignore it at your peril.

Rick Worthy:
Absolutely. First, congratulations, and I’m so glad for you.

David Read:
Getting my head out of my ass.

Rick Worthy:
It’s getting over that fear. It can be so, I’m not gonna say the word, but…

David Read:
Why should I have someone pay me for something that I can do for free? I guess this gets back to how we feel about ourselves as people, as creators; feel that you’ve proven yourself enough to ask for that?

Rick Worthy:
Exactly. This is such a powerful conversation. I think we were meant to talk today for a number of reasons. One of them is I’ve been battling with jumping over this abyss of fear because I can do a lot of things. I can do Shakespeare in front of one person or 1,000 people, doesn’t matter. I always just see it as the same; get up, perform. But there’s one thing that terrifies me and that is asking for help. I don’t know why. Even my closest friends, they know that about me. They’re like, “Dude, you can’t always be the lone wolf. Sometimes you gotta come out and ask for help.” I always say, “I know, I know, I know.” I don’t know why I’m like that. There’s a certain strength to that, but it can also hurt you.

David Read:
It’s vulnerable.

Rick Worthy:
Exactly, man. I’ve been working on this project I came up with since the lockdown. It was my pandemic project, if you will. I bust my ass on this all day long and then I got in two other creatives to help me and we started all working together. We have, I think, a really wonderful concept for a fabulous TV show and it’s about espionage and sort of Jack Reacher, Equalizer kinda stuff. Stuff I love.

David Read:
Were you ready to pitch?

Rick Worthy:
Yes. We presented it and when I say we, I mean really me. I presented it to maybe four people who I know have the power to get it off the ground. It all really sort of came down to, “We know you. We respect your work. We know who you are.” This management company in L.A. is pretty big; they won Emmys and stuff. I just happen to know a friend who knew someone who could get me in front of them. They looked at it and then they called me and said, “We really, really, really think it’s really cool. We love your work.” Particularly, they knew me from, I think, The Man in the High Castle. I said, “Thank you” and they said, “But…”

David Read:
Oh, there’s a “but.”

Rick Worthy:
“But,” “you’re not…” and these were their words, and it hurt like hell, but I get what they were saying. “But you’re not an A-lister.”

David Read:
Oh, go to hell.

Rick Worthy:
So I said, “OK.”

David Read:
I’m sorry. I apologize, that was rude.

Rick Worthy:
I said, “Yeah, well thank you, man.” I said, “OK.” When you hear that, it’s kinda like someone just went ka-boom. I kinda dragged my head around L.A. for a week and then I said, “OK, enough of the sadness. Now what do I do?” OK.

David Read:
Rally.

Rick Worthy:
We’ll raise some money and freaking do it ourselves as an indie film. That’s kinda where we’re at. My fear is asking for the money.

David Read:
I am here for this. I don’t care if it’s spy, thriller, sci-fi, comedy. My audience is here to support you.

Rick Worthy:
Oh, thank you.

David Read:
When you’re ready, give the word.

Rick Worthy:
OK, man.

David Read:
It may be a dollar.

Rick Worthy:
I appreciate you, man. Thank you.

David Read:
I know where you’re coming from, absolutely. Looking back, been doing a lot of Star Trek rewatches and it’s a lot of “spot Rick Worthy.” I seriously think you need to sue Seth MacFarlane for 3947 and Isaac. “Have you watched The Orville? I think he’s seen the trailer.”

Rick Worthy:
I actually have not.

David Read:
They’re identical.

Rick Worthy:
I know that there’s discussion out there. I know that.

David Read:
I’m kidding. What I’m doing is I’m wanting to set this up. It was a pretty straightforward episode of Voyager and we’ve never really talked about 3947, other than in passing. But we can’t see your face, and that character has so much soul with B’Elanna in a couple of those scenes. I think he’s in engineering and she’s saying, “I can’t help you, but here’s what I’m gonna do, this and this for you and you’re gonna go back to your ship.” He just goes, “Thank you” and there’s this lingering shot on him. There’s nothing else that can be done. I love that character.

Rick Worthy:
Man, thanks.

David Read:
I’m really sorry that we never saw him again.

Rick Worthy:
Thanks, man.

David Read:
What a one-off. Holy cow.

Rick Worthy:
It was so cool.

David Read:
How did you breathe?

Rick Worthy:
I don’t know. You’re thinking a lot of things. You’re like, “It’s Star Trek. I have to knock it out of the park every take, every freaking take.” You get on set and you hope that everyone’s gonna be cool, which they were. Roxanne!

David Read:
Ugh, I’ve heard she’s great.

Rick Worthy:
Jonathan. She’s wonderful and a wonderful director too.

David Read:
Frakes directed it, I think.

Rick Worthy:
Frakes directed it and I auditioned for him. I just remember during the audition, Junie Lowry Johnson, casting director, lovely lady. Her team, they were all there, and then Jonathan’s sitting there watching me. He’s looking at my resume, he’s like, “OK. OK. Chicago. OK. Chicago theater. Good. OK. All right. You got any questions? Do you know… No. All right, let’s do it.” As I’m doing the audition, I see he’s smiling in a…

David Read:
He has a gleam in his eye.

Rick Worthy:
… in that wonderful smile. Exactly. He hired me to do this role and I thought it was so freaking wonderful. What a cool character. You look at the episode, you’re like, “OK, it’s a guy in a mannequin outfit.”

David Read:
It’s the ultimate mask work.

Rick Worthy:
It’s the ultimate. I said, “I’ll do anything, man.” It was difficult to breathe. It was difficult to see because they only had the little slits in the mask. Jonathan said, “Take off the mask and then practice where you’re gonna land on your mark and then on action, before we go to camera, put the mask back on.” So that’s how we did it and I love all that stuff. Let’s do it. You have to express the character without seeing the actor’s face. My challenge was to do it all physically and with my voice that I used for the Automated Personnel Unit 3947.

David Read:
“What did I call you? Can I call you 39?”

Rick Worthy:
Yeah.

David Read:
“I am Automated Personnel Unit 3947.”

Rick Worthy:
3947.

David Read:
OK, fine. Jeez. “Don’t send me flowers just yet.” Which of your Star Trek characters do you think back a lot on?

Rick Worthy:
I did a video game that didn’t really do well. I believe it was called The Klingon Warrior. They shot it live action, like a single episode. Jonathan directed it. I remember that.

David Read:
The CD, the point-and-click, Choose Your Own Adventure. Who are you in that? I’ve played that four or five times.

Rick Worthy:
Dude, I’m one of the young badass Klingon guys.

Rick Worthy:
He’s in there and he’s part of the crew.

David Read:
Dude, I loved that.

Rick Worthy:
It was so cool. You can probably maybe even still buy it today some kinda way. I remember we had to learn to sing the Klingon warrior anthem.

David Read:
[sings Klingon] I can’t say it.

Rick Worthy:
You got it. No, that’s good. That’s it.

David Read:
Have you played it?

Rick Worthy:
Yeah.

David Read:
That was good.

Rick Worthy:
It’s one of those things you’re like, “I can’t freaking wait to sit down and play this game.” I don’t think it did well. Nowadays the technology is more advanced.

David Read:
There’s nothing really like it.

Rick Worthy:
I don’t think it did that good.

David Read:
They did another one with the Borg. I can’t imagine what that was like, ’cause it’s mostly continuous takes. Talk about memorization, recitation, hit your mark. The camera is a person. If he has hands, here’s the camera. He’s gotta have hands. You have to look at this… It’s a completely different approach. Frakes would probably have to have had a lot of patience.

Rick Worthy:
I’m pretty sure. I think the cool thing about him is that he always keeps it light. We may have a shit ton of stuff to do and he’ll make a little joke and everyone sort of loosens up. I love that. I love when a director can do that, ’cause I’ve worked with other directors and you can tell they’re feeling the stress. Jonathan’s more like, “OK. I don’t know how we’re gonna do it, but we’ll figure it out.”

David Read:
“We’ll figure it out.” Lean on the people who are around you. He brought it back for Insurrection and when you have someone who you know you can count on to do the work, don’t fix what isn’t broken.

Rick Worthy:
Exactly. That’s something that I love so much. You know someone can do the work, they’re good to work with, call ’em. Jonathan’s like that a lot. I worked with him on the video game and then Insurrection and then the episode with B’Elanna. Then I ran into Jonathan at Dragon Con eight years ago or something. Thousand people standing in line. Not thousand, but many, many…

David Read:
A lot.

Rick Worthy:
A lot of people standing in line, exactly, to meet Jonathan Frakes. He sees me. I get in his eye line and he goes like this, “Come on over.” He took the time to get up and hug me. He said, “Man, it’s so good to see you” and we talked for five minutes, man.

David Read:
Which is a lot there.

Rick Worthy:
I was like, “OK, you got people. You got people waiting.”

David Read:
They can wait. I wanna say hi to my friend. As far as I’m concerned, and a lot of people are gonna disagree with me over this, the best single season of Star Trek is the Xindi arc. You were an Arboreal named Jannar and you were a part of a race that was gunning for Earth, had already wiped out seven million of us. You spent half a year in fur. Tell us about that year. Tell us about that character.

Rick Worthy:
I don’t think anyone’s ever said that. I love that.

David Read:
Steer clear of the water.

Rick Worthy:
Steer clear. Exactly. Man, that job literally came at the right time. A brother needed a job and a good one. Man, the universe delivered, man. God came through. I remember I was staying at a friend’s place. I often have trusted that things would work out, but, man, it was a rough, tough year. Dude, I get a call from my agent, Donna Massetti, who’s still my agent today. She said, “I think I have a really great role in Star Trek: Enterprise and it’s a recurring and we’re just gonna try to close the deal.” “Just do it and see what they say,” without me having to read for it. I said, “I’m standing by.” ‘Cause she says, “Everybody knows you,” so we’re gonna try to get them to make a direct offer. They did, they came through. I didn’t know how many episodes and she said, “I think it’s gonna be at least four.” I said, “Great.” It ended up becoming what?

David Read:
Seven or eight.

Rick Worthy:
Six, seven?

David Read:
Yeah. Yeah, up there. With Randy Oglesby.

Rick Worthy:
Exactly. I love him.

David Read:
Who I think is an amazing actor.

Rick Worthy:
Wonderful. Wonderful. I can’t picture anyone else but him playing that role. He was that good.

David Read:
They killed him and I was upset. They’re like Shakespeare. They’re all stabbing each other in the back and there’s infighting and schisms. What a high concept, even for Star Trek.

Rick Worthy:
Star Trek, it’ll be here always. That’s how important it is to our culture and to many people around the world. I’ve done conventions in Prague and different places. They love Stargate, they love Star Trek and Battlestar Galactica. Some of them love Farscape, but those are typically the top three. People love, love, love those shows, man. I love ’em. Hey, I may never get the Emmy Award that I’ve always wanted. Maybe I will. But I can say that I’m blessed to be part of some wonderful, top-tier sci-fi and fantasy.

David Read:
It’s something that makes people think.

Rick Worthy:
Dude, that’s what we need, I think probably especially now. Not to go off into politics or anything, but I need to escape and I will turn on the TV and watch something that will take me somewhere else. I’ll watch the news later.

David Read:
I was not in love with The Plan, but I was so thrilled that you finally had some meat again for the first time since Season Two with Simon. If I’m putting all cards out on the table and being honest, Eddie Olmos– what’s it like being directed by that guy?

Rick Worthy:
It’s intimidating. When I think of Eddie Olmos, Edward James Olmos, the first thing I think of is Miami Vice. He, the way he would deliver his line, he would be looking away from the actor and looking down like this. You’re like, “Shit.” Whatever he says, they’re gonna do it. He brought that weight, which was so beautiful and honest, to Miami Vice and the gravity of what was going on back in the ’80s. You discover that he’s everybody’s dad on the show and you can always count on. He may be busy getting ready to do God knows what or God knows where in the world the following day, but he always took the time to stop and say, “Hello, good morning. How’s your dog Buddy doing?” He did that. I think that says a lot about him.

David Read:
We’ve talked about your Lab very little. Sorry I never got to meet him. Came close though in Vancouver, but can you tell me about him and how important he was to you?

Rick Worthy:
He was my furry child. I always say we were like a Vaudeville act.

David Read:
Really?

Rick Worthy:
We knew how to make people smile, especially him. I think the cool thing about being in Vancouver was that it’s so dog-friendly there and I was able to take him with me and walk with him in the hotel, at the Sutton Hotel. We would sit down in the lobby and I didn’t even have to put the leash on him. Everyone knew who he was and I was happy I was able to provide that life for him. He met the entire cast of Battlestar Galactica. Edward, Tricia, everybody met Buddy. He enjoyed being on set, hanging out with Dad, but also being around everybody. He was a cool little guy and I miss him all the time. He’s appeared in my dreams.

David Read:
Boy, I know that.

Rick Worthy:
I was gonna say, I believe you had a Labrador as well?

David Read:
I grew up with a standard poodle when I was little. In my teens, I had a German shepherd. In my adulthood, I’ve had a couple of dachshunds, but my folks had a schnauzer poodle that was smart as any four-year-old. It’s hard to articulate this to people who don’t have animals. They don’t get it. They’re like, “Why are they talking about a quadruped?” They’re not gonna get a seat at your table, but there’s a “there there,” and it’s talking back to you if you know how to listen. Your life is fuller because of it. It’s one of those things that, as much as it pains me when I lost them, as much as I still feel it, I wouldn’t take the experience back at all because I am fuller because of them.

Rick Worthy:
Absolutely, man. I just love dogs. I’ve dated, a couple of times, ladies who weren’t into dogs, and those relationships didn’t last long. He and I, Buddy and I, we come as a team.

David Read:
That’s right. Love me, love my dog.

Rick Worthy:
You gotta love us both. Exactly. When I turned 40, I was gonna go to Japan, ’cause I’ve always wanted to go. But I kept thinking, “You know what? I think I’m gonna get a dog. That’s what I’m gonna do and make this really change my whole life.”

David Read:
They need you.

Rick Worthy:
I’m so glad I didn’t.

David Read:
Can’t just leave him at home like a cat.

Rick Worthy:
No, you can’t. I remember I had a friend, he said, “That is an enormous responsibility.” I said, “Hey, I’m up for it. I can meet the challenge.” Like you said, they change your life. Man, he changed my life. In fact, made it better because I had so much more structure, and someone was counting on me.

David Read:
That’s right.

Rick Worthy:
You know what I mean?

David Read:
That’s a big chunk of it, Rick.

Rick Worthy:
Now they’re like, “Hey, you know what? I’ll go hang out with the guys tonight, but not too late, ’cause I wanna get back and take my dog out for a nice walk.”

David Read:
Someone’s waiting on me. That’s right.

Rick Worthy:
Someone’s waiting on me.

David Read:
That’s right. I have a real problem with people who go on social media, “Yeah, we lost Sprocket yesterday, but here’s Spritz. Everybody look at Spritz.” That bothers me like I can’t describe. I always, and this is personal preference, not to wallow in sorrow or anything, but mourn the loss of your pet. You’re not getting a new car. On that note, will you ever get another dog? The reverse of that.

Rick Worthy:
First of all, I totally agree with you.

David Read:
‘Cause honestly I’m surprised. Honestly, every time I get in touch with you, as much as you talk about him, I’m like, “Sooner or later, he’s gonna be like…”

Rick Worthy:
Sooner or later.

David Read:
“… ‘Well, you knucklehead.'” “Open your heart up again to the possibility.” So this may be a PSA for Rick Worthy. It may not be, but I’m curious.

Rick Worthy:
First of all, I totally agree with you. I’m just like you in that regard, because when he died, it broke me in two.

David Read:
How old was he?

Rick Worthy:
He was almost 13. He was born January 15th, which is the same day that Martin Luther King was born. I always say that Buddy had that same spirit like Martin Luther King, because wherever he went, he just made instant friends. Everybody loved him. He was a very peaceful sweetheart of an animal.

David Read:
Labs are amazing. They’ll let you walk all over them.

Rick Worthy:
He died in Vancouver right toward the end of our Season Five of Magicians and three months before would’ve been his 13th birthday. Then the whole world changed with the pandemic.

David Read:
You had a bad year?

Rick Worthy:
I posted on Instagram, “Buddy’s gone, love of my life, I’ll miss him forever.” People kept saying, “When are you gonna get a new dog?” I was like, “Huh?”

David Read:
I hate that. I hate that. This is not a set of tires.

Rick Worthy:
Dude, exactly. I tuned everybody out and, like you said, took the time to mourn. Now I’m at the point where I’m like, there’s so many dogs out there that need homes and need someone to care for them. We’ll see what happens, man. I didn’t adopt Buddy ’cause I really wanted a Labrador and I wanted a chocolate one.

David Read:
Was he a chocolate lab?

Rick Worthy:
He was a chocolate Labrador Retriever. English lab, so he was a little shorter and a little bit stockier. He could swim his ass off. You would see him out in the water in Long Beach, at the Long Beach Dog Beach. It’s called Rosie’s Dog Beach. He would go so far out. I’d be like, “Buddy, come back.” That was his happy place and that was his Toys R Us, that was his Disneyland. If I get another one, I’ve decided I would adopt.

David Read:
I agree. That’s how we lost Indy. My standard poodle swam out too far and he drowned. He had a heart attack and sank. My dad had to go out there and feel for him with his feet. I was eight. He loved his ball that much. When we laid him to rest, and we did lay him to rest, the neighborhood came out and we had a funeral for Indy. Small communities get it and tight groups of people, they get it.

Rick Worthy:
They get it.

David Read:
And Dad buried him with his tennis ball in his mouth.

Rick Worthy:
With the tennis ball in his mouth. That’s beautiful, man. Wow, I can feel that. Heartbreaking. Way to end that.

David Read:
Dad’s an Indianapolis 500 fan.

Rick Worthy:
That’s awesome.

David Read:
Smart as a whip. Don’t get an animal if you’re not gonna commit to one. ‘Cause that’s the thing; you’re all in or you’re not. Don’t lock them up in a cage all day long.

Rick Worthy:
Exactly, man. Buddy was my road dog. Even if I was just running an errand over to Kinko’s or something, I’d be like, “Let’s go. Hop. Let’s go, Bud.” He knew exactly where to hop in and get in the car and we would just go. People would say, “Aren’t you the guy with the Dachshund or the dog?” Or, “Aren’t you the guy with that Labrador?” I’m like, “Yeah, that’s me.”

David Read:
That’s it.

Rick Worthy:
People begin to identify you by your furry baby and not you.

David Read:
That’s it. My Dachshund would be on my lap. I’d have my windows down, getting ready to turn on a road, and the guy in his big F-150 would drive by next to me and say, “Nice wiener.” They liven life in ways that we can… Any kid who isn’t raised with a dog, I feel bad for them. Rick, what’s going on for you next? Are you focusing on this pitch? Is this your thing? Is there anything else we need to be on the lookout for? Where can we be seeing you?

Rick Worthy:
Last year was a very interesting year. I think we’re still kind of recovering. Someone said this, man, and I totally agree. I wanna ask you how you feel about it. We had a pandemic in 2020. I’ll just go ahead and say it, it almost bankrupted me. Thank God we were able to get back to work and I started working here and there. I did a few episodes of Gossip Girl and new dad and another dad on Station 19. I did a miniseries in 2022 called Washington Black, which is on Disney+. It’s just eight episodes, but it’s beautiful historical fiction about a young child who was a slave in Barbados, and then he escapes to Canada on this flying steampunk boat. Sterling K. Brown produced it, he’s one of the stars in it as well. I had a really nice four-episode role and I said, “OK, now I just need more years like this,” because it was a good job, it’s paying the bills and then we went on strike. To this day, I do not regret the eight-and-a-half-month strike, because when the writers went on strike, we went on strike too. We supported our sister union 100%.

David Read:
Repercussions.

Rick Worthy:
It had its repercussions. It got really, really, really hard, man.

David Read:
I am on record on this account saying, “This is gonna cut the industry in half, in terms of the number of productions that are gonna be created.” My best friend is the film buyer for a theater chain based out of Phoenix. They’re in four states, called Harkins.

Rick Worthy:
I know Harkins. They’re a wonderful theater.

David Read:
Best popcorn in the nation for movies.

Rick Worthy:
In the nation, yes.

David Read:
I told him, “Zack, I’m going out next week,” and I looked at the slate, ’cause obviously we’re gonna go and get a free movie. I said, “Every third film to every other film on this list is a re-release.” He said, “David, they’re not making movies anymore.” They’re phoning it in to put out just enough, and comedies go straight to streaming. They don’t get a theatrical run anymore at all and that is criminal.” I don’t know how you un-ring that bell.

Rick Worthy:
We can talk about this for hours, it’s affecting everything, man. Everything’s changed. I’ll just say a couple of things. After the strike, I’m like, “Look, we have to put guardrails around AI. Otherwise, I’m out of a job, and the next generation of actors, they’re out of jobs too.” I know of one person. I don’t know this person personally, I did not know her. But she, I believe, was from Boston, and this young person died. I don’t know the cause of death. Her parents heard her on the radio one morning in a commercial and they were like, “What, did she do a commercial?” No, she didn’t. It was an AI-generated voice that copied her voice. Without her parents’ consent, an advertising company or somebody used this young artist’s voice for a commercial. Man, her parents were pissed off. It’s either the beginning of Terminator or the end of everything, or we have to find a way to protect ourselves from it, because I am not down with people who call themselves AI filmmakers. I think the technology can be used to create certain things, but I’m not down with it making a replica of me, or you, or anyone – Chris Judge, Teryl, anyone. The algorithm, as smart as it is, just doesn’t have a soul. That’s how I feel about it. If you wanna hire an actor, hire a real human being.

David Read:
It’s absolutely sad. For someone like you, so much of your bread and butter is on your voice. You and I have talked about this. I think you could just be a purely voice actor if you wanted to. Let me back up. Rick, how do you legislate at the speed that we need to for this?

Rick Worthy:
Yeah, I don’t know.

David Read:
I think that’s the real trick.

Rick Worthy:
Yeah, I totally agree with you. How do we do that? It’s going so fast that all the creatives in the world are trying to jump on this fast-moving train, which will either be a train wreck, or we’ll get on board and drive it, and help steer it, because it’s here. We can’t pretend that it’s not here. It’s here. We just have to figure out how we can best use it so that it can serve us creatively. If George Lucas and all the young George Lucases of the world, soon-to-be George Lucases, whoever they are, Spielbergs, if they wanna use it to create a vast desert landscape, fantastic. If you wanna create a scene where someone’s traveling into another galaxy and help the technology create that, wonderful. But please, don’t replace us. I felt like that was gonna be sort of the end of everything when I realized how dangerous this is and how powerful the technology is.

David Read:
That’s the thing. Do you have a couple more minutes?

Rick Worthy:
Yeah.

David Read:
[typing text] My name is David Read and I’m talking with my friend, Rick Worthy. [AI voice reading aloud] “My name is David Read and I’m talking with my friend, Rick Worthy.”

Rick Worthy:
Wow.

David Read:
It’ll even re-enunciate if I want it to. [AI voice] “My name is David Read and I’m talking with my friend, Rick Worthy.”

Rick Worthy:
Dude, I cannot even…

David Read:
[AI voice] “My name is David Read and I’m talking with my friend, Rick Worthy.”

Rick Worthy:
Wow.

David Read:
It just spits ’em out like cookies.

Rick Worthy:
I’m terrified, bro.

David Read:
There’s no artifice to that. At this stage, the only thing that you have to mind your Ps and Qs on, is making sure that it pronounces weird words correctly, that you listen for it. Otherwise, it’s there. I was like, “My voice can’t be one of those voices.” Then, as it turns out, your voice is one of those voices, David.

Rick Worthy:
So you wrote it out. I don’t have my reading glasses on, but you wrote it out and then it said it?

David Read:
That’s right.

Rick Worthy:
Man, that’s freaking scary, bro.

David Read:
I know. Your voice is so iconic. I’m thrilled to be having this discussion with you, because you have a gift that transcends the physical. On one hand, to go with the James Earl Jones route, I’m glad the technology exists, because he will never die. He put guardrails in place and Disney purchased it so that he can do that. They’re not putting it into a text prompt. Another voice actor is voicing it and they’re layering him on top. He will always live on that way.

Rick Worthy:
He’ll always live on.

David Read:
That’s right.

Rick Worthy:
That’s fascinating as hell that the technology is there to do something like that. But at the same time, I’m thinking, man, I hope that doesn’t put me out of a job, man. I’ve always said that one of the things I would love to do before I leave this third rock, this beautiful planet, I would love to be the guy that says, “This is CNN Headline News.”

David Read:
That’s right.

Rick Worthy:
It’s five words. But if you can do that, then they can capture probably my face, my mannerisms, and such. It’s for sure controversial, but it’s here, man.

David Read:
That’s it.

Rick Worthy:
It’s definitely here. It is here.

David Read:
It could be used as a tool or as a weapon. I don’t think that you can dispel a gathering storm, but I think that you can shelter yourself as best you can and you could educate people about how to shelter themselves. The thing that scares me I think the most are the people who blind themselves to the technology and who are like, “Oh, I don’t want anything to do with it. It’s not happening.” It’s gonna happen whether you want it to or not. You’re gonna be subsumed by it in some way or another. So, given that approach, what are you gonna do to roll with that punch? You’re gonna get hit. The industry will. Rachel Luttrell and I have talked about this – at some point, someone like Apple for iTunes will come along and offer an alternative to the torrenting, where you can buy a song for 99 cents. “Well, we want them to buy an album.” You can buy the whole album; you don’t have to buy the whole album. “Well, we want them to.” No, that’s not the world you live in anymore. Get over it. The world you’re gonna live in is where Rick Worthy is gonna have an option to sign himself with a company, or a couple of companies out there, that will license his voice, and he permits his voice to be used for X, Y or Z on X, Y or Z, and he will get a passive income stream for it, so that if someone uses it in YouTube, he will get a dollar for 100 views, and if it goes to a million views, he gets $10,000. It will scale with you. Or the alternative is that they can go on pirate websites and copy Rick Worthy’s voice and do it all illegitimately on backwater websites and he’ll never know anything about it.

Rick Worthy:
Probably both.

David Read:
Piracy hasn’t gone away. Let me know if you have to go, Rick.

Rick Worthy:
No, I’m good.

David Read:
Project Hail Mary came out on Tuesday. Last Saturday, it was already available in full resolution on pirate websites. They track that data and they use it to their advantage. It is an amazing frontier and I’ll leave it at that.

Rick Worthy:
Exactly. Great movie, by the way. I’ve seen it twice.

David Read:
It’s so good.

Rick Worthy:
So good. Rocky!

David Read:
Man. Amaze, amaze, amaze.

Rick Worthy:
Amaze, amaze, amaze. Wonderful, wonderful, wonderful film and the discussion about this is every day, ongoing. I just got an email from SAG this morning or yesterday. The new TV theatrical contract has been approved and we just have to vote on it now. The union wants us to vote overwhelmingly yes, so we’re not gonna strike again.

David Read:
OK.

Rick Worthy:
Those eight and a half months out there in the blazing sun. I started striking in New York and then I came to L.A. and I was out there striking in L.A. I hope that it has helped to put safeguards around the technology. Dude, talk about AI. I use the automated Waymo cars.

David Read:
What is that like? I don’t know if I could get into it if I couldn’t break the glass.

Rick Worthy:
I hear you. I totally hear you. I think it’s fun. It’s more affordable than Uber, ’cause you don’t have to tip.

David Read:
Wow.

Rick Worthy:
You just have to give them a good rating. The prices are also typically a bit lower than Uber or Lyft. But at the same time, that’s also putting people out of work as well. Uber drivers and Lyft drivers, ride-share drivers, are now competing with essentially an AI-driven car.

David Read:
It’s just a question of when.

Rick Worthy:
Just a question of when, man.

David Read:
I was with Joseph Mallozzi in L.A, and there was a huge kerfuffle. A Waymo was stuck in the middle of a sub street and it was backed up for 80 yards. There’s nothing you could do. You abandon the car. The gal was outside who had been in it, she’s like, “I’m so sorry. I’m so sorry.” It freaked out because there was parking on both sides. It was one way and it didn’t know what to do. So, we got a long way to go.

Rick Worthy:
We got a long way to go.

David Read:
You are a national treasure, my friend. Many blessings.

Rick Worthy:
Thank you. Thank you, David. Always good to see you.

David Read:
Your voicemails, the messages that you leave me, you are one of the few that I consider a friend after the interview ends. I say that to people on here a lot, it’s a reflex. I care about you very much.

Rick Worthy:
Likewise.

David Read:
Again, I’m sorry that we haven’t had a chance. I’m glad that we’ve been continuing to connect, but I’m really glad that I get to come on and record it for a little while, because you mean a lot to me and I’m just thrilled to have you in my orbit.

Rick Worthy:
I appreciate you, and dude, I feel the same way about you. I thank you for everything you said, man. I’ve met a lot of people, either in person or virtually, and you and I have done both now, and you’re truly one of the good guys in this world, man. What I hate is that we haven’t sat down together and had coffee or something, but we will do that.

David Read:
We will.

Rick Worthy:
I promise you, man.

David Read:
I’ll be out in L.A. pretty soon here. My god son’s out there, I gotta go and drive the rascal nuts. Take care of your mother.

Rick Worthy:
Definitely will.

David Read:
Tell her a friend says hello.

Rick Worthy:
I definitely will, man.

David Read:
Thanks for doing that.

Rick Worthy:
Thank you, bro. Take care. God bless you and take care of yourself. We’re gonna see each other this year for sure, I promise you. We’re gonna go to Jersey Mike’s and do something, man. Or sushi.

David Read:
They’re so expensive now. They’re so expensive. It’s like 30 bucks a sub and chips and a drink.

Rick Worthy:
I know. Exactly. “I just want the bigger size.” “OK, that’s an extra $10.” But they’re so good.

David Read:
They are delicious.

Rick Worthy:
They are delicious.

David Read:
My treat, though. It’ll be my treat.

Rick Worthy:
All right, all right.

David Read:
My friend. Love you, brother. Be well.

Rick Worthy:
Next time, next time. All right, man, take care.

David Read:
Take care and thanks again.

Rick Worthy:
I appreciate it, man. OK, you too. Bye-bye.

David Read:
Bye. That was Rick Worthy, Kytano and Imhotep in Stargate SG-1. There are some people that you just pinch yourself that you get to know and get to occasionally communicate with and he is definitely one of them. My name is David Read, you’re watching The Stargate Oral History Project. If you enjoy Stargate and you wanna see more content like this on YouTube, consider clicking that Like button. It does make a difference with the show and will continue to help us grow, along with this new Stargate that’s in development. Please also consider sharing the video with a Stargate friend and if you wanna get notified about future episodes, click the Subscribe icon. If you click the Bell icon, it’ll notify you the moment a new video drops and you’ll get my notifications of any last-minute guest changes. Clips from this episode will be released – actually, one will probably already have been released by the time you see this on the Dial the Gate YouTube channel. I have tremendous thanks, as I said in the interview, for my Patreon members. All of you who came out of the woodwork a few weeks ago to start supporting me in this endeavor. Just like Rick said, you have to have the courage to ask for help. If that’s you out there, and you know that you need to do that with someone or a group of people, I present to you this list that is proof that sometimes your prayers are answered if you voice them aloud. It’s a pill. It can be. But thank you, guys, so much. We have a number of episodes heading your way. I’m not gonna rattle off the list right now because their order or content may change. Go to dialthegate.com for the complete guest schedule while I’m away. We may be doing some content while I’m gone, we’ll have to see what my infrastructure is. It is a Stargate-related trip and it is in France. EMG, Children of MacGyver, 1:1-scale Stargate is gonna be on display in France at Metz’Torri on the 30th and 31st of May in Metz in France. If you got a chance to be over there to experience it, it’s gonna be something special, duplicated down to the errors in production. I know, it’s not possible, the Stargate had errors. It did have errors, a couple of them, and they built them into this thing. Hopefully I’m gonna be able to tell you exactly what they are here really soon. It is an artisan replica, and hoping to show it off a little bit more to you guys once it’s on its end, so to speak. That’s what I’ve got for you. Thanks again for all your support. Thanks to my production team, my moderators, even though they’re off this one, thank you so much, guys. Frederick Marcoux at ConceptsWeb, he keeps DialtheGate.com up and running, EagleSG for his beautiful opening sequences, Ian for all of his web work. My name is David Read for Dial the Gate, thanks so much for tuning in and I’ll see you on the other side real soon.