FKSPOILR
Logfile LOG9606 Part 4
June 2-June 3, 1996
File: "FKSPOILR LOG9606" Part 4
TOPICS:
SPOILER: AtA, LK (Urs, Fleur, LC)
SPOILER: LK: Alternative Careers
Off-list fan phoned<LK> (2)
Bye Bye.....
SPOILER: LK - Nat's Fear <also HF>
SPOILER: LK, HF (was Off-list fan phoned)
Fred Mollin Interview [01/02]
Fred Mollin Interview [2/2]
=========================================================================
Date: Sun, 2 Jun 1996 21:47:16 -0700
From: [Name removed by request]
Subject: Re: SPOILER: AtA, LK (Urs, Fleur, LC)
At 11:38 AM 6/1/96 -0700, Amy R. wrote:
>And, as both Nick and LC observed, Fleur was of life: "life-giving."
>Urs was of death: "let me die."
Urs was weak in terms of having confidence in herself, in being able to
enjoy ing life, as far as i saw it. Fleur was a bright young woman, eager to
know what everything was about. But despondency doesn't make Urs less worthy
of being LC's casual lover. LC may have found Fleur refreshing, she probably
would have made a better companion for him - nice dichotomy of experiences,
there - but i don't think anyone's necessarily comparing the two. John and
Donna have wimped out of that one for the time being. i'm not touching it
either :)
>option for explaining it. Urs was at a turning point in her life at the
>end of HoD. There are many possible paths from that point to this.
Yep, definitely. She did one of those Rescue 911 good deeds there and it
gave her a nice feeling. A bit of oomph for AtA, maybe (along with having
that new job and then not having to work 'cause of her Ribena Uncle).
John wrote (on Urs fighting back vs. Divia):
>That's true. Well, on the logic that the best explanation is the one
>that fits our pet theory :-), she may have fought in order to try and
>protect LaCroix.
Or the new outfit he bought her. Sorry! Sorry! :)
Urs was definitely feeling better by AtA. Suicidal-minded people can change
their mind. How ironic she got killed off just when things seemed to be
turning around for her.
Apache wrote:
>And Urs has had 120 years of vampire life to hone her intellectual leanings,
>if she had any. She doesn't; she's not a bookish sort.
><snip> she cries, "why are you doing this? I've never denied you anything."
> This is not innocence, but it is naivete.
(Oh, that was painful to edit. i'm sorry, Apache! i'm so determined not to
quote more than four lines!)
Especially if she was abused. i could also see her having had an abusive
childhood which is why she was naive towards her similarly abusive "keeper"
in the saloon flashback. She might not considered herself quick enough to
have ever become bookish, suffered from discouragement... she likely didn't
come from a family like the De Brabants. Cycles and (lack of) habits die
hard. If i'm told i'm stupid, i will believe it. And growing older doesn't
necessarily change that - especially if i've heard it since i was old enough
to understand language. Unless she's gone through the support groups, shrink
sessions, and reconditioning, she'll act dim because that's what she expects
and that's what we expect. And, sometimes, after a point, you don't want to
try and change anymore. What's the point? It's not worth it. And why doesn't
she end it all? Sometimes it's fear. Fear of punishment for committing a
sin, fear of the unknown. And there's always hope. Becuase as much as she
may hate herself and hate her life or just not care for it enough to live
fully, there's always that dream - those altered movie scenes where she's
the content, loved, beautiful girl in the end. And, plus, depressed people
are sometimes just too depressed to go through with it. Lethargy, you know.
(And i'm not reading any farther here than we've been doing for everyone else
;)
Lisa McDavid wrote:
>If LaCroix and Urs had become lovers, LaCroix was no longer frustrated
>and that would explain *a lot* of LaCroix Lite. <evil grin.>
Ribena Uncle's on a sugar high :)
Tippi wrote:
>Vachon says, "Or her evil twin." Urs, "She has a twin?" I don't
>remember the exact quotes, but Urs is definitely portrayed as being one bulb
>short of a chandelier.
i'll make a complete fool of myself and not get a joke sometimes - often
because i haven't been raised with the same jargon as my classmates. i've
lived in either California or the midwest all my life but, because of my
family's nature, i didn't know 3/4 of the jokes i heard in school because
most of them were dirty :) My vocabulary was very clean until i got some
friendly bathroom-minded friends in high school.
Granted this isn't the same thing but unless she's running into walls and
giggling, "Oops! Hee, hee!" i think that John's suggestion that Urs hasn't
kept up with pop-culture is plausible. If the woman can learn, if she
remembers her birthday (assuming she cares enough to note the day of her
birth :), if she isn't so ignorant as to be insensitive towards others, if
she can read a bus schedule and program my VCR after only a few minutes of
instruction, she has all the bulbs she needs.
(Hm. Maybe, had we seen more of her, she would have proved a complete dunce
and maybe that's because she *was/is* a dunce but there's also the
possibilty that some of that abuse that she might have had could have come
too hard and too often to the head.)
Yeah, yeah, and maybe she's from an alien race, maybe she was raised by
wolves, maybe i'm making up too many things... i haven't suggested anything
too outrageous, however much i speculated, you think? They're just
suggestions, nothing more.
<whew> Busy Sunday night.
[Name removed by request]
All I have is what I might have been - Gavin Friday
How can you trust someone who bleeds for 7 days and doesn't die? - BGW
=========================================================================
Date: Mon, 3 Jun 1996 01:02:14 +6
From: Don Fasig <phase3@g.......>
Subject: SPOILER: LK: Alternative Careers
On 25 May 96 at 0:44, OREL, SARA wrote:
> But other than the original concept (okay, okay, a very big
> proviso) there is no reason for Nick to be a cop in the next season.
> Perhaps he could be running a homeless shelter, or a battered women's
> shelter, or a home for runaways.
This is television - if next season he is no longer a cop he'll do what all
ex-cops do [other than run a bar - that job is taken]...he'll become a
private detective!
Hmm. On the other hand perhaps LaCroix will devote himself full time to
his radio talk show, and his new book [ALL radio talk show hosts write
books...don't they]. Nick will retire from the police force and run/own
the Raven...and investigate crimes. Nat may or may not be with him since
she is in roughly the same position as Schroedinger's cat.
Don Fasig ---,-<@
phase3@g.......
=========================================================================
Date: Mon, 3 Jun 1996 09:35:46 -0500
From: Margie Hammet <treeleaf@i.......>
Subject: Re: Off-list fan phoned<LK>
Replying on the Spoiler list, because this reply has spoilers for Last
Knight.
At 09:36 PM 6/2/96 PDT, Sherri Lynn Godsey wrote:
>I had a phone call a little while ago from an off-line fan. Since she
>didn't have computer access, she didn't know the state of the show, and
>when she watched Last Knight and realized they were ending the show, she
>was really upset.
Because of this list, I was made aware of possible other reasonable
interpretations for Last Knight that left both Nick and Natalie alive.
Also because of the list, I got the information from Jim Parriott that
they deliberately left the ending open. I'm wondering about the feelings
of a lot of off-line fans who don't have access to that info. Will a lot
of them just assume that Nick is dead and therefore there's no point trying
to bring the show back? I'm also wondering if a lot of people just won't
bother watching the show if they believe the main character dies at the
end. If that happens, our hopes for good ratings on the Sci-fi channel will
never materialize. Has anyone talked to Jim Parriot about this?
Margie (treeleaf@i.......)
N&NPacker
Cousin of the Knight
=========================================================================
Date: Mon, 3 Jun 1996 11:15:18 EDT
From: Mary Anne Espenshade <mae@a.......>
Subject: Re: Off-list fan phoned<LK>
Margie Hammet <treeleaf@i.......> wrote:
>Because of this list, I was made aware of possible other reasonable
>interpretations for Last Knight .... I'm wondering about the feelings
>of a lot of off-line fans who don't have access to that info. Will a lot
>of them just assume that Nick is dead...
That's definitely the impression I got talking to people at MediaWestCon and
to other friends on the net who watched the show but aren't on forkni-l.
They are also certain that Janette is dead. Nobody off-list seems to find
anything ambiguous about either ending. Of course, I could just be talking to
the wrong people. :-)
--
Mary Anne Espenshade
mae@a.......
"I worked late on my birthday and nobody brought ME a cute vampire!"
=========================================================================
Date: Mon, 3 Jun 1996 10:38:42 CDT
From: Bruce Rawitch <brucer@i.......>
Subject: Bye Bye.....
To all my fellow online FK'ers
Well, all good things must come to an end, and so must my subscription to this
list. Y'all should consider yourself fortunate to be part of such an articulate
and interesting and diverse group of people-this is probably one of the most
polite, charming and fun lists I have ever had the good fortune to be on.
However, even on digest, I still don't have the time to keep up with FORK-NI,
FK-SPOILR and FKFIC-L...you folks sure do have a lot to say ;)
I will stay on the FKFIC-L/Some of the best fanfic I've seen is coming out there
and even though I'm 50 digests behind, I won't give up the fanfic, I won't I
won't I won't!!!!
Hoping for real season of FK.....Keep writing those letters folks.
Cheers
Bruce Rawitch
____________________________________________
\ I've always felt that you can get more \ _ ______ |
\ with a kind word and a 2x4 than you can \ / \___-=O`/|O`/__|
\ with just a kind word..... \_______\ / | / )
/ / `/-==__ _/__|/__=-|
/ Marcus the Ranger/ Babylon 5 / * \ | |
/___________________________________________/ (o)
=========================================================================
Date: Mon, 3 Jun 1996 10:36:28 -0500
From: Margie Hammet <treeleaf@i.......>
Subject: Re: SPOILER: LK - Nat's Fear <also HF>
At 08:22 PM 6/2/96 -0700, Shelley M. Maas wrote:
>.... as he moves her hair away from her shoulder ... she is tense,
>frightened. <snip> .... once he has bitten her. No pleasure ... the sense
>that she is being overwhelmed by violent, terrifying images .... different
>from the scene with Alyssa, who has a blissful smile as he's drinking....
I think it has to do with how both Nick and Natalie were feeling. Nick
was full of pain and guilt, which might have had a lot to do with the kind
of images that he projected to Natalie. Natalie was frightened. That might
have had a lot to do with how she reacted to the images. In the scene with
Alyssa, though, Nick was happy, and Alyssa trusted him (foolishly, as we
found out, but still, she did trust him).
In Forever Knight, as well as a lot of other vampire stories, biting is
sometimes a metaphor for sex. I think if it's seen in that light, especially
in the case of Last Knight, why Natalie had the kind of experience she did
becomes a lot more clear.
I've also been thinking about the difference between Nick and Natalie in
Last Knight and Janette and Robert in Human Factor. In Last Knight, Natalie
wanted Nick to do what he did in an effort to bring about a cure. But
surely that wasn't what was going on in Human Factor. More likely, they
were making love simply to make love. I wonder if that has a lot to do with
the different outcomes. We also don't know exactly why Janette became mortal
or whether it really did have anything to do with drinking Robert's blood,
or if it did, exactly how. It seems to me, that in a way, Natalie was
still looking for a medical cure. It was almost like a prescription, or at
least, certainly like a treatment, i.e. - just take a little at a time.
Nick said it wasn't as simple as that, and I think he's almost surely right.
I wonder if he really knew any more about why Janette became mortal, or if
he just realized it wasn't as simple as Nat was suggesting.
Margie (treeleaf@i.......)
N&NPacker
Cousin of the Knight
=========================================================================
Date: Mon, 3 Jun 1996 09:22:35 -0700
From: Amy R. <akr@n.......>
Subject: SPOILER: LK, HF (was Off-list fan phoned)
On Mon, 3 Jun 1996, Mary Anne Espenshade wrote:
> They are also certain that Janette is dead. Nobody off-list seems to find
> anything ambiguous about either ending. Of course, I could just be talking to
> the wrong people. :-)
No, that is probably the dominant opinion among unconnected fans. It took
the list two months and a satellite-feed tape (thanks, Cynthia!) to
convince me that Janette wasn't dead, and I still think that, within the
context of LK itself, alone, Tracy, Nat and Nick are dead, and LC probably
walked into that sunrise.
But I'm lucky. With all of you, I don't have to take LK as a contained
unit. In and among all the fanfic, whether it has fixed, mocked or
mourned LK, I've been made to see possibilities that wouldn't have
occurred to me, trapped in my own personal perspective.
The, ummm, "average" viewer is not that lucky.
*** Amy, Lady of the Knight (akr@n.......) ***
** Knightie *** Light Cousin *** Fleur-Booster **
=========================================================================
Date: Mon, 3 Jun 1996 16:44:01 -0300
From: Stapleton <d7ux@u.......>
Subject: Fred Mollin Interview [01/02]
I had originally planned to post this to the FORKNI-L list, however, due
to the fact that there are still some people on the list who haven't seen
the latter episodes of the season, I'm posting it here.
This is an interview that I had the opportunity to obtain with Fred
Mollin. Hope you like it.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
In some of the answers of this interview, there are spoilers for third
season episodes, in particular, the final two shows, "Ashes to Ashes" and
"Last Knight"
An Interview With The Music Man
By Lynn Stapleton
On May 23, 1996, I had the opportunity to do a telephone
interview with Forever Knight's composer, Fred Mollie. Fred has
amassed a considerable career in the music, ranging from
producing albums for such artists as Jimmy Webb and Dan Hill. He
has won one Gemini Award for series score for Beyond Reality, as
well as two Juno Awards for Producer of The Year: Dan Hill; and
Best Children's Album: The Rugrats. He's also received multiple
nominations for Geminis for various other projects, and a Grammy
nomination for Producer on Dan Hill's "Sometimes When We Touch".
Mr. Mollie has a large body of work that range from series work,
miniseries, cable movies, and motion pictures.
Here, Mr. Mollie speaks of his experiences in the music
business, his association with Forever Knight, upcoming projects,
and the newly released Forever Knight Original Soundtrack
Recording CD. The music was written by Fred Mollie, with guest
appearances by Geraint Wyn Davies, Nigel Bennett, Lori Yates, and
Stan Meissner.
Long Live The Knight!
LS: How old were you when you first got bitten by the musical
bug?
FM: I've been playing music since I was really young. I started
playing...My first instrument was drums, so we're probably
talking age 10. And then really when made my first kind of
professional musical debut maybe when I was about 14 or 15. So
I've really been doing it since I was 13.
LS: Music sort of runs in my family. Does it in yours?
FM: Music didn't run in mine. I don't know where I got it from,
but I got the musical bug really early. I didn't really have
much of a choice. I just followed my muse. I quit school when I
was 16 to pursue music, so I've been a "professional musician"
since I was 16.
LS: What sort of musical background did you have before
composing for television and movies?
FM: Well, I was a singer/songwriter, and I had rock bands when
I was in my teens and into my early twenties. I then went into
performing acoustically as a singer /songwriter. I moved to
Toronto because my older brother had moved there, and I wanted
to check it out. When I was about 21, I made a career change
that took a couple of years where I went from being a
performer to a musical arranger and then a record producer.
Over the course of, let's say, the next couple of years - so
we're talking the early seventies now - I made that change
and all of a sudden we're producing records. I was producing
records with a partner. I produced records, pop albums for the
better part of... I guess from 1970...'74 until about 1983.
Within that time, I produced a lot of artists and had a lot of
hits. I was very fortunate. Probably the biggest hit that you
would know of in Canada would be Dan Hill's single "Sometimes
When We Touch".
LS: That's one of my favourite songs.
FM: That I produced a long time ago. 1977 or 76, I think. So
I was real fortunate that I was able to make that part of my
career happen at an early time. Then I lived in LA for a
number of years while I continued to produce records. In 1982,
I moved back to Toronto and around that time I was fairly
disillusioned with the record business and I just wanted to
get more...I just wanted to get back to more of my own
composing, my own music. So over the course of the next two or
three more years I made a very slow transition from producing
records to writing songs again, and then getting into TV and
film music. I didn't really plan to do that, it happened that
things just worked out, and I had a couple of options. I took
them and they worked out well. By 1985, I was full time
composing for TV and film. So I can safely say for 11 years
I've been a full time composer in this medium, whereas before
1985, I was still perceived as a record producer.
LS: I've noticed while watching the Canadian SHOWCASE Channel,
where they air Friday 13th: The Series and Beyond Reality,
that your name is listed there as composer.
FM: Right. More of my oldies, but goodies.
LS: You've also composed for the CBC drama "Liar, Liar".
FM: Yes, that's a great film. I've also done a recent one for
the CBC called "Little Criminals".
LS: I'd seen ads for that.
FM: You must see that film. It's brilliant. It's so stark...so
powerful.
LS: What kind of musical influences did you grow up with, that
helped inspire you with the bands?
FM: I was very much, as opposed to...there's a lot of TV and
film composers that I'm sure you'll talk to that would say, I
went to Julliard', or I studied here...', and I did
this...'. I came from a whole different background, much more
from the street, so to speak. I was from a middle class family
in Long Island, NY, and I was completely taken by rock and
roll by a very early age. By age five or six I was walking
down the street. to the record store myself and buying
records. I really loved rock and roll; it got me really
excited by music, so my earliest influences were Buddy Holly,
then around 12, it was the Beatles. And the Beatles were
obviously the ultimate inspiration in a lot of ways, people
like Elvis. All these were important influences. Then after
the Beatles I have so many people who I was inspired by for my
songwriting, such as Jimmy Webb, Randy Newman, and James
Taylor.
LS: And now you've been producing some of their music.
FM: Yes. I've been fortunate, because I've been working with
Jimmy Webb for twenty years. I'm just finishing a new album
with him right now, actually. But I've been real lucky. I've
had such good fortune in the music and recording business, and
I've been doing it for a long time. It's been one of these
things where it's as big a part of my life as anything. That's
really what started it. And my influences continue. I'm
influenced now by the great TV and movie composers, like John
Williams, Dave Grusin and Randy Newman. There's so many people
out there that I have such unbelievable high regard for.
LS: My most recent CD preferences have been the Forever Knight
CD and the Braveheart CD.
FM: Who did Braveheart, James Horner?
LS: Yes, I believe so.
FM: Yeah. James Horner's brilliant. There's so many talented
people out there, I feel like a phony. Like someone's going to
find me out.
LS: You're not. What led you to be composing for Forever
Knight?
FM: There was a call that was made to my agent in LA that
Paragon Pictures was looking for a composer for a new series,
which of course, at that point was Forever Knight. Actually at
that point it was still called Nick Knight. They put a phone call
into about 10-20 different composers across Canada to pitch on
it. Pitch on it means that they sent you a couple of the
treatments, with a couple of blurbs about what the producer
wanted and you were to do a couple of sketches that were to evoke
the mood of what you would do musically on the series. And I
gotta tell you, I felt that there was a very strong chance that
I wouldn't get the job because I'd been working for Paragon a lot
and they had definitely touted me to Jim Parriott [Forever
Knight's producer] who I didn't know. And I think Jim didn't like
being told who he should hire. I knew that for real because at
one point I think Jim told the guys at Paragon, "Look, don't tell
me who I should hire; it's got to be my choice." I remember
telling my agent, Wayne Burgos - a great guy who died with AIDS,
very sadly - that I wasn't even going to pitch on this because
I'm perceived as one of Paragon's team, or something, and it
seemed to me this guy wants to make his own mind up, and it
seemed like I was starting off in a very bad way. I told Wayne,
"Look, I don't think I'm going to pitch on this, cause I think
it's a waste of time." He told me not to do that, and just pitch
it. If it was great, the guy was going to like it no matter what
Paragon or whoever says. Basically Wayne said not to give up on
it.
LS: The opening sequence is very evocative.
FM: Exactly. I did two pieces and one of the pieces I did turned
out to be the theme. I mean literally, outside of remixing it,
that's what I gave Jim Parriott. He did have about 20
submissions, and they were all from the best composers in Canada.
I really thought I didn't have a chance in the world. Then it
turns out I got the phone call saying we got the gig. That's kind
of the ultimate compliment because I had a lot going against me
on that. When I met with Jim, we just got along so wonderfully,
that it turned out to be - for my money - probably one of the
best working relationships I've ever had. I can't tell you how
fortunate I feel that the music worked for him and I was able to
have this wonderful give and take with this guy for the past four
years. It's been incredible.
LS: I had a group of friends over to watch the season finale, and
it was great how the music added to the feel of the show.
FM: It was a great show.
LS: Very ambiguous ending.
FM: Absolutely. I spend about 10 minutes on the internet every
night answering fans' concerns, and I said, "Look, I don't know
if you were watching the same episode I watched, because you
never see LaCroix kill Nick."
LS: And you never see Natalie actually die.
FM: You never see Natalie die. It's totally ambiguous.
LS: I think the only one we know of for sure, would be Tracy.
FM: I think, yeah. And frankly, you know, if we had to lose
Tracy, we lose Tracy, because she added and element to the show
that was frankly more cop. I always felt, the only problem with
the show is that sometimes it was too much of a cop show, and we
love the vampire side. So I think we're in very good shape
because if they want to do a sequel movie or whatever, we've done
nothing. I means all we've done, as you say is create an
ambiguous ending, which we can easily change.
LS: The group on the fan-fiction list are going to be busy for
the next while, because of the ambiguous endings such as in "Last
Knight" and "Human Factor"[ep. # 316].
FM: Exactly. On that one [Human Factor], clearly I believe that
Nick brought Janette over, because the next day he sees the
bodies and they have fang marks in them. Janette's fangs. You
know what, I think we've luckily left it [Last Knight] ambiguous
enough that if they need to come back to the show, which I
certainly hope they do. If they want to go back to the show,
doing a movie, or another season, we haven't done anything wrong
except create a lot of controversy. I loved the final episode. It
was very emotional.
LS: Many of the show's fans know that the cast is a close-knit
group. Is that common or uncommon on other projects you've worked
on?
FM: I think it's not really that common, but at the same time,
certainly the longer a show runs with the same team, I would
imagine the closer you'd get. I think the fact that we were
together in a sense, even though it was three seasons, it was
actually four years. I think we just happened to get a little
involved in each other's lives, and I made wonderful friends. I
think there's a lot of the camaraderie there. It wasn't unusual,
though maybe for a show that only ran for three seasons.
LS: What were some of your favourite episodes to score?
FM: Well, I would probably have to say the finale was the most
emotional. I mean I really found myself getting very emotional as
I was writing certain cues, like when he brings Natalie across,
or not when he brings her across, but when he bites her. Also
when I wrote the whole cue for Tracy, the whole thing after
Tracy's death, like all these things. When Tracy had to impale
Vachon [Ashes to Ashes, ep. # 321], that was very emotional. That
show [AtA] was probably my most ambitious and probably my
proudest moment, scorewise, because I think out of maybe... the
show is 44 minutes long, so I would imagine there is 42 minutes
of score in that episode. It's all real big stuff and I felt
great about it. I would say "Ashes to Ashes" was one of my
favourite scores. Also "Last Knight" and "Queen of Harps" were
favourites. There's one cue from "Avenging Angel" that they let
me just go with no sound effects, just me.
LS: That's one of the scores on the CD.
FM: Yes. There were 70 episodes, and there's a lot of shows I
loved.
=========================================================================
Date: Mon, 3 Jun 1996 16:47:13 -0300
From: Stapleton <d7ux@u.......>
Subject: Fred Mollin Interview [2/2]
Here's the conclusion to the interview.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
LS: "Undue Process" was one of my all-time favourite episodes.
FM: "Undue Process". Absolutely. That was another very
emotional show. That's on the CD as well. There's a lot of
favourites, but certainly of the third season,
"Ashes to Ashes and "Last Knight" are real high up on the
list. There are a few others earlier on, too.
LS: How much creative leeway do you have with composing an
episode?
FM: I have a lot. I was very lucky in that I was able to
establish a form and a style with Jim. And once I kinda locked
with it, he liked it. It was kind of like, "Okay, Fred. You
run with the ball now." So I had a lot of freedom to work
within the world that I created that he liked. I couldn't go
too much further to the left or right, but as long as I stayed
within the realm that he liked, I just basically got to score
the show as I saw fit. And it was a wonderful amount of trust.
It was incredible experience.
LS: From any of the different episodes, what was your
favourite moment.?
FM: Well, that's a good question. There were so many. I have
to go back to the most recent shows. I think just "Last
Knight" overall. There's just so many incredible moments in
that show. I think the moment in "Ashes to Ashes" were
incredible with Divia and LaCroix.
LS: Kathryn Long did a fabulous job as Divia.
FM: Yeah, that's an incredible job. I lived the scenes, the
montage in "Avenging Angel". I thought that was the kind of
direction we could have taken in a fourth season. I loved
"Queen of Harps" which just had great production value,
wonderful scenes.
LS: I like the flashbacks
FM: The flashbacks are always really rich. There were
wonderful flashbacks on the train where they meet the young
Hitler [Jane Doe] - those are great flashbacks. I love the
show. I was a big fan, as well as being a big part of it. I
was a huge fan.
LS: A number of the fans know that the cast are into playing
practical jokes on each other. Have you ever been on the
receiving end of a practical joke on the set?
FM: Yes, I was the butt of one. On an episode called "Blood
Money", which was the last episode of season two. Ger [Geraint
Wyn Davies] directed it. It was ...Ger was basically asking
all his friends to do little cameos, walk-throughs, or extra
parts. I had seen him in a restaurant a couple nights before
he was shooting, and he said, "Ah, you've got to come on the
set and I'll put you in one of the scenes and you'll do a walk
through." I told him it sounded great, no problem, and it
sounded like fun. In Toronto, I don't live far from where they
shot the show, so I said "No problem." I went there and said,
"Okay, look. I've got on my black jacket, black T-shirt and
black jeans..."
LS: They'll stick you in the Raven.
FM: I said I'll be like a Raven customer, and he said,
"Great." So the day we shot in the Raven, I hung around and
shot the shit with everybody. Then when they wanted to shoot
the scene, the one they wanted me in the background for, Ger
kind of choreographed it, and it was a scene where Janette and
Nick walked through the doors of the Raven; they were talking.
He choreographed with Lori [Yates] singing in the background.
I kind of walked through, and he found an extra, blond hair,
very attractive girl who was going to be fake talking to me in
the background, as in the foreground, Janette and Nick are
still talking. And so basically as an extra - I'm an actor and
have been for many years, and I kind of a performer, so I know
all that side of it. For people who don't, as an extra, the
cardinal rule is: you're in the background, therefore you
never look at the camera, you're always supposed to be doing
your thing, whether it's talking to someone or whatever. So I
never looked to see where the camera was, I was looking at my
companion, this fetching girl, fake talking and we were doing
rehearsals. Then they do the first take. I wasn't watching
where the camera was going, cause I'm imagining the camera is
on Janette and Nick, and it's none of my business. I'm just an
extra doing my extra business.
LS: So Ger just brings the camera around in front of your
face.
FM: That's just what I was going to say. What Ger had done is
that he had told the girl on a certain direction or count or
something to basically lock lips with me, and to really as
close to sexually overtaking me, except with all her clothes
on. The girl basically started kissing me, this is while the
camera are rolling, and I'm thinking to myself this girl is
really thinking that she's going to get a better extra part,
if instead of fake talking, she's faking that we're kissing.
Next thing I know, she's jamming her tongue down my throat,
and you know I'm a married guy, and I'm getting sweaty here.
Of course by know I'm hearing laughter because the camera is
right at my face. So they got all this on film of me being a)
caught by surprise and b) being embarrassed, but the camera's
there and it's like "oh shit". They really got me on that.
LS: That's one shot that didn't make it to the Blooper Reel.
FM: It didn't make it to the joke reel and I'm thankful. I
was probably so shocked and embarrassed, that it would have
been so hysterical. But yes, I was they butt of Ger's
practical joke at that point.
LS: How were the selections for the Forever Knight CD chosen?
FM: I didn't chose them. I sent every single show's score down
to Mark Banning at the label, at Crescendo Records. Mark was
patient enough and loved the show enough to go through all the
cues and he picked out what he liked. Once he picked out what
he liked, I then added a couple of suggestions on my end, and
then I sorted through what he liked. We then kind of got to an
agreement on what should be on the album.
LS: Some of Nigel's [Bennett] cues are very interesting.
FM: Those are great. Nigel wrote them himself and he was very
funny. We came in on a Sunday morning and did those real
quick. It took him ten minutes to do them and we were all on
the floor laughing, cause they were so good.
LS: Are there any science fiction programs that you haven't
done, that you would like to score for?
FM: That's kind of an interesting question. I'm not usually a
huge sci-fi or horror fan, believe it or not, even though I do
a lot of horror and science fiction scoring. So I can't really
say that there is. You know I'm not really a Star Trek fan...
I wouldn't say that I aspire to that. I really aspire to
scoring great projects, I don't care what genre. I mean if you
give me a great drama, thriller, comedy romance...I'm
delighted to do a good project. I don't really shoot for sci-fi
or horror as my idiom. Actually, these days I'm trying to
get out of that a bit, because it can pigeon-hole you.
LS: I remember that you had done some scoring for The Outer
Limits. From that interview it seemed that the experience was
not a fond one.
FM: No. The LA Producer in charge was a very bad person to
work with, and made you realise how wonderful someone like Jim
Parriott is. You get very thankful on a show like Forever
Knight when you've worked on The Outer Limits, which is the
opposite.
LS: Parriott seemed to have had a good handle on the show from
the start.
FM: He's just a brilliant guy. A lovely guy, and he's someone
that once you've earned his trust, he allows you to do your
best work.
LS: Aside from the Forever Knight CD and the Friday 13th: The
Series CD, are any of your other compilations on CD?
FM: I don't have any other compilations. I do have of course
the records I've produced, but there's actually a two volume
compilation album called Vinyard Sound. It's on Critique,
which is distributed by BMG, and it's a pretty interesting and
worth a listen. It's different musical artists from Martha's
Vineyard and there's a cut of mine on each of the volumes.
I've got an instrumental kind of new-age cut. There's one on
Volume I called "Kataima Meditations", and on Volume II,
there's one called "Last Boat Home". It's all local bands,
well-established artists and all the money goes to charities.
They are lovely compilations and are available at the large
record stores. As well as the things that I do in record
production, I have a new album coming out in September for
Jimmy Webb that I'm in the middle of producing now. That will
be out on Guardian Records, which is a part of BMI, and it
will be called Ten Easy Pieces. Jimmy Webb is singing his most
famous songs in kind of an unplugged setting and it's
wonderful. It's going to be incredible.
LS: Will the sheet music for the main title ever be released?
FM: I'm hoping that the main title theme will be released I a
sheet music folio of other TV themes. The person you want to
contact - and I suggest all fans contact - is Laura Levinsky.
She's at the Music Department at Tri-Star Television in Culver
City. Laura is a lovely gal and the more letters and the more
phone calls she gets about it, she can then pass it on to
whoever is involved. I think the more demand, the more they'll
be willing to put it out. [Laura Levinsky, Department of
Music, Tri-Star/Columbia Pictures TV, 10202 Washington BLVD,
Culver City, CA 90230, USA]
LS: I had noticed recently on the FK listervs that there are
requests being made to various sci-fi companies to produce
Forever knight merchandise, and get it out there.
FM: That's something Tri-Star should have done right off the
bat. It's really sad that Tri-Star didn't understand what they
had, because had they merchandised the show, we'd already be
in our fifth season and they'd have a hit on their hands.
LS: Had they even advertised the show, really.
FM: Exactly. They didn't publicize, they didn't advertise, and
they didn't merchandise or market, and what a shame, because
the fans out there wanted it.
LS: And what publicity it did get was as a result of fan
effort.
FM: Exactly. It's a sore point, but it's show business. Can't
dwell on it, you know.
LS: Where can we expect to hear from you next, other than the
CD with Jimmy Webb?
FM: Well, at the moment, I just finished a movie called "The
Abduction" for the US LIFETIME Channel and the Canadian
network, The Movie Network. It stars Victoria Principle and
Robert Hays. I'm in the middle of Jimmy's album. To be honest
that's what I've got going. One of the things I've been doing
over the last couple of years, actually the past year and a
half, I've been building a library of music for Hard Copy -
Paramount's tabloid show. Lot's of people do watch it to get
the gossipy junk. But if you do watch Hard Copy, about 70% of
the dramatic score would be mine. That's on a daily basis. I'm
continually evolving my library of music for them. So between
that, Jimmy's thing, and the movie, it's kept me pretty busy.
I look forward to a new series or two for September, but so
far we have not lined up anything particularly exciting yet.
These things tend to happen now, as only now they start
organizing for a new season.
LS: I've been watching a good amount of Canadian programming,
and I continue to see you name come up in the credits as the
composer. You've been quite successful.
FM: I've been very lucky. In the past ten years I've amassed a
lot of credit. I've got a lot of products out there because
I've been very busy. I feel pretty lucky.
LS: I haven't got any further questions for you, but I would
like to thank you.
FM: Well, I want to thank you and the rest of the fans.
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Knight graphics and parchment background created by Melissa Snell and may be found at http://historymedren.about.com/
