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Chatting with the Killjoys: Stunt Doubles, Crossovers, Secrets

Excited for Killjoys to start on Friday? We certainly are! We had the great opportunity to participate in a conference call with the show’s stars, Hannah John-Kamen, Luke Macfarlane and Aaron Ashmore, about the world they’re creating and the fun they’re having. This is part 1 of the conversation – watch for part 2, tomorrow!

All of you have really great chemistry together. Did it happen right away, can you talk about the first time you guys met and worked together as a group?

Luke:  Sure.  So much of the credit is due to the casting process. We had a really great casting director that took the time to really kind of do mix and matches.  So as we’re sort of slowly assembling this group, we kind of auditioned with various people and that’s always terribly nerve racking as an actor, but I think ultimately it’s really a useful sort of thing to do.  Because yes, we got along from the beginning almost immediately, very similar sense of humor.

Aaron:  Yes, and I think that as far as chemistry and stuff  like that, you either have it or you don’t.  That is something that obviously is due to the casting process, and when they’re doing a show like this that obviously revolves around the characters having sort of dynamic chemistry, it’s really important.  But, you know, sometimes you just really lockout and I think the three of us have become, you know, really good friends and we got along so, so well, and it’s kind of rare.  So I think it’s special and I think that we all appreciate it and it’s kind of lucky too that you get three people that just get along so well.

Hannah: And I think it’s great – but it’s important to have the chemistry on screen and off.  And I think that we all have the same sense of humor which really helps and…

Luke: Weird, weird.  I think we’re all weird.

Hannah: Much fun.  And we sing a lot too.

Luke: Yes, we do, we make up songs on the set all the time.

You’ve got to release those!

Luke: Yes, DVD extra, special behind the scenes.

It seems like this group doesn’t tend to always follow the rules that are set forth. Is that going to become a problem or does the company not really care as long as they get what they’re after?

Luke:  It’s a good question.  I think what is interesting with Killjoys is like, you know, there’s been a lot of comparisons to Firefly, that show.  And what I think makes Killjoys really different as an entity and as a show is that we do have to abide by those rules.

So the tension exists within that, sort of how far can you bend the rules.  And I think that makes for an interesting thing, it’s not like we’re just rogue cowboys, we really – we really do have to operate with inside the system so that it becomes a sort of like doubly complicated way of sort of bending the rules as far as we can but yes, of course it becomes complicated because we don’t always abide by the rules.

Hannah: I mean, like the whole saying, is take no bribes, take no sides, the warrant is all, but it’s really hard when you’re put in a situation like Dutch in the first episode with John and D’avin and taking on that warrant and basically kind of saving people’s asses and kind of having that kind of morals – having those morals as well.  They kind of give that kind of dilemma and that conflict with the characters which I think is more interesting.

Aaron: Yes, and I think it shows their intelligence and their creativity and their knowledge of this world and how we sort of – to circumvent some of these things and make it work and I think that that’s kind of interesting as well to see us doing those things.

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The ship is pretty much another character on this series. How do each of you interact with that ship?

Aaron: Well, I would say that John is does most of the work with Lucy (the ship’s interface) although we all interact with her, in all the episodes we all talked to her.  But I think John is Lucy’s favorite and I think that’s sort of addressed at times, even thought John denies that.  But he definitely works with her the most and fixes her and he’s definitely more of a tech guy.

So it’s really interesting to have a character that we work with so closely in such a big part of the show but we don’t  really get to see her or her voice until the final product.  So it’s really cool to see that character come alive when the actor is finally sort of voicing it.  And I think that you’re really going to enjoy it because it just is that really cool AI and she has a real sense of humor too, a real personality…

Luke: I think it’s really telling the way we all decide to interact with Lucy too.  I don’t even bother to learn Lucy’s name until the seventh episode, I just call her ship, which I think is sort of funny. But I think our character’s ability to empathize, you know, and John being really good at that and being able to understand people I think a little bit better than me.

Hannah: I think Lucy serves the team well, she’s so professional.  And that there’s situations in the show where even though Lucy is a machine, you know, she’s a ship, she really helps our characters get out of a situation as much as she can.  And yes, there’s a sense of humor as well and it’s really cool because it’s just seeing that with her voice but with what she says is very, very humorous.

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D’avin and Dutch kind of come into this and we sort of balanced their past with their present.  And John seems to be pretty happy go lucky for lack of a better term, he doesn’t have something hanging on for him.  Will we see a balance of that through the course of the first season where D’avin and Dutch have to address the parts of their past that are still lingering for them?

Hannah: That’s a great question – the relationship between Dutch and D’avin is very interesting because it starts off – I mean, I’m very, very, wary of this intruder coming into my situation with me and John.  But then we find out that we both have a similarity and I think that gets me to a point where we have to address that.  You don’t have to wait too much but there is an unravel with that.

Luke: Yes, I know I think like any two people who have to sort of reconcile their pasts, they clumsily reached for each other in a way because they identified a thing in their past that they need to reconcile.  And we do seek a certain level of conclusion or reconciliation, I think more on my part as far as this thing that happened to me in my past and how I try to take care of it.

Hannah: We’re not very good at talking about our feelings…Like he said we clumsily reach and kind of solve it in our own way.

I know Firefly already has been mentioned and you’re an original show but I believe these comparisons are really intended to be  complimentary and I wanted to know what you guys thought about the inevitable comparisons that will come up along the way?

Aaron:  I think it’s fine because until people really get the personality of our show, that’s the easiest way to understand something or put it out there to compare it with something.  So I think that that’s totally fine.  I think that people who are fans of Firefly, I think there are definitely some similarities just in the genre of the show, so I think that that’s great.

But I also think that Michelle Lovretta, our creator, and the whole creative team have also created their own unique world. And as much as there maybe are some similarities in a broad sense I think the specifics of the show and characters and details are definitely going to become something all to themselves.  So I think the comparisons are like totally cool, I think it’s flattering too because as genre fan myself, Firefly is obviously one of the biggest shows, one of the most beloved shows so any comparisons to that are cool.

Luke: Yes, I definitely think about that.  I mean, that’s the way we understand things is by comparing them to each other.  My hope is that, yes, eventually it steps into its own unique thing and then one day they’ll compare us to something that we haven’t yet seen around the set.  But I would also say Firefly was essentially a rogue group of individuals.  The Killjoys operate within a system and I think that is very, very deeply sort of what makes this different.  We can’t do whatever we want whenever we want, we have to operate with inside the system called the R.A.C..  And I think that makes the world fundamentally different.

One of the interesting things about Dutch is that she’s got a mysterious background. Is that going to be a large part of the story as it unfolds throughout the season?

Hannah: You see hints of it at the beginning of the season, all of these catching up with her.  As the show goes on it seems more like a massive change.  Absolutely you’re going to expect a lot of unraveling of Dutch, and her character, and her past, and why she she is where she is now.  There’s going to be more questions even, as the show goes on.

One last question, what’s the good thing about going back to back on the schedule with Dark Matter? We’re going to have two ship based space shows all together in one night which I’m quite excited about.  And what would you think about the possibilities of crossovers in the future?

Aaron:  Crossovers would be cool but I don’t know if they could handle us because we’re pretty dangerous so if we had to go head to head…

Hannah:Yes, we’re pretty badass.

Aaron:  Yes.  Of course anything like that would be really exciting actually, the crossing into another show even if it’s a minor sort of thing.

Hannah:  Mega cool.

Luke: It would be a funny thing if all of our characters kind of have a big sense of humor and personality.  And from my understanding of Dark Matter they are a little bit more sort of cold killer like – I don’t know if they’re funny so I think they might look at us like we’re a bunch of clowns. But then we beat them up.

Aaron: Dangerous killer clowns, that’s what we are.

Hannah: We’re clowns but then we’d beat them up definitely.

Luke: But then we beat them up and we steal their ship.

Aaron: How funny are we now?

Hannah: Exactly.

Luke: Go back in your cryo freeze.

Aaron:  But yes it would totally be fun probably to do crossovers.

Luke: Very fun.

It seems like a lot of fun to do the fight scenes you guys had, you have all these cool gadgets. Do any of you have any favorite gadget that you work with or that you would like to have in real life or in a fight?

Hannah: My guns, I felt like my guns were part of my limbs.  I don’t know why, I just had this bond with my gun, I fell in love with my laser gun.

Aaron: I think we all had unhealthy attachments to our weapons by the time we were done.

Hannah: Yes. And beautiful custom leather leg harnesses were something I’ll wear as well, yes.

Aaron: The props guys would start asking us if they wanted us to take the guns off us between scenes.  At a certain point all of us were like no, no, no we prefer hanging on to them.  And we’re very adamant about that so, yes, it was kind of that weird.

Luke: Yes, very cool…

Hannah:  Yes, they were like, all right then, OK.

Luke:  Of course they can shoot lasers.

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What is with the green juice that you guys drink?

Hannah: Algae beer.

Aaron: Algae beer which sort of took a backseat after the first episode because I think they’re like – and it’s so gross but that…

Hannah: It was so gross.  But that’s…

Aaron: What is it though?   It’s like coconut water mixed with something else, it was kind of lumpy.

Luke: They blended…

Aaron: Spinach.

Hannah:  I think it’s like a really healthy L.A. smoothie or something but to be honest I’m mad on it.  And then we have algae buns as well that you guys –  hey, I never got to eat it, it was made from beans, isn’t it?

Aaron: Yes, some sort of bean curd. But I think that the spinach started to get stuck in our teeth from the algae beer and you just couldn’t have that in scenes so they’re like yes, we’re going to lose that because you guys are all smiling with that green junk…

Hannah: So it was pumpkin beers.  So we changed it to pumpkin instead of algae.

Luke: I’m glad you asked about that.  I actually asked the writers a similar question, where did the algae beer go, it’s stuck in his teeth.

Are you guys going tweet it from here? Everyone would love to speak with you.

Aaron: I’m going to try and do that for sure – well, I’m not going to try, I am going to do that, yes.  The only thing…

Hannah:  I’m going to do that.

Aaron:  Yes, but your time zone, you’re going to be, you know, Hannah is going to be like in the middle of the night when we’re airing.

Hannah: I’m going to be – I’m dedicated.

Aaron: That’s commitment.

Hannah: It’s going to be 3:00 in the morning for me.  I have a wedding to go to the next day but I should be up in the morning.

Luke: That’s making me feel very bad because I haven’t – I don’t have a Twitter.

The stunts and the fighting are great and you guys do a lot of gadgets and all that stuff. Did you have any special training going in or how did that work?

Hannah: Yes, we all had stunt training, military training, and physical training as well.  And the stunt coordinators are Alam, Alex and Allison. So during the week before they kind of planned out with our stunt doubles, the fight sequence, and it was so much fun.

Luke: When I first got into the business there is a sort of mythological idea that you have an action show, that you’ll have a trainer.  And I remember thinking that was cool.  And this is actually the first time that I ever got a trainer.  We worked out and they took pictures of our shortlist which they sent to the producers.  It’s always like this badass thing that I wanted to have and they did it, and it was great, it was a great excuse to work out.

Aaron: And the physical stuff that we got to do at the beginning, the military stuff, the working out, the fight training is really kind of neat because the three of us didn’t know each other so we’re thrown into all this really intense training together.  And I think that it’s kind of fun when you start on it and it’s a good way to bond with your fellow actors.  And we really get to know each other.  And everybody was slightly out of their element because none of us are martial artists or anything like that.  So you’re all thrown into this new experience in doing it together and yes it was actually a lot of fun.

Hannah: We bonded pretty violently.

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Do you guys get to do a lot of your stunts?

Hannah: Yes, I think we all did them, didn’t we?

Aaron: Yes.

Luke: Yes.

Aaron: For sure.  And obviously there’s stunt doubles for stuff that, you know, they don’t want you to get hurt and all that but they actually let us do a lot of it ourselves.

Luke: Yes, they did.  We had amazing stunt doubles.  My mother came to the set one day when my stunt double was acting.  And the stunt double does the scene, and then, the actors do the scene.  And obviously the camera operators are a little more inclined to show your faces.  My mother says in front of the stunt double, I think you did a much better job than (the double) did.  And I said mom, that’s absolutely incorrect, he’s amazing.  But, you know, moms will be moms.

Aaron: She’s just so proud of her boy.

Luke: She was so proud of her ass-kicking boy.

Killjoys Premieres Friday, June 19 at 9 pm Eastern/8 pm Central on Syfy

Check out the Killjoys Website

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