David Blue gets a little flustered when he’s compared to his Stargate Universe character.
“Everyone keeps saying that!” he pretends to fume.
To be fair, Blue does have a lot in common with Eli Wallace. They’re both self-described pop culture nerds who can’t stop themselves from quoting from their favourite movies and TV shows, and Blue shares Eli’s palpable excitement about working on a space ship. But he’s not exactly like Eli, Blue insists.
“There are worse people to be compared to than an incredibly smart, funny man,” he admits. “But I am much better with women.”
Another difference between the two is their familiarity with the Stargate universe. While Eli plays an MIT dropout who is brought onto the ship with no idea what is going on, Blue has been a die-hard fan of the Stargate franchise for years and knows everything about it.
“When somebody on the show talks about the ancients, I’m the one explaining it to my castmates,” Blue says. “And Eli’s the only one on the show who has no idea what they’re talking about!”
Despite his love of Stargate SG-1 and Stargate Atlantis, however, what drew Blue to Universe was the new series’ sharp shift in tone over its predecessors.
“It’s very difficult to continue SG-1 or continue Atlantis without ruining what they’ve created. It’s such a great library that exists that you don’t want to try to add to it, because you may trip up,” he explains. “I didn’t want to do SG-1 Part 3. We all wanted to do something new. We all wanted new characters who weren’t necessarily the stock military characters or the science characters. Having an experimental tone where not everything works out, that’s something you can look forward to doing, knock on wood, for four or five years.”
And while Eli is stranded on a distant space ship that threatens to break down almost every week, Blue is adamant that is no better place to work than the Universe set. The cast and crew have so much fun together, he says, that they often gather outside of star Robert Carlyle’s trailer for impromptu dance parties.
“He has a trailer with speakers on the outside and he and the cast have similar tastes in music, so at lunch, he puts his music on,” says Blue. “I have about a million videos of cast members dancing between shots. It’s just inherent in us. When we hear music, it’s like an addiction. We must dance. So we all kind of congregate in front of Robert’s trailer.”
So how does Carlyle feel about this?
“He’s going to kill me for saying this, but: you think I don’t have video of Robert Carlyle dancing around?”
Of course, all fun aside, Stargate Universe hasn’t been free from controversy. The show has come under fire for how it treats its female characters, with some critics going so far as to call the show sexist.
“It’s shocking to hear that,” Blue admits. “Ensemble dramas are hard and there’s a limited about of time, and it takes a bit to introduce pieces of characters that you can grow to love. But TJ has quickly become one of my favourite characters, in good part due to Alaina [Huffman’s] performance. And Ming-Na’s character, Wray, has broken my heart this season.”
And, he adds, if non-believers stick with Universe through its entire first season, he thinks they’ll be proven wrong.
“The women aren’t defined by the men around them; they truly, truly aren’t. I realize I know more of what happens than the rest of the audience does, but at this point, I don’t see the problems they’re talking about,” he says. “I don’t know if that’s too much to ask, but I think they should. I have every confidence that people will find something they love in the show.”
Beyond that, however, Blue remains tight-lipped about what’s in store for the show’s mid-season finale (airing Dec. 4 on Space) and beyond. He does allow that Eli goes through a transformation, from the comic relief who annoys the other characters to a bit more of a grownup.
“I think it’s hard when you’re the guy who is always trying to make jokes and you’re asking people, ‘What’s this? What’s that? What’s this do?’ They’re gonna go, ‘Go away, little boy,’” he explains. “Which is part of what I love about Eli and where he goes this season. He has to learn to connect with these people and part of that is maturing a little and letting some stuff go.”
And as for Eli’s luck with the ladies?
“Hey, anytime there’s a new guest star, I’m like, ‘Ooh, is that the one Eli’s going to hook up with?!’” Blue laughs.
In other words, Blue wants Eli to be a little bit more like him.
The mid-season finale of Stargate Universe airs Friday, Dec. 4 at 10 p.m. ET on Space.
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