Mini Convention - Chris Judge

[madbottoms]

A Night with Chris Judge

& Gary Graham

 

 

 

So where do I start?

 

I had the opportunity to experience another great night with another Stargate actor. Chris Judge is an amazingly funny, attentive, and gracious person with whom I was lucky to be able to spend time with.

 

Let me say that these intimate little conventions put on by Friends of SciFi are so wonderful and I really don’t mind having to spend the money on airfares and sometimes rather expensive tickets. It is well worth the money.

 

Okay, back to the convention in question…

 

Tuesday 22 April 2008 – Sydney, Australia.

 

My flight from the North Coast to Sydney was happily uneventful and I was met once again by my lovely friend Debs at the airport. We drove back to her place and had a few drinks while we chatted and got ready for the evening.

 

Around 5pm we got a cab to the venue and picked up our VIP tickets and chatted for a while. As we did so, Chris and another guest, Gary Graham were ushered through and surprisingly no-one really noticed except me and so I said, ‘hello’ and got a ‘hey how are ya’ in return.

 

After a short time we were let into the small function room (only about 35 or so of us) for our little meet and greet with Chris and Gary. Now it seemed as if everyone was a little awestruck at first but people slowly started to move toward him to introduce themselves. Me, well I just walked right up and shook his hand and started chatting away before giving him a gift that Debs so thoughtfully got for him from the both of us. Told him how my 9 year old son is working out a script in homage to the Jaffa and worrying his little head off over special effects and weapons. Boys! He liked the idea which my son was happy to hear when I relayed Chris’ best wishes for the project.

 

With him being such a football fan and it being the centennary of league, we got him a ball cap and beanie. He was very appreciative and thanked us proudly. It made me happy I tell ya. Well anyway I chatted to him for another moment and then let the others have their fill. Besides I needed a drink and managed to get Chris one too. J

 

So next I had some food to soak up the alcohol I had already consumed and then saw that Gary was free and floated over to talk to him for a while. Gray Graham played Matt Sykes in Alien Nation and the Vulcan Ambassador Savari(?) in ‘Star Trek: Enterprise’. I don’t watch Enterprise and knowing me I have got his character’s name totally wrong. However, I absolutely loved Alien Nation and adored the tough, play by his own rules cop, Matt Sykes. Kinda reminds me a little of Jack O’Neill. Except Jack’s much sexier, of course.

 

Anyway, we got talking about Alien Nation as you would, and Enterprise and he compared both and admitted he had more fun doing Alien Nation because he had so much more leeway to do his own thing. He said Star Trek is a little more rigid. We talked for a while and then he was nice enough to pose for some pics with me and him and Debs too, before I let him off the hook. LOL!

 

 

 

Next I managed to wrangle Chris in again and started chatting about all kinds of stuff. During this we started chatting about Rage of Angels with a couple of other nice young ladies, whom one of I later found out was a listsib. That was another bonus of the evening.

 

So, Rage of Angels sounds very interesting and to hear Chris talk about it so passionately makes me so much more eager to see it when it is finally produced. Chris said it is definitely not for kids and laughed when he said it would be a cross between ‘Touched By An Angel’ and ‘300’. Maybe interesting is not the right word to describe it. He was very excited to mention that it will not be a straight to DVD or TV movie but it has actually been picked up by MGM as a full feature film. Woohoo! Imagine CJ and Michael Shanks on the big screen. How great is that? He talked about other projects as well and then he was also nice enough to let me get some pics with him.

 

 

 

 

And all the while I had been talking to him, Debs had been shooting away. On ya, Debs!!! So good conversation and good pics and I was having a great time.

 

 

 

 

I continued chatting along with the ladies I had been talking to with Chris. We talked about other cons and I happened to mention the one I missed in New Jersey a couple of years back and then one of the ladies asked me, ‘Are you Sandy from the North Coast?’ and I looked at her funny and said, ‘Yeah’ and then she introduced herself and OMG it was Seaflower. ‘Hi Jill!’ (sends cyber wave). It was great and we chatted for a while before getting set up in the other room for the Q&A.

 

Gary was first up and he was great. He talked about Alien Nation and attempted to do a very bad Australian accent. You gotta love him for trying though. He mentioned other projects too, he had something happening on the Internet and also previewed a short film he wrote, directed and played a role in. It was really very good. It is called ‘Interviews’.

 

 

Next we watched an intro video of SG1 and then Chris came on stage to loud applause and we got straight into it. We talked of Stargate and the legacy it leaves behind, but also about how it looks as of there will be a third movie and it may even be a feature. That is very exciting news and I can’t wait to hear more about it. I asked his thoughts on that given the series had stopped filming, how did he feel about the show still being able to gain new fans every day. He seemed very humbled by that fact and very appreciative because it is the fans that helps it continue into other ventures like the movies and very proud of all the SciFi fandom as a whole because we are now one of the biggest fandoms and we really do control a lot of the economy.

 

Chris talked about his hair and how it came about that he could finally grow it. He bemoaned his lack of judgement when he actually coloured his hair blonde. ‘What was I thinking?’ he yelled. But it all came down to him trying to shock the writers and producers into allowing him to do something different and finally at the end of season 7 he went into Robert Cooper’s office and gave his speech on the reasoning behind why they should let him grow it for the next season and RCC actually had headphones on the whole time and hadn’t heard a word. Then noticing Chris there he took of the earphones and asked Chris what he needed. Well Chris was speechless after giving a big spiel already and just sort of mumbled something about growing it and RCC’s reply was something like, ‘Oh yeah, do whatever you want.’ LOL!

 

Chris also talked proudly about his ability to fart and discussed his and RDA’s long running farting competition on set and how they actually changed their diets to outdo the other. LOL! He said it got so bad on set sometimes that had to leave the set and get in those industrial fans to air out the place. At one stage the top brass sent a memo around forbidding the crew and staff to get involved because it was too costly. LMAO! But that didn’t stop the guys from continuing. Boys will be boys I guess.

 

 

Intelligent and well thought out questions were asked (well mostly). I was glad I managed to get a couple in myself. One in particular was prompted by the fabulous youtube vid that Shazz so kindly sent to me with Chris doing a very interesting interpretation of ‘The Devil Went Down to Georgia’. OMG it’s so funny. Done back in 1988, I can only assume it was something done as a joke or dare. So anyway, I made mention that I had come across is and his eyes bugged out and he just stared at me from the edge of his chair, I swear I thought he was gonna fall off. LMAO. The beauty of it was that no-one else had any idea what I was talking about and it felt like we were sharing a private joke. It was so cool.

 

Whatever! He said something like, ‘Oh shit! No way, you gotta be kidding me. Really? Noooooo! Where did you find that? Oh my god!’ I had him stumped and he just kept looking at me in shock saying, ‘No way!’ And then every time I went to continue on with my question he’d pin me with his eyes and say, ‘Aht! We’ll discuss this later.’

 

 

I hadn’t laughed so hard in a while and even if I didn’t get the question answered, well I never really got to finish the question because just mentioning the name of it got him gob smacked, and we never really got back to the actual question. I did manage to pull him aside later and we talked about it briefly. He couldn’t believe somebody had filmed it all those years ago. He was a little surprised that someone had a camcorder back then. I mean even in 1988 they had to be some big ass thing to carry around. He thought it was hilarious though and we had a good laugh, even if he was still in a little shock. I think that was one of my highlights of the evening and I’m sure he’ll remember this con for a while to come.

 

And we even got an, ‘Indeed’ out of him. The quintessential Teal’c. That word can mean so many things.

 

We had a break and they aired an episode of Atlantis that Teal’c had been in and him and Ronin had a very cool fight scene. I didn’t really watch it that well because I haven’t seen any of the current season at all.

 

Then it was time to line up for photo ops and we got to get our pics with Chris. I got to cuddle up to him again. He is just so nice and gracious and so big in person. LOL! Then we just hung around for a while and got another drink as you do before going back into the function room where we looked through some dealer tables. There was also an auction and I got myself a signed poster of Aaron Douglas – gotta love the Chief. 

 

Last part of the evening was time for autographs and once again we lined up and chatted as we moved along. Jill, Debs & I got to have a good chat about a few things and it was so good to be able to do that with another listsib. Finally we got up to see Chris again and autographs were signed and thanks given again for the gift and we parted with a smile and a memorable evening of yet another successful FSF convention.

 

Hope you enjoyed my little report and pictures. Thanks so much to Shazz for giving that link and any laughs. Thanks to Debs as always who lets me crash at her place and feeds me bourbon. J You rock!

 

 

Hugs

 

Sandy

 

 

Comments

*snort* the devil went down to Sydney LOL!

[(Anonymous)]

Hey Darling!

Just as I remembered it LOL! Fabulous, wonderful con report. Oh did I tell you that the next time you come to my house there will be a bill waiting for you at reception on your way out? *snicker*

Can't wait until the next convention :)

Hugs
Debs

Re: *snort* the devil went down to Sydney LOL!

[madbottoms.livejournal.com]

Yes he did come down to Sydney and wasn't he wonderful?

And I'm sorry I'm a bit hard of hearing - did you say bill? Huh? What was that? LOL.

Anyhoo, glad I got it all down. I'm lucky I did becuase I still haven't done my report form VC last year and it's almost upon us again for 2008.

Hugs

Sandy

[ocenbrez.livejournal.com]

Great con report Sandy. I'll pay you later for referring to me as a young lady. ;-)

I loved how gobsmacked CJ was when you mentioned the video. I don't thin I've ever seen him speechless but you managed to do it!

[madbottoms.livejournal.com]

Hey Jill

Well ya know I do like to be nice to my friends, but no payment needed, hon.

Seeing Chris gob smacked was worth it. If that was the only thing I did that night or the only thing I ever remember it will be worth it.

And catching up with you would be another.

Hugs

Sandy

[madbottoms.livejournal.com]

Oh and I love that icon. So yummy. I love that man!

[ocenbrez.livejournal.com]

Oh me too. He is big time yummo. ;-)