Singing a new tune
Canadian Idol winner heads up new Space drama
TORONTO — Ten years after Melissa O’Neil won Canadian Idol, the one-time wannabe crooner finds herself back on TV, this time starring on the new Space series Dark Matter.
It’s uncharted territory, admits the Calgary-bred singer, who landed on Broadway with Les Miserables after topping the CTV reality singing competition.
“It is 10 years. It’s weird when I think about it that way,” O’Neil said of the decade-long journey that brought her to a lead role in the sci-fi drama.
“I thought I was going to be a teacher and who knows, I may end up there again one day ... I’ve learned so much and I feel so fulfilled creatively. I’m really savouring every bit of it.”
O’Neil’s Toronto-shot series centres on the crew of a derelict spaceship who awaken with no memories of who they are or how they got there.
She plays Two, who emerges as the tough and determined leader of the group. Then there’s Three, played by Anthony Lemke, who is a mercenary who only looks out for himself.
The series was created by Joseph Mallozzi and Paul Mullie, also behind the Dark Matter graphic novel and the Stargate franchise.
Before the show’s première this week, O’Neil and Lemke spoke about set secrets, spaceships and singalong sci-fi: Q: There’s a lot of mystery in this show. How much did you know as filming unfolded? Were you as inthe-dark as the characters are? Lemke: When we started shooting, absolutely we were. We had read a number of episodes ahead as actors but one of the things that Joe and Paul did very, very well was keep secrets. Boy did they ever. Right up until the last episode of the show, the big cliffhanger. We literally had no idea how that was going to go until it was shot, on the last day of shooting. Q: How about you Melissa? Did not having a backstory make it hard to dig into your character? O’Neil: I had this hunch about my character and I felt very strongly that if this was correct, I needed to know it. And Joe, Paul and I went out for dinner one night and I posed the question to them and I was quite adamant and forthcoming about how I felt that this was crucial information for me to know — if it did end up in fact being true — and they held their cards really close. They were like, ‘No, no, no. You’re OK. You don’t need to know.’
And I kind of sat there thinking, ‘Are you sure?’ Q: And were you right? O’Neil: My hunch was correct. But that’s all I can say. Q: Did that change the way you approached the character? O’Neil: Occasionally yes … The same thing was happening with the character Two—as she moves along in the season she definitely experiences this sense about herself.
And I won’t say too much more about that. Q: Anthony, what did you latch onto in playing Three? Lemke: In a way he’s a very simple guy on the surface. He’s the guy who literally says exactly what he thinks all the time and damn the consequences … He’s an ends-justifies-the-means kind of guy ... the thing that gets us to survive until tomorrow is the right thing.
And he enjoys the discovery that he makes at the end of the pilot, which is a bit of a startling discovery. And everyone reacts to it differently on board and my character in the end revels in that discovery. So in a way, that’s what I had to latch on to.
You know, we’ve seen that type of character before in sci-fi ... Han Solo is an easy reference, for sure, and that looking-out-for-No. 1 kind of dude is who Three is set up to be. And as with all the other characters, who he’s set up to be is not his entire story. Q: Is the whole series confined to the ship? O’Neil: We do get off the ship sometimes, we land on planets. But it is a ship-based show and what’s exciting about that is we don’t have that on television right now — a ship-based drama that’s filled with a lot of humour as well.
I think audiences are going to be excited to return to that kind of a format. And our ship is incredible. It’s absolutely fantastic when you look at it on screen. Q: Nice to see yet another strong female lead on a sci-fi show. O’Neil: I think so too. I’m honoured to be playing one. Q: I don’t suppose there’s going to be any singing? Lemke: We tried hard!
Honestly, we were campaigning with Joe to get a musical episode in there.
I think we’re going to have to wait until season 3.