411mania Interviews: Katee Sackhoff
Posted by Al Norton on 03.08.2010
411's Al Norton sits down for an exclusive interview with Katee Sackhoff to discuss working on 24, the Battlestar Galactica finale, if she'd want to be one of Charlie's Angels, and her cross country motorcycle trek with Tricia Helfer.
Katee Sackhoff will probably be forever associated with Kara "Starbuck" Thrace, the Saturn Award winning role she played on Battlestar Galactica. She also starred in NBC's Bionic Woman and has appeared on Nip/Tuck, Law & Order, and The Big Bang Theory. She can currently be seen on Fox's 24 every Monday night at 9 pm.
Editor's Note: Katee was not allowed to discuss her recently reported casting in the lead role of an untitled ABC pilot written and directed by Richard Hatem (Supernatural, The Dead Zone, The Lost Room).
Al Norton: Hey, how are you?
Katee Sackhoff: A little hung over.
Al Norton: Was there an occasion?
Katee Sackhoff: No. Just Thursday. Well, I'm in the last two months of being 29 so I figure I should take advantage of it.
Al Norton: 30 isn't so bad.
Katee Sackhoff: I have a philosophy that when you're 29 people think you're old because you're actually the oldest of the young people but when you turn 30, they think you're young again because you're the youngest of the old people.
Al Norton: That makes some sense.
Katee Sackhoff: When I say to people that I'm 29 they always look at me like, "oh no" but when you say, "30", which I started doing because I was running my own little test, they go, "oh my God, you're a baby."
Al Norton: So was there a libation of choice last night?
Katee Sackhoff: A white burgundy. Nothing fancy.
Al Norton: How much of a 24 fan were you before you got the job?
Katee Sackhoff: I watched the first season, every single episode, and then with the schedule for Battlestar I just got busy. And especially with 24, if you miss an episode you're really far behind. They do that really good recap from the previous week's episode. In all honesty, the recaps are so long on 24 that you almost see the whole episode. I loved the show coming in. I loved Keifer, the whole thing. They figured out how to keep people interested in a show for so many years that isn't a procedural.
Al Norton: How much did you know about Dana before you started seeing the actual scripts?
Katee Sackhoff: When I went in and auditioned I knew the role was going to go one way or the other, either possibly be a throwaway or become something more. I went in and sat down with the guys and we talked about it and they promised they would give me a gun at some point.
Al Norton: They didn't tell you who you might shoot, though.
Katee Sackhoff: No, and they didn't actually say I was going to shoot it, either, just that I would have a gun. I should have gotten that in writing and I should have made them clarify something like, "you are going to pull the trigger."
Al Norton: Is it hard to prep for a role when you don't know that much about it?
Katee Sackhoff: It is because I knew somewhat about Dana/Jenny, I knew that's who she was as far as background, but beyond that I couldn't prepare for too much. I had to really commit to the moment because you can't commit to the story.
Al Norton: What's Kiefer like to work with?
Katee Sackhoff: Lovely. Kiefer gives 110% to everything that he does. He's fantastic.
Al Norton: Coming off of Battlestar you must have thought, "well, I'll never do anything that's that intense again"…
Katee Sackhoff: You know what's funny is that I tried to not do something that was as intense. I did a pilot (a Dick Wolf produced procedural that NBC did not pick up) and cried every night on the way home. I said, "you know what? I think that I'm meant to blow shit up." I really do. Especially for a series that could potentially go for a number of years, and you're working 12 – 16 hour days, you've got to be having fun. I don't stand around and talk very well. I need things to do, things to look forward to. I can do the talky talky stuff but make sure I have a gun at some point (laughing) because it gives me something to look forward to. Make her tough, but a little sensitive. Give her some layers. I don't ask for too much (laughing). I want to play somebody complicated. If not, I'll make her complicated.
Al Norton: When talking to people who work on shows where the on-screen stuff is life or death, I've found that usually means the cast is much more likely to goof off the minute the cameras turn off.
Katee Sackhoff: Yes. Kiefer got mad at me because I got the band wrong and I keep saying he has "All Out Of Love" by Air Supply as his ring tone and that's not who it is. Supposedly it's some Canadian artist and I can't remember the name of the song but it's something so cheesy. It sounded so great when I thought it was Air Supply but it's not Air Supply. It's a Canadian man from the 80's, and it's a love song. I get it wrong. I do love music though.
Al Norton: I'm not sure you can say you love music when you've confessed to me before how you used to dance to Alyssa Milano.
Katee Sackhoff: Oh my God, totally. I had Teen Steam. I idolized her.
Al Norton: Both 24 and Battlestar have very passionate fan bases that use the internet to talk about how they feel about the show. Do you ever succumb to temptation and go searching?
Katee Sackhoff: Yeah, they're all like, "I hate Dana! (laughing)" I don't go looking anymore. The moment during the beginning of Battlestar when people began insulting me as an actual person I was like, "and I quit the internet."
Al Norton: Well maybe a little but you've got a pretty cool website that gets updated all the time.
Katee Sackhoff: My website is fantastic because my webmaster Justin kicks ass. You can get video updates, which are fun. It's me, typically with no makeup on, answering questions and being stupid. We do weekly updates on what I'm doing. All my press stuff is up there. My blog hasn't started yet because I'm a little scared of what I'll say so I've kind of avoided that. It's pretty fun. We are trying to bring back the fan clubs of the 90's. Now with the internet there is all this information readily available but in the 90's you had to be in a fan club to get the information and that personal connection and we are trying to be the best of both worlds. The store on the website is almost up and running and people will be able to buy pictures and autographs and memorabilia, with all of the money going to charity.
Al Norton: Avoiding talking about any projects in general, how do you deal with being in the middle of pilot season and having your character and possibly your show be so up in the air?
Katee Sackhoff: The good thing about 24 is that I'm friends with Brannon Braga (one of the show's executive producers) so it makes it easier for me to get some information out of him. I can find out enough so that I don't worry either way. I haven't had to gamble too much with what I am going to be doing.
Al Norton: A couple of months ago there was word that ABC was thinking about rebooting Charlie's Angels and I immediately starting writing that my dream casting would have you, Natalie Morales (The Middleman), and Charisma Carpenter as my three Angels.
Katee Sackhoff: That would be fun (laughing). I don't know that I'd want to work with two other women. Women tend to be a bit on the overdramatic side, and I'm not excluding myself as part of the problem (laughing) so I'm just saying that things seem to move a lot smoother if I'm on a show where the cast is mostly men.
Al Norton: I know it's almost a year ago now but were you happy with the Battlestar Galactica finale, both for the series and for Starbuck.
Katee Sackhoff: Yes, very much so. The one thing I requested from the writers and Ron Moore (the showrunner) the entire time was that I wanted Starbuck to be at peace and however she got to that point I was cool with. And I feel that she found it.
Al Norton: And the last few minutes of the episode?
Katee Sackhoff: I loved it. I know some people thought it was crap but those were probably the same people who were like, "Starbuck's a girl?!?!"
Al Norton: What do you watch on TV these days? If you could pick a show to guest on, what would it be?
Katee Sackhoff: It would probably be Deadliest Catch. Or Alaska State Troopers, because I want to go hang out in Alaska and arrest some drunken Eskimos. That would be fun (laughing).
Al Norton: Speaking of fun, how great a time did you have with your Big Bang Theory guest spot?
Katee Sackhoff: So much fun. I loved it. I'm upset I haven't gotten to go back more. Tricia Helfer is going back to Two and a Half Men and she called me and I was jealous. I said, "tell Chuck Lorre I have a bone to pick with him."
Al Norton: There aren't a lot of jobs where you show up, take off your clothes, and get into a tub.
Katee Sackhoff: I know, right? I think that's how it happened. I showed up for Tricia's Two and a Half Men and Chuck was like, "you. Let's do an episode. I'm calling you next week." That's what happens when you hang out with Tricia, her good luck rubs off.
Al Norton: Tell me about your comic book project.
Katee Sackhoff: It's called Versus and we just started taking meetings to pitch to comic book houses. I can't tell you anything yet (laughing). All I can tell you is that my writing partner is a comic book fanatic and told me he used to have this mad crush geek boy fantasy about the Black Canary and he said that this new character is his new fantasy. She's so bad ass. I think it's going to make a lot of little boys swoon and a lot of girls pretty excited. It's a lot of fun.
Al Norton: Was doing a comic book on your to-do list?
Katee Sackhoff: It was on my to-do list. I have a list of things I want to do, especially since I'm hitting my 30's.
Al Norton: When you hit a certain age it goes from being your to-do list to being your bucket list.
Katee Sackhoff: It's true. I'm calling this my third life crisis.
Al Norton: What are some of the other things on the list?
Katee Sackhoff: I want to go to Viet-Nam with my Father, that's on the list. I want to go dive in a shark cage. I want to go on an elephant safari in Botswana.
Al Norton: I'm glad the first one you mentioned might make you some money so you can afford to pay for the rest of them.
Katee Sackhoff: I know. Tricia Helfer and I are in pre-production right now on a documentary web series we are producing that we've called, "The Untitled Tricia-Katee Documentary Trek." We're going to drive cross country on our motorcycles. It's inspired by the Van Buren sisters, who were two socialite sisters in 1916 who, to relieve the burden from men serving in World War 1, volunteered to be motorcycle mail carriers, which at the time was a job men had to do on top of their other duties. They were denied and the Army stated women didn't have the strength or stamina to ride motorcycles, so these two socialite sisters got on 1916 Indian motorcycles and drove cross country to prove that women could do it. They drove the first two wheeled vehicle to get to the top of Pike's Peak in Colorado, they were arrested in Utah for wearing men's clothing; they were pretty amazing. They got to San Francisco they day they said they would get there, which in the mail delivery business is pretty important, and this took months. This was 1916 and even today the documentary is going to take us 25 days. They reapplied after they finished the journey and were denied again.
Because the sisters were trying to help the military, we decided we would raise money for the military with our ride. We decided we should give back. We're kicking around doing a simultaneous on-line auction.
Al Norton: You mentioned this was for the web but if someone came along and said, "hey, we want to put this on the air" I assume you'd be interested.
Katee Sackhoff: Of course. It's something we're kicking around.
Al Norton: The only issue is that I can see how a TV executive might not want to cover up your faces with helmets the whole time.
Katee Sackhoff: The good news is we'll be miked the whole time, which is exactly what I'm sure any man wants to hear. "Tricia, I have to pee." "I'm really tired." "Did you see that guy in that car? He was really cute. (laughing)"
