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	Andromeda

SPACE.com: So, you’re there in front of the greenscreen reacting to four episodes worth of stuff?

LD: To a large degree, yeah. It gets better. Once I have a body [which happens in the third episode], it’s much easier to shoot a scene the way you would normally shoot a scene, instead of having to insert greenscreens and do the AI (Artificial Intelligence) shots. In the video, that was just me on a wireframe. But there’s still a certain bit of greenscreen stuff to do. They’re cutting down on that, most of it’s just Andromeda’s interaction hologram. But it adds an interesting dimension to it anyway.

"Strictly speaking from a story sense, is it absolutely necessary to have the plunging neckline?"
     

SPACE.com: How do you see Andromeda growing, now that she has a body?

LD: Well, it was interesting, because the first two episodes, somebody somewhere -- and I’m not sure who, and I don’t really want to know who -- didn’t understand how Andromeda had emotions before she was given a human body.

So we actually had to go back and reshoot some of the stuff from the first two episodes. The note [I was given was to] "try to take out as much personality and emotion as you can." Which was kinda funny.

So the performance in the first two episodes of Andromeda, for me anyways, is a completely manufactured thing. When she gets a body, I was really grateful because it adds a really interesting dimension in that she’s very childlike -- but not in the same way, say, that Trance is childlike -- because she has three years of life experience behind her. That and she’s programmed to be somewhat wise and intelligent. As her ship self, she doesn’t get physical reactions and emotions.

In Rommie, she does. Like when you get butterflies in your stomach or getting all choked up in your throat. Those sorts of reactions are new to her. Knowing what everything is in theory, and then experiencing it.

SPACE.com: So she’s perpetually, as Stanislavski would say, "in the moment"?

LD: Yeah, but, not entirely because she’s in a lot of places at once. And initially, there are subtleties in that because she’s still going on automatic pilot. She already has a built-in personality, and the built-in personality is not a wide-eyed innocent. So there are just moments where it becomes a little overwhelming because she’s actually not living in the moment, in that she’s falling back on her programming.

And then, periodically, she’s forced to be in the moment because something is happening in this body and, "oh my, why do I have butterflies? What is this feeling?" And it’s having to say, "okay, I’ve heard about this before, this is normal." More along those lines.

SPACE.com: I understand for your audition you had to do a very schizophrenic thing?

LD: They wrote a scene specifically for the audition, and it was the Andromeda Hologram, Andromeda Android and Rommie (the humanoid avatar) having an argument. It was really interesting because I learned the dialogue for all three of them, and then created different characterizations for them. It worked out really well, I did it three times, once as each manifestation of Andromeda. And it was very funny because I managed to get through it and not lose my head.

SPACE.com: And have you had now an opportunity to do that again in the show itself?

LD: A little bit. I created three different characterizations for Andromeda. Not hugely different ones, it’s more like the older sister, the middle sister and the youngest sister.

That was sort of how it worked. But the problem is, getting toward the end of the day and when we’ve got to get a bunch of shots and we don’t have to set up a greenscreen it’s like, "okay, now you’re the AI."

So I’ve made the script notes and talked to Robert [Hewitt Wolfe] and they’ve changed the dialogue to make it suit one or the other characterizations. A lot of that still shows up, and I try to do it as much as I can, but sometimes it’s not really all that possible. There are other times when I’m just literally spitting out information that there’s no point in even bothering to try, 'cause that’s just chewing up scenery.

SPACE.com: So, who’s the older sister?

LD: The AI. Definitely. She’s probably the most logical, the one who doesn’t bear idiots lightly, and although they all think of themselves in the first person, she’s the one who considers herself really in control of the ship.

But, they all are, really. I have problems sometimes sitting and wrapping my head around it, it’s one of those things that I’ve got to just feel my way through into what feels right as opposed to making too many notes because, as an actor, that locks me into things. It’s almost like painting yourself into a corner.

The middle sister with the more aggressive of the personalities would probably be the Andromeda Hologram. And the youngest sister would be Rommie. Now, she’s got bits of both of the personalities, but then there’s a whole other aspect to it as well, this idea of actual sensation in regards to emotion.

SPACE.com: Now, Kevin looks better in the black battle armor. Have you gone through a costume change?

LD: Oh my God. Okay. Every episode, I’m wearing something new. It hasn’t even been nailed down yet. At one point, I saw the black uniform and I went, "oooh, I want one of those."

But I think the idea is that they wanted the female uniforms to be different, female variations of the male uniform. That red pleather thing with the gold trim, with the ridiculously plunging neckline, that is the female High Guard uniform.

SPACE.com: Yes, well, we can guess which gender designed that one.

LD: Duuuuuuuuh. Yeah. Sorry. I have minor issues with that. My dad was very funny because, being a dad, but also being an incredibly intelligent, logical individual, he’s also not exactly somebody who takes umbrage at many things.

So, when I went home just after the premiere he was like, "Strictly speaking from a story sense, is it absolutely necessary to have the plunging neckline?"

But they did a lot of ironing out wrinkles, so to speak, as far as the look of the show is concerned. And I don’t think that the red pleather was that popular. A lot of the decisions on Andromeda are made by committee, because there are a lot of people involved and thank God, for the most part, they’re all on the same page. The places where they’re not on the same page, it’s stuff that’s easily fixable like the costumes or the aliens or stuff like that.

So, there are wrinkles, but they’re all being worked out and it’s actually a really fun, happy environment to be in. But, let’s see, I’ve had one, two, three, four (oooh, that one was bad), five, six different uniforms. And one of them was just . . . I looked like a cross between a futuristic cafeteria lady and Lieutenant Uhura, so that one stayed for one episode and now it’s gone. It will never see the light of day again.

SPACE.com: Is there a rationale behind this? Are you suddenly becoming a clotheshorse?

LD: There’s a little bit. Funny enough, not the next episode we’re about to start shooting, but the episode after that, Robert actually went so far as to explain why I keep wearing a bunch of different outfits.

Because I kept saying to him, "Andromeda is a really cheeky starship. She’s the last surviving officer in the High Guard, and she refuses to wear a uniform."

And he goes, "Well they’re all sorts of uniforms." And I’m like, "Well, the audience doesn’t know that." I think once I get to wear the same uniform as Kevin does, and then again it’s a stylized female version, but at least it doesn’t have the hugely plunging neckline.

SPACE.com: So you’ll think you’ll settle down on the black one?

LD: No. Hell, no. What they’ve decided -- what’s being figured out now is -- the AI and the hologram will always wear the black combat uniforms, and Rommie will wear different uniforms, because the argument also is that Andromeda has this life-size Barbie doll. She kind of wants to dress it up.