LA Times article praises Galactica, interviews Tahmoh

The LA Times recently profiled Battlestar in advance of its Season 4 premiere this Friday. Praising the series' relevance, it also spoke with much of the cast, including Tahmoh.

Many of the younger cast members such as Bamber and Tahmoh Penikett, who portrays Karl "Helo" Agathon, seem ready to shed their Galactica flight suits, pack up the industry credibility earned by their work on "Battlestar" and use it in places where they will be seen more.

"The end is in sight, for better or worse," said the London-born Bamber. "Every time I come to Vancouver now there will be a sort of Proustian element and a Pavlovian response. I'll think of my children being very young here, this stage and set, coming to North America, the sights and sounds. It will all be 'Battlestar.' "

Penikett was less sentimental: "There is a lot of television out there, and a lot of it is bad, but still it feels like time to head toward the horizon."

As Galactica writer Mark Verheiden lamented in his blog, the story does contain the requisite condescension to Sci-fi fans, but is nonetheless a good read:

"Looks like the interviews were conducted around the time the WGA strike was happening, so they're four or five months old, but it's all very thoughtful. Sadly, there is one unfortunate reference to science fiction fans playing dress-up (Spock ears? Really? Could you at least update your condescension?), but otherwise it's an excellent piece."

So please take Tahmoh's quote about some fans with a grain of salt. The author of the piece clearly had an agenda and Tahmoh has never been anything but gracious, friendly and respectful in interactions with fans at conventions. There's no denying there is a lunatic fringe to fandom and that's clearly the group that Tahmoh had in mind, not all Sci-fi fans. After all, as the Televisionary recently wrote, Tahmoh is "hands-down one of the nicest guys in the business."

Bid to win dinner with Tahmoh & Kandyse McClure

Next week you'll be able to bid to win dinner with Tahmoh and his Galactica co-star Kandyse McClure (Dualla) at a special eBay auction to benefit their friend, actress Babz Chula. Chula, who starred in The Green Chain along with Tahmoh and Tricia Helfer, is fighting a recurrence of her cancer.

Here's the message Tahmoh sent me about the auction:

"One of the most respected actors in Canada, especially Vancouver, has been battling two rare forms of cancer. The community is coming together to do a charity auction of dinners with many notable 'celebrities'. I've volunteered as have many others. Check out the site and if you could post it that would be most appreciated: www.babzchulasociety.org."

You'll also be able to bid on dinner with actor Callum Keith Rennie, who plays Leoben on Battlestar and will star in the upcoming X Files movie.

Here are some more details on the effort:

Babz Chula, a key figure in Vancouver's indie film scene, recently learned breast cancer has recurred and has spread to her liver. She has made plans to start an integrated healing program.

The film industry has rallied around her to help raise money to pay for her medical bills by creating The Babz Chula Lifeline for Artists Society.

The Society will launch an auction on eBay running from April 2 to 12. Auction items will include the opportunity to dine with stars, and movie and TV memorabilia.

Excerpts from a profile of Chula from The Green Chain website:

Award-winning actor Babz Chula is one of Canada's most accomplished, versatile and daring actors. Known as "Queen of the Indies", she is a fierce supporter of the independent film scene in Canada. In 2006 Babz was honored with a Lifetime Achievement Award by the Vancouver Film Critics Circle and an Outstanding Achievement Award from the Leo Awards. Recently she took home another Best Actress award from the New York Film Festival for her portrayal of Mother in Claudia Morgado's evocative film Bitten.

I'll post more details on the auction as they become available next week.

Tahmoh cast in Joss Whedon’s new TV series, Dollhouse!

TV Guide and The Hollywood Reporter are reporting that Tahmoh was just cast in Joss Whedon's much-anticipated upcoming FOX series "Dollhouse," which received a seven-episode order shortly before the writer's strike.

"Dollhouse" revolves around a group of young men and women, aka "Dolls," who are imprinted with different personalities for different assignments. They have no memories of their previous lives, until Echo (Eliza Dushku) begins to try to find out who she was.

Penikett will play Paul Smith, an FBI field agent obsessed with the urban myth of Dollhouse and a twisted romantic foil for Echo.

Ausiello adds:

Whedon has tapped Galactica stud Tahmoh Penikett (aka Helo) to play Eliza Dushku's "twisted romantic foil" in Dollhouse, a spokesperson for Twentieth Television confirms.

Penikett's character, Paul Smith (originally named Paul Ballard), is described as an FBI agent who becomes obsessed with both the urban myth that is Dollhouse and its most recognizable inhabitant, Echo (Dushku).

Tahmoh mentioned yesterday that he was up for a show... I'm guessing this is it! Huge congratulations!

Updated: EOnline adds this about Tahmoh and his character, Paul Smith:

Yeeee!!!! Just in case you need more reason to get excited about Joss Whedon's return to television with the upcoming FOX drama series Dollhouse, here is some just-leaked casting scoop on who is joining the gang, including a certain Battlestar fan favorite (Helo!). Awe. Some.

Tahmoh Penikett as Paul Smith: 30s, good looks hardened by a cynical distaste for most of humanity. An FBI field agent, he's been chasing the urban myth of the Dollhouse long enough to have lost any shot at promotion. Becomes obsessed with and a twisted romantic foil for Echo (Eliza Dushku).

Also be sure to check out Kristen's interview with Dollhouse creator, Joss Whedon, and Eliza Dushku over at EOnline.

In case there's any confusion, Paul Smith is a "series regular" (main cast, as opposed to recurring). The original casting call (similar to EOnline above) is here.

Updated: The show will be presented to advertisers on May 15. Shooting starts in late April in Los Angeles, according to this report.

Folks over at Whedonesque are thrilled with the casting of Tahmoh, read lots of positive comments here.

Dollhouse links:

• The Dollverse - news/fansite
• DollhouseTV.net - news/fansite
• Joss Whedon's Dollhouse - Unofficial Fan Site
• Wikipedia

Will add more as I find it! As always, feel free to email me if you have any tips or info!

Tahmoh talks about the Season 4 Premiere (video)

A special new episode of the Hypaspace Weekly sci-fi news show hosted by Grace Park and Katee Sackhoff is now available on the Space Channel website. In it, Tahmoh talks about Helo's reaction to *spoiler* Starbuck's return and other fourth season developments!

Watch now!

Catch up on the previous Hypaspace episode featuring Tahmoh here.

Galactica resumes filming; Helo as a Simpson

According to Galactica scribe Mark Verheiden, filming resumes today for Battlestar's fourth and final season:

[W]e start shooting episode #12 of the twenty episodes left for season four and the series. Mr. Ron Moore himself writes and directs this opus, and... that's all I'm going to say about the episode itself. Except it will probably run the usual 42-ish minutes and I can almost guarantee it will be shot in beautiful color.

In celebration, thanks to the talents of fans like quirkybird, here is Helo as a character from the Simpsons (along with various Sharons, Hera and D'Anna). GalactiSimpsons of the whole cast below.

New high-res photos of Helo in Season 4, "Six of One"

New promotional photos for Galactica's upcoming fourth season have been released. Helo appears in two stills from the second episode of the season, "Six of One." Here they are in high-res thanks to dryope!

See the other promo photos for this episode here.

Updated: NBCU Photo Bank added a few more stills from "Six of One."

Helo is also visible in his dress greys in the background of this shot:

Another video interview about BSG Season 3

The Australian Channel 10 HD has posted a new interview with Tahmoh about Galactica's third season.

Tahmoh talks about Helo's relationship with Adama and how that changes when he discovers Hera is alive. He also discusses one of his most difficult scenes yet--when Helo shoots Sharon so she can go rescue Hera--and how he and Grace Park conceptualized the scene.

If you missed the two earlier interviews videos with Tahmoh from Channel 10, you can find them on the Channel 10 site or here and here.

Thanks again to Michelle from Battlestar Blog for the head's up!

Screencaps of Tahmoh in Wildfire 7 (2002)

Early in his career, Tahmoh played a park ranger in the forest fire-fighting movie, Wildfire 7. It's available on DVD via Amazon. I've made screencaps of Tahmoh's five scenes in the movie, which you can see over at the site's Flickr.

See the rest of the photos from Wildfire 7.

Read a plot description
& watch the film's trailer (which includes Tahmoh).

Galactica Season 3 DVDs available today; S2 on sale

Battlestar Galactica Season 3 DVDs now available.

The six-disc Season 3 DVD set features the Resistance webisodes, the 20 S3 episodes, Ron Moore's podcast commentaries, David Eick's videoblogs and deleted scenes from all the episodes.

Even if you've ordered your set already, be sure to check out the Helo deleted scene now up on the Amazon order page.

For today only, Amazon is also selling Battlestar Galactica Season 2.0 and Season 2.5 episode box sets for $25 each!

Today the Sci-fi Channel is also running a marathon of Season 3 episodes.

Tahmoh autograph card for Smallville Season 6

For any Smallville fans out there, Tahmoh was one of 9 guest stars from the show's sixth season to sign autograph cards for Inkworks. To buy just Tahmoh's autograph card, head over to ebay where there are half a dozen available right now.

For any Hush fans out there, Tori Spelling also apparently guest-starred on Smallville last season, so you can score both Tahmoh and Tori's autographs. If you haven't seen Hush, it airs again this Wednesday at 2pm on Lifetime.

Helo named "TV's Hottest Dad" by BuddyTV

BuddyTV recently rated the hottest fathers on TV and Helo came out on top as the #1 Hottest TV Dad:

"Yes, Tahmoh Penikett is one fine looking man, but what makes Battlestar Galactica's Helo a truly hot father is the dedication he has to his wife Sharon (Grace Park) and child. First, he stuck by his wife, even after discovering she was a Cylon. Then, upon discovering the death of their child Hera was faked, Helo killed his wife so that she could rescue their child (it makes sense if you know the show). Committing treason for the sake of your child is about as extreme an act of fatherhood as we can imagine, and this helps make Helo the hot dad he is."

First photos of Tahmoh at the Monterrey, Mexico Con

Thanks to L030, Aburto and Mudo from Protobunker Studio for sharing their photos of Tahmoh at the 32nd comic and video game convention in Monterrey, Mexico last weekend.

You can see more convention photos at their Flickr pages here and here.

If anyone else has any photos or reports from the con, please email me.

Tahmoh talks about filming Trapped Ashes

In case you missed it, the Trapped Ashes myspace page has posted the September '07 Fangoria article on the making of the horror anthology film. It includes a few brief quotes from Tahmoh about the production:

With Russell now wrapped, the production moves immediately onto director Hellman's "Stanley's Girlfriend," a visually more subdued segment... Shooting on a sound-stage in eastern Vancouver, actor Tahmoh Penikett (whose career is catching fire due to his turn as 'Helo' on the Sci-Fi Channel series Battlestar Galactica,), says of Hellman, "Monte is an absolute pleasure. We've been working at a feverish pace, but he has put a lot of trust in me, and I've had no trouble trusting and understanding his direction."

Penikett, who portrays the screenwriter 'Leo' in the segment (with John Saxon playing the older version of the character), tells us that in addition to Hellman's involvement, the signing of fellow Canadian actor Tygh (Disturbing Behavior) Runyon was instrumental in sparking his interest. "I've heard many great things," says Penikett, "and I couldn't wait to work with him."

Read the full article for more details about the movie and shooting Tahmoh's segment.

Director Monte Hellman also had praise for Runyon and Tahmoh in a recent interview:

"I normally shy away from any subject involving well-known public figures portrayed by actors, feeling it's impossible to overcome the latent image of the real person in the audience's mind's eye. But with STANLEY'S GIRLFRIEND there were two mitigating factors. One, I felt that Kubrick at the age of 29 wouldn't be familiar to an audience today. And two, I had observed Kubrick frequently during this period, and found the challenge of recreating his personna irresistible.

Of course, as always, everything depends on casting. I was fortunate not only to find the perfect actor to play the young Stanley Kubrick, but equally exciting actors for his antagonists as well."

Remember, I posted more than 250 screencaps of Tahmoh's scenes in Trapped Ashes in January. They're available on the site's Flickr.

Trapped Ashes is due for a US DVD release this summer via Lionsgate. It's already out in Germany (with Tahmoh on the cover).

See a Helo Season 3 deleted scene thanks to Amazon

Amazon has a free "related video" of a Galactica Season 3 deleted scene featuring Helo and Dualla on their Season 3 DVD pre-order page.

The short scene is a nice exchange between Helo and Dualla, hinting at their friendship that must have developed during their year orbiting New Caprica together. Helo tries to cheer Dualla with some quips and then quietly tries to reassure her everything will be okay.

It's too bad we didn't get to see more of this relationship onscreen, but the Season 3 DVDs--available March 18th--promise more than an hour's worth of new footage!

Pre-order your Season 3 DVDs today!

(If you click through to Amazon from this site, it will receive 5%
of your purchase price at no cost to you.)

Thanks to mamaboo for the head's up!

Hypaspace previews Battlestar Season 4 (video)

Hypaspace weekly, a program from the Canadian Space channel, has scored a bunch of interviews with the cast of Battlestar Galactica that they'll be airing in advance of Season 4's April premiere. Tahmoh briefly appears in their March 1st episode, available on the Space website.

Check it out!

Frakking hilarious Battlestar Galactica recap (video)

If you haven't yet, you must watch the frakking awesome 8-minute recap of Seasons 1-3 of Galactica. Helo features rather largely in it due to his plot-heavy arc.

It's up over at Scifi.com or IMDB for international fans.

I've also uploaded the early Helo promo pictures from Season 1 that surfaced a few weeks ago to the site's Flickr for ease of browsing. All of them are watermarked, unless fans have photoshopped them, like this terrific one above.