Big Ted
Attending the Starfury Chariots of War Xena convention in London at the end of September, Ted Raimi kindly granted Xena Magazine a few moments of his time to fill our readers in on his latest antics. Interview by Paul Simpson and Ruth Thomas.
Official Xena Magazine: Issue 14
After his exhaustive interview in issue 12 of Xena Magazine, you'd think there'd be little new to learn from Ted Raimi, but that's never the case.
So the all-important question is, is he coming back to Xena? “More than likely,” he admits, “but at the moment in the capacity of a ghost. I mean, does anyone ever really die in Xena? It's like Elvis - nobody's ever dead.” He shakes his head in amazement. “I hope to come back, but not as a serious ghost. Most of the ghosts on Xena are so serious, but why would you have a serious ghost of Joxer?
“We were shooting the scene in Motherhood where Joxer was a ghost,” Raimi recalls, “and the director, Rick Jacobson, who directs a lot of episodes, just loves the character of Joxer. He and I were just joking around off-camera, and I was saying, ‘Rick, what if Joxer didn’t know how to be a ghost? He’s a poltergeist who doesn't know how to polter or geist, so he bumps his head on the ceilings?’ So we thought that would be a funny place to start.
“My idea was he’d be semi-permeable, so you’d tie a rope around him and let him go like a kite,” Raimi explains good-humouredly. “So he could check things out: ‘Joxer, go check out the next village!’ It'd be a CGI nightmare - $8 million per episode. Every shot of me would be blue screen! But that’s one idea, and I hope that I'll come back more than once.
“I’m a little busy at the moment, but I sure would like to come back. I’ve done nothing yet, but they’ve asked me a couple of times if I’m busy at particular timeframes. I’ll probably come back in two months, maybe, towards the end of the season.”
So what is Ted Raimi currently busy doing? “Being unemployed!” he jokes. “Bruce [Autolycus] Campbell and I are working to develop a television show together that Bruce will executive produce, and hopefully I’ll star in,” he reveals.
“Bruce and I have worked together a billion times. He’s a terrific guy, and probably one of the funniest guys I’ve ever met, no doubt about it. So it’s an honour to work with him.
“I just did a movie with Jeff Combs and Seth Green called The Attic Expeditions,” he continues. “It’s a psychological horror movie that’s coming out soon. I did that mainly because I wanted to work with Jeff Combs. I’ve been a fan of his for years. The Attic Expeditions was cool because I got to play a very studious, serious doctor. Jeff Combs was the bad doctor. But it was fun; it was great. It was something very different, something that I had not done.”
Much to fans’ disappointment, Raimi points out that he probably won’t be climbing walls alongside Tobey Maguire’s Spider-Man in his brother Sam’s new movie. “I’m not involved at the moment. Usually what happens when I’m in one of my brother’s movies is I’ll come on the set to visit him and I’ll go, ‘who’s playing Guard Number One? Has he shown up for work? No? Can I play him?’ Then I’ll get in some costume.”
Would Raimi do another long-running episodic show? “Yes, if it was my show! Xena was a great time, a wonderful time, but I’ve been the ‘other guy’ on TV for about 10 years. It’s fun - you walk down the street and people go, ‘Aren’t you That Guy?’ I don’t want to be That Guy anymore! I’ll make a TV show called That Guy! Either I’ll do my own things on my own terms, do movies for the rest of my life, or my own TV show. At least I’d have that on somewhat of my own terms.
“The wonderful thing about Xena was the producers were so forward looking, generous and smart,” Raimi enthuses of the show, “I was able to do lots of things I wanted to do in collaboration with them. But that's rare. I could easily roll into another TV show right away, but it would probably be like seaQuest - I’d have no input. So something on my own terms would be real nice.
“Right now I’m more concerned with producing this movie I’m setting up - I’ve got to get it out. Xena’s been great - it’s been a wild ride — and one of the best.”