Close Call
Paul Simpson and Ruth Thomas catch up with Eric Close, a science fiction and fantasy television regular whose career was kick-started by an appearance in Hercules many years ago...
Official Xena Magazine: Issue 24
When he thinks back eight years to the five weeks he spent working on the Hercules TV Movie Hercules and the Lost Kingdom, actor Eric Close’s strongest memory is of Hercules himself. “Kevin Sorbo and I became good friends through that experience,” he recalls fondly.
Although he has since become familiar to television audiences worldwide thanks to his starring roles in the science fiction shows Dark Skies and Now and Again, as well as in the Western series The Magnificent Seven, Close was a newcomer to the world of fantasy television when he travelled from Los Angeles to the far side of the Pacific Ocean to film Hercules and the Lost Kingdom.
Eric Close was born on Staten Island, New York, but spent most of his youth in San Diego, near the California/Mexico border. His varied acting career began when he reached his teenage years. “I've had the acting bug since I was 13 years old,” he explains. “I was in a theatre group in Junior High, and that's where I first discovered the joy of acting.” However, Close decided to study Communications at the University of Southern California in Los Angeles, and it was only after he appeared on stage in the play Rat Songs and linked up with an agent that he started to seek employment as a professional actor.
Close initially played minor roles in a wide variety of series, including MacGyver and Major Dad, before spending a year playing the part of Sawyer Walker in the Emmy award-winning soap opera Santa Barbara. That role opened some doors for the young actor, and he went on to work in the independent features American Me and Taking Liberty.
In the autumn of 1993, Close auditioned for the role of Telamon in Hercules and the Lost Kingdom, which was originally intended to be the very first televised Hercules TV Movie. Telamon was the son of the King of Troy, who Hercules helps find his city and regain his throne. Telamon also falls in love with Hercules' travelling companion, Deianeira, played in this instance by Renee O'Connor.
“They offered me the part,” Close recalls, “and I went down to New Zealand. Harley Cokliss, an English director, was in charge. But what started as three weeks of work turned into five weeks' worth!”
Close smiles as he recalls the events of late 1993. “What had happened was they were in negotiations with Anthony Quinn to play Zeus,” he explains. “He signed on to play the part and came down to shoot his material.”
Unfortunately, because Quinn's arrival was very much at the last minute and the renowned actor was only available for a very short space of time, the production schedule was thrown out of the window and reorganised. Only those actors who appeared in scenes with Quinn - such as Robert Trebor and Kevin Sorbo himself - were required during that week. The other actors were given an unexpected, paid vacation. “I had an entire week off in New Zealand to just travel around,” Close recalls happily.
Ever one to take the opportunity to investigate his surroundings, Close decided that, rather than hanging around near the filming location, he would venture further afield - accompanied by his girlfriend. “I flew her down to New Zealand,” he says, “and we spent the week travelling around. When Anthony Quinn was finished working, I went back and we finished up.”
Some of Close’s funniest memories involve working with Robert Trebor, the actor who would eventually go on to play Hercules and Xena’s resident con man, Salmoneus. However, in Hercules and the Lost Kingdom, Trebor portrayed Waylin, a slave who attaches himself rather firmly to Hercules' side. “He was hilarious,” Close remembers. “He was the sidekick and he was fantastic! We had a lot of fun together.” The actor gives a very credible rendition of Robert Trebor’s fruity, booming voice. “Bazzoms!” he cries, and then explains. “Every time the girls came on set, they would have those push-up dresses on. Robert would see them and go, ‘Bazooms!’”
Close enjoyed the combination of action and humour that characterised the script of Hercules and the Lost Kingdom, in which frantic battles sat comfortably alongside appalling puns, and sardonic dialogue came from the mouth of Sorbo’s Hercules. Close’s character in Dark Skies carried a lot of the drama, and there was a gritty realism to much of his work in The Magnificent Seven, but it was only when he took on the part of Michael Wiseman in Now and Again that Close found a role which combined the humour and drama he had enjoyed so much in Hercules.
It’s a quality that he continues to search for in scripts. “I think things sometimes become too serious, and that spoils it,” he explains. “On Hercules, there was all this action, but it was really tongue-in-cheek and light-hearted. I think action is good, but I am actually more interested in projects that have a lot of humour.”
Once his work on Hercules was over, Close was cast in the US drama series Sisters, which led to his role on Dark Skies. Close played John Loengard, a young man who discovers that nothing is quite what it seems and aliens have been manipulating the US public since the Roswell incident in 1947. Producers Brent Friedmann and Bryce Zabel had very ambitious plans for the show, aiming to bring it to the end of a five-year arc in 2000.
“I don’t think there’s anything wrong with having a five-year plan,” Close says, “because when the studio comes to look at it, it’s much easier if they know where the series is going to go.” However, despite adding a pre-Voyager Jeri Ryan to the cast in an attempt to boost the flagging ratings, Dark Skies folded after only one season.
As a youngster, Eric Close had dreamed of being a cowboy, and not long after Dark Skies finished, he got the chance to fulfil his ambition. “Every year I spent time in Colorado, and I’ve travelled around quite a bit in Montana,” he says. “I always had a fantasy of wanting to be a cowboy, so I went ahead and picked up the hat and boots. And every time I’m out there, it’s a fantasy.”
A few weeks after telling a reporter that he would love to play a cowboy, he was offered the part of Vin Tanner in The Magnificent Seven, which gave him the opportunity to work with The Terminator’s Michael Biehn, and briefly with the original Magnificent Seven’s Robert Vaughn.
Close remained in the Wild West for two years before the Magnificent Seven rode off into the sunset, and as the show was winding down, he entered discussions with Glenn Gordon Caronn, the creator of the Bruce Willis/Cybil Shepherd comedy drama Moonlighting. Caronn had come up with an idea for a new show, Now and Again, in which Close would play Michael Wiseman, whose fit, superhuman body housed the mind of a failing 40-year-old insurance salesman, initially played by John Goodman. The only snag is that Wiseman cannot tell his wife and teenage daughter that he is still alive.
The script for the pilot combined everything that Close was looking for - action, humour and a strong sense of family - and once the show had been ordered, he and his family moved to New York for the duration of filming. The hardest thing for him? “Staying away from the craft services table,” he jokes. “I had to remain in really good physical condition. There were times when I was restricted to just eating broccoli for breakfast!”
Sadly, although Now and Again received critical acclaim and garnered a very strong and loyal fan base, US network CBS elected not to renew the series for a second year. “I know they were hoping to explore the dark side of what Michael was experiencing in this new life of his,” Close says regretfully. “It’s hard to know that you have a family out there and theoretically you are still alive, yet you can't see them. So Glenn wanted to continue to explore Michael’s psyche regarding those things.
“I would have liked to have seen his wife eventually move on. Not that she should leave the show, but it would have been nice to have seen her get into another serious relationship, and be able to finally let go and try to start her life over. At the same time I would have liked to have seen Michael do the same thing. Maybe it would have been nice if Michael had been able to get involved in some relationships as well.”
Close’s career has taken him all around the world, and although he never returned to New Zealand to work with Kevin Sorbo on Hercules following his initial appearance, he would welcome an opportunity to work with his friend again.
“I’d love to,” he emphasises. “Kevin is fantastic! He’s one of the best.”