Xena & Hercules Articles Archive

IT SEEMS HARD to believe, but in less than two months, filming will wrap on the final episode of Xena: Warrior Princess, one of the most successful adventure series in the history of syndicated television. But just how that episode ends is still very much up in the air. Will Xena (Lucy Lawless) ride off into the sunset with her long-time companion Gabrielle (Renee O'Connor) and live happily ever after, or will they both go out fighting for their beliefs, in one final blaze of glory?

Well, there's isn't much point in asking O'Connor, who claims that she still hasn't been told how the series will reach its conclusion. "Everyone asks Lucy and I how the show will end," she insists, "but we still don't know. We have a general idea of what country it might be set in, but we don't know what's going to happen. It's very bittersweet at the moment, because there aren't many episodes left; I think there are only five more to do."

The Final Hurdle

The actress is speaking from Auckland where the cast and crew of Xena are heading into their final block of filming. "Right now, we're working on an episode that deals with the extermination of the centaurs. We reintroduce Ephiny's character and meet her son as a grown man. And then we're going to film a wonderful episode in a couple of weeks called When Fates Collide, which takes us out of our reality and explains what could happen if one person's destiny was changed and how that would affect everyone else. I think that one is really interesting and quite well written.

"So we have those two coming up, and then we go into the musical and that last two episodes, which Rob [Tapert, the show's executive producer and real-life husband of Lucy Lawless] is directing. Those two are actually one store, and I'm so excited Rob is directing again. I think it was Year Four when he was last behind the camera, and for this to be his baby and to be ending is going to be profoundly sad, but it's going to be a wonderful experience for us all to be together in the end like that. It must be a bit of a relief to know that he doesn't have to prepare five more stories after he finishes directing, so that might east the burden a bit."

Tapert isn't the only one taking a turn in the director's chair after a long absence, O'Connor recently took the helm for her second episode of Xena, having directed the clip-heavy Deja vu All Over Again that ended Season Four. Her latest assignment is Dangerous Prey, a fast-paced adventure that borrows elements from The Most Dangerous Game and The Naked Prey.

"It's about a man who's attempting to exterminate the Amazon race because he's looking for human sport. This man goes around to different countries looking for different types of prey that he can kill, and he's now moved up the ladder to hunting humans. He begins the episode by going after the Amazons, thinking that they're an elite race that would give him the most challenge, but then he comes across Xena. Another story plot is that Xena starts a relationship with a character Varia [played by Tsianina Joelson]. an Amazon who we introduced earlier in the season, so that's a new friendship that we carry on for the rest of the season."

The Directing Bug O'Connor first began lobbying Tapert to direct an episode when production was beginning on Season Four. "Rob has always taken huge risks with me." she explains, "first, when he cast me as Gabrielle. and then when I told him I wanted to direct. What happened is, we had a Canadian director TJ Scott over, filming two episodes back to back [Adventures in the Sin Trade] and my character wasn't in them very much, so I asked Rob if I could shadow this director on my time off. He said sure, no problem; I don't think he expected me to be as diligent about being there every hour of the day when the director was there, which I was.

"I took notes for two weeks, and at the end. Rob said, 'I guess I'm going to have to give you an episode, aren't I?' So that's how the first event became a reality. I had a very small episode, because I believe they wanted to give me something to have a taste of it, but Deja vu actually became a huge episode, trying to fit into a small little hole of a schedule, so it was quite discouraging.

"After Lucy had Julius and everything was a little more back to normal, I approached Rob again and said. 'I'd really like to direct again with this being our last year.' I'm sure he thought about it a bit. and finally agreed. He was very supportive. Every now and then, he'd pull me aside and said. 'I've got another titbit of information that you should always remember as a director. Being a director himself, he kept encouraging me to go for it, and Dangerous Prey ended up being a huge action-driven episode. It was much exciting, and everything went really well. I was told, 'This would be quite an achievement for an experienced director, so we just want you to know what you're getting into,' and I had a director of photography Aaron Morton who was doing it for the first time as well, but we just went for it. He works on our second unit, so this was his first break too, and we worked really well as a collaborative team. He gave me this poem by Kipling before we began, that basically said, 'Don't doubt yourself when everyone else doubts you,' and I said, `Yeah, that's going to be us!"'

Learning Curve

Unlike her previous assignment where O'Connor had to divide her attention between acting and directing, Dangerous Prey is much more Gabrielle-lite, which meant more time could be spent behind the camera. " I learned that lesson the first time!" she laughs. " I only had one day where I had to play both roles as actor and director, and even then, it was so incredibly challenging.

"I really admire Michael Hurst [who played lolaus in Hercules before moving on to direct] because he seems to do it all the time. I found it very difficult, trying to be an actor and working out the scene with everyone else. and then jumping to the other side and explaining the shots that we're going to do in the sequence to tell that part of the story. There was one moment where I thought, 'Oh no, this is a little more than I expected!' but I had such a supportive team that it was just only for a second and then it was all right."

With her directorial urges assuaged at least for the time being, O'Connor returns her attention to the acting arena. With Xena's sixth season set 35 years in the warrior princess's future, it meant leaving much of the original supporting cast behind and that put the spotlight squarely back on the two leads. "I have to say, the workload was actually easier for me this year as compared to Season Five when Lucy was pregnant. That was the probably the biggest challenge, to suddenly be thrown into carrying more of the workload than I was expecting. Lucy had done so much for so long that I guess I became complacent in terms of what my role was in the show.

"It seemed to me that Season Six was more of a two-hander, but it was comforting to know that Lucy was there and we both wanted it to be the best year yet. Physically, it was the most horrendous because it was so incredibly cold this year. For some reason, we had almost every episode involving either rain machines or rivers, so it was quite challenging in that respect." Darker Sixth Compared to previous outings, the sixth season of Xena was a bit darker in many ways, from the Evil Dead-dead like storyline of The Haunting of Amphipolis, to Xena's graphic torture scenes in Who's Gurkhan? to Gabrielle's near-roasting in The Abyss anc near-decapitation in Legacy. "I definitely think it's a dark year," affirms O'Connor. "One of our recurring themes is, what do you do with the one man who's trying to exterminate a race? That seems to be our situation do we have to exterminate him in order tc keep the greater good intact? That's a huge challenge. Being a hero show, nobody wants to see the hero kill anyone, and we've beer approaching that theme time and time again this year. So to me that's pretty dark.

"Roasting Gabrielle over a fire was actually for me, the most profound moment in the entire series. It was such an awful experience, I've never before felt completely violated in acting ever. It wasn't actually happening professionally, it was just the fact that it was happening to my character. It was jusl an awful feeling, and so demoralizing. First of all, I think the idea of someone being chained just goes against every human instinct of freedom that we have. On top of that, to be forced with that thing stuffed it her mouth, I couldn't imagine any person having to endure something like that. It was just awful, such a profound, wrong feeling for any human being, preparing to be eaten. I was actually quite surprised that it affected me that way."

No Funny Business

One of the reasons for that darker tone may be the lack of comedic episodes early in the season. It didn't make the work any more difficult, but humour does have its place in the mix. "Neither Lucy or I take our work home, so I don't think it really affects us psychologically, but I know that we would love to some more comedies. I think it's a sixth sense that we both have, to want to be comedians. I sure miss them and I miss Ted Raimi [whose character Joxer appeared in most of the comedic episodes], but hopefully we're going to get to see him before the show is over. I heard that he might be coming back."

Some of the changes in the series are much subtler. Gabrielle's physical appearance for example, has continued to evolve into the formidable young warrior of recent seasons. "It's funny," reflects O'Connor, "I was just thinking about that after watching the profile of Lucy [for the E! Network in America] and seeing us in the early days. It's really interesting for me to think about what I was doing physically at the time; I was lifting a lot of weights and eating carbohydrates in order to exercise as much as I was.

"I think I had this bizarre sense that I had to be a big strong woman in order to pull off this sort of role. I obviously had to realize that it didn't look that attractive on camera, so I basically experimented over the years and tried to find what sort of exercise and ' diet suited my body type the most. It's been really interesting, actually; I finally met with a nutritionist and worked out what sort of food is really good for you, because I'd been experimenting quite a bit. I tried vegetarianism for about a year, but I'm really pleased with the results, and how comfortable I feel with my lifestyle."

While on the subject of life style choices, it seems fitting to acknowledge the show's long-running subtext about just how deep the relationship between Xena and Gabrielle actually runs. "You know, we have an interesting episode coming up with our musical. where we play different characters. That's when I really think we'll embrace the gay community who have supported us all these years and hopefully have a ball with enjoying and celebrating that culture. I'm playing Sappho, and Lucy is playing her lover, it was Fred. but I think they've changed her name. Lucy is such a wonderful comedian that I'm looking forward to seeing what she does with the characters."

To the Future

With Xena now finally coming to an end. O'Connor acknowledges the next several months will involve a good deal of decision making. For one thing, the actress was recently wedded to a New Zealander not involved in show business, which means finding ways to balance work and marriage. 'Hopefully well be able to spend time in both countries. It's just a matter of trying to figure out our life style and what demands will be on us work-wise."

As for rumours about a series of possible Xena tv movies. "I'm hoping that the show will go out with a boom, so for me. I'd like to cleaner to the fans if we say this is their story, from the moment where we begin and they met each other until the end and this is how we've resolved their friendship. It would be nice just to keep it clean."

But what if there was a great script on offer? "Actually, I don't think we have that much interest from the studio, so I'm not quite sure how that's going to pan out. It's really hard to know which side is the one that takes it to a grinding halt. I'm not quite sure myself, I just know that personally for me. I'd like to start a family and let myself be open to the next phase of my life, as I enter my '30s."

But these are all decisions to be made in the future. For now. Renee O'Connor is too busy working on the final episodes of Xena: Warrior Princess, and enjoying every single minute of it. "I am starting to think about what I'm going to do. but don't ask me to grasp the idea that this show is going to end: it just seems so hard to believe! When this is finished, I would love to sleep for maybe a month, but if there's any work available script-wise that I would like to do. I'm sure I would be on to it in a second. I love to work and to act, so it won't be too long before I start to get antsy."

Nazzaro, Joe. "Gabrielle's Hope." TV Zone. Issue 136. pp24-30.