KryptonSite
Interview With Smallville Executive Producer Alfred Gough
Sept. 13, 2005 - Interview conducted by Craig Byrne (PlanetKrypton@aol.com)
Alfred Gough photo courtesy of
Warner Bros. Television Production, inc.
Season
Five of Smallville begins on September 29, and to prepare
the Internet community at large for the occasion, Executive
Producer Alfred Gough participated in several interviews
on September 13.
Be
warned there are spoilers within this interview.
KRYPTONSITE:
Is there any truth to the rumors that Dean Cain will be
appearing at some point this season?
SMALLVILLE
EXECUTIVE PRODUCER ALFRED GOUGH: I will say there is a little
truth to the Dean Cain rumors. We have spoken to Dean's people.
We have not found a story yet that we want to put him in. I
think if you're going to get somebody like Dean, you've got
to make sure that the role is right, and that the episode is
good. He is definitely someone we want on the show, and as soon
as we find the right episode and the right character, we will
move on it, and hopefully given his schedule, he'll be able
to do it.
K-SITE:
Now that certain restrictions from the movie have been lifted,
could we see Jor-El in physical form this year?
GOUGH:
The answer is, you could, but you won't. It's still going
to be Terence, and it's still going to be the voice, and now
we're not in the cave anymore; we're in the Fortress of Solitude.
But it's still going to be Terence; it's still going to just
be his voice.
K-SITE:
Has the addition of the Professor Fine or Brainiac character
opened up some doors for the show storytelling wise?
GOUGH:
Absolutely. I think what it's done is it's given us a new villain
that's even more powerful in many ways than Lex or Lionel, and
I think also it's been a great introduction to see Clark in
college, because he plays a college professor. So as the kids
grow up, it's a great way to do that story. Here's this charismatic
college professor who's a cross between Robin Williams in Dead
Poets [Society] and John Houseman in the Paper Chase. He needs
Clark to do something very specific, as Brainiac, so it's sort
of the Grand Seduction of Clark Kent, and Fine is trying to
turn him against Lex. And given what Lex has been doing this
season, that's not terribly hard. Clark is certainly primed
to not want to trust him. So I think it becomes a very interesting
triangle between Fine, Clark, and Lex.
K-SITE:
Is the character of Pauline Kahn [played by Carrie Fisher,
introduced in the episode "Thirst"]
going to be recurring?
GOUGH:
At this point she's just in an episode, but she could certainly
recur.
K-SITE:
What about the character of Bittleman [Daily Planet low-on-the-food-chain
guy played by Richard Kahan in "Thirst," originally
suspected to be a potential love interest for Chloe]?
GOUGH:
No, that's just a minor role.
K-SITE:
Besides the Fortress of Solitude, what new sets will we
be seeing this season?
GOUGH:
You'll actually be seeing the basement of the Daily Planet,
'cause Chloe is going to be interning there. In the episode
where Carrie comes, Chloe's going to the Planet looking for
a job, and obviously she had a column in the Planet two seasons
ago, and that - it doesn't sit well with Pauline. So, you know,
Chloe has to start at the bottom, and the bottom is literally
the basement of the Planet.
K-SITE:
Are there any plans for other DC Comics heroes showing up
this season beyond Aquaman?
GOUGH:
I can't say which one, but we are definitely kicking around
another one.
K-SITE:
How did the idea of using Aquaman come about?
GOUGH:
We had a story we wanted to tell, and it seemed like Aquaman
was the right character for the story, just in the way that
Flash last season was about, you know, here's a kid who hasn't
quite figured out what to do with his powers, but having powers
doesn't riddle him with angst. Aquaman is a marine biology major
at the University of Miami, on the swim team, but he's an environmental
activist. Lex is up to no good at Crater Lake, and Arthur "A.C."
is there to investigate. And I think through the course of the
episode, is he sort of teaches Clark to think globally with
his powers, not just about Smallville.
K-SITE:
There are some titles for some episodes on the site that
we don't yet have information about - "Splinter,"
"Solitude," and "Lexmas." Can you tell us
anything about those?
GOUGH:
"Lexmas" is going to be first holiday-themed episode,
and it'll air sometime in December. "Splinter"
and "Solitude" - all I will say is they're Brainiac's
first attempt to get Clark to do what he wants."
K-SITE:
Is there any more news on a "Return of Bart" story?
[Bart Allen, aka the teenaged future Flash, appeared in the
episode "Run"]
GOUGH:
Potentially. If we have the right story, we'd bring him back.
But he's also a recurring character on Veronica Mars
now.
K-SITE:
Can you talk a bit about the Fortress of Solitude set?
GOUGH:
It keys off the original set from the Donner movie, but again,
with advances made in CGI and things, I think, you now look
at when Clark throws the crystal and the fortress comes out
in the movie, it's sort of quaint; it's a few sparks and some
smoke and suddenly the Fortress is there. And this one is a
much bigger birth to the Fortress. David Willson, our production
designer, has just gone above and beyond with this one. He's
done a great job on that and the Daily Planet set. So it's huge.
I think you'll get a much bigger sense, too, of just how massive
the Fortress is, in certain shots.
K-SITE:
Is there a connection between the look of the set in Smallville
and how it'll be in "Superman Returns?"
GOUGH:
It's one of the things that, you know, we went down to Sydney
in May [Miles and myself], and met with Bryan and Mike and Dan,
and we talked about the Fortress, and we both agreed that whatever
sort of looks of these bigger things, whether they be the Planet
or the Fortress, we should key off the original Donner movie.
Which we planned to do anyway. It's not like we were going to
put the Fortress in the Jungles of Peru. We had always planned
that the end of high school graduation, Clark would be walking
across the glacier to the Fortress. So we'd always planned to
do that anyway.
The movie
has been great. We sort of keep each other abreast of what we're
doing, so that there are no egregious mythology clashes.
K-SITE:
Is there any truth to the talk about Lex having an undersea
lair this season?
GOUGH:
No [laughs]. That's great. No. The undersea lair. I like
it, though. You may see it now.
K-SITE:
Can you talk a bit about Lex's eventual turn down the dark side?
GOUGH:
I think this season you're really going to see Lex take those
turns, and the friendship with Clark is pretty much deteriorated.
And you'll start to see the Lex that we all know and most of
us love emerge from the character that we've seen on the show.
K-SITE:
How did it come about for Tom Wopat to appear on the show? [In
episode #5-6, "Exposed"]
GOUGH:
We always wanted him to be on the show, obviously, for the Dukes
of Hazzard connection. But we wanted to tell the right story,
and make sure that it was an interesting character, to convince
him to come do it. He plays a state senator, who through the
course of the episode, has a bit of a shady path. He started
out very idealized and is now being brought down by this political
scandal. I think in the episode, he's sort of the guy that Clark
looked up to, but realizes that even the people you look up
to sometimes have feet of clay. I think there are some great
scenes with him and Jonathan Kent. Jack Jennings drives a Dodge
Charger, so we have some driving scenes with Tom and John.
K-SITE:
Are we going to see any more interaction between Lionel
and Martha this season?
GOUGH:
Potentially, yes, you will.
K-SITE:
Whatever happened to Lana's aunt?
GOUGH:
Nell just moved away.
K-SITE:
Isn't Lana going to be in Metropolis too?
GOUGH:
Yeah, but she's going to be living in Metropolis University
with Chloe. She doesn't really hang out with her aunt all that
much.
K-SITE:
Why should the people who stopped watching Smallville
in favor of Lost last season, come back to watching the
show?
GOUGH:
I think this is the season, as a fan, you've been waiting
for. This is the season you'll see Lex turn bad. You'll see
Clark and Lana together. You'll see Clark taking on his mantle,
we say it's sort of Superman in training. And you're going to
see a lot more of the DC Universe coming in. Obviously the Fortress
of Solitude, the Daily Planet. There'll be more Metropolis stories.
You'll see Aquaman, Brainiac, and potentially other DC characters.
So I think it's the season the fans have been waiting for.
-----
Gough
has told us that he and Miles Millar know where Smallville
will end, but he didn't offer any details beyond that. He
also revealed that Erica Durance will indeed be in the new season's
opening credits, and she is contracted for 13 episodes.
"We're
gonna have a brand spanking new title sequence. Completely new
graphics, completely new everything," he revealed.
KryptonSite
would again like to thank Alfred Gough for taking the time to
participate in this interview. Season 5 begins on September
29, 2005 (Thursday!) on the WB.
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KryptonSite
Interview With Smallville Executive Producer Alfred Gough
KRYPTONSITE:
Is there any truth to the rumors that Dean Cain will be
appearing at some point this season?
K-SITE:
Is the character of Pauline Kahn [played by Carrie Fisher,
introduced in the episode 
K-SITE:
How did the idea of using Aquaman come about?
K-SITE:
Is there any more news on a "Return of Bart" story?
[Bart Allen, aka the teenaged future Flash, appeared in the
episode "Run"]
K-SITE:
Is there a connection between the look of the set in Smallville
and how it'll be in "Superman Returns?"
K-SITE:
Is there any truth to the talk about Lex having an undersea
lair this season?
K-SITE:
How did it come about for Tom Wopat to appear on the show? [In
episode #5-6, "Exposed"]
Gough
has told us that he and Miles Millar know where Smallville
will end, but he didn't offer any details beyond that. He
also revealed that Erica Durance will indeed be in the new season's
opening credits, and she is contracted for 13 episodes.
