The Origins of Amber, and other cast speculations

[tommo]

Cheers Blixxt. Thanks Brian. And can I just say, that it sounds like one of those kinds of introductions. Nuff said. Heh heh.

Edited to add: I just watched the pilot. Now there's valuable minutes of my life I'll never get back.

"You evil bitch troll from hell!" ~ Patsy Stone

[This message has been edited by tommo (edited December 13, 2001).]

[Sassette]

I saw the unaired pilot at a completely non-Buffy related convention thingy. We dubbed it the "Alyson Hannigan Appreciation Video" ... and while you'll never get those minutes back, I, personally, have found that I actually appreciate the immensely talented Ms. Hannigan more after having watched it.

-Sass

[Dazey]

I love the whole Amber-casting story. It was Fate, I tell you. If, heaven forfend, another actress had been cast, I guarantee you that the Kitty board would not even exist, because W/T would not exist. In fact, I once started a thread on that very subject, and lo and behold it's still around. Here you go.

[tommo]

Fate's fickle hand...

I just thank whatever stars were watching over Amber that day, because, after watching the pilot, I really can't see that actress doing half the stuff that Aly does.

I'm a horrid person, I know it. That poor girl is probably languishing in 'casting couch hell' somewhere and cursing the day she ever met Joss Whedon...

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"You evil bitch troll from hell!" ~ Patsy Stone

[Magikcat]

Did you know that James Marsters(Spike) grow up in the same town as me!!!!!!!!

[Magikcat]

I am also going to the same high school that George Lucas went to...I'm so spiecal.

[tommo]

quote:

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Originally posted by Magikcat:
I'm so spiecal.

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You're so what?

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"You evil bitch troll from hell!" ~ Patsy Stonequote:

[Hemiola]

Oh yeah? My high school in Brooklyn was also attended by Barbra Streisand and Bobby Fisher!!

[Dr.G]

Mad man Bobby Fisher? Chess cult guru figure? Cewl!

[CaptMurdock]

quote:

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Originally posted by Sassette:
I saw the unaired pilot at a completely non-Buffy related convention thingy. We dubbed it the "Alyson Hannigan Appreciation Video" ... and while you'll never get those minutes back, I, personally, have found that I actually appreciate the immensely talented Ms. Hannigan more after having watched it.

-Sass

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Oh, my lord. Truer word was never spoken.

Actually, the only thing I miss about that whole 30-minute abortion was Xander showing Buffy around to the various groups around campus:

(the following is paraphrasing)

X: "Okay, can you guess who these guys are?"

B: "Mmmmm...drama club."

X: "Right. How'd you guess?"

B: "They're so...gesture-y. [makes expansive, expressive arm gestures] 'Did you get that homework assignment?'"

X: [making similar gestures with his arms] 'No, I so did not get it!'"

Classic Joss, that scene. The rest -- burn that junk!

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"Good God, that's a lot of shake!"quote:

[Willowlicious]

quote:

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Originally posted by tommo:
after watching the pilot, I really can't see that actress doing half the stuff that Aly does.

I'm a horrid person, I know it. That poor girl is probably languishing in 'casting couch hell' somewhere and cursing the day she ever met Joss Whedon...

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You're not a horrid person, believe me! I downloaded the unaired pilot because I'd heard that Riff Regan was quite the washout as Willow. It was worse than I expected. She looked completely lost and you could tell she had NO idea what to do with the character. There isn't a glimmer of inspiration or creativity in her performance. I'm not trying to bash her, I just don't know how she was cast at all. It's a mystery.

I love this thread, because I love casting stories. If I wasn't a writer (toiling on many unsold projects, plotting my move to LA--just what Hollywood needs another pathetic writer!), I would love to go into casting. Not movie casting, TV casting. Milling through the acting workshops looking for talent, any kind of talent. The grunt work. I like the process. If I never sell another story and my g/f ever finishes her master's degree and starts supporting me , I might just go into it. Hmmm.

Edited to add my Six Degrees to Whoever. Umm, nobody famous ever graduated from my school, but my first gay bar was Menjos in Detroit where Madonna honed her dancing skills before moving to NYC. And, I've met Courtney Love twice, she called something I wrote about her "cool as fuck." It was one of my proudest moments. Oh, and Kurt Cobain was my 3rd cousin, father's side. And my uncle was in "Magnolia" as one of the harmonica players. Sarah McLachlan called me "cute" once, but it was over the phone so how would she know! I have a bunch...but they obviously haven't gotten me anywhere and none of them are BtVS related!

[This message has been edited by Willowlicious (edited December 13, 2001).]quote:

[Nouvelle]

I believe that Riff Reagen appeared in several episodes of Roseanne as the girl who lived next door and had a wild sister. Riff was supposed to be like a young Rosie and the sister was supposed to be like a younger Jackie.

As for "six degrees of being around a famous person in a round about way", let me just say that my brother is friends with John Schlatter, the guy who began Papa John's pizza. He's from my home town and still lives here, but gives all of his money to Louisville instead. They even have a Papa John's stadium.

[gypsyfoot]

Speaking of keeping talent around (we were weren't we?). Brian Thompson who played Luke eps 1&2 came back as the judge in season 2.
BTW in WTTHM at the end of scene 3 Luke is kneeling in front of a pool from which the master arises. That pool is red because it is a pool of blood. Don't know if Joss was be subtle or that was an inside joke.
Back to talent, Darla was supposed to die at the Bronze in The Harvest but they kept her for a few more episodes.
edited to add: I believe Joss says in his commentary on the tape of WTTHM & Harvest that both Nick & David were new to acting and that SMG & Aly carried them (metaphorically speaking) at first.

[This message has been edited by gypsyfoot (edited December 14, 2001).]

[judy]

Riff??? The pre-Willow actress's name is Riff??? Ohhhh, I feel even MORE sorry for her now.

(trying to imagine "And Riff Regan as Willow..." roflmao)

Uh, anyone, if your RL name is Riff, sorry. Don't go into acting.

These stories were great bedtime reading. Hey, Ruth and Julia, how bout makin' these casting stories even BETTER bedtime reading...

[This message has been edited by judy (edited December 14, 2001).]

[lion + dove]

okay some links and quotes on casting stories I talked about earlier:

first James Marsters's casting story from Darkhorse.com (http://www.darkhorse.com/news/interview ... index.html):

Excerpt:
SE: But you play Spike on Buffy -- how did that opportunity arise for you?

JM: I was called in by Marcia Shulman, who was casting Buffy and has since moved on to become head of casting at Fox. They had been searching for someone for a long time, and hadn't found him, so they were casting people who probably had less television experience, which I did. And I came in and had the time of my life, quite frankly. My memory of it was that I was just having fun. I was playing. They had me do it -- first I read for Marcia's assistant, and we did this scene for about 45 minutes. She had me do it in both a southern accent and a British accent. They weren't sure quite what they wanted , and they liked what I did, then they called me in with Juliet (Landau), who was precast, and I have to say we just clicked in together right away. There was an instinctual trust that usually takes a long time to develop, but for some reason she and I -- just having met thirty seconds before -- just decided to jump off the cliff together, which I really appreciate, because she didn't have to. She had the role already. She didn't have to extend herself that way, but decided to just play.

SE: It only works better for her if you guys are going to be a couple for a while and you're actually working from the chemistry that was naturally there in the first place

JM: Yeah, it's a kind of informed self interest that I think some people may not realize.

In fact, the shot that I see most often of us from the show -- stills from the first episode where we were meeting The Annointed One -- was taken directly from the audition. We kind of leaned into each other, locked at the forehead, and looked at the camera. That just happened in the audition, and that was the end of the audition, and everyone was like, "we love these guys!" It was just, frankly, a particularly good audition. I can't really account for it other than that. And I don't know if I want to examine why I particularly enjoy playing a character who enjoys hurting people (laughs)...

as for Danny Strong, can't find the original place I saw it (coulda sworn straight from Joss's mouth), but found this link to a Danny interview and excerpt:
http://www.slayground.net/danny/interview.html

Adina asks: How did you land the role of our beloved Jonathan?

[Danny responds]I auditioned for the role of Xander, and then the casting director brought me back to read for a number of smaller roles for Joss. He liked what I did with one of the roles ("student") and that was how it all started. Jonathan sort of grew from that.

okay, found one for Nich Brendon a little bareboned, but it does convey how whirlwind it all was back in the day:
http://www.nicholas-brendon.com/xfactor.html

BTM: Lets take it back t the beginning. What was your Buffy audition like?
NB: It was at the end of pilots season, so I was kind of on a roll, and I just went in and met with Marcia Shulman, our former casting director, who's now whead of casting over at Fox. She said to come back at four o'clock and meet Joss. That was the first time I'd heard his name. That was a Thursday, and at about seven o'clock on Thursday I founf out that I was gonna go to Fox and test. Friday night I found out that I was going to the WB on Monday, and then at 11 o'clock tuesday morning I found out that I had the part as Xander Harris. It was pretty cool.

BTM: Did the cast bond pretty quickly?
NB: Definitely. We were all for one and one for all, Joss included. Once we saw the show was really good, it was easy. It was weird because it was all of our first primt-time series experiance. Tony Head has VR5 or something, but it was the first one that was really good, since Joss is here and he's the god.

[This message has been edited by lion + dove (edited December 14, 2001).]

[MadProphet]

I loved the unaired pilot just for the HORRIBLE cheesy vampire death scenes. I haven't seen anything that hokey since the heyday of Hammer flicks.

I just realized how old I may have just sounded, feel free to disregard the Hammer portion of that comment.

[perspixx]

where can one find or view this unaired pilot?

[fell]

Yes, the pilot is surprisingly bad, esp considering that Sarah, Nick, and Tony play pretty much the same parts in the opener. It's a sad thing for Riff Regan to forever be known as "the actress who isn't Aly" but there's no denying just how important Aly is to the mix.

One bit I really liked from the pilot was Buffy's back-flip from the 2nd-floor railing in the library. It looked like she (Sarah) did her own stunts in the pilot.

[lion + dove]

sorry to keep posting more, but i think they're sorta cool. this is from Clever Little Slayer's Fun Stuff page:
http://www.cleverlittleslayer.batcave.net/funstuff.html

on casting David Boreanaz:

David was ‘discovered’ whilst out walking his dog Bertha Blue. His now manager spotted him from his window and, even before approaching David, called Buffy’s casting agent Marcia Shulman and told her he’d found her Angel. When David came in for the audition, Marcia wrote ‘He’s the guy’ in the margin of her casting book.

[Note from me: In an early, early MSN online chat, David touched the subject briefly. Mentioned he had to try out 3 or 4 times. So apparently others had to be convinced of DB as Angel. You can read the (very long, short answered, and very Bertha Blue heavy) whole chat at Phoenix's David Boreanaz website:
http://www.david-boreanaz.com/Witty/msnchat.htm

And a quickie about my 6 degrees favorite:
Armin Shimerman originally tried out for Principal Flutie- go figure.

And I know everyone here already knows this, but can't neglect my all time favorite Buffy character finally getting the perfect actress to play her:

"Actually, she had not originally been cast for the role of Willow, but she kept very persistent and came back to half a dozen casting sessions (the actress for Willow was not easy to choose), until she finally won the role. She was later told by Joss Whedon that she had been chosen for her energy and her good contact with the other members of the cast."

from http://www.boadicea.net/buffy/character ... m#boadicea

another similar but more fleshed out tale of aly from powerwrestling.com (go figure):

When the original casting for the TV series "Buffy The Vampire Slayer" occurred Aly tried out for the part of Willow Rosenborg. She didn't get it and instead the part went to Riff Regan who starred as Willow in the original half hour presentation of "Buffy". When they got the go ahead to make a full series of "Buffy" once again Aly tried out for the part of Willow. But after stumbling across a lot of the technological references she thought she hadn't got the part. A week later Aly got a call saying that she had got the part, apparently she'd gotten over with Joss Whedon because of her energy and spunk, coupled with Aly's idea of playing Willow as truly innocent.

okay those who aren't fans of Riley (or as my roomie and I call him "Cornfed") avert your eyes. here's a lengthy-ish story of Riley's casting straight from Marc Blucas's mouth:

a 28-year-old with limited experience of acting in series television, marc blucas auditioned for the role and instantly grabbed whedon's attention. "my first audition with sarah went horribly," blucas tells starburst. "it was a very intimiate scene and i had hurt my back the night before playing basketball. i couldn't walk; i slept on the floor. it needed to be a physical scene, even though it was the first time we had met and so i did an entire scene leaning up against a bookcase. it was horrible. i was about as intimate as a lampshade.
"after that i said, 'thanks for having me back, good luck with this, sarah'. then a couple of days later, joss called me at home and the first thing he said to me was, 'how's your back?' now i wanted it even more. these are quality people; these are people my mom and dad want me to work with! he said, 'i know you're the guy. i've seen you do this and i want to have you back.' second chances are few and far between in this town. he said, 'i want to bring you back in; he was trying to buy me recovery time."
blucas admits that while watching episodes as research for the auditioning process he had actually become a huge fan of buffy. "it's fun, it's smart, it's very clever..." he enthuses. "after three or four episodes it's like, 'ok, vampires exist. deal with it!' it got its hook in me so bad. any actor will admit they read a lot of material that's not so hot and you take the job for a pay cheque more than you believe in it. that happens a lot when you audition. as i was auditioning for this, during the 50-step process, i came to really fall in love with it and say, 'i want this so badly'."
fortunately, this desire was reciprocated. as much as blucas wanted to appear in buffy, whedon was eager to secure the role for him. "it was about his presence," says the producer of his casting choice. "gary cooper is what it was. the performance was good, but it was about somebody who just captured you in a way that you just felt different when they left the room. and he was a very different presence from david. we wanted somebody who was very trustworthy and very american."

from http://www.marc-blucas.com/headlines/starburst.html

[Lizzy]

Found what I was talking about regarding the casting of Amber. This is from an article I found at Amazing Amber (http://amazingamber.co.uk):

"She's such a delight," notes Whedon, "and this is one of those 'I'm an idiot' stories that I hate to tell, but she came in and read beautifully, but she was so different from the person I had imagined. The person I had imagined physically was more kinda like Ally McBeal - thin and little and tiny. And here was Amber, who was taller and sort of more mature-looking physically, so I was sort of taken aback by her. And it was (co-producer) Marti Noxon who kept saying 'This is the girl! This is the girl! Bring her back!' Now it's one of those things where you couldn't imagine having cast anyone else. So Marti gets the biggest plug for that."

Oh Joss, you're right, it is an "I'm an idiot" story. You are forgiven, even gods make mistakes.

[xita]

It's ok though it seems to work for Joss. Aly also was not physically what he had imagined for Willow and it worked out Meant to be

[Web Warlock]

Now here is a terrible thought.

The original actress for Willow and Tara still in the show...

I watched the UAP and I could not finish it. It wasn't right. Besides, Ally is so damn cute.

BTW, MadProphet, I am huge Hammer fan. I think I have every bad Hammer Vampire film on tape somewhere.

Warlock

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Web Warlock
web.warlock@attbi.com webwarlock@planetadnd.com
Author, the Netbooks of Witches and Warlocks
The Other Side: http://www.xtreme-gaming.com/~theotherside/
The DnD Community Council: http://www.dndcommunitycouncil.org/nbownw
--
"If that is all the Gods can do then I'm over to the Dark Side so fast!" - Tom Servo, MST3k

[fell]

My jaw dropped when i read that Riff Regan was selected over Ally! What were they thinking? Of course, it may not be true. But it makes you wonder how often casting is based one someone's preconception of the part rather than the readings, though.

Buffy without Aly or Amber? No way.

[judy]

Well, just a few weeks ago I lived in the land of, "I don't trust Marti or her loyalty to W/T" and now I find out she has two mommies and advocated for the hiring of Amber. While I'll take Joss and RR Kirshner's depictions and understanding of W/T over the Noxon's anyday... excuse me while I take some Tums for my heartburn from having to eat sooo much humble pie.

[Original Cici]

J. August Richards (Gunn) took acting classes, his teacher was Dr. Benton from ER, i don't remember his actual name.

Anyway...he nearly didn't get the part according to the Buffy magazine:

It's almost a part that didn’t materialize for Richards, who was supposed to audition for another series while waiting to hear form Angel.

"That morning I woke up and went to go test for Angel. Then I was sitting in my apartment waiting to see if I got the part -- if I did, I wouldn't go to the next audition. But if I didn't, I'd have to," he recalls. "I couldn't even look at the script for the next job, because I was so needing to know if I got the part on Angel. It was five minutes before the second audition, I was sitting outside feeling kind of depressed like I hadn't gotten it, and then right as I was getting out of the car, my manager called me and told me I had gotten the part. I didn't want to go to the other audition -- I wasn't mentally up to it, because I was attached to this character. I felt like auditioning for the second role would be letting Gunn go."

Also, he was on 'Diagnosis Murder' on BBC1 today...the name of his character was Troy Sommers...which i thought was a bit of a coincidence, but then maybe not.

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Original Cici

Buffy - 'What happened to Xander?'
Giles - 'He kept poking me with his hook. I sent him over to charmed objects. With any luck he'll poke the wrong one and end up in an alternate dimension inhabited by a fifty-foot Giles that squishes annoying teeny pirates.'

Dawn - 'I kiss all the time. Not that i'm a kiss slut.'

[Dumbsaint]

quote:

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Originally posted by judy:
These stories were great bedtime reading. Hey, Ruth and Julia, how bout makin' these casting stories even BETTER bedtime reading...

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I have no idea what you could
*possibly* be referring to, Judy. None. None at all.

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This mummy hand has ceased to BE! It is an EX-mummy hand!quote:

[tommo]

I'm confused as to exactly what is meant here. Ahem.

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"You evil bitch troll from hell!" ~ Patsy Stone

[xita]

I don't know what you are all talking about either, but could you please write it and quick?