STARGATE SG-1 - SCIFI AND TV TALK: Sci-Fi Blast From The Past - Colin Cunningham
by Steve Eramo
05/11/2011
In today's Sci-Fi Blast From The Past, versatile and talented actor Colin Cunningham talks about finally booking his role as Major Paul Davis on Stargate SG-1. Also, for those who might be new to SciFiAndTvTalk, please note that all my Sci-Fi Blast From The Past posts are portions of previously published interviews from my 30+ years as a freelance journalist. For those who are reading these pieces for the first time, I hope you enjoy them!
... Aliens, reporters, soldiers, even the character of Dr. Daniel Jackson, you name it. Colin Cunningham auditioned for just about every part imaginable on Stargate SG-1. “I couldn’t get arrested on the show,” notes the actor. “I tried and I tried. I even wore glasses when I read for the Daniel role, but nothing seemed to work. Then, after almost two years, this part of Major Paul Davis came along. I went into the audition thinking, ‘OK, here goes nothing,’ and the next thing I knew they said, ‘OK, you’re hired.’ The rest as they say is history. Not long after getting the job I happened to talk to [executive producer] Michael Greenburg who told me, ‘After you came in for your very first audition we said, “We’ve got to find a part for this guy.” So we kept bringing you back in.’ When I landed the Davis role I thought, ‘Yes, I finally made it onboard!’”
Cunningham’s character first arrives on the scene in the second-season Stargate SG-1 episode A Matter of Time. In it, the SGC discovers it cannot terminate a connection to a world near a black hole. The Pentagon dispatches an envoy, USAF Major Paul Davis, to accompany General Hammond (Don S. Davis) back to Washington, D.C. for a top-level meeting on the situation.
“All I kept thinking that day was, ‘Man, I really want to do a good job because I would love for them to invite me back.’ I knew my lines, I knew Don Davis’s lines, I knew everybody’s lines,” laughs Cunningham. “I also wanted to attach a real sense of urgency to all the scenes that Major Davis was in. Oddly enough, I wasn’t nervous. I’d already been acting for a while, so being in front of the cameras didn’t bother me. However, I will admit that I was, and still am, in awe of the Stargate sets. As an actor, sometimes you play a victim, a cop, a lawyer, whatever. Rarely, though, do you get to walk into an Asgard spaceship, you know? It was like being in Disneyland. So that was pretty cool...”
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