SANCTUARY - THE MORTON REPORT: Vamping It Up: Interview With Sanctuary's Jonathon Young
By Steve Eramo
October 24, 2011
He is brilliant, egotistical, a connoisseur of fine wine as well as a snazzy dresser and rather long in the tooth, literally - Sanctuary’s Nikola Tesla is all that and much more. Based on the real-life Serbian-American inventor, mechanical and electrical engineer, the character is a member of a secret Victorian-era group called The Five. Tesla and his colleagues - Dr. Helen Magnus, John Druitt, James Watson and Nigel Griffin - injected themselves with pure vampire blood, giving each of them unique abilities.
In Tesla’s case, the blood activated his dormant vampire genes, transforming him into a half-vampire. He eventually left The Five and went underground for 60 years in an attempt to resurrect his vampire ancestors. Introduced in the first season Sanctuary episode “The Five,” Tesla turns up in Rome to warn Helen that her life is in danger. Of course, in typical Tesla fashion, he has an ulterior motive. Over the past four years, actor Jonathon Young has made the Tesla role his own, slipping perfectly into the character’s tasteful wardrobe and lofty manner. Funnily enough, this version of the character was not what he initially expected to be playing...
Helen Magnus (Amanda Tapping) and Nikola Tesla (Jonathon Young) from Animus
... “When my character first showed up on the program, he had a plan to essentially recruit Helen,” notes Young. “When, however, she declined his offer to join him in his plans for world domination, Tesla was all set to kill her. I often think back to that first episode because there’s quite a bit of evidence of a really warm friendship with a long history between these two characters, and certainly in comparison to ‘The Five,’ Tesla has become softer in his relationship to Magnus. Yes, he’s always looking out for himself above anyone else, but it’s clear that he cares a great deal for Helen and would do anything to help her. She’s the one person who, I think, knows how to get the human side to come to the surface where Nikola Tesla is concerned..."
Sanctuary season four airs Friday at 10/9C on Syfy and in Canada on Space Channel.
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