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Virginia Hey - The elegant, blue, spiritual centre of the original Farscape cast.

Joining Farscape
  Tell us about getting the part of Zhaan on Farscape?

I auditioned. She was called Zenn at that stage and Farscape was called Space Chase.

Sci fi fans will know how it works, they�ll understand the casting process - a sheet is sent to various theatrical agencies with a breakdown of what they�re looking for. It�s like a shopping list: "Today we�re shopping for two characters." On the first casting sheet that came out of the Space Chase production offices, they were looking for a character called D�Argo, who would be completely covered in prosthetics: "Must be tall, strong, with a great voice, will not be seen except for the eyes."

Then, the next little paragraph underneath was "Zenn, Z-E-N-N, alien priest, actress must be fit, statuesque, between 25 and 45," - a huge age group, and that was it. When an actor looks at breakdowns we have to be psychic. It�s gut instinct, because you�re not given any information. You have to say "Yes, I�m interested," or "No I�m not interested," based on three lines. If it�s a film you can read the whole script and decide whether you�d like to audition, but for TV you don�t ever know anything about the piece until you start working, so you just get a feeling for it.

The thing that stuck out for me was "priest". I do a lot of reiki and energy work, and I studied naturopathy and homeopathy and herbal medicine and, when I grow up, somehow, sometime, I�d also like to be a holistic doctor. I believe in spirituality, in Eastern philosophies and I�m open to any kind of shamanistic work, so when I read, "Alien priest" my subconscious jumped into play. I thought "Oh, wouldn�t that be wonderful, to channel through some of the things that I�ve been learning in the last 20 years."

I didn�t even know whether Zenn had any kind of eastern philosophy. Well, she�s alien, so it�s nothing to do with the Earth and Earth philosophies but I thought, "Wouldn�t it be great if I got the job and I could put some eastern philosophies into the character," so I jumped at the chance. I auditioned and eventually, after a long process, got it. I had no idea I�d be blue and bald.

A close shave
  Would it have made a difference to whether you applied for the role of Zhaan if you had known about the make-up?

Yes, it would have made a difference - and the casting agent knew that. They won�t admit it, but they knew it. Because if it had said: "Alien priest, actress must be fit, statuesque, between 25 and 45 and prepared to shave off all of her hair and eyebrows for five years," I would have gone "I don�t think so".

So, the casting agent knew that I�d be perfect for the part, but they omitted to tell me they had to shave my hair because they knew [I wouldn�t do it].

It was the make-up artist who told me. Everyone maintains [the situation was] "Oops, did you tell her? Didn�t you tell her? Oh dear," but I think it was a big ploy. Maybe everybody did forget, but do you know what? By them forgetting they got me.

[At the audition] I was wondering where all the other girls were that I usually audition with were, because [you get] pretty typecast, and if I�m going for a role usually they want someone who�s kind of statuesque - another way of saying tall - so you get all the statuesque actresses coming out of the woodwork. There�s generally about ten other actresses who are similar to me, with tall, high cheek bones, that slightly elegant look, blond, long hair, that I always see at every audition. When I was auditioning for [Zhaan] I thought "Where are they? This is bizarre." I saw a room full of really young girls, really short, which was strange because it said statuesque, and with very very short hair.

Of course, everybody else except me managed to get the brief with "By the way you will be bald and blue." All those girls had very very short hair, so it was no big deal for them to cut it, whereas with me, my hair was down to here. So I�m glad they did keep it from me.

Shock of the blue
  Did you find that having the make-up on helped you portray Zhaan?

Eventually, yes, but not in the beginning. Initially it was a shock, and I was going home and crying my eyes out, thinking, "What have I done?"

I thought "God, what am I going to do if [this show] is not well received? It�s going to take me three years to grow back my hair, and eyebrows take months and months. I�ve ruined my career." At first it was difficult and very depressing.

I�d look in the mirror and I�d see this red, rubbed thumb. That�s what I looked like, just a pink, rubbed thumb. I used to take the make-up with fruit acid so I�ve got squillions of broken capillaries as a result. So for the first two weeks, every night I�d just cry my heart out.

But, after I got used to the make-up and started to see some dailies, and after the make-up artists found their way as well and adjusted the make-up to work perfectly, then I started to get a feel for it and it did help. At the same time, also I�m an actor, so I�m able to switch in and switch out, and most of the time I didn�t realise that I was blue and unless I looked down and saw my hands.

I used to wonder why people were staring at me. People would stare, speechless, very close to my face, and it actually made me feel really horrible and very uncomfortable. I used to forget that I was in make-up and I used to wonder what the hell they were looking at.

Superior beings
  What would you say were the strengths and the weaknesses of Zhaan?

I don�t think she had any weaknesses. She was a higher power unto herself - humans are the ones that have the weaknesses. All Delvians are highly evolved and Zhaan was the only Delvian able to be violent. It�s completely against a Delvian�s genetic structure to be evil or anything less than blessed, but because there was some kind of genetic hiccup she was able to be evil.

That�s why she was chosen to be a political activist. Zhaan killed an evil dictator to save Delvia, and that�s when she was caught by the peacekeepers and shunted off into jail.

Maybe in her own mind she saw [herself as] weak for not being able to give more love to everybody. She didn�t see herself as perfect and I think she wanted to. I think she probably would have seen a weakness in that she was not able to completely rid herself of the dark side. She so desperately wanted to; she prayed everyday to try to rid herself of it and it took her hundreds of years, yet she still reverted. Which was fabulous, as an actor to play, that kind of complex character.

Returning to life
  What�s it like coming back for your appearance in the fourth season?

It was great, it was really good.

I had a different make-up artist doing my face so, if anyone�s wondering, [that�s why] I looked completely different. There was nothing the same except the contact lenses. They decided for some reason to make the lipstick and the eye make up grey, and used a totally different base.

It was all completely different and so it was very strange for me to be the person that I love so desperately, deeply, but be looking different. If you were somehow disfigured and you looked in the mirror and you had a different face, that was what it was like for me, because Zhaan is part of me.

I don�t care what anyone says, I wasn�t just acting the part, I took her over. Most actors remove themselves completely from the character - the character has nothing to do with them really, they�re just calling on past experiences to feel them, but with Zhaan it was really something different.

It was almost like I was channelling her. I don�t think I could have survived with all that make-up and the toxins and chemical if I hadn�t had a massive background of energy work, energy healing, reiki, homeopathy and herbal medicine. I wouldn�t have lasted because my kidneys started bleeding after the first three months, and I channelled myself into that character to keep myself on my feet and to keep going.

I loved her so much that nothing was going to stop me. Even my human frailty was not going to stop me, which was idiotic in the end. The doctors were saying, "Are you completely insane, what are you doing, this is a fictitious character, stop ruining your health, you only have one body."

I didn�t go home and think I was Zhaan, it wasn�t like that. But I was so in love with that character, so I channelled everything I knew from spirituality, from meditation processes, filling myself full of energy to keep myself going and so it is kind of like channelling.

It was nice. Actually Ben had tears in his eyes when he was working with me, Ben�s very shy, and he�s a very lovely guy and very supportive and I hadn�t seen him for quite some time. It�s magical, when Ben and I work together. I think it comes across on screen and you feel it. There�s an electricity, but it�s a warm one, not a testosterone kind of human thing. It�s almost like two soul mates working with each other, and everyone on sets feels a bit blissed out.

I didn�t get to see everybody, but I saw Ben and I saw Gigi, and Rowan Woods, one of my favourite directors of all time, was playing me! They didn�t tell me he was going to be the other Zhaan, they wanted to surprise me. I particularly love working with Rowan Woods and there he was dressed as me. He had my two make-up artists, the bugger - that�s why his make-up was perfect. I said, "You wretch, you�ve stolen my two make-up artists".

A higher love
  Tell us about working with Paul Goddard - you had a lot of close scenes with him.

Paul Goddard is just heaven. I can�t think of any other word that would describe him.

I haven�t ever had an intense love relationship with an actor character before. The longest I ever was in a series for was six months and I didn�t have a love interest, so this was the first time. [It was] not only having a love interest that�s human, but you�re talking about a spiritual love interest, the love that Stark and Zhaan had was on a spiritual plane. It wasn�t earthly, their love was in another dimension.

Their love was how I fantasise human love to be, but of course can�t be. It was a spiritual love, so you can�t work with an actor that closely and have that intensity of emotion [without having something of it in reality.] Don�t forget that as actors, we try to get as truthful as we can with the emotion, so if we�re supposed to have a spiritual love we try as much as we can as humans to find that. He�s a beautiful spiritual man and I had a big spiritual side of me, and that side was in love with Paul�s spiritual side.

We absolutely adore each other but it�s not physical, it�s the kind of love that will last forever. So he is a very special human being and means the world to me. It wouldn�t have happened, it�s just one of those things � he had a partner and I had a partner but I like to think that in another world Paul and I, Paul and Virginia fell in love. I think we�d probably die and go to heaven. He�s gorgeous, yeah, he�s lovely.

They�re not puppets!
  Can you tell me about the challenges of working with animatronic characters?

Some people say Muppets and some people say puppets, and I go "Puppets! Muppets! They�re animatronic characters."

They�re exquisitely computerised. All of the animatronic characters have their faces wired so that they have a certain amount of facial movement, like a human. Their eyes are wired, their eyelids are wired, their eyebrows are wired. Once the animatronic characters are switched on they�re so lifelike.

If you told me as a director that I had to talk to this spoon [holds spoon up], and this spoon was an alien creature and had feelings and could talk back, then I�m going to relate to this spoon that way. The beauty of it was that we were relating to [the animatronic creatures] � they�re not alive, but boy, the Jim Henson creature shop sure makes them look incredibly alive.

It�s disconcerting because when they�re switched off they go [limp], and it�s like Rygel�s had a stroke. There was one scene where I had to seduce Rygel � it�s funny now because Rygel and I didn�t have that kind of relationship at all - but this was in the first season where they weren�t quite sure what anyone�s relationship with anyone else was.

It was funny because with filming, if you�re doing a two-shot the camera�s going to favour either one of you at a time. Usually they do a wide shot where you�re both in the frame. Then they come in and they�ll shoot [the other character], the camera over the back of my shoulder and then vice versa, they�ll shoot me, the camera over our [the other character�s] shoulder.

When they were shooting Rygel and I was off-camera, he was animated, his eyebrows were moving, his eyes were sparkling and moving away and his mouth was moving. It was fantastic. But when it was my turn he was switched off, damn it. He only had one operator, who was holding Rygel�s body up and moving his head because the camera saw the back of his head so it had to look as though he was alive and moving.

I had to do the whole scene with Rygel [limp and lifeless] and it was really hard actually, but I did it. Afterwards, I said to the director "You rat, you could have at least had them turn Rygel on for me so that he was animated," and the director said, "Oh, I hadn�t thought of that. Oh no, we must do that in future, sorry".

Often the actor that you�re talking to [in a scene] has to run off and shoot something else, so often we�re acting to just a piece of tape on the side of the camera. So we are very accustomed to acting to anything, but it�s just a little bit disconcerting when you�re acting to an actual actor or character and they�re slumped. It would be like if I was doing a scene with Ben and he was filing his nails or something, or saying his lines and looking somewhere else.

Hard work and humour
  Was there much joking about on set?

I think people thought that there were pranks because they liked to think it�s like a big Hollywood movie set where you�re shooting one hour and it takes you six months so you�ve got a lot of time.

Actually we�d shoot the equivalent of a feature film in a week. We�re constantly shooting scenes from other episodes as well, so we�re always shooting three episodes simultaneously, but it can get anything up to five to seven. So it�s full-on, it�s non-stop, it�s relentless. It was the hardest, most difficult, most complex role I�ve ever had in of my life, and therefore the most fulfilling and compelling, because every actor likes to be challenged. We�re suckers for punishment, so the more painful and complex and challenging it is, and the more you have to wrench yourself inside out to do it, the more we like it. There�s nothing worse than a boring role.

So there really is no time for pranks, but if something does happen and, whoops, we have to cut, it is always Anthony who will turn the mistake into a joke, and then he�ll do something funny. It�s always Anthony, because D'Argo is a big kid, primarily he�s a strong warrior, [but] he�s also childlike, so the way Anthony kept his energy up was to be bubbly and childlike.

I was pretty quiet most of the time because Zhaan is linked in with upstairs. She�s got a spiritual connection all the time and there�s a certain feeling that I slip into - I step into another dimension almost when I�m Zhaan. So in-between times I like to keep myself even, calm, and serene.

On set friends
  Were you close to the rest of the cast?

I didn�t really have much of a rapport [with many of the cast]. I suppose [it was mainly between] Paul and I, because you have the best rapport with the people that you work with most. I didn�t have a jokey rapport with Ben because he�s very shy, and he�s a really beautiful guy, so we had a very gentle rapport.

Did you have much of a rapport with Claudia Black?

Claudia and Anthony were the comedy duo, and Ben would join in as well. Once he gets going, he�s incredibly funny. Plus I�m older, and I tried to mother everyone, and they hated it.

The Cancellation
  What was your reaction to the news of the cancellation?

I was dumbfounded. [I had] a sinking horrible despair, like your best friend dying. [I thought] "What the hell... huh, no, it�s a joke! You�re not joking? No it must be. This is gossip". So [there was] complete disbelief, [I was], ringing people up [and asking] "Is it true?" "Yes it�s true." "What!"

I was over here [in America] when it happened. In Australia I could have rallied around everyone, [but being here] I was very isolated. It was awful for me because it was like you�re in a beautiful marriage, and suddenly you get a phone call from a lawyer saying, "Sorry, you�re divorced, and your kids are being taken away from you, thanks, bye bye".

It was most profound for me because the reason I left Farscape was for nothing except [that] I was as sick as a dog and the make-up made me so damn ill. So my feeling was of horrible disbelief and despair.

Why Zhaan went
  Virginia tells us why she left the show, and what the future held for Zhaan.

The reason I left Farscape was for nothing except I was as sick as a dog and the make-up made me so damn ill. I kept going, but I just couldn�t do it any more - but it wasn�t because I didn�t adore Zhaan. I said to the producers, "I still want to do it, I�d be happy to do six episodes a season, but I can�t do any more than that because it just makes me too b***** sick." They said "Uh, well we don�t know how," because they�d already written Zhaan into the whole of the third season, so I really threw a spanner in the works.

Through the fourth they were trying to figure out what to do with me, but they said yes, they wanted to. Zhaan wasn�t gone. I was sworn to secrecy. I was doing conventions and it was really hard. People were asking me whether Zhaan was dead and I couldn�t tell them.

So, was Zhaan dead or not?

The fan reaction was phenomenal - it brought tears to all of our eyes.

We as actors cannot get involved. You have no idea how we all want to start our own rallies. We want to picket, we want to be heard, be seen, scream, shout, cry, complain. We can�t because we�re the actors and if we complain, whoever decides to put Farscape back on again is going to say, "Those actors, Jesus, you don�t want to let them loose with the press because they�re into mutiny and they have a go at their own, at the hand that feeds them." So we have to be very careful.

We love the Sci Fi Channel, they were our family. They�ve been very good to us, nobody should come down on Sci Fi. Even if [the decision was down to them], if it is or if it isn�t, we have to respect the decision. Something will be done, the fan response has been so phenomenal that producers out there would be really stupid not to raise money. Why not make a three part tele-movie or a series of tele-movies?

It doesn�t have to necessarily be on Sci Fi. I want it to be on Sci Fi, it would be wonderful because that�s our family, but even if it�s not I don�t understand why producers from all over the world haven�t noticed that the fans of this particular Sci Fi show have gone completely over the top in making sure that they�re seen and heard. The response is incredible, and it amazes me that producers haven�t noticed that. How many producers have got a couple of million dollars to make a TV movie, Farscape TV movie? Two million pounds.

I was talking to some of the Farscape people here, and I said to them, "Hey guys, why don�t you just keep your campaign going and raise millions and make it yourselves?" We�d do it. Actors would be into it. I�m waiting for someone like Richard Branson. I�m hoping that he�s a huge sci fi fan, hoping for him to suddenly say, "That would be great, yeah, I�ll produce it".

Moving on
  So what are you doing next? Should we look out for you?

Well, just leaning forward and taking my clothes off, can you see this? [Virginia indicates her t-shirt, which says "Alien of extraordinary ability"]. I�ve been a very very patient girl and it has taken me a year to get my work papers for America.

I�ve actually been over here for a year, but it�s been illegal for me to work, so I�ve been doing nothing except conventions. It�s been great because I�ve had a chance to meet fans, from all over the world - I cannot tell you how awesome that�s been for me because I�m one of these actors that actually loves the fans.

I�m always getting into trouble for it because a lot of the time you�re encouraged to be isolated to a certain extent. Apparently it helps with merchandising if you�re unattainable and you�re a god-like figure and not approachable. I get in there with everyone and I love it, and so I�ve had a great opportunity to meet everyone.

That�s the only thing that legally I could do, I could make personal appearances and sell my autograph. So I�ve just got my work papers six weeks ago, and strangely enough, my Green Card application was approved under the petition heading �Alien of extraordinarily ability� � I laughed myself stupid.

I thought it was a joke, so I rang [my lawyer] up and said "You�re kidding, that�s hilarious" he said "What�s hilarious?" because he had no sense of humour. I said "Alien of extraordinary ability, did you have that printed up?, the certificate you sent me, it�s hilarious!"

He said "What are you talking about?" and I said, "I got the mock certificate you sent in the mail and it says the Government of America has approved your Green Card under the heading of [Alien of extraordinary ability]"

He said "You twit, alien of extraordinary ability, means - [you�re] alien, [because] you�re Australian, extraordinary ability is the type of visa that I�ve filled out for you. It�s one where you have to prove that you�re at the top of your field in your own country and legally they have to use those terms, it�s got nothing to do with Zhaan, you twit."

So I am now, as of six weeks ago, officially named by the United States immigration services, an alien of extraordinary ability. So now for the first time I�m able to audition in America, and I�ve been inundated with sci fi scripts - I�m going crazy with them. Funnily enough I�ve been sent a lot of vampire scripts as well, I suppose because of being tall and busty with all the hair.

I don�t know that I�ll be doing vampire [stories], but you�ll be seeing me, believe me, you�ll be seeing me, I don�t know in what yet, but I�m not going to go away.

I look forward to it.

Thank you. And "Hi" to everybody in England. I used to live in England for twenty-seven years and I love you all. Hi the Beeb!