Carmen Argenziano as Jacob Carter/Selmak on Stargate SG-1. Photo copyright of MGM.
In today's Sci-Fi Blast From The Past, Carmen Argenziano talks about playing the dual role of Jacob Carter/Selmak on Stargate SG-1.
In life, we usually turn to someone else to ask advice of or seek guidance on a matter. That’s not necessarily true for Stargate SG-1’s Jacob Carter. The retired Air Force general can literally look inside himself for a “second opinion.” For over three years, he has been sharing his body with a Tok’ra symbiote called Selmak. In the second season episode Secrets, Jacob tells his daughter Sam Carter that he is dying of terminal cancer. It is Carter’s idea, while on a mission with SG-1 in the two-part story The Tok’ra, to have Jacob merge with a symbiote whose host body is dying. The match was a success, the symbiote cured Jacob’s cancer, and he went on to become Earth’s official liaison to the Tok’ra. Playing a human with a beast in his belly has proven to be a wonderful acting challenge for Carmen Argenziano.
“I thought long and hard about how to play Jacob after he joined with Selmak,” muses Argenziano, whose character is currently helping out the SG-1 team in the episode Allegiance. “In the end, I decided to portray him as having a duality or kind of well-adjusted, schizoid personality. Jacob is extremely grateful to Selmak for saving his life. He knows of the symbiote’s wisdom, and therefore there’s no real competition between them. I think both he and Selmak are quite symbiotic and when a single consciousness emerges it truly is that individual and vice versa.
“So I decided to somehow merge the two personalities within myself and make a smooth transition from one to the other. I try to keep my performance as real and natural as I can and just let the script take the characters wherever it wants. There’s almost a spiritual or ethereal quality to Selmak in that when he speaks through Jacob it is all-consuming like a burning bush. Jacob acts as a universal conduit for the alien and I find that fascinating.”
Argenziano recalls there being some stiff competition for the part of Selmak, including an actor who had a recurring role in the first season of The X-Files. “Frankly, I was somewhat surprised and elated that I got the role,” smiles the actor. “However, on the day of the audition I felt kind of ‘up,’ as opposed to days when auditioning can make you feel a little tense. I came home and told my wife, who used to be an actress and with whom I work on all my auditions, ‘It felt good, so we’ll see.’ Lo and behold I got the part. The batting average for auditions is usually one in ten for an actor. It’s a tough process and for journeymen career actors like myself it can sometimes get to you. You just have to try to keep positive and make it kind of a creative experience as opposed to just going in there and trying to get the job. So in the end it all worked out and I got this wonderful little job that takes me to Vancouver on occasion.”
Although he’d been acting for many years prior to working on Stargate SG-1, the actor was still a bit nervous when making his debut on the series in Secrets. “As an actor, coming into what was more or less an established family, I felt a little like the new kid on the block,” notes Argenziano. “I think Amanda Tapping sensed my apprehension on that first day. I remember struggling with the scene when Jacob is about to tell Sam that he has cancer. Just as they were about to roll the cameras, Amanda took my hand and gave it a warm, reassuring squeeze. That meant so much to me. I can’t say enough good things about her. Amanda is a Meryl Streep-quality actress as well as a generous, gracious and supportive human being. I genuinely love working with her.”
Although his character did eventually end up receiving a Tok’ra symbiote, Secrets was originally supposed to be Argenziano’s first and last Stargate SG-1 episode. “My first day on the job I went to see Jonathan Glassner and Brad Wright, who told me that they were thinking of having Jacob not survive the cancer,” says the actor. “However, upon further consideration they decided he would, in fact, live, and much to my delight I became a recurring character on the show.”
Series co-producer Peter DeLuise has directed a number of the Stargate SG-1 episodes the actor has appeared in, including Allegiance. “Peter is a lot of fun,” says Argenziano. “He’s an actor, too, so he knows how to communicate what he wants to his fellow actors. He has a wonderful energy that I appreciate in directors. When a director has that kind of enthusiasm it brings an actor up to that same level and helps him infuse his performance with a similar energy. So I always enjoy working with Peter.”
Among Argenziano’s many acting credits are guest-star appearances on other Sci-Fi programmes including The Bionic Woman, NightMan and Babylon 5. The actor played Urza Jaddo in the second season B5 episode Knives. “That was a real change of pace for me as an actor,” he says. “It was one of my first Sci-Fi roles and a kind of larger-than-life character. I had a great deal of fun working with Peter Jurasik [Londo Mollari], especially when doing the sword-fighting scenes. I brought one of my sons to the set with me one day and he was just in awe of everything he saw. It was a big deal for him. What’s wonderful about a TV show like Babylon 5, and Stargate, too, is that my boys get to see me perform. So much of what I do I don’t allow them to watch because of the language and other stuff, but I let them watch these shows.”
Prior to Allegiance, the actor guest-starred in the sixth season Stargate SG-1 episode Descent. With his work on Allegiancedone, Argenziano is off to catch a plane back home to Los Angeles. He is scheduled to start work on a made-for-TV film with, among other people, Teri Hatcher of Lois and Clark fame. “I’m hoping, though, to come back up here again this year to do another Stargate or two,” enthuses Argenziano.
Steve Eramo
As noted above, photo copyright of MGM, so please no unauthorized copying or duplicating of any kind. Thanks!
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