Host: Roger Lodge
Guests: Jim Parriott (JP), Geraint Wyn Davies (GWD), Nigel Bennett (NB)

Host: All right, Folks. Coming up next - stars Nigel Bennet & Geraint Wyn Davies and producer Jim Parriott will join us to discuss another unlikely cult hit about vampires. It's finally time for the Forever Knight war room. As promised, I'm heading down to the war room to meet the guys from Forever Knight. I haven't been this excited since Denny's brought back the Grand Slam!

You know, the show ran on CBS in the early 90's and then in syndication and on USA.And now it's back here on the Sci Fi Channel with a vengeance. The series, which began airing in 1992, tells the story of Nick Knight, an 800 year old vampire who is now a police detective. And, of course, works the graveyard shift.

The big twist is that this vampire, played by Geraint Wyn-Davies, wants to give up his evil past, and actually is the hero of this series.

(Scenes from Forever Knight interspersed with individual comments by the actors)

GWD: This is about a guy wanting to be good to atone for his sins in the past. It's an addiction. I play a man who is addicted to blood and who's trying to stay off it.

Host: Some of the behind-the-scenes tricks used by the producers of Forever Knight include: $2000 a pair hand-crafted vampire contact lenses made in Italy; currant juice, imported from England to double as drinkable blood, and lots of pairs of vampire teeth. Which can cause problems on the set.

NB: Well, you bite yourself if you're not very careful with the teeth. They are very sharp. And if you are biting someone else's neck, you have to be really careful because you can't feel when you're touching skin.

Host: Nigel Bennett plays the evil vampire trying to drag Nick Knight back into the dark side.

NB: The temptation of knowing you're never going to die, if you can just keep out of the way of stakes and sunlight, that must be a great temptation! You're not going to age. Those elements are very attractive.

Host: We've made it down to the war room folks, to discuss a topic we've addressed before: vampires. But this time we're not talking Dracula! Forget about it! That's yesterday's news! We're talking Forever Knight, and joining us today to talk about the more modern blood-suckers are: Jim Parriot, executive producer and creator of Forever Knight. Incidentally, Jim is also the producer of another one of my favorites, Dark Skies, and is working on the Anne Rice TV series now shooting in New Orleans. And Geraint Wynn-Davies is here. The star of Forever Knight, who played one of my favorite vampires. The one, the only, Nick Knight! His new series, Black Harbour, was just picked up for another season in Canada. When can we see it here?

GWD: Hopefully soon. They're going to sell it, I think, this year, to anyone who is willing to buy it.

Host: And to my left, as if he needs an introduction! Folks, he's Nigel Bennett! He, of course, played LaCroix on the show. And co-authored Keeper of the King with P.N.Elrod. And, if I'm not mistaken, did the voices on the audio version. Correct?

NB: Yeah, that's right. It will be out soon.

Host: First of all, thanks so much for being here. My first question: Passion, horror, pointy teeth, it's easy for us, the audience, to see why this show is such a big hit. But, why, today, a year since you shot your last show, is this still a big cult hit?

GWD: Passion, horror, pointy teeth! (laughs)

NB: And, it's a good show. I think it still is a good show. It had romance. It had sex, to an extent. And that's very attractive.

GWD: Well, actually, every episode Jim would write it for a new beautiful woman to come on for me to bite. And then we decided that Nigel had to bite them as well. Which was great for them! The key element of it: eternity. It's so cool to be with someone who is going to live forever.

Host: Mr. Parriott, what do you think?

JP: The themes are strong and important. They have to do with the eternal. They are the big themes. They are about love and loyalty.

GWD: It's actually what sci-fi deals with best. Sci-fi can do it better than almost any other kind of genre because you can take that kind of God and universal ideas and you can put it into a story. It's also something about the classical nature of the story. You can have period stuff where people are dressed up in little frocks. And you can say things about humanity.

Host: We have been promising this Forever Knight war room for a long time. Some of our fans have written quite a few letters regarding the show. Let's check one out now:

To: SF Vortex
From: Tippie Blevins
"Would you have been a fan of the show if you hadn't been involved with it?"

Host: A very good question! What do you guys say?

GWD: Yes, I think I would have been. Maybe not necessarily with me playing it. But, it was pretty cool. I think it was trying to do something that not very many shows were doing at the time. That kind of darkness with the sense of humor that Jim brought to us. Nigel and I and the players as well as Cathy and John and everyone else that played on it. That was kind of cool. And there was a playfulness that we all had that you can't act. You have to live it.

Host: Guys, even in the old days, vampires and sexuality. In this show, a lot of vampires, a lot of sexuality. Why the connection? Jim?

JP: Well, it could be Nigel! (laughs) It's penetration. I mean fang penetration. It's unrequited love. You know, vampires can't actually do it without killing the woman, so there's a whole tension there.

GWD: But also, for the woman or the person being brought over, it is the ultimate act of submission. You are giving your lifel You're not just giving your body, but your whole being to this entity, this vampire.

JP: La petite morte.

GWD: Exactly, the little death. Sex is called the little death. This is a biggie. A huge, huge death. (laughs)

Host: Nigel, do you agree?

NB: Oh, absolutely. And it's about sucking...and romance.

Host: You consider vampires to be romantic? Wait! wait! let me try - (bites at Ger's neck) what's so romantic about that?

NB: It's all the stuff that leads up to it that's romantic.

JP: I think that the whole idea of unrequited love, if I may repeat myself, I think that's the whole deal. It's romantic. You can have that. But, it doesn't end in sex. It can't end in sex with a vampire. So, there's a whole tension there, and that is good.

GWD: And also, the man or the vampire brings centuries of history and of lovemaking. I mean, there is a skill there, a huge skill, which is sexy and which is romantic. And, other than the feeding frenzy which people put into vampire lore, it is incredibly sensual as well as sexual.

NB: Then there is hypnosis. It's an established fact that vampires can actually hypnotize - thump,thump,thump,thump- that's the sound they make. Like a heartbeat.

Host: It's time for another viewer letter. This one is from Bobbie Williams and she writes:
"In my opinion, Forever Knight is a metaphor for life. It reflects the journey we all take as we strive to become something more than what we are." So, in that context, how would you guys characterize the relationship between Nick and La Croix?

NB: Well, La Croix is his father.

GWD: And his mentor.

NB: His mentor and his brother. He brought Nick across.

GWD: He taught him everything he knows. They are lack-of-soul mates.

NB: And I think La Croix was very angry at Nick.

Host: They certainly had a very strange relationship.

NB: He was ticked off at Nick, who was rejecting all of his "father's" values.

GWD: It was a classic "can't live with, can't live without" relationship. It is, like the letter says, a metaphor for life. Truly, the metaphor of being outside of life.

Host: Nick's struggle is to be mortal.

GWD: Exactly. Actually, it's the metaphor of being just outside of what we all complain about. That is to say, it's about loneliness, about not being a member of that club. It's about us always wanting to be a part of something that we are not allowed into. And there's something about the mortals wanting to be vampires because they can't and the vampires, at least this vampire, wanting to be something that he can't. It requires death, which is the mortal act which he covets.

JP: Exactly! That was it.

Host: Real quick, it's been a year since you taped your last show. What do you miss most?

NB: The crew were great. The actors that I worked with. It was fabulous, the whole experience.

JP: The best crew, best actors, best group of people I've ever worked with. You know, you work nights so there's a certain amount of pressure, and loneliness, and bonding.

NB: Yeah, a lot of bonding going on.

GWD: And Jim, when he created it, he gave it to us. And I don't mean it as a bad thing. He gave it to us, it was our show. He invited us in for this journey of Forever Knight and we took it.

NB: It was a real hands-off situation.

Host. I have about 30 seconds left - real quick - the future of Forever Knight. Maybe a movie-of-the-week? Maybe a feature film? What do you think, guys?

GWD: If we could get that thing kickstarted, it would be great.

NB: We would love to.

GWD: The series has anywhere to go.

JP: We didn't end it. We left the final frame on LaCroix with his stake raised. We never saw it come down.