Dollhouse

AUSTRALIAN actor Dichen Lachman tells Alica Clarke that being a blank slate can be mentally exhausting. Dollhouse is the latest show to come from the mind of Joss Whedon, the man who gave us Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Angel, Firefly, and many other geek favourites.

The show centres on a place called The Dollhouse where uber-geniuses have a bunch of programmable people, available to anyone who can afford to hire them.

The `dolls’ in The Dollhouse can be anyone and anything: a super spy, a sex slave, a back-up singer/body guard, you name it.

Like all of Whedon’s previous shows, on the surface Dollhouse looks like just another adventure-of-the-week show, but, as always, there is much more going on underneath.

If you want to look deeper, the show explores the nature of consent, the importance of fantasy and what makes a human be a someone.

One of the ’dolls’ is Sierra, played by Australian actor Dichen Lachman. Although all the ’dolls’ have American accents in between assignments, Lachman has been able to use her Australian accent in a couple of episodes.

“They love the way we (Australians) speak, they can’t get enough of it’’ she said.

“They’re just really happy to have that versatility with the character as well, to be able to switch around accents.’’

But the biggest challenge of the role wasn’t trying to master a different accent, but trying to portray someone who is a blank slate most of the time.

”The doll state is difficult because you’re sort of hovering on this fine line, that there’s something going on deep in the core of that person but really most of it’s gone,’’ she said.

“The doll state’s probably one of the more challenging roles. But then it gets challenging playing the active state, out there in the world doing your tasks. And those characters are similar to other characters you’ve played.

“Like, the spy character I played is not that dissimilar to the girl who comes in shooting guns. And even though they’re supposed to be completely different people, they’re in a similar sort of world, and to create those differences can be challenging as well, but that’s what’s fun about it. They’re both challenging in different ways, I guess.’’

There was some concern about whether Dollhouse, whose first season has finished airing in the US, would get a second season.

It, along with a lot of other shows in the fantasy genre, faced the axe.

This prompted an overwhelming show of support from fans who crashed the Fox network’s phone lines with calls begging for the show be saved.

To everyone’s surprise, it was. Along with the rest of the cast, Lachman was overwhelmed by the support for Dollhouse.

“It was amazing!’’ she says.

”I was so grateful to everyone who tweeted with Fox and called them. It was remarkable and just really proved that the fans of Joss don’t just like his shows, they love them.’’

DOLLHOUSE, TUE, 6.30PM, FOX8; 8.30PM, FOX8+2