Buffy The Vampire Slayer

LOS ANGELES (Zap2it.com) - Former "Popular" and "Odyssey 5" regular Christopher Gorham now has a show of his own, "Jake 2.0," premiering Wednesday, Sept. 10, on UPN. But even with the excitement of all that, his eyes light up when he recalls his one-episode stint on "Buffy the Vampire Slayer," which ended its seven-season run on UPN last year.

It came in April of 1998, during season two of "Buffy," when the show was still on The WB. "I Only Have Eyes for You," written by Marti Noxon (who went on to become an executive producer), featured Gorham as James, a Sunnydale High student from the 1950s who has an ill-fated romance with a teacher called Grace (Meredith Salenger, who later starred on "Dawson’s Creek").

The duo’s tragic end continues to haunt the school, and as preparations for the Sadie Hawkins Day dance approach, the spirits of James and Grace possess people in the school, forcing them to reenact a murder/suicide.

The last two possessed are Buffy (Sarah Michelle Gellar) and the vampire Angel (David Boreanaz), who had recently lost his soul and turned against former love Buffy. In a twist, James takes over Buffy, while Grace inhabits Angel. "Sarah Michelle Gellar was unbelievable to work with," says Gorham. "I played this character that possessed Buffy. There was a big breakup scene where my character ended up shooting and killing his teacher accidentally and then killing himself.

"The scene was done by me; it was done by Sarah and David; and it was done by two other guest stars as well.

"Anyway, I show up and I’m thinking, ’OK, well, I’m a guest star on the show. They’re going to tell me how Sarah did it, and then I’m going to copy what she did.’ No. I did it first, and then Sarah and David and the other two guest stars, they watched the dailies of what I did, and they matched me.

"On one of the days where we were actually working together, she comes up to me and says, ’Chris, listen, how do you want to play this scene?’ Blown away. I was so floored. I couldn’t believe it.

"I was like, ’OK ... yeah, this is how I was going to do it.’ But I couldn’t believe she would even ask. She was going first that day, and she asked me how I would want to do it. It’s totally the right way to do it, but coming onto a series where she’s already a huge star, you don’t expect her to do that. She was unbelievable, just great. Nothing bad to say about her."

Gorham’s compliments also extend to "Buffy’s" creator, Joss Whedon. "He is unbelievable. I ran into him a year later. I was at the building, auditioning for something else completely. He walked by, ’Hey, Chris, how you doing?’ Floored. Could not believe he remembered who I was. So yes, he’s just really cool."

In one of TV’s interesting coincidences, David Greenwalt, who was a producer and writer on "Buffy" at the time Gorham did his guest shot, is now the show-runner on "Jake 2.0." Further, "Jake" faces off against the "Buffy" spin-off, The WB’s "Angel," starring David Boreanaz and co-created by Greenwalt, on Wednesdays this fall.