James Marsters

James "Lil’ Jimmy" Marsters @ Hi-Fi Bar, Melbourne, 8pm, Sat 2nd July 2005
We arrived to find a queue stretching down Swanston St and around into Collins St, ie. the longest queue I’d ever seen. Not wanting to join that queue, we instead went to Starbucks. Joining the much smaller queue around 8ish, we politely answered people when they asked what we were queuing for (they didn’t know who James’ was). Entering said Hi-Fi Bar around 8.30pm, we noted support band start at 9.15 and James’ start at 10.15. Getting a reasonable position at the bottom of the stairs we played the waiting game.


Support band was average (lead singer didn’t sing, so much as yell) and James hit the stage a little after 10.15. My sister was very happy as James’ had on the all-important black rock shirt, plus it was open to reveal his manly chest. He played for about an hour, all acoustic by hisself. Unimpressed by the first few songs, I eventually warmed to the music and James’ jittery style of playing (He plays like he prances a convention stage). There were a couple of great songs in the middle (sorry, no idea of song titles), and he played a few GOTR songs incl. Dangerous and Smile. Most everything else was off Civilised Man, and while it’s not my cup of tea, I appreciated the warmth and honesty of his performance.

# James "The " Marsters @ Tabula Rasa Convention, Melbourne, 12.30pm, Sunday 3rd July 2005
Then it was time for a lunch break at the Casino. We came back just in time for James’ Q+A. Although everything seemed to be messed up in terms of queues, they seemed to be getting through them (about half hour late at this point). One of the reasons maybe, is that there was less seating this year than last year. James bounded the stage is his typical jittery style and talked about:
# He dared somone to embarrass him. Some people came close, but he was quick with a comeback everytime.
# Males, and how they can let nothing get past them (like when they use a remote control, they’ve gotta know everything thats going on) and how having children yanked him into the present (did a big stage motion to go along with this).
# He had a few things to say about SMG: incredibly professional, liked to control everything, but didn’t appreciate the way she behaved when he had to be naked (she laughed and the entire crew laughed).
# Would like to play Richard II. He thinks previous portayals have missed the point of the character.
# He’s currently got his 12".. doll, that is, dressed as Qui-Gon Jinn.
# They would lie to the producers and say that the makeup took 45mins went it actually took 20mins.
# He started to empathise with Spike when they did the first William the Bloody episode.
# He said art is human birthright and is trying everything: books, poetry, painting, gardening, music. He started on the music when he was 14 and started singing in bars at 16.
# He recited the line "Guess that means she was thinking about you... all those times I was puttin’ it to her" plus whispered "Mountain Dew".
# He spoke about GOTR, saying the songwriter was writing for his own voice and not James’. James couldn’t relate, as the writer was 10-15 years younger than him.
# He mentioned the Italian girl in "The Girl In Question" episode was cast the night before filiming and kept forgetting her lines. JM doing a good DB impression, said: "I’m gonna kill her..".
# He said evil Spike was more fun to play. He said the later stuff was harder, but he was prouder of this work. He said that the more extreme the writing was, the more he felt he needed to give the love in the closeups and exhibit a lot soul. He also said that Spike was an edited version of hisself.
# James then did what he thought was a good Aussie accent, but it wasn’t really.
# He discussed the hours they would work: 13-14 hrs a day, from 4.30 Monday morining through to 6am Saturday.
# Someone asked about gag reels and he said they didn’t really have much. Joss would cut a little film at the end of each season, but they concentrated more on the crew.
# Someone asked him his favorite joke, to which he replied "My life!".
# He was asked if there was anyone he really hated on the crew. There was one person, who he thought was a hack and a creep. Their credo was "I don’t give a hoot, just shoot, shoot, shoot".
# Not winning an Emmy became a badge of honor for them.
# His favorite acting partner is Juliet Landau - she’s "consumed by the passion".
# When asked what music he likes he started singing Britney, then referred to the corporations putting us all to sleep. He loves Tom Waits ("transforming pain into beauty", plus Kurt Cobain. he would like to learn the trumpet and cover Miles Davis.
# He was asked who he would like to have on a deserted island with him. Dr. Martin Luther King, someone bad like Genghis Khan, Bruce Lee (goofy, happy man) and Jimi Hendrix. When asked why there were no woman, he quickly added Queen Elizabeth and Meryl Streep.
# He called the WB "little bastards" for promoting Spike’s return on Angel when he was to die in Buffy.
# When asked who he wouldn’t want on a deserted island, he said George, Ronald, anyone in the that White Mansion.
# When asked his favorite love scene, someone yelled out "Invisible Buffy".
# He said social skills were as important as talent, and said it didn’t matter how much talent you had if you were a jerk. He mentioned a bully early on in the show who made passes at SMG, and James and David were like: "He’s dead..".
# He got kicked out of Julliard ("The working actors are the one’s who got kicked out"), becaused he questioned the validity of there classes. He studied with Michael Wincott (who also got kicked out) and did a nice impression of him.
# The cast were very close and it became like family, warts and all their imperfections. There is a deep love, but JM admitted he hadn’t sought them out.
# He compared SMG to DB, saying DB was a more straight ahead worker and he respected him.
# He talked more about the Leonard Nimoy incident where in a green room he went all fan gushy and demanded the dance from Leonard, who wouldn’t budge and closed down. JM left, and his girlfriend, who wasn’t a Trekkie started a conversation with Nimoy.
# "The patch is a great system for the delivery of nicotine."
# His least favorite filming was when his hand was on fire and he let it burn for too long and burnt himself.
# His favorite filming included being with Juliet, Tom Lenk and Mercedes McCambridge, because they were fun to work with and would just come in and not be the big guest star.
# He described Joss as a big kid at heart, but in a good way.
# He described Buffy as being about adolesence, giving up on dreams and reconciling how messed up the world is and dealing with it.
# He described Angel as more adult, about redemption, making up for old mistakes and that it was sold to an audience younger than it should have been.
# When asked about the best kisser, he said they were all good kissers, but screen kissing is different to the real thing. There’s nothing less romantic. You gotta mush the face.
# He talked about his stunt double, Steve Tartalia, who was the preeminent caucasian stuntman in Hong Kong. He’s multi-certified and his reel was amazing and very Jackie Chan like. The problem was James would often do his own stunts and Steve would have little to do. In later seasons, they would sit down together with the script and work where "James would have a backache".
# A very young girl asked if James liked food, to which he replied "Food is the bomb!". He said he picked Pruscutto and baked chicken. He also liked strange items like snail or eyeballs.

Another break and we wandered around a bit before settling at the start of the queue for photo with ASH. I decided early on that I wouldn’t go in the photo this year - my sister happily obliged. We chatted about various things and looked at some of the photos James had done. He has only one straight on pose in every photo except when one, where he and a couple do a really outrageous out-there screaming pose. The ASH photo was over quick and my sister commented she got a great hug with him and thinks she grabbed him around his belly button. He seemed happy also. During this, they were playing something where James was wearing a dinner suit - is this Cool Money?


When we came back in, we saw most of the rest of Tabula Rasa, from where we left off earlier in the day. Great ep, but never did like Mr. Shark.