Dollhouse

When Tahmoh Penikett ("Battlestar Galactica") arrived on the set of Fox’s "Dollhouse" (8 p.m. Friday, WFLD-Ch. 32) to play FBI agent Paul Ballard, he quickly learned a lesson: Don’t improvise with creator Joss Whedon’s words.

Tahmoh “He’s so good that he knows exactly how the line needs to be delivered. And you really have to deliver it the way he wrote it,” said Penikett over coffee in a Chicago hotel recently. “It just doesn’t work [otherwise]. ... The joke doesn’t work, the humor doesn’t work, the whole thing just falls apart.

“I tried,” he said with a laugh, “and I ended up falling flat on my face a couple times.”

In the early going of “Dollhouse,” Penikett’s character doesn’t have much luck either. Ballard is seeking proof of an organization called the Dollhouse, which imprints new personalities on its operatives for specific tasks and then wipes their minds clean after each mission.

“At some level, it’s almost like murder,” said Penikett, who has also played Karl “Helo” Agathon on “Battlestar Galactica” for four seasons. “You’re killing someone’s personality and imprinting them with another. It’s a dangerous power to have.”

But early on in the season, the dogged FBI agent is not having much luck convincing his bosses that this underground operation, which is used by the wealthy and powerful, even exists. But he remains determined to find out whether the Dollhouse is real.

"What you get a sense of with Paul is, the more you beat him down the harder he works," Penikett said. "He’s willing to put his physical safety at risk, even his life."

Dh-103_sc14_0932 Ballard’s not the only one putting his life on the line. In this week’s excellent episode, “Dollhouse” operative Echo (Eliza Dushku) finds herself in danger in an action-packed hour full of twists and turns.

If you missed last week’s premiere, never mind: Friday’s episode is better.

As Whedon’s first TV project in several years, “Dollhouse” was bound to get extra scrutiny, but it got even more attention last summer, when Whedon scrapped the original pilot, which contained a scene in which Ballard met Echo (or at least a version of her).

“I think the fact that Paul doesn’t meet Echo right away is a smarter choice,” Penikett said. “It gives the audience something to look forward to and to wonder about. … These two characters seem to be headed toward one another and seem to be connected in some way — it’s like, when will they have that first meeting?”

But Penikett says the show’s reboot did present its share of challenges.

DH_09-Tahmoh-Set_848_ly “Once we got started with the re-imagined pilot, it took a while for me to understand my story line in terms of who [Ballard] met and when, because that changed significantly,” he said. “The overall story line and the direction really hasn’t changed that much. And that became even more clear to me when we finished [filming] the season, which was last week. [But] honestly, it took a while to make sense again because we were shooting episodes out of order. We were [location] shooting all over the place.”

To help viewers understand "Dollhouse’s" provocative concept, the first few episodes are self-contained hours focused on Echo’s weekly adventures. But Penikett says that midway through the show’s 13-episode season, the mythology will kick into high gear.

“Halfway through the season, you’ll start seeing some of the main story lines and arcs developed in a more serious way, around the fifth episode. I think that’s when Joss and his writing team really found their feet and said, ‘OK, this is what we wanted. This is what we were aiming at and we’ve got it now,’” Penikett said.

"I can’t tell you how confidence-building it is when you experience that," the actor added. "Because as everyone knows, we had somewhat of a tumultuous start. There was a lot of speculation, a lot of bad press, and you inevitably get caught up in it a little bit. … Once I read the fifth and sixth episode, specifically [Episode 5, the Whedon-penned] ’Man on the Street,’ I was like, ’This is it. This is the show.’"

Photos: Penikett on "Dollhouse," guest star Matt Keeslar and Dushku in Friday’s episode of the show, Penikett.

There are a few more quotes about "Dollhouse" from Penikett below. We also talked about "Battlestar Galactica" — I’ll be posting that part of the interview later this week.

We talked for a while about the amazing book "Never Let Me Go" by Kazuo Ishiguro, which Penikett brought up in his first conversation with Whedon:

Penikett: "I was sad for weeks, what an incredible piece of work. I couldn’t stop thinking about it. There was something about the innocent quality of the characters in that book, the idea that they had a higher purpose or a reason - there was something they were working toward and yet they didn’t quite know what it was. I found it very similar to what Joss told me was the situation with the dolls. That’s why I brought it up as soon as he told me about the premise."

We talked about the exploration of the morality of what’s being done to the dolls:

Dollhouse_bts_0019_f Penikett: "It will be continue to be explored through the series. I think that’s one of the questions Joss wants to ask, if this technology was available, who would use it? It’d be easy to say you wouldn’t, but if the technology was accessible and affordable, could and wouldn’t you? I think a lot of people would. That raises questions about what’s ethically and morally right today in society and how much values have changed. As a society, we’ve become, in the West, absolutely insatiable. The technology is moving so quickly, we can barely keep up with it. We want more, we’re insatiable. Joss is exploring those ideas in ’Dollhouse.’"

We talked about whether there is something in Ballard’s history that causes him to be so obsessed with the Dollhouse:

Penikett: "As the show goes on this season, you’re going to see him become absolutely consumed with the Dollhouse. He can’t let it go. I think it’s a really compelling thing about his character — the audience is going to be wondering, what is it about the Dollhouse that is affecting him so personally? Whether we explore that first season or not, I’m not sure, you’ll have to tune in and see.

"He doesn’t himself quite understand it but there’s something there. Paul’s got some demons and I think it will be explored, hopefully eventually — why he’s so untrusting. He has a self-righteous attitude. I think he’s very capable but he’s also got a short fuse and he’s willing to bend the rules his own way."

We discussed what I called "the Mulder problem" — that is, if Ballard is determined to expose the Dollhouse, why don’t they just kill him?

Penikett: "I think early on, they don’t know who this guys is. They just feel he’s an FBI agent. But what kind of threat does he really pose? This is a huge corporation, possibly. A very underground organization that caters to very rich and powerful people at all levels of government and corporations. These people are professionals at keeping things hush-hush. If any of this information came out it would be very damaging to all of them."

He talked a bit more about the Ballard story line and the fact that in the first half of the season, it doesn’t much involve the rest of the show’s cast:

"You know what, funnily enough, it actually worked [for the role]. Because that’s very much Paul’s experience in his life right now. He’s a loner. He’s on this mission by himself. That’s what’s happening. And that’s what I was doing playing the part — I was only working with a small part of the cast. I was missing the rest of them for a large part of the season — the first half. So it almost feels like you’re on a different show."