Part political conspiracy, part action thriller and part mystery,
XIII is a tension-fuelled new Showcase series about a black-ops secret
agent who has lost his identity and his memory, but not his drive to
survive. Based on a series of Belgian graphic novels launched in the
’80s, it’s less a whodunnit that a whodunwhat, not to mention a
Who-Am-I: because when a spy can’t even recognize himself, how can he
know what he stands for? Stuart Townsend stars as a lethal weapon on
the run, desperate to figure out if he’s trying to escape something, or
find it. Whichever the case, the results will be explosive. Join us
for this blog series as we look over XIII’s shoulder and try to figure
out who he is, before he does.
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XIII Blog #5:
“TRUST ME: YOU CANNOT TRUST ME”--SHOWCASE.ca SPEAKS WITH STUART TOWNSEND
by Gary Butler
I can’t say I was surprised when amnesiac black-ops agent XIII, played by Stuart Townsend, made the following statement in “The Bunker,” last night’s episode of Showcase’s XIII: The Series (WATCH IT HERE):
“My best guess is we’re going to be walking in to wall-to-wall deathtraps.”
It’s a great line of dialogue, rife with promise. The episode, which sees XIII and his partner Jones negotiating a retrofitted warehouse in search of a vital clue at the heart of an ambush-laden maze, easily stands as the series’ most explosive to date. And that’s saying something: For just three examples, we’ve previously seen our titular protagonist use explosions aplenty in the process of infiltrating a terrorist training camp (ep5), heisting a bank (ep9) and breaking into a maximum security prison (ep6). (In fact, does this series have a per-episode explosion quota that must be filled? If so: Colour me happy.) Still, “The Bunker” deftly ups the ante, as XIII’s quest for the the third watch leads to a discovery of a new player, ‘the fourth man.’
So, while bang-for-buck is a good enough reason, it’s not the actual reason that I wasn’t surprised when, poring over schematics for the factory labyrinth early in the episode, XIII said we should expect wall-to-wall deathtraps.
The reason that it didn’t surprise me is because Townsend told me about it during a Showcase.ca-exclusive interview conducted after he finished filming the first season.
Showcase.ca: Word is you’re doing all of the stunts in XIII yourself. Is this true, and does your pre-acting background as a boxer come in handy?
Stuart Townsend: It’s all me, in all of the fight sequences. A fitness background like boxing is great to have for a job that needs you to be fit. I took Muay Thai training to do this [eight-point contact fighting, compared to boxing, which is two points --Ed], unfortunately it was only six weeks of it, so I’m no professional, just functional. But I never got injured or hurt or anything, in a stunt, or when a guy kicks my ass.
Q: You get your ass kicked a lot?
A: Oh yeah. And then I kick theirs.
Q: Who’s tougher, XIII or Jason Bourne (The Bourne Identity)?
A: XIII, of course. The name alone! His name’s XIII, for God’s sake!
Q: XIII or 007 -- the “tough” Daniel Craig 007?
A: XIII would kick that dude’s ass. 007 acts tough but he’s really a gentleman
Q: XIII or the guy from Memento?
A: XIII. He’s more... linear.
Q: In terms of that “linear” plot, how much can you tell us about what’s coming up on XIII? In fact, how much do you even know?
A: We were given the series overview, but not all the scripts. For me, I decided to just forget about it and discover things each week on my own. It was a fun and very novel approach, and a lot of the time I was surprised, watching him discover himself. In terms of what I knew... I watched the previous series (XIII: The Conspiracy, not required to understand the current series --Ed] and read the available English comic books [not all of the French comic book series has been translated --Ed.]. In terms of what I can tell you... I could tell you everything. I will tell you nothing. Trust me: You cannot trust me.
Q: C’mon, just a little teaser. Not a major spoiler.
A: By the end, a lot of what we’ve “learned” will prove to be a complete lie. There are a lot of shockers near the end. OK, one episode has deathtraps all through this incredible maze that this paranoid guy made; that might be my favourite. No, the final episode is my favourite, for personal reasons. We were doing this pivotal scene and I had a head cold, it was -25C, we’d been working 70-hour weeks for months, and we were all approaching burnout. That played into the character’s urgency, but... There is an emotional revelation, and when we shot the scene I did an angry approach, which I felt was the right kind of way. But the director said, “OK, I got that side of XIII, now give me a more vulnerable side.” So we did it again, and I did not want to. And through sheer exhaustion, and being in the moment, all of these emotions welled up and I had to really push back in order to not, well, babble. As an actor,
this never happened to me before. And I had to walk away from the set, find a corner where no one could see me, and cry.
Q: You felt...
A: I felt very alive in that moment. Blessed.
Q: XIII has a pretty cool tattoo. Do you have the tat, yourself, or was it just a temporary one?
A: We’ll have to have another couple of seasons of the show for me to get it stamped, but I’d do it. It is pretty cool, I have to say.
See you shortly for…
XIII Blog #6:
PUZZLES, KEYS, AND THE WEAPON XIII HAS BEEN “WATCHING” OUT FOR