Interview with Rachel Nichols

On the cusp of Continuum‘s third season, we had the chance to catch up with the wonderful Rachel Nichols, who plays the lead character Kiera Cameron on the show.

The faces were familiar when I arrived to participate in a small roundtable interview with Rachel Nichols. Tim and Sue, AKA The Mind Reels, were fresh from the Canadian Screen Awards the night before. We had met some months earlier and spent a lot of time chatting quietly on the set of Lost Girl on the police precinct set, so it was good to know the people I’d be interviewing with.

Rachel Nichols is no stranger to sci-fi, so when she was cast as the lead character in Continuum I could tell already it was going to be a great show. Her character is well written and as with many sci-fi shows and films past and present, she plays a strong female role. If you haven’t seen Continuum, you may also recognize Nichols from Alias where she played Rachel Gibson, or perhaps you remember her as Gaila, the Orion girl that had Kirk in her bed in JJ Abrams reboot of Star Trek. She’s played all kinds of different roles, but she shines through and stands out as Kiera Cameron in Continuum.

Tim (Mind Reels) What is the biggest challenge coming up for Kiera and what was the biggest challenge you had while filming this season?

I’ve said season one was all about [Kiera] getting home, getting home, getting home. Season two was still about getting home, but acknowledging responsibility. Responsibility that all of our actions — my actions, Alec’s actions, Liber8’s actions — are all going to affect the future. In season three, I’ve coined ‘for the greater good’. In season three, Kiera makes the hard decision that while she’s still trying to maintain that kind of crappy future that she came from, she still wants to get back to her husband and son. Mainly her son because they painted her husband as kind of questionable.

Being in the present day, she’s realized how bad that future actually was that she came from. In trying to preserve that for just two people instead of trying to enact change that will make a better future for all of humanity — that would be a really selfish move. So this season is all about the greater good and that’s been a very difficult decision for her — both to make and realize — episode five of season two when she said goodbye to Sam, that was one thing that was sort of on the tip of the iceberg; the idea that she’s actively not trying to get home now.

We shot one scene that was extremely difficult was with two Alec Sadler’s. That gets very confusing because you have ‘scar Alec’ and ‘regular Alec’ this season. I mean, if I think [the scene] was difficult, go talk to Erik Knudsen who played both Alec’s! That’s always difficult.

Also, playing dead! Quite difficult, especially when you are outdoors and can’t actually let out any breath because it would show. Or if you are in a freezer! Playing dead is quite difficult. People think you just take a nap and it’s like, ‘no! If I’m napping I’m breathing!’ I can’t take a nap!

Stephanie (Geek Chic Elite) When we took a look at the trailer for season three, there seems to be a lot of interesting time jumps — how do you feel about this season coming up and the direction that it’s headed?

I just saw the first episode of season three yesterday (March 9th) at Toronto Comic Con. That was my first time watching it and you know, I love to do that — I never see any movies that I’ve done before the premiere. I like to watch it with people at the same time and have the same reaction. I like that and unless I have to see the final cut before I do the press which usually doesn’t happen — I can remember what the shooting was like — so I’m watching the show yesterday and I’m like ‘oh my gosh, I forgot about this. Oh my gosh, I forgot about this!’ because we shot it in December and now we are on episode eleven and there a couple very interesting things that happen in the premiere.

But yes, you’re right, there are different timelines, not only the 2077 timeline and the present day, but we have a couple present day timelines going on. Then, we are going to have a surprise visitor from a completely different timeline, 2032, who comes back from 2032 not knowing who Alec Sadler is… but in 2077, everyone knows who Sadler is. You’re right, get ready for a wild ride!

We also do some flashback-forwards to the future where you get to learn more about the Garza / Kiera relationship which is quite cool and they do have this huge fight sequence where they are actually fighting together at the beginning of season three. Then of course you’ve got all of these new realizations that Escher is Alec’s father, Alec is Jason’s father, I told Carlos I’m from the future — oh my god.

I actually haven’t read the last two episodes yet. I like to go episode by episode. I did the same thing with The Inside and Alias because I was excited to read them. I didn’t want to know what was going to happen, I just wanted to read it. I have been told that we are going to off someone but we don’t know who that is — hopefully not me because I’d be really upset!

Apparently the last two episodes are going to be quite a dramatic turn. Brian Markinson always jokes that he’s going to get too expensive and we are going to kill him off. He’s like “I should probably just end every season on life support.” I don’t quite know where it ends up — but we are shooting episode eleven now and there are still two Alec Sadler’s… even though in the beginning I said I was going to have to choose one…

Tim (Mind Reels) I love the tech in the series. Everything that we see — I love that even though it is science fiction, it’s all grounded in a very plausible reality. Is there anything besides the suit and the gun that you would have brought back with you?

Cool, thank you! I did bring back the toy soldier which Kiera still has in her desk. I haven’t seen anything anything in our future-flash-forwards that I wish I brought back with me, but the invisibility cloak comes into play this season and I wish I brought one of those back with me because that’s quite awesome. But my suit does make me go invisible I guess — too much invisibility is too much of a good thing! I do love the tech and people say ‘time travel, how do you believe that?’ and I always say it’s wishful thinking. I always think, ‘wouldn’t that be cool if that could happen?’ How much did we love Back to the Future? I remember being so obsessed with those movies and the idea that time travel could really exist. If you can imagine it, you can make it happen — I think that’s how some people can suspend disbelief, hoping that one day that tech exists.

With time travel, I would never want to see the future. I would love to go back in time for sure, but not ahead.

Tim (Mind Reels) I want to see dinosaurs!

Dinosaurs are right up there, how the Egyptians built the pyramids, I would really like to know. As well as the Sphinx, we can go there too.

Sue (Mind Reels) Well, since you’re in the area…

Yes, since we’re in the neighborhood we might as well check that out too. If I got to be really wealthy I would go back to Elizabethan England! I would love to be at court. Then there’s the roaring 20s and the really cool music scene of the 60s — I’ve had a lot of time to mull this over.

Sue (Mind Reels) Within the show, the tech is so much more impersonal in the future. Watching Kiera learn how to talk on a phone that she has to hold to her ear and deal with people face to face…

I love that you mention that because it was a very calculated move for Simon and I. If you watch the first couple of episodes she’s almost like a robot and I’ve always said that present day humans are much more ‘human’ than they are in the future. The tech has taken us completely away. Carlos in the first season says, “you look like you are just looking through these people. You have zero bedside manners, you are rude… talk to these people!” And I’m like, “No, I am looking through these people, I’m scanning them and I don’t need to talk to them”. That’s what the future is.

Sue (Mind Reels) But now she has to learn to trust her instincts and read people instead of reading what scanners show her.

Absolutely! That’s been something that she has learned through three seasons. The idea of those times when she does put the tech away or she relies on her instincts — Alec has put a block on her CMR so she can’t read him but she doesn’t know she can’t read him. She has to trust her gut a lot in season three and it’s becoming second nature to her but it’s also petrifying. It’s exciting and scary at the same time.

Sue (Mind Reels) I said to Tim on the second episode, isn’t she on the ‘bad guys side’ in a way because I kind of agree with Liber8.

That’s the brilliance of the show. You think in the beginning that it’s very black and white. It’s good versus evil. Then you start really learning and thinking, like Keira learns – maybe their [Liber8’s] tactics aren’t ideal but their goal is. What they’re after makes sense. When she comes back and sees the present day and compares it to the future she says, ‘I kind of know what they were getting at’. So now — and I don’t know if this is true — people are asking if Keira is going to join Liber8. I thought, for the first time ever, ‘yeah, maybe’!

Watch the first ten minutes of Continuum season three episode one below, courtesy of Shaw Media and don’t forget to see the shows return on Showcase, Monday March 16th at 9PM ET/PT!