Highlander: More than a Television Show

What happened! Her head??? He beheaded her???...

Immortals, sword-fights, large electrical storms, glimpses into history. The universe of Highlander is a complex weave of themes that first baits its prey with curiosity. Even Dave Abramowitz, the Creative Consultant for the series admits that "You have to pay attention to Highlander. Everything plays into everything else. And you have to have some knowledge of what Watchers are and Duncan's history."

Highlander is in a large part the creation of Bill Panzer, its executive producer. He wanted to create a world that "deals with people who are exactly like us with one little difference." That difference is immortality. Living forever is an incredible idea at first, but Highlander shows that life is often a curse as well as a gift. Immortals do not have parents, nor do they have children, both of these are a source of longing for many immortals as they search for their identity and ponder the heritage they, after witnessing hundreds of years, will leave.

Immortals simply appear as foundlings and live until they meet a first death from which they awake. This first death changes an immortal's life in dramatic ways. "It was all around me, and within me," Duncan, the main character of the show, explains about the first time he sensed another immortal. Immortals use this sensation to prepare for battle. While immortals are given the ability to live without aging or permanent injury, they can lose their life by being beheaded (or, as affectionately referred to by fans, by being whacked). When an immortal takes the head of his opponent, he gains his power through an electrical storm known as the quickening. With this transfer of energy and power, the victor becomes stronger. There are few rules to their game; immortals do not fight on holy ground, they fight one-on-one, and most importantly, when all is finished only one immortal will remain, with enough power to aid or hinder mankind for an eternity.

Immortality is not the only story in Highlander, for Panzer's idea worked, and while immortality brings an air of fantasy or science fiction to the show, the set and characters quickly make the series within the realm of reality. Maysen, a friend in Indiana told me that "Yes, the show is about immortals and their fight to be the final immortal, but it also deals with how they live life." No immortal's life is known as well as that of Duncan MacLeod.

The other guests start to arrive at the Pavia, and two other raffle winners sit themselves down at my table. Once the twenty-four fans seat themselves, the cast filters in and I watch in awe as familiar faces walk by with eyes more vibrant than the television screen had ever suggested. At last the face of Duncan MacLeod appears, as actor Adrian Paul walks through the door. He glances about the room, looks at me, and smiles. He is wearing tight black jeans, a black t-shirt, and a black dress shirt, loosely buttoned up. He is the first to talk to the small group of fans, as he stops to say hello and joke with us before finding his own table just across the room.

Adrian Paul is a London born actor who worked as a dancer and a model before making it to television. His biography in the PEACE newsletter says that "He has been likened to Sean Connery and Cary Grant and described as a cross between Errol Flynn and Douglas Fairbanks" (PEACE is his fanclub, dedicated not only to following Adrian's career, but helping his fans find peace in their lives as well). One of the common compliments given Adrian is that his work ethic is incredible, and that he often endures long hours and physical stress in order to give the best quality to the show. Besides acting, Adrian has directed three episodes, including Homeland, an episode where he returns to Scotland (and yes, it was partially filmed in Scotland, where a helicopter sweeping across the moor for a panoramic shot spooked his horse), and one of the most celebrated and intense episodes, Revelations 6:8 (the 100th episode that involved, filming in a submarine base in Bordeaux, four sword-fights, and the only double-quickening to appear in the show). One of the executive producers said "Everyone likes Adrian. We've thrown him in rivers in the freezing cold. We've woken him up at ungodly hours, and he never complains. He's amazing, and we probably couldn't pull it off without him."

Each episode begins with: "He is Duncan MacLeod, the Highlander. Born in 1592 in the Highlands of Scotland and he is still alive, he is immortal. For four hundred years he has been a warrior, a lover, and a wanderer." A warrior who fought in the bloody battle of Culloden (1746), learned the way of the Samurai from Hideo Koto (1778), and took up the sword to follow Napoleon (1815). While carrying a wounded man at the battle of Waterloo, Duncan finds an immortal named Darius. Darius is over 2,000 years old, and was once a great military leader, but now works in the robes of a priest to care for the living. He meets Duncan with gentle chastisement: "You shouldn't be taking part in this tragedy."

"Oh I'm sure you're quite loyal to your convictions and compatriots, but I wonder what these men think about that, about convictions and compatriotism now."

Although Duncan could not find it in his heart to let his sword rest while mortals were dying, the impact of Darius altered his life, and he no longer joined in the vain conquests of men. The fight of immortals is not something that he can turn his back on, even when it calls for him to decide between honor and friendship.

Duncan has used much of his immortality to travel the world (which is sometimes a necessity if the village just saw you ‘die' and is prone to burning witches). From China in 1680, North Africa in 1755, and Cambodia in 1975, Duncan has wandered the world. Throughout the six years spanned by the series, Duncan shifts between living in Seattle and Paris. Duncan moves as much to escape the world as he does to discover it. His life is surrounded by death, by the memories of the men he has killed, by the lessons of a life lived by the blade of the sword. He is a fairytale hero in part, but even he admits that he is a murderer, and we see in his memories where his warrior's honor turned to hatred and vengeance. Gillian Horvath, Associate Creative Consultant for the series explains that "Duncan didn't have to be superman, Mr. Perfect - nothing ever scared him. In Band of Brothers, he's afraid of Grayson. He says so, but he doesn't just say it with words, he says it with body language, with the look in his eyes. During the fight, you see fear. You see him not know if he's going to live, and that's incredible."

As the shows intro explains, Duncan is a lover. The first season details the end of his relationship with Tessa Noel, his mortal soul-mate of twelve years. Tessa is a sculpturer he met in Paris, who has given up the chance for a family or a normal life in order to be with Duncan. She is the first mortal lover he has shared his immortality with, and together they work through the added difficulties his violent life brings. "Alexandra Vandernoot, who plays Tessa, was the goddess. And when I saw her and Adrian standing together, I thought that if I died, and there was a Mount Olympus, that the two of them would be standing together with thunderbolts around them," Abramowitz said. Alexandra was the first to enter the Pavia, and after seeing her first hand, it is hard to disagree with Abramowitz. She is graceful, elegant and carries a strength that resonates through her character. Tessa not only understood the trials of Duncan's life, she made him feel human and dared to stand up to him. "Please, don't say anything in front of the lady. Let me just go in the next room and crochet while you have cigars and brandy, and talk about beheadings." Tessa refuses to play the damsel in distress, and it is her artistic career that takes them from their antique shop in Seattle to Paris and their barge upon the Seine. Tessa's death comes unexpectedly, as a type of afterthought to an episode. Duncan finishes a fight only to hear a gunshot, and runs to find Tessa lying in the street by their car, her body limp and covered in blood.

Duncan's other great love interest in the series is Amanda, played by Elizabeth Gracen. In Gracen's own words, "She is the ultimate trickster - an acrobat, a thief and 1,500 years old. She is sassy and strong and gets by on her wits and her sex appeal." Amanda often wanders into his life just when she needs a scapegoat or a getaway. Duncan tolerates her because she makes him laugh, and he loves her (even when he takes an arrow in his backside while helping her escape a Turkish prison in 1753). If nothing else, Amanda brings a lighter side to the dark and brooding Highlander.

One of the most significant characters in the show is Richie. Richie is in a large part the audience's contact with the show. He is present from the first episode, as he is a young immortal yet to die his first death, and completely ignorant of what he is. Richie, played by Stan Kirsch, is a street kid and a punk. Viewers follow Richie into the world of immortality, as he explores not only living by the sword, but the confines of immortal relationships. Initially Duncan is Richie's teacher, showing him the rules of the game and giving him advice as a father figure would. By the fifth season of Highlander, Richie is no longer Duncan's student, but his friend, and in immortality friendships can be costly. Through a complex chain of events, in what becomes the most criticized and shocking moment for fans, Duncan mistakenly takes Richie's head. Although many fans were outraged, Abramowitz explained the decision as a chance for great drama, drama which manifested itself in the last two episodes of the series where Duncan finally finds the emotional strength to move on after what he's done.

One of the other mortals we follow in the show is Joe Dawson, played by Jim Byrnes. "Joe's just an ordinary person witnessing extraordinary events," Jim says. Joe is a watcher, part of a secret society of mortals that seek to record the lives of immortals out of curiosity and a sense of history. When there is only one immortal left, it will be their job to tell the world his story. With Joe some of the secrecy vanished as his assignment, Duncan discovered the watchers after Darius's death, and he and Joe soon became friends. Jim Byrnes brought a lot to the character of Joe. Jim is a blues musician in Canada, and Joe owns a blues bar in Seattle, that is a common setting for discussions of immortal history between the characters. One of the greatest scenes Joe has is in Armageddon. Joe is taunted by a demonic force (the same one responsible for Richie's death two episodes earlier) to turn his back on Duncan. Joe lost his legs to a mine in Vietnam, mirroring the loss Jim Byrnes suffered in a car accident. The demon taunts Joe with the promise of legs, a promise that confronts both actor and character with an incredible possibility. Joe begins to walk upon the new set of legs with tears streaming down his face, and the demon tells him that he can keep the legs, if he only refuses to help Duncan. Joe rejects the bargain, and falls to the floor, far from his cane or prosthetics. Joe later tells Duncan "Like I would sell my soul for a simple god-damned pair of legs." Joe is a great element to Highlander. He brings in questions of friendship, loyalty and honor, as he constantly runs into the title law of watchers-‘Observe and record, but never interfere." Abramowitz describes Joe as "the human factor, but he's the heroic human factor."

Although not the last of the reoccurring characters in Highlander, the character of Methos is one of the most intriguing men created by the series. He is introduced as a myth, Methos- the oldest immortal. When Duncan finds him masquerading as Adam Pierson, mild mannered watcher, the only thing known about his character is that he is 5,000 years old, and that he is conveniently a watcher looking for himself. He plays the game by a slightly different set of rules, as he strategically avoids fights and immortals through the information he gleans from the watcher files. The first advice to fall from his lips is, "Live, grow stronger, fight another day." As his friendship with Duncan grows so does the mystery about him. After 5,000 years, "What did you expect? Einstein? Freud? Buddha? I'm just a guy." A guy who, as it turns out, has been many things in his past. The most startling revelation about him appears in Comes a Horseman, when an immortal named Kronos (played by Valentine Pelka) appears. Kronos, one of the most horrific immortals Duncan has met, greets Methos with a knife in the chest and "Greetings Brother." At the height of his power, Kronos had been the heart for the Four Horseman, raping and pillaging his way across the world of the Bronze age. Methos had been the Horseman's mind.

"I killed, but I didn't just kill fifty. I didn't kill one hundred. I killed a thousand. I killed ten thousand! And I was good at it. And it wasn't for vengeance, it wasn't for greed, it was because, . . . I liked it. Cassandra was nothing, her village was nothing. Do you know who I was? I was Death. Death," he laughs. "Death on a horse. When mothers warned their children that the monsters would get them, that monster was me. I was the nightmare that kept them awake at night."

Peter Wingfield, the voice and soul of Methos, was born in Wales, and originally went into medical school instead of acting. When he entered the universe of Highlander, he admits to having little idea of what he was getting into. Of his character he once said "I don't feel in control of him at all, while I suspect he has complete control over me!" Gerard Hameline, director of Comes a Horseman once said. "Peter Wingfield was so fantastic, just so fantastic. I wish on every television show there were actors of this caliber." Peter, as I soon find out, is an incredible man in more ways than one.

I converse lightly with the two woman at my table, until we all give in and watch the actors across the room. I stir the chicken and pasta about my plate, and as I remind the waiter that no, I do not want any wine, I realize that the actors are rising, making their way over to the tables where we sit. One man ventures to my table and almost apologetically explains, "You probably don't remember my role but I was . . ." ". . . Kin Caide!" all three of us answer, and he grins at the recognition. As he talks with us, I can see him standing on a deserted isle in the South Pacific, cursing at MacLeod for assisting in a mutiny that leaves him on the island for one hundred years.

One of the many things that draws fans to Highlander, is the accurate portrayal of history. "It stirred my soul. It spoke to me of adventure and endurance. Of going on no matter what. It had humor and history and period costuming, which I love, and Scottish accents which make me smile." shared a close friend, and fellow fan from Wisconsin. Almost every episode carries a flashback, in which Duncan remembers something from his past. In one episode of his youth Scottish Black huts were called for. Just as the production designer finished up the black huts a Scottish family came along and asked for a look inside. Once they had looked around the father said "This is a better example of a Scottish Black Hut of the period, in its furnishings and dressings, than we have in our own museum." In another episode viewers discover that Duncan was part of a plot to kill Hitler, and the episode gives an incredibly detailed and first hand account of the ‘Valkyrie'. These accomplishments would not mean as much if Highlander were a movie, but it is a series. As Rick Sherwood, a journalist for the Hollywood Reporter wrote, "With its lavish locales, sumptuous costumes, eye-popping special effects and stories that travel around the globe and across four centuries, it would seem nearly impossible to pull off a series such as "Highlander" with its notoriously tight syndicated TV budgets."

Kin Caide leaves my table, and quite suddenly a thick English accent floats over my head "Hello, is anyone sitting here?" I quickly shift my chair to make room for Valentine Pelka to sit at my right. He first learns our names, and then begins to talk with us about his character. "He was evil, but he had a certain way he liked things to be." I nod and realize my steady gaze is making him uncomfortable.

It is hard for me to contain my surprise, as Valentine shares a bit of his life with us, and hard for me to quiet the voice in my head reminding me that his face belongs to one of the greatest swordsman Duncan fought. "I love riding and fighting anyway, and Adrian is the best fighter that I have ever fought. When Adrian and I first had a crack at it, I missed a parry, and he really goes for it, too, and he stopped the sword two inches from the side of my head. Whoa." The sword-fights in Highlander are created with an exceptional level of skill and accuracy, something remarkable when 75% of the guest stars have never touched a sword before. "The fights are not there gratuitously; they are there to further the plot, they are there to tell things about the characters." Braun McAsh, the series sword master said. He clarified that as plot devices they do deviate from the reality of sword fighting. "No one wants to see the fight with the immortal who never learned to use a sword." Anthony De Longis is an actor who brought his own skills with the Destreza, an intricate form of Spanish swordplay using both daggers and rapiers. While working with McAsh for a demonstration on combat techniques, Anthony explained "Fencing is a physical chess game. You close one door and open three." Outside of skill, McAsh considered other factors into his choreography. "The historical flashbacks allow us to go to a wide variety of time periods, and every time you go to a different time or place you are using different weapons and fighting styles."

As Valentine speaks, I try to find some composure, some shred of intelligence to show the man sitting before me. "Where you prepared for the reaction the fans had to Kronos?"

"That's a good question," he pauses to think for a moment, then explains his surprise at how personally the fans are affected. The woman sitting across from me then shares how she and her husband were filing for a divorce before they started to watch the show together. It had been his ticket that won her place at our dinner table, and he had handed it over to her as a gift.

Highlander fans are an interesting breed. From Stardust, a grandmother in New Jersey, to Big John, a college student in Indiana, they are caring, passionate, intellectual people. The cast often echoes the words Peter shared with the fans, "The warmth that you offer to me and the other members of the cast and crew is a special, precious thing, and I'm very grateful for it." Highlander fans are equally as giving in praise. While every episode isn't golden, and fans often argue with each other and the writers over different turns of events, Highlander is still an incredible work. One fan at the convention describes Highlander as "a fascinating show. The issues that it explores between question's justice, morality, ethics. It's great to watch. It's intelligent television." But it is more than television, only a crafted work can reach people the way that Highlander does. One of the friends I have met through the series said that because of Highlander she has "attended conventions, gone on a cruise, met wonderful people in chat-rooms (as well as my husband), bought swords and taken martial arts classes. It also makes me think more about history and what effect I have on others' lives."

Highlander moves people to think, to reach out and learn about the actors, the history, the martial arts portrayed, and in the end the fans end up learning about each other. One of the people I cherish most is Mistress Wanderer. She helped me attend the convention, arranging for my hotel room and screaming with me when my raffle number was called. We email every day (we have done so for over three years), and when I asked her how Highlander had changed her life she replied "It opened up a whole new world of people to me. I met a lot of people on the Highlander forum and became good friends with them. These are people that wouldn't be able to meet any where else because of geography and the differences in our lives. Even if Highlander fades completely away, the friendships will still last."

Valentine moves on to another table, and I look up to see that Peter Wingfield is walking toward us. My breathing is no longer hurried, just difficult, as he smiles and says hello. Somehow I catch his attention, and we begin to talk one-on-one, about an English series called "Noah's Ark" in which he recently starred. Peter is over six feet tall, and he suddenly realizes that I am straining my neck to look into his face. With his charming smile, he lowers himself to crouch at my feet, resting his arm for balance beside my leg.

He talks now about the animals he had filmed with, how difficult it is to time things when horses are involved, and how he loved the animals, but his allergies didn't. I nod, smile, and try to let my face express the words that are lost to me now. He glances up as he talks, and I feel the chair shift as a figure rests his weight on the back of my chair. I glance up to see who is listening in on my conversation with Peter, and Adrian Paul smiles warmly down as Peter continues with his story.

When asked what legacy Adrian hoped Duncan had left with people, he responded "He made people laugh, he made people think, and maybe he did something better." Big John watched the last episodes with me, and concluded that "We know that Duncan MacLeod is always out there, always watching over us, always fighting the good fight. Always and forever, Duncan MacLeod - The Highlander."

Perhaps Peter Wingfield said it best. "This, this whole thing. You know this. This weekend. The show, one hundred and twenty-odd episodes of it. The whole thing is so beyond my experience. The journey that I've mad from not having any idea what the show is about to it being the major force in my life both internally and physically. It has completely changed my life."






(written December 9, 1999)