JEFFREY COMBS' SECOND PANEL & FAKE AUDITION 3rd SEPTEMBER 2000, NEXUS CONVENTION, BERLIN
JEFFREY COMBS' SECOND PANEL & FAKE AUDITION 3rd SEPTEMBER 2000, NEXUS CONVENTION, BERLIN
Transcript by Emilia Petrov
pictures taken from:
What had started as an ordinary panel of Jeffrey Combs
suddenly turned into a hilarious comedy show including Ted Raimi (Xena),
Julie Caitlin Brown (B5) and Robert W. Krimmer (B5).
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Announcer: Jeffrey Combs! JC: Oh my Goooood! Let me tell you….can you all hear me? You will never guess where I was just at! I’m a California boy and I Just went to a Mexican restaurant in Berlin! (cheers). And it was pretty damn good! It was really good! And so I’m excited. I ’ve been away from home for about 3 weeks and you kinda miss the things that you know! Well, and then all of a sudden I had Mexican food (laughter). But I also had a Bratwurst the other day and then I also had a Currywurst the other day (laughter)… so, you know, I’m a man of the WORLD!…. Erm… It’s been great. I’ve been here in Berlin and I was in Ireland for 2 weeks and then I went to London and I did a signing there. I don’t do very many of these conventions and so it’s all sort of a really neat experience, although I used to do more conventions when I had done this movie Re-Animator and other sort of horror movies, but I haven’t been to many Star Trek conventions, so this is really an interesting experience and it gives you a chance to dance…
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I hope everybody’s having a good time? (cheers) I hope I got a chance to meet a lot of you, gave you an autograph… so… I’m having a great time and if there any… got any questions, there’s a microphone over there…. what am I telling you for, you know this! You were here for Walter [Koenig], let’s hear it for Walter! (applause) the original Trek man! I mean that was a typical thing for me. I loved the original Star Trek series. My dad wouldn’t let me watch it, thought it was nonsense. And he wanted to watch something on the other channel so. that made me wanna watch it even more!. So all these years later I’m part of this Star Trek thing and it started out like… didn’t know this was going to happen! I got on Star Trek, I just guest starred, just one character and he was gone and then about a month later they called and said they wanted to do another character, this guy named Brunt! And I said: “OK, does he work for the Federation?”and they said: “Oh, he’s a Ferengi!”. And I didn’t really know what a Ferengi was, but when you’re in that make up you KNOW what a Ferengi is! (laughter).You look in the mirror and go: “Jeff…!” In fact I told a story yesterday: after doing Brunt, I
was doing Weyoun and I did a lot more Weyouns than Brunt but I came back
once to do a Brunt and Marc Alaimo, who I’m sure you all know, plays Gul
Dukat, was on the set talking to the producer about an upcoming show and
I’m in my Ferengi make-up and I don’t think he was aware that I also played
Brunt, so I kinda walked up to him and said: “Mishter Alaimo?” And he looked
at me like: “Oh, my God!” He said : “Yeah, thanks…thanks, pal!”. And I
just kept bugging him you know. Eventually I had to let him know that I
was…Weyoun! So that happened a lot, there were a lot of crew members who
didn’t know that I played both characters. They would ask me: “Hey, how
are you?”. I said: “Good man, how are you?”. The next episode I would come
in and I would have the other make up on and I walked up to say: “Hey man,
how are ya?”. They’d go: “Aaaaaah……good….good!”. So that’s how good the
make up was!
  (Boris Karloff voice) We have a question! Q: (Someone asks a question on how Ferengi are played by relatively short men and ‘coz his English isn’t that good, he slips and says “your little man”. The crowd bursts into laughter and JC looks somewhat surprised) JC: What do you mean? …Little man?…It’s not that little! (laughter) Q: (Question continued. It’s becoming clear to JC now! But he’s teasing a bit!) JC: Ooooh, little guys? The little guys play Ferengi? Is that what you’re saying? (laughter) Q: (This guy’s trying desperately to ask the question properly) JC: You mean on screen we all look bigger than we really are? (laughter)…I resent that! (laughter) I’m the same as any guy if not bigger in this room!!! No, no, I get your point though. I don’t mean to make fun of you, but a lot of actors are small. Mel Gibson is a little guy! Dustin Hoffman…they are of about my height, they’re little people! But, you know, that’s the magic of film. But film can be an equalizer in that kinda way. They do things, someone who can never be a leading man on stage, because he’s too short…it solves the problem! And as far as Ferengis, they will always be… I was a tall Ferengi! Max [Grodenchik] and Armin [Shimerman] and Aron [Eisenberg] they are all short guys…made me feel like John Wayne or something! (laughter). I don’t feel like John Wayne very often! Q: Do you know your German voice of Brunt and Weyoun? JC: Do I know who’s doing my German voices? Q: Did you hear? JC: No, I haven’t heard it at all! Not at all, I haven’t heard that and that is the first thing that I thought of…and I panicked when coming out here no one is going to understand what I’m going to say. I don’t know any German except “danke!” [Thank you!] And then it occurred to me: wait a minute, these people don’t even know what I sound like, they’ve heard some other guy… Q: No, we CAN hear you…[explains how she can download wav-files from the internet] JC: So you can do both! Which is better? Q: Your voice! (cheers) [Question continues on whether he changes his voice playing Brunt or is it the teeth that do that for him] JC: Yeah, I change my voice as Brunt partly because of the teeth…kinda…(changes voice)…forshesh…you…to….chanshe…but I also use the upper part of my mouth…(changes voice again)…’cosh I have to! Can’t get yer damn lipsh around da teeth! (laughter). Now what does the guy do that does the Ferengi here? Do they stick teeth in their mouth? Q: I don’t know. Sounds like it! JC: Sounds like they do that maybe? They probably should! ‘Coz that would give ‘em the same sound! Q: [Tells how Brunt’s voice in German is very high pitched] JC: (changes voice to high pitch) Brunt’sh voish is very high…? Like thish? (laughter). I’ll kill him! He needs acting lessons! Does it like Jerry Lewis or something! Q: Has it always been a dream of you to become an actor? JC: Has it always been a dream of mine to be an actor? (sighs) Yeah, I guess so. I mean I didn’t really…as a kid I had a lot of imagination. I would watch things on TV or at the movies and they would go up in my room and do “that”. Of course I always had sort of the desire to play other characters. I used to love to watch people, I loved to just sit at the airport and go: “Just look at THAT guy…?” , “Those shoes…?” , “Wow!”. You know, I’ve always been interested in people and personalities and stories, always interested, always have been! When my parents had people over, I would sit in the corner and just listen to them! Listen to their stories! So I’ve always enjoyed that, really interested in characters. I used to draw a lot when I was a kid! Most of the things I would draw, were faces! Of people I never knew. I would just think ‘em up and they would get older and older and, you know, I was just interested in faces and people! So I started acting - most actors will probably admit to this - for selfish reasons: to get an easy grade maybe in acting class in highschool. And girls! There’s girls in there. But when I started college, I realized that really it is an honorable craft! And a difficult one, and it takes discipline and it’s a hell of a lot of work! It really, really is great to be on stage, and then later when I started doing movies, be on the set, all the things that it takes to make a movie, different elements It’s really like a collaboration that…there’s nothing better! And you’re making something! And you want to do it as good as you possibly can, so, that’s the way Star Trek was too! Really a rich, rich, good experience…it was like going home! Q: In “Love and a .45 “ you worked with Peter Fonda… JC: In “Love and a .45” I worked with….I broke Peter Fonda’s finger! (laugher) No…. Q: [Says it in German and JC looks puzzled] JC: OK, that part I didn’t get…(laughter) [RK in the audience shouts at the stage] RK: WHY WERE YOU WEARING A GIRL’S DRESS? (laughter) JC: Yes, it was a great time! I’ll tell you why it was a great time! I am a huge fan of his father’s. Henry Fonda to me was an icon! And he [Peter Fonda] looks just like him! And he is absolutely nothing like him! He is like on amphetamines! He tells you all kinds of stories, a really fascinating guy! “Easy Rider” and all of that! He’s famous in his own rights. You know it was really great working with him! And it was really like that the whole movie. I think that movie was really an intense little movie. And it didn’t really get as much exposure as it could have. Really cool, riding back and forth to the set with Peter Fonda! Really great guy! Q: Thank you! Q: [In German…the audience helps JC out, in “Love and a .45” it is said that his relatives are like Dinosaur Bob, the character played by JC in that movie] JC: Many of my relatives are like Dinosaur Bob? (laughter)
I sort of …kinda said that in interviews. A lot of my family is from Arkansas!
Where Bill Clinton’s from, and they’re kind of hill people, they live up
on the hills and they ARE like Dinosaur Bob. Erm…but not a viscious, not
as mean, like from the country: the sideburns, the boots,…yeah….yeah….bad!
Jeffrey Combs in "Love
and a .45"
Q: (in German) OK, danke!
 JC: You’re welcome! (laughter) Y’all come back now! Live long and prosper! [the guy was wearing a Spock T-shirt] [Someone else suddenly jumps up to ask a question and JC’s in a good mood] JC: Hey, how are you? Q: (in German) Gut! JC: OK!
JC: First of all, I played the writer H.P. Lovecraft who looked like a really weird guy. He had a long, long face with a really long chin and kind of a strong nose, kinda like…you guys get “The Munsters” here? (crowd goes “yeah”)…Fred Gwyn!. H.P. Lovecraft (points to one side)…Fred Gwyn (points to other side)…separated at birth! They looked really a lot alike! And so I don’t look like anything like him, but who came to the day and who saved me was John Vulich…He’s won a number of Emmy’s I think for Babylon 5. John Vulich, and he’s got a make up house called “Optic Nerves” and at the end of every Babylon 5 episode, you will see “special effects make up” by “Optic Nerves”. And it’s run by a guy named John Vulich. He put the most amazing make up on me, he put a chin on me and a nose. I didn’t look anything like myself! The only problem with that movie was, the producer/director wanted Lovecraft to be a hero! Like Indiana Jones! And I said: “H.P. Lovecraft was a really weird guy who sat in his room, phobious about germs and things in the air” and weird dude! I said: “How do we reconcile this?”…So to be true to Lovecraft and yet I had to pull swords out of my kane and fight monsters and stuff and…kinda weird! Q: Thank you! JC: You’re welcome! And YOU live long and prosper! [another
Spock T-shirt]
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