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In the first of two Farscape interviews this issue, Nick Joy tarcked down feisty Gigi Edgley to talk sex, 16-hour days and the shape of a new season.

Sometimes, the more things change, the more they stay the same. Having found fame in Farscape as Nebari thrill-seeker Chiana, and flown halfway round the world from Australia to London, the Perth-born actress Gigi Edgley is suffering from déjà vu. "At Home Bush studios, where we shoot the show, we're under a flight path for the planes, right next to the Olympic stadium. Everyone gets ready to roll once a plane has gone over," she says, while competing with the noise of 747s taking off behind us at Heathrow airport.

Gigi is in town for Starfury's Defiant convention. The diminutive actress is psyching-up for a session on stage, and already the adrenalin is pumping. "I love my job," she squeals. "I'm sure that a lot of people think that I'm just a wacked-out little kid, but everyday that I go on set is a blessing." In the same way that it's hard to tie-down Chiana in one word (thief, scoundrel, liar, drama queen or good-time girl?), Gigi Edgley defies easy description. Shifting constantly in her seat, she jumps from one topic to another, interrupting her own chain of thought while scarcely pausing to take a breath. In most respects she's nothing like Chiana, but it's easy to see how the actress brought the character uniquely to life.

At the end of Season Three, Chiana was off on a quest to find her brother Nerri. While tight-lipped about significant plot details, Gigi reveals how this character arc has progressed in Season Four. "We're on episode eight at the moment, but I must say that episode seven was fantastic for me. Ben Browder wrote a beautiful script and we had a lot of time to play with each other in that show... Oops that sounds bad!" she giggles. "I really can't say much, but that script takes us in such a new improved direction that's so not Farscape, that it's... Farscape! I know that probably makes no sense, but it's all about breaking conventions."

Indeed, Season Three witnessed a number of breaks in convention. The series lead was split in two, the crew went two separate ways and in one case, Revenging Angel, they became animated in the literal sense. Are there any more conventions left to be broken?

"I tell you, I don't know how much more off-the-wall we can go, but we're getting there." she reassures.

While she's played pivotal scenes in Season Three's Eat Me, Scratch n' Sniff and Dog With Two Bones, many episodes found Gigi relegated to the background. Thankfully, this season is bringing Chiana to the fore, and we're seeing more of her primal/alien characteristics. "She's a lot heavier in Season Four, and we're taking her deeper and darker. In Season Three I was fluttering around a bit too much in the background, but this series has been a nice opportunity for me to go in and fool around with Chi," she adds. "Every scene I'm in has started to pick up the pace. In fact, I recieved an email from [executive producer] David Kemper and he said that my work in the first Season Four episode [Crichton Kicks] was 'phenomenal, fantastic, wonderful' blah blah blah. I was really pleased with that feedback because Ben had already picked up on the fact that I was playing Chiana as very angsty this year, and it was nice to see that it was recognised and approved of."

While Gigi is precise about the way her character is performed, she doesn't 'interfere' with the direction the writers intend to take her. "They tell you these huge character arcs that they're setting-up for you, but then they never go anywhere. They're already feeding us some nice character stuff, and if you try to direct them it gets too muddy. It's just a matter of playing it moment by moment. Anyway, I don't have a lot of time to chat to the writers because Chi has been so heavy this year. Sometimes it's got to the point where we get the script the day before we shoot, which is quite tricky for me because I love to break everything down and put it back together again. I like a couple of days for it to sit in your belly so that you're not just reciting lines. It gets a bit dizzy when you're shooting one episode and doing the ADR [dubbing] on another at the same time. You're so tired when you get home that the last thing you want to do is look at the next Farscape script."

In Season Three, the crew splits between Moya and Talyn, which meant that they weren't all on screen at the same time. While this should have meant less time on set, and more time off, it didn't work out this way. "It's funny, because when everyone heard about this we thought we were going to get whole days off, but because we don't work in soundstages there's a lot of over-dubbing to do. 95% of the dialogue is ADR, which is good if you want to fool around with your speech, but not so good when you want a day off to build up to your next stuff. The ADR studio is an hour's travel time away and because we only get a 10-hour turnaround you can lose two hours travelling from studio to set. You end up with only eight hours to sleep, eat, wash your clothes, ring your mum and learn your lines, and with all this stuff in your face you can easily become paranoid and get tunnel vision."

Being the professional that she is, Gigi accepts that the time constraints are all part of the job. However, things might be easier. "I've spent two years without batting an eyelid, hoping that my skin holds up and my body can handle the physical strains. They think that you can be constantly worked 16-hour days, but the body just can't keep up with that. It gets to the point where you're on set after lunch, looking at the characters who only have 20-minute make-ups, and you're finding it so hard to be true to your lines. I know that this is the film industry and there are certain demands placed on us, but sometimes it's ludicrous. You feel like saying 'C'mon guys, please just give me the respect to do the best I can.' They say 'Gig, we want you to cry, but cry without tears because we don't want the make-up to run'."

"We have this fantastic 35-move sword fight this year and I came in at 5am in the morning, but we didn't start shooting it until an hour into extra time," she continues. "I was tired, and that's when it gets a little scary. It's not life threatening, but it threatens your craft and the story as a whole," she sighs. But then she perks up again and shows me that trademark Nebari head tilt. "But, I'm absolutely head over heels for Chiana and wouldn't give her up for anything. This series I feel like I'm really owning her, so it's all worth it."

It's all a far cry from Gigi's grand entrance in Durka Returns, an otherwise unmemorable late Season One episode. She clearly made an impact as Durka's feisty prisoner en route to a mind cleansing; so much that her character was not killed off as originally planned, and she returned for a further four shows that year before becoming a regular in Season Two. "Honest to goodness, I just thought that it was a single gig and I had no idea what I was getting myself into. I was a year out of university and living day to day on no money with five people in a three-bedroomed house. Until the script turned up I really had no idea what Chiana would be doing, and when I read it there was just one baby scene with Ben. I had no idea that she had the potential of becoming long-running, or even how big the show was at that time."

The show already had a growing fan-base on the Internet and Chiana's debut certainly resonated with the fans. "I knew I'd made an impact when I had a death threat after that first episode!" she laughs nervously. "They said 'If she gets between Crichton and Aeryn I'll get my pulse pistol out and shoot her myself.' I thought 'Oh my God! (screams)' Yes, it was only chatroom chat, but it made me very clear that there are dedicated fans you don't want to mess with." In addition to keeping the fans on her side, Gigi also had the challenge of replicating a character performance that was only designed for one episode. "Why did I do all those movements?" she asks out loud. "I remember Ant(hony Simcoe - D'Argo) coming in and watching the scene where Chi gets shocked. Every time they shot it, even when the camera was filming Ben's angle or one of the other boy's reverses (shots), I threw myself into it - literally. Ant said 'You're gonna be so exhausted', and sure enough by the end of the day I had whiplash and migraine."

To sustain her performance and health, Gigi has tempered Chiana's movements, but it's a struggle. "Since that first episode I've learned how much I can actually do, because at the end of each day you have to be as good as at the beginning to match the continuity. In fact, the directors sometimes asked me to slow down - they'd say 'Gig, would you please keep still and stop twitching; it's hard to focus on the dialogue with that white wig flying around!'" It might be tiring, but Gigi's performance is at least being recognised - she's just been nominated as Best Supporting Actress in this summer's Saturn Awards.

Having avoided the subject for so long, let's talk about sex. Chiana is a sensual creature who loves intimate contact, and at one point was having great sex with crewmate D'Argo. However, this relationship came to an end when she started fooling around with D'Argo's son Jothee (Suns & Lovers). After a fairly celibate Season Three, can we expect more - Ahem! - action this year? "You can't ask that!" she squeals with faux offence. "When I go up on stage at conventions a lot of people ask, 'Is sex important to you?' It's such a personal question, and I have to remember that they're asking this based on what they've seen on the show. The truth is that I wake up in the morning feeling like crap, with all my other problems in life, and I don't necessarily think about things like this. But when I look back at the series and see the whole Chiana picture, I go 'My goodness, what was going on there?' You get caught up in the whirlwind of it all."

And finally, what can Gigi tell us about the proposed Farscape feature film? "Yeah... That would be stunning if it actually happned. We try to punch out a feature every day, but within the constraints of weekly television you have to make sure you don't sacrifice too much of the story-telling. With a movie you'd have a strong character arc and the preparation time to go nuts and really dive in to the story."

So, will Gigi be with Chiana to the bitter end, or might she be tempted to wander if the show deserts her character? "Without a doubt, I'll be here. Each day I feel like I'm getting closer to her, which is both scary and rewarding."