Tricia Helfer

But I was I was like really trying to downplay that at the time because at the time there was no kind of crossover model turned out, you know, like model turned act. It was kind of a bad thing, and it's like you can't You're probably not going to be able to act if you're a model type thing. So, right, I really did downplay it a lot.

How do you downplay I don't I mean, what like you, I don't wash your hair for a week or like what like you.

I would always go in with like, well, you know it does.

It has hurt me in many ways my height because I'm almost six week tall.

Right, I'm five eleve so that I'm taller, don't don't get braggy, I'm taller.

Hello, I'm Trisha Halfer and I am certifiably the mother of cats and goats, and I'm moonlight as an actor and a model.

Hi, everybody, welcome back here to another episode of Off the Beat. I am once again your host, Brian Bumgartner. Now you've probably heard that classic Hollywood story about someone being discovered while just going about their daily life. Right, They're at a grocery store and an agent comes up and says, hey, there we've got to get you to Hollywood be in the movies. My experience, this is many years of meetings and interviewing many many actors. That doesn't happen. Okay,

I love it bubblin squea gano, bubble and squeaker, cooking every move over from the.

Ninefo Hi, Tricia, Hello, how are you?

I'm doing good? Thank you. I'm pleased to be here with you.

Well, thank you so much for coming in and having a little chat with me today. Where are you where? Like? What city are you in?

I'm I'm not in a city actually, and you're from Georgia. You're from Georgia, right, you might you might go, you might know where I am. Then?

Actually I'm in Chattahoochee.

Hills Chatahoochie Hills. Yeah, so I lived well that's an exaggeration. I was a like two minute walk down the hill from the Chatahoochee River. So the Chattahooche Hills. What is that like north Atlanta? North of Atlanta?

That south?

Actually is it's south like an hour south of city, so like twenty five minutes south of the airport.

Are do you live there now?

I do?

I think I had a midlife crisis in twenty twenty one and just backed up and without even thinking about anything and moved. So yes, since since fall of twenty one live. I live here now, but I'm I'm hoping to come back to.

La Okay, But but do you like it?

I do.

It's it's not to start off a fun and negative.

Right, Well, no, that's fine.

No, it's been a I do love it. I mean, I live out on twenty five acres.

I like, I literally just changed lifestyle and and it's been you know, it's it's great.

I missed my friends, I miss being you know.

I moved here not knowing anyone, right, So, and then I moved here and my mom died and my dad got Alzheimer's and I uninjured my knee and was out of work for a year and hobbling around and Jesus, no, it couldn't be physical, couldn't go hiking, couldn't do anything like that. And then the strike happened, and then now here we are.

It's like, you move and just your life goes to shit.

I don't know, Oh I got you could say whatever you want. Oh my god, that's terrible.

It's hard to not base it off of like the move, like that's what made everything go bad. Oh god, logically I know that's not.

The case, but well, It's very interesting. I mean, you've kind of written a perfect transition for me, because now you're there in rural Georgia, twenty five acres sounds like a farm to me. You grew up on a farm.

I did in rural.

Rural, by the way, is one of the hardest words for me to say personally, and the fact that I just did it twice in the same sentence is unbelievable. Uh in Canada.

A I did?

Yes?

Get it? A get it? Yeah? Yeah? All right, So you worked on a farm when you were a kid, earned some money working on a farm, right, Yeah.

I absolutely did. I was.

I was actually just there visiting my family last week.

Yeah. I grew up on a farm, working farm.

My grand my grandparents started the farm, and my father was born and raised on a farm, and so that was my I never had an after school job aside from being a farm hand, so I grew up driving tractors and fixing farm machinery and all of that.

Do you do you have animals? Now? Do you have a garden.

I do have a garden.

I have six cats, which I brought with me from la and I have two goats.

Goats that qualifies as a farm. If you have a goat, then that equals farm. Like do you, I don't know, do you milk the goats? Like what are the goats do? Do the goats help keep the grass down? Do they do you play with them? Like? What what do you do with the goats?

They're boys, so milking them would be a different thing.

All right, that's awkward. Okay, I took I took a gamble. I don't know. Do people milk goats if they have goats?

They do. There's a neighbor's mine.

She has a bunch of goats and she milks them, and she has a little farm stand and she makes okay, goat cheese and all the all the stuff that is. Yeah, that's way too much work for me. Mine are just spoiled, little you know. They get their fresh apple in the morning and carrots in the evening, and they're you know, yesterday I got the hoofs trimmed, and yeah, they're they're kind of just a little spoiled rescues.

Well, now, when you go back to LA, are you going to bring the goats?

That's my plan?

Okay, you know, I'm actually thinking of looking at places like Woodland Hills, or even carts. Mensino are zoned for farm animals, so goat friendly.

Yes, that's right.

Yeah, I don't think i'd be smacked at in Beverly Hills, where I was before.

You know, I went from studios, I went, I'm like Laurel Canyon to Beverly Hills like a Coldwater Canyon to Sherman Oaks Canyon in my many years there, and yeah, I don't think they do very well there.

No, probably not. So you were you did farm work? What were you interested in as a kid?

Like?

Were you watching movies? Television? I know you're in Canada, but you must have access to American shows there or not so much?

Actually, no, they do.

I mean it's not it is the Great White North, but it's not so far removed that it doesn't have you know, you can't get all all the American shows because they do certainly limit different stations, right yea, yeah, but I had no TV growing up, so I really did not grow up with any access to movies or television or anything like that. So we saw very few movies and I was I was allowed to go over

Last nights congratulations, Yes, very good. Yes, I'm happy for them.

But yeah, I didn't really you know, I was I was interested in volleyball and school and so sports.

More stories. Yeah, okay, Now rumor has it that you were approached at a movie theater? Now was this in Canada about being a model? Is this right?

That that is correct?

Yes, I was in the nearest town that had a movie theater, like a one room theater, Stetler, Alberta. And I think the town has about forty five hundred people something like that.

And yeah, so I was there.

And it was actually a girl that had gone to school with my older sister, and she was doing some local modeling for this agent, Kelly Strait, who was who was only twenty four himself when he started, and he used to scout for Ford models in New York and everything. And so she asked, and I said, absolutely not. You know, this is obviously pre cell phones and pre right, you know, Google and everything.

But she gave him my parents' number.

Because of course there's the Yellow Pages, and so he called and I was goaded on by my volleyball teammates, okay to go see him the next time I was in the city, and so I did, and like literally about a month or two later, I was in New York City.

So okay, So wait a second. So I'm so this is so interesting to me because you're saying it like this is a matter of fact. But there are talent there's talent scouts in Stetler, Alberta, Canada that are like legit recruiting for like legit modeling jobs in New York City. Well, this is surprising. This would be like Atlanta back in the day. Now Atlanta is different. But if it was like, hey, do you want to be a model? I would think you know that that would that would well they wouldn't

Well I did. Again, it wasn't him that was there.

Although he is also from a small town, he lives in Calgary now, so he has just always wanted to stay in Alberta. He could have gone to any of the you know, New York, he could have been an agent anywhere, and he's just always been partial to staying where he grew up.

But he did.

He he really was. He's an interesting guy. He's got a very good eye for the modeling business right and and what is working and everything at the time, and just but he if he had probably approached me, I would have been way too shy, and because he's quite he's quite energetic and quite quite a personality.

But it was a girl that went to school with my older sister.

So I knew her okay, and you know, i'd known her for years. And she said she was in Calgary doing you know, at university and had met and was doing some local modeling and that type of thing.

So it might have been a different story if he had approached me.

So within a couple of months, you're in You're in New York City m hm, and you're so what are you doing, like you're immediately starting to get jobs.

Well, this was between grade eleven and grade twelve. So I went.

He set me up to go, and I actually stayed at Eileen Ford's house or her apartment, and I went to New York for five days to get some pictures so they they he had he took some pictures of me and he sent them to for New York and they said we want her, and so I went there and did some test.

Shoots they had set up.

You know, you have to get photos r right to be able to show. And then he had organized me to be with an agency in Montreal. So I was only in New York the first time for five days and I went from there to Montreal, where an agency started putting me out in the Montreal market for three weeks. So I was gone for like for a month basically. And I remember, I just I did all these like Bridal magazines.

I was six sixteen seventeen.

I was gonna say, yeah, I was young for.

That seventeen and just doing all these Bridal magazines and I look at them now, and my mom has them all still and.

Or had them all still, and.

I just it's they're so funny to see that time period and the Bridal magazines. But yeah, So I went there and with the guys of kind of just with the idea of just kind of seeing what it was, what it was like and then going back to grade twelve. So I went, and I remember specifically I made thirty six thousand dollars in three weeks. And I went back to grade twelve, and then I was like, maybe I should.

Give this a track. I liked it to go to Milan.

They want me to go to Paris, Like, maybe I should try this, and so I did my first semester and then and then I packed up and I left.

I left before graduating.

And you were based then in New York or you just went wherever you had to go.

Well, yeah, I went to Milan first for a couple of months, and then I went to Paris, and then very quickly moved my base, like within a year, moved my base to New York. I just I'm much more of a kind of New York mentality than living in Paris.

I didn't.

I didn't like living in Paris at that time. So okay, love it, love visiting it now, but I didn't like it as a seventeen eighteen year old. I found it very kind of difficult to get to get by in many ways.

Nineteen ninety two, you won the Ford Supermodel of the World contest. Supermodel of the World is I mean that's.

A title, it's a statement.

Yeah, it was.

It was a kind of I kind of just glazed right over that. That was between Milan and Paris.

They uh, oh so even before oh so, just based on your first time and then going to Milan, you're now the supermodel of the year, says Ford.

Well, they hazy right back in the back in the early nineties. I think in the eighties and nineties, they had these things, these these I mean, for lack of a better word, pageant. I've never been a pageant person, but it is a modeling competition, right. It's it's a you do runway and you do photo shoots and everything.

But then, you know, so things like that helped.

But then other times I remember meeting I can't remember who it was, but it was somebody at Vogue and I walked in and of course on your card, your composite card, it says forts new Fall of the World. And they just look at me and like, oh, so you're a supermodel, Like you have no pictures. Basically you're brand new. You're a supermodel.

And I'm like, I didn't name it and.

I did not get that job. So it was a blessing and accurse.

I mean the I mean basically, any top fashion outlet that I have heard of you have either done shows for or ads for. How long were you intensive and more specifically, what made you begin to think about doing something else, I e.

Acting at the time.

I mean I probably did it for ten years, okay, seventeen to twenty seven. I think I moved to La around I have to do the math, but around twenty seven or twenty eight, and it had been a couple

So I was like, Okay, I'm gonna have to figure out something else to do.

Okay. I mean your math I think is pretty spot on. Because you moved to Los Angeles and you pretty much immediately begin booking some television jobs. What did you do to prepare for that? Was it just like, oh, this is something else that I want to do, or was there something specifically about acting that you wanted to give a try, and then what did you do to prepare yourself for it?

Well?

I I thought for a while that I was like, okay, what about like reporting.

I had done some kind of correspondent report, hosting or a fashion file that type of thing.

Yeah, and so I had done a few segments and things, and then I just realized, even you're in front of the camera there, I kind of like being the you know, maybe this is a little selfish or narcissistic, but I kind of like being the topic, you know.

Right right, right, right right, Tell me it wasn't.

And that I'm kind of making fun of myself there. I don't mean it necessarily like that, but it wasn't.

I just didn't.

It didn't catch me right, And so I was like, why don't I take an acting class. I had never done anything like that again, grew up without watching really anything. But I thought, even if it helps me with commercial auditions. Most of the only commercial editions I did at the time were beauty beauty commercials, right, I wasn't going out for anything else, but maybe it'll help me in that in that respect, And I got into an acting class. My my commercial agent suggested some places and I called

I love this.

I was terrified, right, and I had never been through therapy, but I remember saying walking in, going.

I feel like I've just had a therapy session. I just feel like I've like I've been terrified, but I.

Feel like I've released some stuff, right, And that's what started it. It was Penny Templeton Studios in New York, and I just I took her on camera class and then I took her ongoing and wanted me to take their masterclass, and I took that while I continue to model. I think I did that for about a year and a half and then I was like, okay, I'm moving to LA and I just packed up and moved to LA.

I was thinking about you, not having met you, but sort of looking over your history before and there's something like you had such a career and although not as

It does, And I think.

There's different elements I think to it, right, Like, definitely I was a very shy kid, so modeling and being in that world and being in front of the camera even though your crews are much smaller, you know, a few people, five to ten people maximum, right, compared to or maybe sometimes down to two or three or a or a you know Vasaci fashion show where you're in

Right, There's parts.

Of me that have always felt like a little bit of a not a fraud, but it's like I do still walk into some job sometimes like a very apprehensive and then it's it's usually until the first take or two and then you're it just kicks in or everything makes sense or or something. But because I didn't go to act, you know, I really didn't go to a big acting school. I haven't done plays, I haven't you know, I didn't grow up watching TV.

I didn't it or movies. I'm not well versed in that way.

I've always felt like I don't know a lot about you know, people. People talk about all these different old movies and things like that, and it's.

Just over my head.

But I've just had and granted, I could go and study more, and I could go and obviously watch things more than I do, but then I fall back on the well, sometimes it's just about people watching and some sort of natural abilities maybe the wrong word, but natural something too.

Sure.

You know, when I was a kid, I was going to go into psychology.

So that's what gets me about about our business, is getting into the psychology.

Of the character.

Right.

Yeah, it didn't really answer your question.

Sorry, No, no, I mean I mean it sort of did. I mean in terms of what interests you, which is that you know, that's what's interesting to me. I just I don't know, there's something about and look you're talking to I mean, I literally don't know anything about high fashion, but I know enough to know it's got to be exposing in a way. And again not just physically, I mean,

It did, because you're used to being in front of the camera's or having people's attention on you. Right, the whole room is looking at you, and that can be very disconcerting. Yes, And it was when I first started modeling, when you know, when I was seventeen eighteen, I was it was terrifying to have everybody look at me. Yes, and then you know, you're like and you're not quite sure,

Kelly, My old modeling age we call a bone structure, whatever it is.

But you have to be able to translate that and and be able to translate the tone that the photographer and the magazine or whatever is looking for. And that's also in film, right, because you have different tones. Be within comedy, you have different tones. Within drama, you have different tones. And also just having being used to having the eyeballs all focused on you, and a lot of them not sometimes not happy with what you're doing necessarily

Right, Yeah, so you have to.

Be willing to mess up and be willing to make an ass of yourself and not let it destroy you.

Yeah. Shortly after you move to LA, you take your acting classes, you move to LA, you get a role on Showtime's Jeremiah. What was it like being on set for the first time?

Uh, it was awful. I got fired from that job.

You did, so my first ever acting job I got fired from.

That's happened. It happens everybody.

I was still modeling at the time.

I was still living in New York, and I remember, I think it was summer of two thousand and one, and I had was in LA for a modeling job and my commercial agent knew that I had wanted to start, you know, I was acting classes and I had planned on moving at the end of the year. I think I looked at houses and everything, and so they said, oh, there's this audition. Stay an extra day and go in on this audition. So I did, and it was Jeremiah and it was for the lead female role.

And flew back to New York and they wanted to test me.

I didn't even know what a studio test was, right, So they fly me back out.

I test. They don't take any of us.

There's four four women similar look whatever, they didn't take any of us. Cut to I'm back in New York. Nine to eleven happens. I drive down after about a week. I had a place in Jupiter au On in Florida. I'm down in Florida and I get the call, You're You're hired. You have to be in Vancouver in like two days for four months.

Now. I got to get on my get on a plane. That I'm terrified.

You know, I've just watched the towers fall from my apartment. You know, I've driven down with two cats, and I've got to get by myself with two cats, back up and pack up.

And leave for four months. That all happens.

And I get to Vancouver and it was Luke Perry and Malcolm Jamal Warner and they were lovely. My character is introduced at the very end of a two hour pilot to then be part of the series, right right. They're searching for this valhalla, this this place, and they finally find it at the end of the two hour pilot. I get there and the showrunner won't even like look at me. He's so unhappy that the studio has.

Forced you on all.

Yes, and this was my first introduction to the business.

Like he wanted nothing of my type at all, you know, and I don't want to explain what he wanted, but something that I could not be.

Ever okay, right, yes, and they ended up.

I remember he said that I was nerve. I had one scene and the scene was fine, Like we used it on my reel.

It was good, there was nothing wrong with it, right, and Luke Perry.

Years later, I ran into Luke Perry at like comic Con Warner Brothers party and.

He was like, yeah, that was so mess you know, messed up and whatever.

But he used the fact that I was off in the corner prepping, as I had been told in Penny Templeton studio was like prepping to do an emotional scene, and he said that I was I was just way too nervous and whatever. But I was like I and she's like off in the corner whatever, and I was I was preparing the scene was fine, and but I get fed and they don't replace me, they just can the character completely and then lo and behold, he gets what he wants.

Like a few episodes later, I watched it and there was a character that he was wanting.

So it all worked out fine. But you know things, at the time, it was very hard to take and to accept. But if I had done that, I wouldn't have then been available to do Battlestar Galactica. That went two seasons, and I wouldn't have been able to do it because it crossed over a year. Yeah, so I'm trying to tell my sell myself now that that same thing, when my career is in the crapper and I'm am I ever gonna work again, I'm trying to remind myself of that.

Well. Yeah, I mean, look, you did get and you said went a couple of seasons Battlestar Galactica, your character number six, not only Battlestar Galactica becomes a huge epic press getting show of various incarnations across what do they call it, across the in perpetuity throughout the universe. There you go, I finally got it. That's the phrase they always use. Not just that, but you play a character that gets to play different variations of themselves, which is

I had been in La about a year at that point, so it was and it was, you know, I had done a couple of things. I had done a couple of guest stars and you know, right, and in an indie movie and yeah, I just it was I think I had done a guest star for CSI Vegas season two, that's how long ago was and the finale.

And it was.

The casting director that remembered me from that show that then pulled me in to read for the producers of Battlestar.

Wait a second, it's uh cher Dean. Yes, I was on CSIS. You said, CSI Vegas. That's just CSI.

That's the original.

Yes, the og the O G. Yes, what did you play on there?

I played a model, so I was the victim and I actually auditioned. There was this two sisters, the model and her sister, and I auditioned for the sister and I remember they called me back in and they said, look, there's two that's we want you these two. But you look like you could be a model. She doesn't, so at least at that time, that sounds true.

I didn't mean it.

They said it, so we need you to play the role that has no lines.

Well, no, but the fact that they the fact that they said it looks like you could be a model, were you were exactly?

But I was.

I was like really trying to downplay that at the time because at the time there was no kind of crossover model turned out, you know, like model turned act. It was kind of a bad thing, and it's like you can't you're probably not going to be able to act if you're a model type thing. So, right, I really did downplay it a lot.

How do you downplay I don't, I mean, what like you, I don't wash your hair for a week or like what like you.

I would always go in with like, well, you know it does it has hurt me in many ways my height because I'm almost six feet tall, right.

I'm five le so that I'm taller, don't don't get braggy, I'm taller.

I love when somebody's taller.

But I don't know for men, if it ever hurts you that you're tall. But you know, we all get we all get put in boxes of what you can play in which you couldn't play.

But this was actually quite a difficult role.

Because even though yeah, she was a model and she didn't have any lines, she had body dysmorphic disorder. Okay, so there was quite a few scenes and and she ultimately gets toxic shocks in Rome from like cutting herself and that type of thing, and and nobody killed her.

She died herself. But okay, yeah, so what did you play?

Dog Man?

Dog Man? Dog walker dressed up as a furry.

That's it right there, that's it. Yes, I didn't even know what it was at the time, I'll be honest with you, but it was explained to me in great detail what a furry is and likes to be. Uh, yeah, that was it, all right? He got totally off topic. I just love I just I just love comparing CSI stories. And actually before we move on, because I do want to talk about Star Galactica, but I do want to what what were you in? Uh? I didn't I'm sorry,

No?

I was.

It was a two episode bank robbing. I was an international uh, internationally sought criminal okay, and I and I yeah, held a bank hostage.

Okay. Well so then so there you go. So I do want to talk about this before we talk about you actually like being a star on a serious regular part. I often talk about for pragmatic reasons that Criminal Minds was one of the hardest jobs I ever did in television because because you're a guest star, right, But it sounds like you had the same situation that I did, where you go in and and functionally like you are the lead. It's your story, Yes, you or the protagonist.

Yes, Guest starring is a tough job, because you're right, you come into a well oiled machine where everybody knows each other and you know you're in the business long enough, hopefully you know. It's more often that when you do come on and guests are on something, you end up knowing crew you've worked with before, and that starts to

Out like lunch in my trailer today, please lunch? Yeah? All right. So back to Battlestar Galacticat you auditioned for number six, was this an exhaustive audition process. Did you have multiple steps or was this was this easier?

You know, I had multiple steps.

I remember specifically it was January sixth that I went in because I was given the script right before Christmas and I took it home with me and it was for the miniseries.

It was a big script.

And I came back and I auditioned and then they said it went really well, but you know, they're not making up any minds, and I was still really like almost no credits, right, So I think they were looking for a name or they were you know, and I think i'd also heard it some points they were thinking of maybe having this character kind of CGI, which in that time period also was a little bit newer, harder to do, and and it wasn't. It was like two months later that they came back. So I just thought

I can be a little petty, but.

I just couldn't just sat there on the corner of my desk and cut to I think it was two months later, it was in March, and they called me back in and I went back in, and then they said the next day I was going to test for it, and I had to do a work and maybe it wasn't the next day, but I had to do a work session, which I'd never done a work session before, and went through that process and then tested and it was a full like, oh gosh, at least half to I think we got there at eight thirty in the

Wow.

And I remember, you know, just pairing. It was probably like eight or nine guys and gals and for the number six in baltar role, and I don't I don't remember much of it. We all went in separately, and then they got rid of some people, which is.

So awkward, so awkward.

And then they started pairing us up and I remember James and I James Callus, who played balltar, went in and he remembers this. He remembers hearing somebody in the room say that's it, but I don't.

I don't remember that.

I just remember thinking, well, now I'm definitely not going to get it because I tower above him, and at this point.

I had no idea what I've done.

At one point, I think it was I think it was Robert all Right came up to me and he's like, just because they keep giving everybody gives you notes and everybody and by the time you go back in, it's like fifteen people have given you notes. You're going back in for the fourth time. And it must have just shone on my face, like I was like a deer in the headlights. And he just took me aside in the hallway and just said, just go back to what you did in.

The room when you came in to see me.

Just forget about everything and just go back to what you came in here with. And I guess that's what I attempted to do. But I remember thinking, I tower over James. I'm never going to.

Get this for ale. So it started as a mini series.

Yeah, it was a We shot him for our mini series in the spring of two thousand and three, and then we didn't go back to start filming the series, which started with an episode called thirty three in until two thousand and four.

Wow full series movies, on and on and on. Have you ever heard the phrase bears.

Big Battlestar Galactica. Yes, from the office.

Well we have a little kinship there from the show because as it sounds like, you know, our good friend Rain Wilson aka Dwight was a big Battlestar Galactica fan. I hope everybody considered that to be endearing. I mean it was Dwight absolutely.

Did you hear that?

Was that the same episode or was there another Was there another place where something about you watch Battlestar galacticat know what you're dumb or something like that, there was another Yeah, or was that from the same episode.

I don't know. I think that was different. But I think he had that, he had the T shirt. He was very clearly a big uh. So it got a lot of discussion I will say on our real live set at the time as well. It was It was a big It was a big show on our set. What are you most thankful for out of that experience? I mean, your first big time show multiple years but really sort of launches you. But what for you is your sort of memory.

I know it's going to sound kind of corny to say, but the people, you know, I had moved to LA and really didn't know. I moved there not knowing anybody, and a year later got Battle Star and it was just one of those experiences where it was such a collaborative group of people and such an amazing group of people that really formed a family. And they are, you know,

I miss my family.

It's Edward James almost Mary McDonald and Katie Sagoff and Michael truccau and like James call like they they are my nearest and dearest, and so I know it sounds corny, but there. You don't always have that experience where you know, you get together and you may have some fun experiences, but then you all go in your separate ways, and we didn't.

We just really became a family.

And I know they'll be with me for the rest of my life and they have my back, and so that.

To me is is the biggest thing that I took out of it.

But you know.

The other thing would be, you know, more specific to the actual show, would be it's kind of longevity and the quality of the writing and this subject matter that we got to deal with is something that I think it has already lived on and I think will continue to.

That keeps on giving.

Are you a gamer?

I've never actually played a game in my life, but I've voiced like about eight different games.

Well, no, that's why I was going to ask, because you brought up the voiceover and you, I mean, that's been a large chunk of work that you have done. I mean, from international model to television star and now do you enjoy doing the voiceovers?

I do.

I mean, if I had to choose one, I would choose on camera, just because you actually have the interaction with other people. You know, You're not just in a sound booth by yourself, and depending on the job, sometimes you really don't have a lot of you know, I'm not a Hanks area, I'm not a Dan Castelnetto where I can do eight million different voices and accents.

I can do.

I can do a slight version of my own voice and accent. You know, I can sound I can sound a little bit different. But it is I really enjoy doing it. But between the two, I prefer on.

Camera another show that you had the opportunity to work on. I mean there have been many that has gotten a lot of attention. Is Lucifer. Talk to me about that, the world of that show and why you enjoyed playing in it.

It was another experience, was a really great group of people, a different tone of a show, much more I call it a popcorn show.

You know, it's much much lighter, fair sure, even.

Though it's you know, show about the devil and uh it's based off of a graphic novel comic book tongue in cheek, but with heart and certainly some some definitely heartfelt moments. And and Tom Ellis, who played Lucifer, was just such is such a lovely person and fantastic actor and so so focused and professional and everything. So it

Creation, goddess of all creation is like that is a name, that mean from the name from from from Ford supermodel of the World. Now you're the goddess of all creation. This is like an This is an upgrade. I mean at what's next? I don't even know.

Yeah, it's all downhill from there.

No, there's got something.

I played Dracula next.

So well, I yes, I that's actually an upgrade. That's pretty pretty. Yeah that did you enjoy that? I mean that is an archetype. I mean that is an archetype of I don't know, I mean it is had so many iterations, but I just thought it was so interesting and your work at it was so so interesting. What did you what did you pull from for creating that character? Did you did you go back in time looking at prior history or was this more your own interpretation for Dracula? Yeah?

Yeah, I mean I gosh, I can't remember at the time i'd gone back and I'd read a book about Dracula through Hall in Hollywood, like all the different kind of mood, and there'd never been a female Dracula.

There had been.

Brides of Dracula and things, so I was a little nervous about that.

But it wasn't not a hugely watched show, so.

But it was you know, like similar to I would say, Van Housing was similar to like a walking walking Dead, but vampires instead of zombies, right apocalyptic type thing, and their their slant was female. But you know, the van Helsing was a female, and I did I didn't want to copy someone, right, So I did go back and watch a couple of things. I was big into the Anne Riis books, interview with a vampire and all those type of things. I just want I wanted to sink

Of Draculas, and you know, there's all different types.

Of tones of Dracula as well, from more campy to scarier and more serious and that type of thing, and Van Helsing was definitely a little bit more on the serious side than super campy, right right, Yeah, I.

Just kind of want Is it bad to say I just kind of wung it?

No? Is that the right wung it? Did you did it?

I wong it?

Can you say that?

I don't that's a word. I don't think it.

I just wung it. I just winged it. I don't know. This is a great question. I didn't research that either. Yeah, I mean, you're the variety. I envy you for the variety of say, genres that you've been able to play in. I mean, right, so there's sci fi, fantasy, some horror, even some procedural that we've discussed as well, video games, rom coms. Is there anything that you that appeals to you, Tricia the most?

Yeah, in terms of what I want to play or what I want to I mean, I again, I because I didn't grow up with the TV, I often find myself just not even watching anything like I'll I'll it sounds awful, but I'll.

Sometimes just sit there and stare.

At a wall before I'll like reflok or watch TV as I just sometimes need quiet. But I would love like to find a show like you know, I like shows like Ozark or Breaking Bad or that ting where

You know.

There's a there's a serial killer role that I want to play so badly and I'm trying to get made. But there's a lot of layers to this character, right, but she would be a pretty bigger than life character as well.

But I just really want to.

And I don't get it that often to play more your every every woman, every person type thing and a story about whatever the story is.

Am I making any sense?

Yeah? I think? I mean, I mean how I interpret what you're saying so I don't want to put words in your mouth is like ultra realism, which actually makes sense to me because of Yeah, there's been a lot that has been stylized for you so far, in your career. And so when I think about like Ozark, Breaking Bad had its own sort of sensibility. But I but but ultimately, yeah, sort of ultra realism. That's how I would kind of define that.

I now have a word for or for what it is I haven't I tell I just told my guy the other day. I was like, I'm better when words are written for me and then I make them pun to life.

Like I'm not very good on my own. I can't.

I'm not a good improver, not good thinker on my feet. So thank you for giving me the word for that. But yeah, and I had a slice of it. This year, I've done two indie films and I played played a character version of a real woman that has a breast cancer survivor story. And I played off a book called Walk Beside Me by Christine Handy and I did that this the beginning of the year, and that was but

The other movie, I believe you're referring to the Great sail Ish tell me about the film. It's a it's a comedy, right it is.

It's I actually haven't even seen it yet. That's not the one I was talking about. I just the other one I was talking about was called Primitive War that I just came back from filming in Australia, but it's not out yet.

But it was a lot of fun.

But The Great Salish Heist was Actually it's a small, small movie. I played a very small role in it. I play a museum curator. That it is a comedy. Dennis Daryl wrote and produced it, and it's it's really about the First Nations and their struggle throughout throughout history of recovering their artifacts and their land.

And certain things like that.

And so so there's there's a museum exhibit that they are sending off. So I play the museum curator that thinks that she she's not malicious, she doesn't come from it. You know, she comes from a mindset of let's show these artifacts to the world as a to they wanted, you know, Dennis's Carroll character wants to keep the artifacts for themselves, right and you.

You know, you could see both sides.

But I play a very small role in but it's it's there. It's a heist movie, so it's their plan of reclaiming the artifacts.

Got it? Is it going to be available and wide release? Do you know what the plan is? You haven't seen it yet.

I have not seen it yet.

No, it's a At this point, it's just doing kind of the festival circuit up in Canada, so I have not seen that yet.

But all right, Well do you do comic cons?

I do? I have it. I don't do a lot of them.

I with Battlestar and Lucifer and Ben Helsing and things like that. I was at San Diego quite a bit when those were airing, but I haven't. I did the OD I just did one in Perth, Australia on the way back from from filming Primitive War on the Gold Coast.

Really yeah, So I.

Do them every once in a while. I've got I've got two coming up this year. I've got a Battlestar Galactica reunion coming up in Chicago, which will be really fun, and then I've got to loose for one coming up in September in Birmingham, England.

I mean the fact that I was supposed to do that one time the fact that you have these three shows that are so big in that world. I mean, that's that's what I mean. Yeah, we need to get you on something ultra realistic because like you have like spanned the like large scale comic DC world.

But I've never been in a superhero.

I've never been in a big movie, like a big Marvel or anything like that type of movie.

I've never been. I've never been in a big movie.

We don't changed that.

I was in Bombshell, but I was in a tiny role I actually played. I listened to your episode and Cameronda today.

God, I was supposed to. I was supposed to say that it's here in my papers. Yes, how delightful is hurt? Do you know her? Have you met her? No?

I have not, And but she was absolutely Yeah. I used to watch her on CNN years ago. But yeah, I think she's delightful. But I've never met her in person. But I specifically was.

Like, oh, I want to listen to this one.

So but yeah, I played her in Bombshell, so a couple of couple of scenes, very small scenes.

Well, she's interesting. At least she didn't she didn't send you a hate mail?

No, no, not at all. I think we corresponded over Twitter briefly or DMed each other briefly. And I don't know if it was before, before the movie came out or after, but but the director had said he thinks she'll like my performance, So that's what I went on.

Is it fun for you? The fanaticism with which people hold I mean, you just mentioned three shows, but I'll stick very specifically to Battlestar Galactica because even with Lucifer and Van helsing and all that, I mean, Battlestar Galactica is just well, I mean, it's it's a it's a cultural, pop culture iconic show. Does the fanaticism with which people, uh celebrate that show? Is that fun for you? Always? Is that? Is that difficult for you?

It is? I don't. I don't find it difficult because I look at it in.

A few ways that like, you know, we're describing comic cons that type of thing I've described it is.

What's the difference of going to.

See a you know, I watched the hockey game last night and people were dressed up with their favorite jersey and yeah, their faces painted the colors of the team. What's the difference of going to a comicon and people are dressed up as their favorite character or something like that. There's really no it's it's a coming together of a like minded enjoyment.

Right.

But I don't often get recognized in public for number six, So it's not like it affects me too much personally out on the street, so to speak, because I don't I don't walk around, you know, I don't have the white hair that was more iconic with the character. I had versions of the character that had my own hair color in later seasons. But right but the you know, the the one that people think of is the white

They like that you don't look like Yeah, I mean, this is a whole other We could have a huge conversation about just this topic alone. You know. I think it's and I'm saying this from a like a culture again, like a cultural standpoint. I think that the beautiful people in our business get recognized less. Don't know why I have been sitting this is the story I always tell,

I always thought, like I look at it too, is like often I changed hair and makeup or whatever.

Yeah, I feel like I'm a.

Little bit of a chameleon in that way, Like different hair and makeup really changes me. And I know that from my modeling days. I can look different with a soft makeup or a dramatic makeup or dark hair. Like even people I know if I changed my hair color don't recognize being off the top.

So I don't know. Maybe there's something to that. Did you just call me a pretty person now again?

I said culturally? I said culturally the idea of attracted. What did I say pretty? I don't think I said pretty, I don't. Somebody checked the tape Trasa.

Well, if you did, I appreciate it, because you know, I'm fifty now, and that's kind of has an expiration date in Hollywood.

So you don't you don't look you don't look a day over fifty. I mean, thank you.

I mean I'm a day in maybe a month, month and a half over fifty.

Thank you so much for joining me. I wish you all success. I mean, listen, here's here's the sum total of what I heard. Okay, you discussed having a career lull, and you've shot two movies this year. Okay, and we're only in June. So let's just say I think you're doing just fine. Enjoy your cats, Enjoy Chattahoochee City, and hey, I'll be down there. My family's still there. I'll look you up and we'll go to a hockey game.

Come visit.

Loved it, all right, all right, thank you so much.

Thank you, Bryan, Thank you Tricia.

I am so glad that we got to catch up. Thank you for that conversation and to hear your amazing story. I don't think that I can advise young actors to go standing around outside movie theaters waiting for their big break. But the world is a better place now because you did. Listeners. I look forward to seeing you all here again next week. It's summer. Get outside, but keep me in your ears while you do it. Have a great week. Off the Beat is hosted and executive produced by me Brian Baumgartner,