Ellen Dubin: The Queen of Sci-Fi

Actress Ellen Dubin may look like “the girl next door,” but there is more to her than meets the eye. While she doesn’t mind playing the occasional doting mom or singing, dancing stewardess, she feels most at home playing a sexy cannibalistic alien or a demonic zombie. In other words, the wilder the better! It is, in fact, these roles that make Ellen Dubin stand out as a cult favorite among Sci-Fi fans. So it was a wonderful opportunity to interview one of the show’s shining stars and learn more about what it takes to play some of the most bizarre characters the mind can imagine.

FQ: What projects are you currently working on?

ED: I am very fortunate in my acting career to do a wide variety of projects. Currently, I am in LA doing voice work on two amazing video games. One I can finally announce – Guild Wars 2 – the award-winning fantasy role-playing game developed by ArenaNet.  The other is one of the most highly-anticipated games of the year, in which I have been sworn to secrecy. I love working on games because you are given such freedom to play and be anything, just by using your voice. I am very indebted to my LA voice agent, Tom Lawless at Vox, who sees me playing a huge amount of characters and pushes me to go above and beyond what I think I am capable of.

I am also working on a web series called THE RESOLVE – a series in the style of Alfred Hitchcock. I love working on this show because it is fly-by-the-seat-of-your pants acting. You only get a small amount of time to create relationships and you don’t really know what is going to happen down the road in your storyline, so you have to make some very strong choices to keep the audience happy. And with a thriller type genre, it works very well. I play a dedicated psychologist who falls in love with a serial killer played by the show’s creator and producer, Russ Cootey.

In a different vein, I also just worked on a sketch comedy show with the wonderful comedic actor Ron James — THE RON JAMES SHOW. I love this kind of comedy; it is fast and furious!

And I just finished a 3D Zombie comedy film called DEAD BEFORE DAWN, starring opposite the fabulous Devon Bostick. I loved the whole cast and production team of Avi Federgreen, April Mullen, and Tim Doiron.  I always wanted to do a zombie project!

FQ: Wow, you are insanely busy! What’s on your acting “wish list”?

ED: For my ‘Wish List,’ I would love to get on the show FRINGE, LAW AND ORDER, (every actor has to have that show on their resume), TRUE BLOOD, do  a show on Broadway  (theater separates the men from the boys, the gals from the women- you get the picture), and I also would love to do a film like AVATAR , LORD OF THE RINGS etc. The list is endless!  I secretly would love to do a musical again and bring back my dancing and singing skills, get a long running animation series, and do tons more video game work.

FQ: In the upcoming film, Dead Before Dawn, you play the prim and proper mother, Beverly, who later transforms into a “zemon” – essentially, a half-zombie half-demon hybrid. What were the biggest challenges playing a zemon and where did you find inspiration for your character?

ED: You are going to laugh at this answer: there was no big challenge in the acting of the zemon for me! I love offbeat roles like that! I tend to dive-in and embrace the wackiness of this kind of character. The wonderful director (April Mullen) and I worked together to create the zemon walk and style, and she also told me that zemons are different then zombies in that they can control their emotions. They are not totally brain-dead. So I worked from there.  It’s best not to think too much when you play roles like that. It’s best to jump into the deep end and savor every moment.

The harder part for me, as an actor, was to play the prim and proper mother to the male lead, Caspar (Devon Bostick). It’s always much harder to sit on your feelings and be reserved. The only challenge for me, physically, was wearing those oversized black contacts. I didn’t like the feel of them at all, but it helped the look of the zemon so much, I had to do it! I didn’t mind being covered in blood and gore, but the contacts were not my favorite part.

FQ: I understand that Dead Before Dawn will be the first Canadian film shot entirely in 3-D. What modifications do you have to make on-set to accommodate this new technology?

ED: Of course, you do your best work in any type of medium but some of the modifications were:

• Delivering the lines down the barrel of the camera lens: You are more focused to hit the right mark because every little movement shows on camera.  
• Sometimes you also have to do some more exaggerated actions toward the camera for the audience to register that action when they put on their 3D glasses — like thrusting objects towards camera in fight scenes was a big thing.
• Also, big amounts of goopy blood were used – more than usual.
• They had set up a monitor so we could view the 3D action with glasses when we weren’t on camera. It was very helpful it terms of giving the actors a visual aid. It reminded me of green screen work in that it is very precise, meticulous work.
• We also shot on a red camera — so the lighting appeared to be different than we are used to, but it all contributes to the incredible look of the piece. I loved it!

Giggerota The Wicked from "Lexx"

FQ:  Going back in time… It looks like you gathered quite the cult following in the late nineties from your appearances on the Sci-Fi Channel’s risqué show Lexx – playing Giggerota the Wicked, Queen Lexx, and Pope Genevieve G. Rota. What was most rewarding about those roles?

ED: There is nothing better than doing an offbeat, wild role like GIGGEROTA THE WICKED and having fans embrace you for your work. That, to me, is the most rewarding thing. That role put me on the map in the Sci-Fi world and I am forever grateful. I still get fan mail about this role! It really resonated with people. I think fans appreciated that my character was a woman who was aggressive, funny, oversexed, over-hungry, and didn’t care whose toes she stepped on. It was also rewarding to be the only recurring character brought back for four seasons because of the fan response and reincarnated in different bodies with some of the same characteristics of the original character. How unique and fun is that?! It was great to create a character from the ground-up and keep appearing from season to season to surprise the audience! I will always be indebted to Paul Donovan and his fantastic creative team. I have fan clubs in Bulgaria, Russia and all over the world because of it. I also loved doing the first two movies with iconic actors like Barry Bostwick, Tim Curry, Rutger Hauer, and Malcolm McDowell! It’s so great to be a part of Sci-Fi history!

FQ: You’ve had to wear uncomfortable contacts as a zemon, an inflexible skin-tight suit in Lexx, and full prosthetics as Aunt Beast in A Wrinkle In Time. I think this is a part of acting that audiences sometimes take for granted, but I’d imagine it’s incredibly challenging to get dressed up like that and be on set for many hours. Can you recall a time where you really had to reach inside yourself to find every ounce of patience imaginable to pull off a day on set?

Ellen (left) as Aunt Beast

ED: This is a great question because I agree with you. I don’t think an audience can appreciate the amount of time and effort that — not only the actors go through — but the hair, makeup, and wardrobe people have to endure as well. It is a very long, time-consuming, sometimes physically unbearable, process.

I would say the hardest gig with prosthetics was the DISNEY/ABC fantasy piece A WRINKLE IN TIME . I wore a uni-tard that was covered in two bulky, fat suits, and then a very hairy one-piece gorilla-like outfit. It was hot, sweaty, and itchy: I looked like Chewbacca!

It doesn’t stop there — I then had prosthetics put on my face: first a full rubber covering, then individual pieces of animal hair glued painstakingly (by two makeup people) on that mask, which was stuck on my face with some kind of latex glue.  One makeup person blew dry my face with a hair dryer so the rubber base would settle and dry, and the other was the gluer of the hair. Then I had huge prosthetic lips applied and my eyes were covered in hair. I didn’t even have the luxury of a PLANET OF THE APES actor to have my eyes peek through. My character, Aunt Beast, was a blind healer.

So here I was, covered from head to toe in a fat suit with huge hairy feet and no eyes and four arms. On set, I had to manipulate the second set of arms on my own like a puppeteer and they were heavy rubber latex arms. It was a physical nightmare! I remember one day I was so hot they put me in a separate room where I literally had a hose of cold air blasted at my stomach area and behind my neck and back. I sat still and alone a lot because the outfit, the hair, and the heat were a trial in absolute patience!

I would get to work at 3:30 AM – five hours to get into hair, makeup and wardrobe. I also needed two people to literally guide me onto the set because there were stairs and my feet were so big and hairy and I could barely see!! Lunch was a nightmare. Actors love lunch. I hated it because my lunch consisted of people feeding me with pieces of small cheese or pineapple stuck on a toothpick, so it wouldn’t get into my beast beard! Also, from a purely practical level, I didn’t want to eat or drink too much because to go to the bathroom was a major production.

When you are that hot, you are supposed to drink lots of water so you don’t get dizzy and dehydrated. I chose the dizzy and dehydrated. It was way too difficult to go the washroom in that very complicated outfit and try and put it back on without the help of three ‘trainers’ — that is what I called them because I felt like an animal caged in a zoo!

Ah, what we do for our art!  Aunt Beast looked fabulous!

FQ: You played Ilene in Napoleon Dynamite. What did you think when you first read the script? Were you surprised it became such a cult hit, or were there certain scenes that made you say, “I can definitely see how this could speak to a generation”?

ED: There was no way I ever saw that ND would become a huge cult hit. When I first read the script, I thought, ‘Ok… this is quirky, weird and strange… but could be fun to go to a new place to work.’ I always love it when work is combined with going to a different city or country, so I can combine work with exploring. Also, one of the producers, Chris Wyatt, was a huge Sci-Fi fan and had interviewed me for a magazine and wanted me in the film. I thought, ‘How nice – let’s do this cute piece!’  I like to help out friends and meet new filmmakers, so why not?

How fabulous that this little film with no A-list movie stars became the iconic comedy of a generation! It really spoke to the nerd in all of us! I am thrilled when underdogs make it in this crazy business of ours because I consider myself one of them as well. I have never quite fit the niche of everyday TV or film actors.  So I was blown away by the success of the film. It has now been turned into an animation series… I hope I can get on it! I don’t think anyone saw the astronomical success of NAPOLEON DYNAMITE!

FQ: Boeing Boeing was a hugely popular stage comedy you starred in. Do you find film or live action to be more challenging – and why?

ED: I love all genres, but the most rewarding part of doing live-stage is that you immediately hear and feel the audience reaction. You are live in-person and you can sense when an audience is with you on that journey. It is the most satisfying feeling there is. Nothing can replace that taste of live theater.

It is also very satisfying to rehearse a role in-depth and get to know every nuance of the character you play, as you have the time and luxury to play that role several times a week and get to really know her inside-and-out. With TV and film, you have a short time to learn the role, perfect the role, and create something magical much quicker.  And you have NO control over what an editor is going to do with that footage once he or she gets it in the editing room. The stage actor, once the director leaves, is in control of their performance.  It is live, so the challenge is — if you make a mistake — you must continue that performance. The show must go on! In TV and film, you can do the scene again.

The challenge in TV and film is that you spend a lot of time waiting because there are set-ups and lighting to contend with. So you have to keep your energy constantly up while you hurry up and wait.

FQ: What are three little-known facts about you?

ED: I appear to be a wild gal, but I am very conservative. I would kill for my friends and family. I can eat a ton of food faster than anyone I know.

FQ: Toronto is such an amazing world-class city. Aside from family and friends, what do you miss most about Toronto when you’re shuttling to LA and elsewhere for shoots?

ED: I miss the seasons, especially spring and fall. I love seeing the leaves and I love spring air – it has that fresh clean smell. I don’t miss the cold winters though! I miss some of the spots I go to with my family and friends – shops and restaurants where I know people. The familiarity of a city is always warm and welcoming. I love that the air is better and there is less traffic than LA. But I can adapt to any city. Of course, I do have to say there is no aside — I miss my family and friends terribly when I am on the road!

FQ: In addition to your acting work, I understand you’re also a spokesperson for the Make A Wish Foundation. I’m sure there were many touching moments working with the terminally ill, but do any particular wishes really stand out in your mind?

ED: I am grateful to be the spokesperson for such an astounding organization as Make A Wish. To me, what stands out isn’t the wishes so much but the kids behind the wishes. Yes a lot want to play baseball with a famous sports figure. A great majority want to go to Disneyland or have a pink playhouse. But their bravery, their willingness to share and laugh is what I am really touched by.

I remember hosting a huge fundraiser event for Make A Wish and I brought on stage a little girl who was terminally ill with cancer. I was crying – I could barely get a sentence out — she kept telling me that it was going to be ok and she made me feel better! She didn’t see anything negative about her situation. She was positive and encouraging. When you see amazing kids like her that are so inspiring, you realize that you have a lot to be grateful for.

For more information on Ellen Dubin, be sure to visit her official PR page and add her on Facebook!