#AlexOLoughlin – Empower and Inspire

 

It was great to see Alex in this kind of setting again, taking part on the panel of actors at the Paley Centre last weekend. I know we get to see him live and in person at SOTB every year, but to see him as part of a panel, with media and fans together, is always great. It allows us to also see more of how he interacts with colleagues and fellow actors.

Of course, as many times before, Alex’s shoes made headlines among the fangirls. This time he chose bright coloured Adidas sneakers with an East African theme from the SOLARHU collection, decorated with the slogans “Empower” and “Inspire” on them. It kind  of resonated with me, because over the past 9 years Alex managed to inspired me, and being one of his fans empowered me to do many things I would have never dreamt of doing before.

While watching the panel, I wrote down a few of my feelings and thoughts as they came up, and decided to share some of them with you. The full panel discussion is available for rent from the Paley centre and does not cost much ($1,99) to rent.

My overall feeling was that it was more and better than I expected, but in the same breath less than what I would have wanted. I can understand how it can be a great idea to have all of Peter’s shows together, but as an Alex fan, there was not a lot of new things about Alex apart from enjoying him as a person once again, that interested me.

My own feeling was that you can see a bond of mutual respect and affection between Alex as actor and Peter as producer, without them laying it on too thick as “best” buds or something. If you look at Peter’s productions, you realise that Alex as a #1 on the call sheet, has been with Peter for there longest period of any of the other # 1 actors that worked with him over the years. That would suggest that they know each other pretty well by now.

Rightly so, Alex got introduced just before him and also got to sit by Peter’s side. It was also good to hear Peter giving Alex credit for many things.

• Introductions:

I know we as fangirls and especially us here can on occasion go overboard about Alex shirtless and drool about his body a lot, but I would have preferred in a setting like this, that they (Kevin) could have found some more appropriate way to introduce Alex with, other than to mention his awesome beach body. There are so many more attributes that Alex posses that can be used to announce him on stage …. #justsaying.

• Peter on what his shows are about:

He calls his shows – “An escape for a family to watch together.” And I guess the success of these shows, show us that on some level that is true. Even a young fangirl in the audience said that that was what happen in their family. And when Peter questioned her on why they delay-watch the shows, Alex was quick to tell him not to judge how young people watch, but rather be glad that they do watch!

• Season 10 renewal?:

Although we have not received official news of the renewal and Season 10, there has already been a lot of indication that it is happening.

• Alex being funny and ironic:

Saying that he is prone to self obsession – which of course made Ian next to him laugh a lot. And saying that he and Peter have screamed at each other a lot over the years – which Peter firmly and verbally denied, of course. And on the carpet saying, “I like yelling at Scott. It comes naturally” , which of course is quite the opposite if you have actually watched Steve and Danno over the years.

• Crossovers:

I am not sure what everybody’s obsession is with crossovers between shows. Not sure if it kind of makes that fictional world more real or something? Crossovers for me do not really always work well. The previous crossover between H50 and MacGyver left us fans with a lot of unanswered questions and as foreigners, we do not have the privilege of seeing those shows and those episodes of different shows necessarily at the same times. And even for US viewers it can fail. So why gun so hard for it?

• Character driven procedural:

I guess Peter does not watch a lot of other procedurals that air these days. If he did watch them, he would most probably not promote his shows as the ones who are character driven. In most other procedurals that I have watched over the past years, there are a lot more personal character development that actually happen as part of the greater show that in H50. And most of those shows do not skip 10’s of episodes or even seasons to run those character based storylines again ….. and sometimes characters even do stuff that are totally opposite of what their character usually do or claim to be.

• Alex as writer:

Apparently Alex wrote an 8 page script. Not sure if it will ever be used on the show at all. But you can hear from Peter’s comments about it, that it shows Alex’s need for more character driven parts and stories in H50. Things that we have also asked for all these years.

• Alex on previous co-stars:

In a few short words, Alex gave a large amount of props to the stars who left the show at the end of Season 7. He said that Beulah and Meaghan had big shoes to fill. In my book, in this type of setting, it actually said a lot. Why do I say that? Because Alex was not asked or harassed about it, but he chose to use it.

• Casting:

Jay Hernandez, who plays Magnum gave Peter props for knowing how to cast his shows and for putting the right people together. I know in the early days (2010), in an interview with Eric Cebula of  ET Canada, Alex also said that the he told Peter that H50 was perfectly cast – I sometimes wonder if he kept on thinking the same way over the years …….

• Ian only comment:

Ian Anthony Dale, who on the panel (apart from Alex), has been on the show the longest, chose to give Alex some well deserved praise at the only time that he really actually got to say something. Thanks Ian Anthony, you made this Alex-fangirl’s day! He  emphasised that Alex’s dedication is a big part of what made the show work for all these years.

• Team spirit:

I could only smile at Chi McBride for saying that you have to at least have a good time and some fun while you are making a show for the “Idiot Box”, otherwise what is the use of living. And he spoke a lot about the camaraderie and genuine affection for each other among the cast.

• Alex as director and on being tired of acting:

In the comments on the previous post about the event, Cassiopea said that maybe if Alex got a nice role to play, it would change his mind about his feelings for acting again. I kind of feel the same. And for many years I have been hoping that as soon as H50 ends, he would be offered a dream role in a movie that would suit his style of acting and that would show of his talent to the rest of the world. Those who might not be interested in watching H50. In many of his early interviews be said that he does not want to play a similar kind of character again and again, and maybe being the same character for 9 years make him say things like, “I’m so over acting”, meaning that he is tired of it. He is still a story-teller and an entertainer and that is great. I just hope that he will not choose to stay behind the camera and rob the world of seeing him in action – and by action, I do not mean another action hero, but a deeper, more fully fleshed out character role.

And just for some fun – Alex then and now:

His last visit at Paley was 11 years and two other shows ago in 2008, when they were trying to save Moonlight from cancellation.

PS: I really wish that people would have the decency to spell is surname correct. Especially people who manage official tweets for a place like the Paley Centre