Wolf 359:
SG5

by Susan Griffiths

met up with everyone at Euston station, at our "usual" meeting place. The major difference this year was that half our party were heading for Cult TV and the other half were heading for SG5.
I set off with Corinne, Darren, Simon and Tim to catch a train heading in the general direction of Blackpool and lo and behold, we ended up sitting with some fun loving guys who were - funnily enough - heading for Cult TV!
Having checked into the guesthouse I would be staying in that weekend, then going for a brisk walk to the Norbreck castle hotel, it was time to join the queue for registration, which was pretty long.

Having done that, it was great to be able to meet up with some familiar faces in the hotel bar, chill out and enjoy some cold pints of lager - which were very welcome!

The weekend of SG5 literally blew me away…. And that was just the weather!
In a way, it wasn't too much of a hassle that there were high winds as well rain every five minutes as I spent so much time in the hotel.

Douglas Arthurs	Jaqueline Samunda	Marshall Teague	Lynn Smith	N John Smith	Peter Williams
Garwin Sanford Christopher Judge Gary Jones Jay Acavone JR Bourne

The opening ceremony produced some surprise guests, including Douglas Arthurs who plays Heru'er, and Jaqueline Samunda who plays Nurti. Together with Peter Williams, we had a strong Goa'uld presence that weekend! Other gusts were Gary Jones (Chevron Guy), Marshall Teague, JR Bourne (Martouf), Christopher Judge (Teal'c), Garwin Sanford (Narim) Jay Acavone, and N John and Lynn Smith (who work behind the behind the scenes).

Wolf events have come up with bigger and better sets for the stage at their events, with their Stargate being something special. This time it was accompanied by a sarcophagus and a screen similar to that used in a Goa'uld scout ship! An added touch was a UAV sailing across the hall!
The Guests….

Gary Jones might play a relatively small role in SG1 but he had a lot to say - and a very entertaining way of saying it! He had tales of the "challenging" nature of his lines (usually "yes sir" or "wormhole activation") and the time when he took part in a practical joke on Don S Davis, who plays General Hammond. This involved Chevron Guy telling General Hammond to "open the damn gate himself". Another aspect of Gary Jones is his William Shatner impressions, and his excellent impression of a Welshman announcing an unscheduled activation and alien invasion. Put it this way - the approach was very laid back…

Christopher Judge was as laid back and humorous as he was at SG1 and it was great to see him. At one point during his talk, it appeared that he thought it would be a little boring for everyone to hear him talk about the prank that Michael Shanks played on him involving a bear and a cliff - so he got one of the stewards to tell the story instead!

She did a great job and explained that it was no problem her talking as she was a teacher by trade! The rapport between Christopher Judge and JR Bourne was amusing as well - JR revealed that Chris likes to wind him up by making comments about him being skinny. So… during one of JR's talks a booming voice from off stage called "JR, get your skinny white ass off that stage!". JR also said that even when he tried to work out and bulk himself up a bit, Chris still made comments about him being skinny!

During Chris's talk on Sunday, which was the last one of the day, he spiced things up a little by proceeding to auction off the other actors' rear ends. He disappeared behind the screen and bought out JR Bourne and proceeded to auction a feel of his rear end which went for a couple of hundred pounds (all in the name of charity!). There was a twist to that one as the winner of the bid exchanged a feel of his rear for a kiss!! Chris then he bought out Garwin Sanford, whose rear end also fetched a good price. Chris himself had his rear end auctioned… and between then a handsome sum was raised!

Jacqueline Samunda, who plays Nurti, had never done a convention before but came across very well on stage, with tales of her stage work and how she liked the costumes she wore in SG1, as well as the welcoming and friendly atmosphere of the show's cast and crew. During the closing ceremony she also joined in with the auctioning of her rear end raised about £250!

Douglas Arthurs might play a formidable villain on screen but in real life he is a party animal and a guy with a great sense of humour. He was not afraid to join in with the discos and had a great time partying with the attendees.

Peter Williams was the opposite of his character (which is probably a very good thing) - chilled out and at ease with everything and wearing cool shades. Not even a longer spell in the sarcophagus than originally intended could shatter his relaxed approach to - well - just about everything! He had some tales to tell of his time on Stargate including what it was like wearing the gold serpent guard armour and how the headpiece was potentially damaging to a person's nose, and touched upon other subjects like how much he liked Bob Marley… He also demonstrated a great vocal impression of Desmond Tutu when asked about the kind of accents he is called upon to do.

Garwin had a few tales of his own, which involved a scene involving him having to run up a set of stairs and say a line. He tried to effect being out of breath to add realism in the first take, which led to Amanda Tapping wondering whether Garwin was really that out of shape… So in the next take he modified his approach, but the re-shoot didn't go that well… in the end the guys ended up running up and down the stairs a lot as it took a few takes to get the scene right! He also had a tale to tell about the cat he appears on screen with and about how lazy it was, making him wonder at one point whether it was under sedation...!

N John and Lynn Smith had some interesting tales to tell about behind the scenes, which was good to hear. It was interesting to hear about some of the locations that were used and the way that it was a challenge to find suitable locations for alien planets and the like. Lynn has a mystery for everyone with the say she signed her autograph with the abbreviation "LT-", explaining she would reveal its meaning in her talk the next day. So… Corinne asked her what it meant. Lynn explained that one of her friends, who was dying, had crammed as much into her like as possible to make it worthwhile. She explained that it meant live the dash - the dash being the two dates on a tombstone - and making every day count. And for Lynn, the convention itself was one of those worthwhile days - which was praise indeed.

The Evening Entertainment…

While the actors were entertaining, another high point of the convention was the social element and the discos. While the DJ in question didn't seem too promising to start off with, he merely needed some pointers in the fine art of convention discos and how to cater for the requirements of the attendees. Thanks to that, we got to hear convention classics such as "Star Trekkin'", "The Macarena", "Bohemian Rhapsody" and "Hawaii Five O"! While the bar charged the usual hotel prices it was at least close to hand in the hall itself. Pints of lager were supplied in plastic cups, which provided entertainment as several people decided to build pyramids out of them n their tables - an appropriate shape for a Stargate convention!
Several months before the event, a challenge was set upon. Could certain members of SG5, SG9 and the LOTNA come up with convincing looking dress blues for the Saturday night of the convention? The answer was yes, we could! Not only was it satisfying to have achieved the goal - the end result also looked pretty darn fine, too! There was a hidden agenda in selecting which rank we wanted to be at the event. Three of us went for being technical sergeants for one main reason - it was the easiest badge to get hold of!!
Costumes were also in presence on the Sunday night which included Corinne and Tim as doctor and nurse (Tim was the nurse, by the way, while Corinne scared a few people with her rubber gloves!!). We had a couple of colonel Maybourne lookalikes in the form of Simon and James in the loudest, most dubious Hawaiian shirts known to man. I took the opportunity of showing off my Airman First Class Pratt costume (Airman Pratt being a character I made up for some fan fics - the character in question being a real whiz at repairing soup and coffee machines!). Well, after Corinne went to all the trouble of coming up with the costume, it just had to be done!!
	Much fun was had with the props that Tim had - namely surgical gloves. It turned out that if you inflated them and bounced them across a table it kept the group of people congregated around there amused for a good long while!

Usually the Sunday night of these events incorporates the Battle of Britain, which means chucking paper planes at chandeliers (this was something that came about courtesy of Tim at SG3). Sadly the change of venue meant that we had no chandeliers to use as target practice or big sparkly air craft carriers - depending on your point of view!! Despite the lack of chandeliers, paper planes still got thrown - so did paper plates in an attempt to knock down the pyramids of plastic pint glasses that were in evidence once again.

Autographs and Refreshments

The autograph queues were managed well, with people being called by ticket number and the information being displayed on screen in the main hall. The autograph sessions were also held conveniently close to the main hall and the queuing time was not too bad either. Another convenient point about the main hall was that a refreshments stand was located in the hallway just outside serving tea, coffee and a selection of sandwiches and snacks. While the prices weren't brilliant, it was decent enough food to keep a person going throughout the day.

And Finally…

Brian announced that SG5 was probably the last weekend Stargate convention he was likely to do, although he would still do evening and one day events. Overall, the convention was good fun, and the social element, always welcome at any kind of event, was in strong presence. I would definitely say that in that respect, Wolf Events bowed out on a high note.