Date: 1/10/2001
Subject:  Eberts File GOAC

Hello all, welcome back!

To those who emerged on the other side of this long draught, I salute you! Not only did you brave countless re-runs but also a night and time switch as well. Anyone reading this can considered themselves true fans.

Now, on to business.

First let me say how hard it is to come back after such a long hiatus. The expectations seem to grow the longer you’re away. Sometimes this can become insurmountable (I honestly think that some people would be disappointed in the new Star Wars regardless of how well it was.). I hope that as you watched this episode you remember that it is just episode 15 and our first year.

Having said all that let me say that I thought this was a great episode! Ghost of a Chance takes us in to slightly uncharted waters (pun intended). The Agency now has The Organization to contend with and Darien, The Dark Woman. Both of these seem to be reflections of the original. In some ways, I like to call this season 1.5 because I think these episodes can stand on their own. We’ll see what you think.

Here’s some stuff you may want to know…

* The Vince shirtless scenes. I guess I should have prepared you for this. I distinctly remember watching some dailies of the scenes and thinking that the VVSB’ers will require CPR after this episode. I’ll try to provide more or a warning.

* The tables turn with the return Agent Miller. Obviously this mission was important enough to warrant revealing of the I-man project to the CIA. It’s really great working with Dan Roebuck. He’s been in everything and has tons of great stories (including funny ones about his stint on Matlock). He and I hit it off when we discovered that we both played Charlie Brown in the musical "You’re A Good Man, Charlie Brown." This segues nicely to…

* The open scenes had to shot rather quickly. We had returned to shoot a week earlier than expected. As a result, my understudy for the aforementioned "YAGMCB" was not ready. I relayed this problem to TPTB and they assured me that I would leave the set before 6pm to make my 7:30 curtain. I arrived around 8am to shoot my scene with plenty of time and only two scenes to shoot. 7 1/2 hours later…nothing. Finally, they realized that I was leaving and suddenly the race was on. Credit Ken (our director for the episode) for really making things happen. We blasted through the scene and I left only 5 minutes late. Unfortunately, I wasn’t able to be in the following briefing scene, but I’m happy to say that Charlie Brown made his opening curtain.

* This is rather embarrassing, but I didn’t realize that Idalis was THE Idalis of MTV fame. I had a long chat with her and kept thinking "What a different name, just like the MTV personality!"

* The drowning-kissing scene between The Dark Woman and Darien was a tricky one. There will be several shots for a blooper reel involving the problems of water pressure (too much and lack of) as well as P.A.’s not turning off the water after the cut. I’ll let you use you imagination on this one.

* Balboa Park in S.D. doubled for Santa Ruego.

* A little known fact about about Santa Ruego is it’s slight deviation in grammatical rules. Evidentially, they have no distinction between the possessive YOUR and the contracted YOU ARE. This explains the unusual spelling in the subtitles, as they are able to use either in circumstances. ;-)

I’m really going to have to take notes as I shoot from now on. As I strain my weak brain to remember events, they are slowly blurring together. I’ll try to be a little more informative for the next episode.

Well, that’s all I have to this week. Thanks for tuning in on the new night (You have many other options!) and time. As always, you are the most important aspect of this show and you voice counts! So hang in there, it’s only a matter of days until "Flowers for Hobbes!"

Thanks Mike