Dear Tahmoh...

Dear Tahmoh Penikett,

Please stop being so hot. I'm a happily married woman now, but whenever I have to look up your name, which is frequently for some reason, I end up at your Wikipedia page and this picture.

You are way too fine with your OJ and cool, assessing gaze. And the suggestive position of your microphone makes me want to come up and ask you questions.

I love my husband. So four the sake of our happy marriage, please stop being so awesome.

Sincerely,

Vicki.


EDIT: FOR the sake of our happy marriage. Thanks for catching that, Jenny!

Inspiration...

People often ask me if I base my characters on people I know.

Meet my latest hero, Kyle Peters.


Because working with Georges St. Pierre as a template for Dominic Payette in Fighting for Her Love worked so well to keep my creative juices (get your mind out of the gutter) flowing, I decided to pattern Kyle after Tahmoh Penikett, aka Helo from Battlestar Galactica and Paul Ballard from Dollhouse.

What I particularly like about Tahmoh, apart from a fantastic body, is his ability to shift from hard get-the-job-done guy to soft and sweet husband/lover/father. In his roles as Helo and Paul, he radiates absolute strength, but there's also a core of uncertainty and the tiniest hint of weakness there, too. If you watch him in interviews and on stage at conventions, he comes off as a super-playful guy who loves what he does and loves the fans. Tahmoh is also a practitioner of Muay Thai, as demonstrated in Dollhouse.

I found it quite easy to picture Kyle, a former Olympic gold wrestler, shifting through these different variations of Tahmoh at different stages of Kyle's life. The sheer intensity on his face is what I try to keep in mind.

And just because I think it's funny, Kyle's also a huge fan of Battlestar. 'Cuz that's the way I role.

Dollhouse

Episode one in a word: superpromising.

I'm not prepared to say AWESOME yet, only because Joss Whedon's history with FOX and the Friday 9pm time slot a la Firefly could mean we see the demise of this series before it's allowed to take flight, and I don't think I can take any more disappointments. But so far, the premise has been well trotted out, the character conflicts and moral dilemmas made clear, and the performances have been good enough for a season opener.

My only complaint is that Eliza Dushku as Echo doesn't quite pull a convincing River Tam-esque doll, but she fits the roll of kick-ass chameleon secret agent quite well. I'm confident her performance will only mature and improve as the face of Buffy's Faith slowly sinks into the background as Echo takes on more and more layers to her Dollhouse role.

Best thing about episode one: Tahmoh Penikett MMA fighting, shirtless. Damn, I didn't think you could improve on Helo. And on the subject of BSG, fave line from Dollhouse: "People want father figures, guys you can trust. Like Edward James Olmos."