On Thursday at 7:30PM in the Hilton Salon, Mandalorian actors Simon Kassianides and Katee Sackhoff received a raucous Dragon Con welcome. Moderator Dot R. Steverson asked the actors whether this was their first Dragon Con. Sackhoff said this was her third. For Kassianides, though, this not only his first Dragon Con but his first visit to Atlanta.
While audience members lined up at the microphones, Steverson asked the guests what was the first thing about Star Wars that they loved. Kassianides replied, “Leia.” Over the applause for that answer, Sackhoff said she concurred. She then described watching A New Hope with her father. While she didn’t fully understand it, she loved being immersed in the world, which was much more real that that of Forbidden Planet, which she also watched with her father. She also loved everything about Harrison Ford’s Han Solo, so much so that she wanted to be Han.
Kassianides added that his brother collected the Star Wars toys and that Kassianides thus “inherited this obsession.”
Steverson then opened the floor to questions from the audience and from Discord. The first questioner wanted to know which role in the actors’ career meant the most to them and why they said that one.
Sackhoff pointed out that there’s “a fantasy that actors have the luxury of choice.” Most actors, she said, take every job because it’s a job, and jobs beget other jobs and offer the chance to make contacts. Until Battlestar Galactica (BSG), she had mostly played stereotypical blondes, a course that didn’t offer much longevity. When BSG came along, she would’ve done whatever she had to in order to have that job. She wasn’t the first choice for the role. The producers originally wanted someone older and maybe more hardened. Starbuck’s vulnerability came from Sackhoff and changed the character. Sackhoff described it as the first role that unequivocally changed her life.
Kassianides described his grandfather, who was a farmer from a small village in Cyprus, where Kassianides is from, as “a big hero” of his. His grandfather had no money but managed to make his way to England. He was living in England when Kassianides landed a role in Tennessee Williams’ Night of the Iguana in London’s West End. Woody Harrelson was starring in the production. The night Kassianides’s grandfather attended the play, Harrelson told Kassianides afterward that the Kassianides family were obviously there. “They all looked like you, and they were only looking at you” even though Harrelson had top billing.
A questioner referred to an interview with actor Tahmoh Penikett that Sackhoff had done on her podcast and asked whether she felt she had “gotten her groove back.” The actor replied that everyone was doing the best they could and that everyone puts on a front that everything is fine. The more honest she is, though, the more supportive other people are. She added that she has gotten her groove back. She played Bo-Katan [Kryze] for 15 years, first in animation and then in live action. In the third season, for the first time, she had difficulty relating to Bo’s motivations. She let the disconnected feeling and uncertainty become the character, who was trying to do right by her people and had a lot of guilt about her past choices.
Sackhoff experienced impostor syndrome and realized how much of her identity was bound up in acting. Her difficulty connecting with Bo shook her confidence. She finally moved past the problem by learning to have fun again.
The subject shifted to the scenes the actors read in their auditions for The Mandalorian. Kassianides said his scene was barking orders and running down a hallway with detonators strapped to him. He described it as “bedlam, totally messed up.” He went in a different direction from the actor before him because he heard every word of that audition and the actor was “brilliant.” Afterward, the casting people described his performance as interesting, “never a good word.” The casting director knew him from working on Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D., and he thought that helped.
Sackhoff, having portrayed Bo-Katan in animation, cornered Dave Filoni at Star Wars Celebration “and guilted him into it.” She then sat down with Jon Favreau and talked with him for 20 minutes before realizing her face as Bo-Katan was already all over the walls.
Asked what roles the actors would love to play, Sackhoff said she didn’t have a particular role in mind but “would die to work with” Sigourney Weaver and Gary Oldman. Kassianides is happy to have worked with the people he has and would love to work with Christopher Nolan, Martin Scorsese, and Robert DeNiro.
Discussing voice acting, Sackhoff said being in a booth, with only her voice mattering, gives her the freedom to experiment without worrying about how she looks. The sillier she looks, the freer she feels. She can contort her face if she wants to try that. Kassianides remarked that people become less self-conscious with age and stop caring so much about how they look on camera.
Sackhoff said she didn’t know BSG’s Starbuck was originally a man until her father told her. Against his advice, she looked on the message boards and saw irate fans. She watched an episode of the original show but turned it off because Starbuck wasn’t the same character. Instead of trying to do what Dirk Benedict had done, she went for the feeling people got from watching him. Sackhoff modeled her Starbuck on her brother, a strong, capable, vulnerable father and uncle.
Both actors said costuming was important to their portrayals. Sackhoff said she wears the character’s shoes when doing voice work. For Kassianides, the character begins with wardrobe. When he goes into fittings, he pushes back on everything, tests everything, and questions every choice. His costume as Axe Woves for season two of The Mandalorian was cobbled together from spare bits. For season three, however, his wardrobe was created for him. He wanted to be certain it would work for Axe.
The actors said they had origin stories for their characters. Kassianides approached Sackhoff to figure out his relationship with Bo-Katan and where his journey started. They decided he’d had a merit-based progression to her side. He didn’t come from a wealthy or noble background. Sackhoff said they wanted to be sure Bo and Axe “had a moment,” even though they were wearing helmets, when they thought he would sacrifice his life. Dave Filoni supplied Bo’s backstory. As the second-born in the royal family, her role was to fight.
As the panel wound down, Steverson asked the actors which fandoms they enjoyed. Without hesitation, Kassianides said, “Batman.” He’d watched The Batman on his flight to Atlanta. Batman, he noted, could be real. Sackhoff’s daughter loves Batman. Both actors enjoy the first Michael Keaton Batman film and can quote the Joker’s line about dancing with the devil in the pale moonlight. Sackhoff named her children after Hermione Granger and Ginny Weasley.
The panel concluded with enthusiastic applause.
