Morena Baccarin Reinventing“V”

We’ve breathed easy the past two decades, believing the red dust had finally wiped the Visi­tors from our planet for good. But the reptilians are back, along with the concept of a subtle, insidious alien invasion that provided chatter to our schooldays and nightmares after dark. “V” has returned to television, with Morena Baccarin’s Anna wielding her quiet beauty to lull the people of Earth into the notion that her species is here to guide us into a state of grace, to cure the sick and heal the planet. “We are of peace, always,” she intones. But her calm demeanor and captivating smile denote the end of humankind to those who know the truth.

Baccarin was drawn to Anna as soon as she read the script. “This is a role that would be delicious to play,” she recalls thinking. And to bring truth to her performance, she chooses not to see Anna as a villain. “I don’t think I can if I want to play her well,” the daughter of Brazilian stage and TV actress, Vera Setta, explains. “She’s a leader who is saving her people. She’s an incredible character to play. One of the great things about doing this show is that we all get to walk a very fine line between good and bad. It’s not like the old show, where there were very evil characters to the core. It’s a little more multifaceted than that, so there are some good dynamics. She’s very nurturing, and at the same time mili­tant, about saving her people. So there’s a great dichotomy of good and evil, rage and calm, all those things.

“You start to realize that this is dire for them,” Baccarin dis­closes of the Visitors’ perspective. “So there’s room in there for a little bit of heart, a little bit of humanity—no pun intended.” When asked to define the core of the antagonist she plays, the affable enchantress laughs, “I see her as a perfectly reasonable alien, who has her people’s best interests at heart.” And when we mention the pivotal scene in which Anna explains to Scott Wolf’s newsman, Chad Decker, that he’s not to ask any questions that will put her in a negative light, Baccarin quips, “And that goes for me too, by the way.” She adds, “I’m just kidding," but we still shiver.

It’s her mix of fun and gravity that brings to mind one of the Rio de Janeiro-born actor’s previous forays into science fiction, Joss Whedon’s “Firefly” (2002). The sadly short-lived, swashbuckling space adventure featured Baccarin as Inara Serra, a licensed “Companion,” or high-status courtesan. The Juilliard-trained thes­pian had initially balked at auditioning for the racy part, but after reading for Whedon, she thought, “I am so lucky if I get a second to work with this man.” And within days, she was aboard Serenity. “We loved that spaceship,” she smiles. “It was very different from the look of ‘V.’ ‘Firefly’ was a very homey kind of place; things were falling apart, and it had some old furniture. I feel like the look of that show was very interesting, [and] I had the most beautiful clothing to wear. The cast and the crew—it was a family, for real. It was really, really amazing."

With intense fan support and high DVD sales of “Firefly”’s 14 episodes, Baccarin reunited with Whedon and her castmates in Serenity, the feature-film follow-up to the galactic western epic. “We all came back,” she relates of the film that gave closure not only to viewers, but to those involved with its production. “We were like, ‘Man, this never happens! Let’s just savor this moment and enjoy this as best as we can.’”

Living in Brazil until age seven, Baccarin was raised in the world of theater and screen. “I grew up in a very artistic family,” she tells us. “My mom is an actress in Brazil, my uncle was an actor, my great uncle is a big theater director there. So I grew up in the arts. I always thought that’s what everybody did; that was the norm. When we came to the States, I was very interested in academics. I loved English, and math, and science, and I thought I would do something mainstream—and it turned out, not so much.”

In fact, it wasn’t long at all before the precocious performer entered the fray. “When I was four or five months old, my mom got me on stage,” Baccarin declares fondly. “She was doing a play at the time and I was crying backstage. It was a Christmas play and I think she was Mother Mary, and I ended up being baby Jesus because she just wanted me near her. So maybe that’s when I got bit by the bug!”

The worldly youngster came of age in the West Village of New York City, and attended the Fiorello H. La Guardia High School of Music & Art and Performing Arts — the school featured in the movie, Fame. “I chose acting as my discipline there,” she says, “and

from the first day of school, I fell in love with it a hundred per­cent. I was the shyest kid growing up, and I went in there and I did a monologue, and I was like, ‘Oh my God, this is so much fun! I don’t have to be me!’ It was a revelation, and from that day, I knew what I wanted to do.” After graduating from Juilliard, Baccarin understudied Natalie Portman in a Central Park production of Chekhov’s “The Seagull,” featuring Meryl Streep, Christopher Walken, and Philip Seymour Hoffman. “I don’t think I’ve ever learned more in my life,” she gushes. “It was an intense master class every day I was there.” And as she tells of a brief mis­step, we quickly learn where the stunning powerhouse gets her quiet malevolence as she leads the Visitors toward the vanquish­ing of the human race. When called to step in for Portman during a dress rehearsal, she relates, “I was jumping on Philip Seymour Hoffman’s cues, and he just went, ‘Shhh.’ And he put his finger on my lips to say, ‘Listen.’ Literally from that moment, I learned the biggest lesson an actor could possibly learn, which is to listen and to be present. And that’s all I needed. I didn’t need all the acting I was brewing up and concocting in my head. I just need­ed to sit there and listen to him, and my next line would come! And it did, and it was one of the most amazing experiences. And afterwards, Meryl Streep came up to me and put her hand on my face, and said, ‘That was beautiful.’ I could have died in that moment and been happy.”

Yet even though it may lead to the demise of the world as we know it, we’re glad she carried on. As Baccarin enjoys a break from shooting, she has some time to ponder the fascination we have with the idea of spacecrafts hovering ominously overhead, and an alien power determining our fate. “I think it’s something that we’re inherently interested in,” she confides, “because it would be very egotistical to think that we’re the only intelligent living beings in the entire universe. I think we’re fascinated with that, and there’s also something very vulnerable, and catastrophic, and huge about the image of a spaceship looming over cities. I think we’re immedi­ately attracted to that possibility. It takes us away from our lives enough to make us wonder and think about what’s out there. And it also reflects exactly what’s happening in the world today. These aliens come down and give us health care—it’s what we need!”

Baccarin is also appreciating some time amid solid objects, having spent her recent weeks in the computer-generated sur­roundings of the Visitor ships. “My sets are all CG,” she explains. “Everything I do is green screen. It’s really amazing how they’ve made the spaceship look and I’m floored by what they can cre­ate, but showing up to work in green screen every day gets a little trying. You just want something concrete to look at. It’s really dif­ficult, but I've been running around to the monitors, because we have this awesome technology where they can set up a shot and the computer reads what the room is, so on the monitor we can see the actual room in real time. So that’s really cool; I always check and see where I am!”

Though very young when she first watched the original “V,” which began as a pair of miniseries (1983 and 1984) and devel­oped into a full-fledged show (1984-1985), the performer remem­bers the carnivorous temperament of Jane Badler’s Diana, the Visi­tor leader whose shoes Baccarin has been chosen to fill. Regard­ing the infamous scene in which Diana swallows a guinea pig whole, the alluring star hints at the likelihood of similarly shocking events in the current run. “I’m up to the challenge of having those hallmark moments,” she grins. “It will be fun! I think we’ll plan to do it in a different way, but I’ve been told by the producers that we’re definitely not going to ignore those big elements. So hopefully it will be in a very creative way that we get to do that.”

And will the show provide the white-knuckled adrenaline rush we remember from back in the day? “Yes, yes, yes,” she replies. “I can’t even say it enough. We all re-watched the pilot recently as a launching-the-show hurrah, and I had goosebumps, I have to admit! And I’m not just saying this because I’m in it. I really did, and it’s a show I would tune into. I think it’s really fun, and very fast-paced, where you can’t catch your breath. And there are some great little twists by the end of the first four episodes that will leave people dying to see more.” And amid the fast-paced, nail-biting thrill of it all, Baccarin reveals, “There are some beautiful, beautiful things in there as well.”  ▼

“V” airs Tuesdays at 8pm on ABC. “Firefly” and its follow-up film, Serenity, are available on DVD.