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Wednesday February 21, 2007

Seventh heaven for CSI fans

FELLOW CSI: Crime Scene Investigation fans, did you think we’d have travelled this far? It’s been seven years down the road, and apparently (the show’s tagline) “Sin Never Sleeps” continues to captivate. And from what we hear, there is much to look forward to this season – from a guest appearance by the likes of The Who’s Roger Daltrey (in the episode Living Legend) to an illicit romance between Gil Grissom and Sara Sidle (did we hear you sigh “Finally?”) to someone leaving a trail of miniature crime scenes all over the place.

A couple of the CSIs get hurt along the way, including Catherine Willows who gets raped (Built to Kill) and Greg Sanders who gets beaten up (Fannysmakin’).

And (can you believe it?) Grissom takes a sabbatical! Here, William Petersen shares his thoughts on some of the upcoming themes and plotlines.

On Grissom and Sara’s affair

We’ve been together for a while; it’s just that no one knew it. It’s an interesting thing to play and it’s somewhat fraught with danger. In Grissom’s mind, it’s a secret affair. I don’t think he knows what will happen.

I think their relationship would be a disturbance to the rest of the team.

It wouldn’t be good for Grissom as he’s a supervisor and it wouldn’t be good for Sara who’s a subordinate. They realise the conflict, which makes for interesting drama.

On his (Petersen’s) sabbatical

I had a play sent to me from a person at a theatre in Rhode Island and I read it and was terribly moved by it.

I felt that it would be a tremendous challenge to try to make it happen, but I knew I needed to get back into theatre.Because it was a short run and over the holidays, we were able to fit it in without missing him (Grissom) too much.

On Grissom’s sabbatical

Grissom also wanted to take a break to do something that is closer to what he started out doing. Grissom was in a place where he was getting burned out doing his job and needed to touch base with those elements of his nature that made him a scientist and that was returning to the field to do teaching and research. At the beginning of CSI, he operated as a mentor to the other CSIs and now they’ve reached a level where they don’t require his expertise or leadership in that way.

On the miniatures

It’s a theatre within the theatre. The miniature killer is a horrible criminal and a genius at work. All of Grissom’s senses are engaged in this, and he wants to find out how and why this person is doing this.

The fact that there are clues left by the criminal intentionally is also fascinating to Grissom. He’s being led to a certain degree and it’s going to become more and more difficult for him to deal with.

It’s fascinating to us as the actors and characters, so hopefully it will be fascinating to the audience.

I had little soldiers when I was a kid and I used to stand them up all over the place and imagine entire worlds around them. My mother was fascinated with dollhouses. I think that is the part in us that is the child. Certainly, there is a part of this killer that remains in this child-like state.

On Liev Schreiber (who stands in for Petersen while he’s away)

I was hoping that we could alternate. I’d go do some theatre and he’d do CSI and vice versa. I don’t think it’s going to work out like that. I’m thrilled that he is here because it helps the show.

On Roger Daltrey’s guest appearance

There is a nice synchronicity to having Roger in the show considering what The Who has done for the CSI landscape. He had a tough thing to do in a very short period of time.

He did a remarkable job. (Theme tracks for all the CSI series including Miami and New York are classic rock gems by The Who).

CSI 7 premieres exclusively Wednesday night over Astro AXN Channel 17 at 10pm.

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