QUANTUM LEAP Leaps into WonderCon 2023 – Interviews Pt 3 with Raymond Lee, Caitlin Bassett, Dean GeorgarisDate: Saturday, March 25, 2023
Location: WonderCon 2023 – Anaheim, CA
Date: Saturday, March 25, 2023
At WonderCon 2023, day two….getting déjà vu? I’m sure you’ve probably read this already because this is the third and final interview round from NBC’s QUANTUM LEAP press room at WonderCon 2023. I won’t bore with the details that are already noted in the first two rounds of interviews – Ernie Hudson and Deborah Pratt (EP) and Mason Alexander Park and Nanrisa Lee.
The final round of interviews is with actors Raymond Lee and Caitlin Bassett, along with Executive Producer Dean Georgaris. One thing that resonated with me is the fact that R. Lee is Asian-American, as am I, and he addresses the fact that at the time he was cast for Quantum Leap, Asian hate was going on. This series premiered in September 2022, and there were a lot of things happening in the world, including hate crimes against Asian-Americans. And Georgaris’ answer is amazing: “I want to be clear, the best actor on the planet for the role just happened to be Asian American…”
The chemistry of this cast is off-the-chart; the genuine adoration lingers in the room as these amazing, talented actors coexist on a grueling set day in and day out. Even in a press room at a convention, they’re unable to hide the fact that they truly like each other.
I would like to apologize in advance to Caitlin Bassett and Dean Georgaris for the photo below. Bassett looks slightly confused, and Georgaris looks like he needs the coffee she’s holding…my bad. It wasn’t easy doing a screenshot off the video without a ton of people floating around in the background, and/or without one or both you with your eyes closed. You still look fabulous in the video, though and that’s what really counts. Raymond Lee, you look fabulous too!
Please see the full transcription below.
Quantum Leap – WonderCon 2023 Interview Pt 3 – Raymond Lee, Caitlin Bassett, Dean Georgaris
Quantum Leap – Raymond Lee, Caitlin Bassett, Dean Georgaris Interview – video transcription:
OUTLET 1: I’ve watched the original, but I’m feeling what a lot of people are feeling is like the whole retro-fatigue is like here’s a reboot OK, I get it. So, what is your, like kind of encouragement people to check out Quantum Leap? I do know from the trailer, you look super fun in it, so you’re kind of encouraging me to watch it. So, it’s kind of like what your thoughts are on that?
GEORGARIS: What I would say is, you know, people hear reboot and they think, ohh, we’re gonna just copy what they did in different era and stick it on now. And I think what they should hear is that was a really powerful universal story.
This is a really interesting time in the world to start telling that story again. And I think that’s really one of the many secrets behind Quantum Leap, is that it’s a show that seems to return to TV when we need it.
[overlap – someone brings R. Lee a snack]
GEORGARIS: And I am not repeating that answer.
BASSETT: And, and now we have snacks.
YEC/JUDY: To go with said coffee.
R. LEE: I will say this. And I don’t know how purposeful it was at the top, and being one Asian American to another (he looks at Outlet 1), when I was cast in this show, Asian hate was going on. And to see, you know, and I don’t think it’s a pointed thing, but to see an Asian person being the face of empathy, so to speak, I think will have a ripple effect, right? And I and it’s definitely made my circle see things differently.
And I can only imagine, they’re, if people talking about it, that it’s subconsciously working on some sort of a level. So, I have to commend the people who made the decision to put someone like me at the forefront, to be something to be very poignant.
GEORGARIS: If I could just add to that in terms of timeliness, I want to be clear, the best actor on the planet for the role just happened to be Asian American, right? So it wasn’t like the agenda was we have to pick someone from a category.
Ray is unbelievable. Every week that’s another reason to watch. Just watch to see what he does and the fact that he’s an Asian American and we can draw on that experience is a bonus.
But to be clear, he’s cast because he is the best.
YEC/JUDY: And to follow up on that note, your character shows so much empathy and you convey it with such a genuine realness, it comes through the screen.
Can you tell me, like your mindset as well because there are so many diverse episodes and story arts and each jump that you do, each leap.
Can you tell me, like, your mindset as you go into like each script, you’re like, OK, I’ve got to be this person, you know? And then how can I convey that, you know, genuine empathy?
R. LEE: The story informs me, my first look at it, and I look at what is this episode about? What is the theme of this? I have to absorb that first. But I also think this the probably the way I was brought up, you know I was taught to think and care for other people.
And so part of what I’m working through in therapy is to like not fix everybody’s feelings, right. And so, but I can’t help it. Like, in my circumstance and how I grew up, I was always looking to fix situations, right.
So, I think Ben Song has something of that in him where he doesn’t want to, but he can’t help it and so he finds people in situations, and he can’t help it.
So, yeah, I just kind of keep having to look at each scene through this lens of he can’t help it and ultimately there’s a part of him that gets fulfilled by helping. So it’s sort of, it’s just an extension of what I was taught.
So you would say you’re 50% you and 50% Ben, in this, in this?
OUTLET 2: When you have a military background, so how has that helped you play Addison?
BASSETT: It’s helped tremendously in the sense that it’s not something I have to create, right? So and the writers were wonderful enough to write to it and include it in like a really real way, not just a peripheral where, you know, that’s just [overlap] the episode where we learned about [overlap] yeah, [overlap] your dad and everything was amazing [overlap] but everything, but it’s they’ve included a character, a female character, that’s has this experience.
But what I love about it, and which I hope other veterans coming into the industry can also do, is that being, yeah, in the military was a big and very formative experience, incredibly so, but it’s only one experience and only one part of who you are.
And so that, you know, leaning on that, I don’t have to create it. It’s there when I need it, but I also know when to put it down and just be a person or be, you know, a friend or lover or a broken heart, you know, like it just you. So, it’s, it’s helped a ton and I love how they’ve included it.
GEORGARIS: It probably helps too because it’s really demanding to be one of the two actors that basically are working every day, you know, 12 hours a day. I think you need the discipline to sort of keep your life going, keep your studies going, if you’re acting, you know what I mean? Like, I think you do a lot of work off camera. Yeah, though I think the military, that military background helps.
BASSETT: Yeah, it helped a lot. [overlap]
GEORGARIS: You always were. [unitelligible]
OUTLET 3: As we head into the season finale and then looking ahead into season 2, how much do the writers let the actors know what’s possibly coming up for their characters?
GEORGARIS: We, Martin and I, tell our cast a lot.
Because I think, in particular, because it’s such a demanding show and each leap is demanding so much of their acting that you want to give them a sense of what the arc is going to be.
So, you know, Ray can know, ‘alright, in these two episodes, I’m going to be angry, I understand that I’m going to be angry because I’m going to get less angry later.’
So, we tell them a lot. We trust them.
R. LEE and BASSETT: Yeah.
R. LEE: They’re an open book. Whatever we need to know, they tell us and…
GEORGARIS: And they know if they spill the secrets…done.
OUTLET 2: The love story, you know, it’s a tricky thing. It could, you know, it could have gone wrong, but it went very right. You know, you guys have a great chemistry.
I mean, can you talk about like playing that all season and having to develop and having to, you know, deal with the fact that Ben can’t remember everything and, you know, everything, you know… [overlap]
BASSETT: Wait, is there a love story?
R. LEE: We’re supposed to be in love? We missed that one.
YEC/JUDY: (to Georgaris) Where were you? You said you told them everything?
BASSETT: Lies!
GEORGARIS: [overlap] Just… don’t think I just said.
R. LEE: You know, it’s… we’re we’re partners, right. Like we’re friends before anything else and I think we’re always constantly looking out for each other and you know our check-ins are very frequent. Caitlin asks me 10 times a day how you doing, how you doing, how you doing, you know and she’s very in-tune.
She’s very present in a scene partner and a friend and somebody who I’ve logged the most hours acting with anyone in my life, that’s what you want, you know.
And so we’re constantly looking for ways to better each other in scenes and how we can make each other look the best.
And really, it helps everything, right.
It helps the story, it helps to arc, it helps, it helps just to be friends. So, I think yeah… we’re… yeah.
BASSETT: We’re buds. Yeah. A very good lesson I learned you know, or everyone, every actor learns in theater school is, is the most important scene part…person in the scene is your scene partner and I think as long as you also that’s on and off screen, I learned is what they don’t teach you.
And so as long as you’re taking care of everybody, actors, crew, you know, like they take care of you, and it works.
GEORGARIS: You know, we’ve approached this as two people who are in love who have this incredible trauma, crisis, which is they’re separated. And what you’re watching in the first season is how they stay bonded despite the fact that they’re enduring this crisis.
And I think it’s the fact that they sort of like one may err a little bit, be a little mean one episode, but the other one cuts some slack. I think seeing them work together, you get that feeling of, ahh, this is a couple working through, you know, a crisis.
Thank you.
Thank you so much, wonderful to meet you.
—- END —
Tune in for the QUANTUM LEAP season one finale on Monday, April 3, 2023 at 10/9c on NBC and next day on Peacock
Follow on Social: @NBC #QuantumLeap and you can follow the Writers at @QuantumWriters
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