THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Thursday, October 12, 1995 TAG: 9510120026
SECTION: DAILY BREAK PAGE: E1 EDITION: FINAL
TYPE: Column
SOURCE: Larry Bonko
LENGTH: Long : 102 lines
FROM INSIDE a large canvas tent filled with the tools of archaeology - the science and art of digging for the remains of man's past - comes the rolling baritone of actor John Rhys-Davies.
``In the forests of northern India 160 years ago, the ruins of a great lost city came to light. . . .''
Rhys-Davies is introducing an episode of ``Archaeology,'' which last month began its fourth season on The Learning Channel. The series is produced in Virginia Beach by New Dominion Pictures. It's on TLC Mondays at 8 and 11 p.m. and Sunday at 9:30 and 11:30 p.m.
From offices at the Oceanfront, executive producers Tom Naughton, Nicolas Valcour, Mary Ellen Iwatt and Tom Simon have dispatched crews to Italy, Chile, Egypt and many other points on the globe to gather the raw material for 13 episodes each season.
Rhys-Davies, the host and narrator of ``Archaeology,'' is far from the digs where skeletons in an ancient graveyard near Rome have been uncovered. On this day of filming, Rhys-Davies speaks of the mysteries of India's Temples of the Kama Sutra, but in fact he is half a world away from the temple walls.
Rhys-Davies is before a camera rolling along a short track in Virginia Beach's First Landing (formerly Seashore) State Park, which is just a stone's throw from busy Shore Drive. He has just finished a catered lunch of pizza.
The forests of northern India?
Hardly.
On this day in Virginia Beach, producer-director Naughton has set up a shoot that passes for deep inside India because he learned long ago to trick the camera into thinking that First Landing State Park is India, the Amazon, Australia, Turkey, Russia, Greece, almost anywhere.
Earlier this year, after Naughton called for an immense photograph of a Mayan temple to be set up on the park's sandy floor, Virginia Beach became the jungles of Honduras for an episode of ``Archaeology'' called ``Clash of the Maya Superpowers.''
``The park,'' said Naughton, ``holds lots of possibilities for the filmmaker.''
It is Hollywood come east when New Dominion Pictures sets up in Virginia Beach. Rhys-Davies rolls to the shoot in a white limousine 30 feet long driven by a chauffeur dressed in coat and tie.
When he leaves the limo, Rhys-Davies finds Carol Maxwell waiting to do his makeup - the actor asks to look as if he has a good tan - as well as a bustling ant colony of grips, electricians, gaffers and Charles Tinsley manning the teleprompter.
Also working under bright white lights carried to the park are director of photography Dave Haycox, production manager Joy Nimmo, art director John Wade and about a dozen others who at times sit on rented chairs. Naughton's company has generated millions for the local economy in producing this series.
``What we do here in Virginia Beach is filming that measures up tothe industry's highest standards,'' said Naughton. ``We don't waste time.''
Or compromise quality.
``Archaeology'' is a uniformly handsome television series, and a darn interesting one. Among the episodes that Rhys-Davies will introduce this year are ``Death at Pompeii,'' ``A Roman Plague'' and ``Raiders of the Civil War.'' Shooting concluded in Virginia Beach last week.
Rhys-Davies recently came from his home on the Isle of Man in the Irish Sea to finish up the narrations for the new season, clicking them off at the rate of five a day. He has the voice and the on-camera presence to elevate the words in the ``Archaeology'' scripts to high drama. He brings to the show a bit of the swagger of ``Raiders of Lost Ark,'' in which he appeared 14 years ago.
Rhys-Davies booms out, ``The tomb and final resting place of Alexander the Great remains one of the most elusive and prized archaeological treasures of all time.'' You feel the goose bumps rising even on a hot and humid October day.
Now it is time for Rhys-Davies to bring on the episode about an epidemic of malaria that swept through a city called Sagalassos that was once part of the Roman Empire. ``Disaster struck in AD 541 in the form of a plague that killed nearly half the population, not long after the city was wracked by catastrophic earthquakes.''
More goose bumps.
Off camera, Rhys-Davies is a jovial bear of a man who says he is famous from his work in films and television, but not too famous. At airports, he has been mistaken for Dom DeLuise and Wolfman Jack.
And always, he is in demand by producers here and abroad. ``It is apparently a seller's market for tall, fat, ugly actors with loud voices,'' he said.
Rhys-Davies will soon resume work in Vancouver, British Columbia, on ``Sliders,'' a science-fiction series that Fox canceled and then brought back as a midseason replacement. He was marvelously blustery in that role.
Naughton sends camera crews to South American forests, to paths once traveled by Attila the Hun and into the shadow of Mount Vesuvius. But Rhys-Davies has yet to break away from his busy schedule in films and TV to accompany the New Dominion crews in search of interesting holes in the ground.
Maybe next year.
Until that happens, he will pop into Virginia Beach from time to time, be carried to some local spot chosen by Naughton to resemble Siberia or wherever, and boom out on cue the introductions to ``Archaeology.''
``I'm John Rhys-Davies. Join me as we go in search of Russian Amazons.''
Nobody except you and I have to know that when he said that, Rhys-Davies was standing in Virginia Beach. There wasn't a Russian Amazon in sight. by CNB