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PSI FACTOR:
Close and Personal
Laziness not a Psi Factor
No hair-raising tales with Psi
Aykroyd's high on spirits
PSI FACTOR: All you'll need to know!
The investigators from PSI FACTOR: CHRONICLES OF THE PARANORMAL don't have to believe in the supernatural to explain the show's spirited rise in popularity, a surge that recently secured a 22 episode renewal for a third season, bringing the total to 66 episodes to date. While there has been lots of paranormal activity on-screen, it's the hard work off-screen by the producers that explain the improvement to what was already a first-class product. Their efforts have clearly pleased viewers as ratings have increased markedly since PSI FACTOR's 1996 debut. While the show had always been popular among women, more and more men began tuning in this past season. In fact, viewership among men aged 18-34 increased by a staggering 92 per cent in 1997. The biggest transition from PSI FACTOR's first season was to focus on one investigation in each hour-long episode. In each of the previous shows, the Office of Scientific Investigation and Research (OSIR) team had to tackle two paranormal puzzles. That change alone gave the writers time to go beyond stories which centre on the paranormal event not the human element. "Instead of focusing on the phenomenon, we began to focus on our heroes and how they react to the phenomenon," says Executive Producer James Nadler of ATLANTIS. "So now a show won't just be a tale about ghosts but how the members of the OSIR team feel about ghosts as they try to solve the mystery. That's what good story-telling is. The audience wants a representative, someone it can follow through the story. You want some kind of personal connection to the people you tune in to watch each week. "In order to build that personal connection between the audience and the PSI FACTOR heroes, more attention was paid to both the look and substance of the central characters. "We have a terrific ensemble cast." Nadler points out. "And we wanted them to pop off the screen even more. In the first season, they all played professional investigators but seemed a little too interchangeable." In the case of Senior Data Analyst Lindsay Donner, played by Nancy Anne Sakovich, this meant developing story lines which showed off different facets of her character. In Season One, Donner came across as warm and professional," says Nadler. "In Season Two, we were able to show more of her passion, anger, sense of humor and ambition. We established Donner as the team's undercover expert and started to explore her personal history. And it helps that Nancy is someone who can handle martial arts and action scenes really well." Donner's wardrobe was tweaked in season two to give her a sleeker, more sophisticated look. The response to these changes has been strong especially among men writing into the show via the Internet. But while the show's resident beauty attracts viewers, so does its beasts. Werewolves, ectoplasmic apparitions, yetis, vampires...you name it, PSI FACTOR has it, along with a healthy dose of hauntings, possessions, alien abductions and the like. "That's where the real fun is," says Nadler. "And it's also a challenge, coming up with, say, a different kind of story about a werewolf. But we managed to do it, and viewers are responding." He laughs. "Actually, our werewolf was bald. We did one of the first bald were-wolves. It was different but I think it worked. Then again, a monster is in the eyes of the beholder."
If Psi Factor's Nancy Anne Sakovich doesn't get back to work soon, her
knees might never forgive her. Just back from the gym, she's
settled into a cozy spot in her Toronto home, decaf coffee in hand and
bags of ice on her sore knees -- ready for an interview.
Shooting for the paranormal drama, which is now in its second season, wrapped in
December and could resume later this month.
"Since the show's finished I've gone back to a really strict gym regime...,"
she says by way of explanation, giving no indication of workout regret.
After a gentle suggestion she might consider slowing down, Sakovich utters a
sheepish "Yeah..."
One of Canada's busiest actors, there's little chance Sakovich will
downshift her heavy workout schedule until she has to.
For now, Sakovich is relishing her freedom, and her personal trainer.
"It is really nice. I'm so comfortable with (down time)."
On Psi Factor, which airs at 8 p.m. Fridays, Sakovich plays
Lindsay Donner, a member of a scientific team which explores paranormal
phenomena from apparent alien abductions to hyper-realistic dreams.
As part of the show's ensemble cast, Sakovich had to assimilate a
number of changes this season, especially two new characters.
Matt Frewer, know best for his 80s turn as Max Headroom, steps in as Lindsay's
new case manager. Despite his somewhat dour role, Frewer cracks up his
coworkers on the set, she says.
"He's very funny. He keeps things light."
And there's Michael Moriarty, who might be the only famous
American actor who, for political reasons, has left the U.S. to work in
Canada's relatively tiny entertainment industry.
"I was thrilled because I watched him on Law & Order. I so admired his work," says
Sakovich of her famous co-star, whose role is as a mysterious informant
who feeds Lindsay and her team secret info.
Sakovich calls Moriarty a "generous" actor. "He never changes
his performance based on whether it's your close-up or his."
Another major shift is from a half-hour format to an hour.
"It's so much better. We used to have so little time to tell a story.
In a half hour you have 22 minutes. And Dan (Aykroyd) does the intro and
the extro, so that takes off another few minutes.
"We had 17, 18 minutes to tell a story."
Sakovich also welcomes the chance to explore Lindsay's personal life.
"In the first season all the characters were in the same boat, in that
there wasn't time to know anything about them personally. Now the hour
allows us all to reveal more of who these people are."
Sakovich casts her mind back to episodes filmed long ago for examples.
One instalment in particular, called Bad Dreams, Sakovich says, explored a
lot of personal territory.
In Bad Dreams, a series of women are suffering physical abuse -- only the
attacks happen while they're dreaming. They actually wake up with wounds.
"Lindsay becomes a part of that. She becomes aware that it is possible
to affect one's destiny. Everyone has the ability to control their own fate."
It may sound like a simple principle, but Sakovich says she learned similar
lessons only recently.
Sakovich says the experience of shooting a made-for-TV movie about
Canadian Olympic rower Silken Laumann -- which aired in the summer of 1996
-- taught her everything about seizing conttrol of one's life.
"She refused to succumb to twists of fate. After the accident in which she
almost lost her leg, she wasn't going to let it stop her from her dreams."
Suddenly the swollen knees come into perspective.
"I always say go big or go home," she admits.
Wednesday, April 8, 1998
By TRALEE PEARCE -- Ottawa Sun
No hair-raising tales with Psi:
Series based on 'actual case files' of unusual occurrences is ludicrous
An
unseen force closes on the hand, compelling the changing of the channel.
Paranormal phenomenon?
Nah.
Just a reasonable reaction to the series Psi Factor: Chronicles Of The
Paranormal, premiering tomorrow night at 10 on Global.
This eye-rollingly stupid X-Files Meets Unsolved Mysteries draws its plots
from "the actual case files" of a California-based believers group
named the Office of Scientific Investigation and Research, a team apparently
on speed-dial to every unusual occurrence around the globe. The title only
sounds like a haircare product. Psi is a letter in the Greek alphabet,
symbolizing the unknown.
Mixing reality TV re-enactment techniques with drama - there are two stories
in each weekly hour - an incident is presented and actors playing OSIR
scientists investigate.
Team leader is the wooden Professor Connor Doyle (Paul Miller), a Secret
Service type often seen dictating into his ear-piece.
"Case log update," Doyle says in episode one, Dream House, in
which an unfinished house attacks the owners and construction workers.
"Accoustical, atmospheric and nuclear flux technologies have been
introduced to the environment. All elimination procedures have proved thus
far unsuccessful considering bridge procedure with OSIR A.I. specialist."
Say what?
"Operatives specializing in alternative information using metaphysical
techniques," says Doyle.
Help. A ton of gibberish has fallen on me and I can't get up.
The cast seem to have been directed to portray the OSIR scientists as robotic
brow-furrowers who talk like textbooks. Not that they don't brighten at any
suggestion that events are paranormally-based. In Dream House, no sooner
has a psychic theorized that apparitions are future versions of the
homeowners sending them warnings from a parallel dimension, than these
scientists are nodding like dashboard dogs. Hey, forget all those readings
we've taken with those goofy gadgets that look like the prop department
hung everything it could find from a strap. Parallel dimension. Of course.
Psi Factor is attached to its techno-hooey accoutrements to the point of
unintentional hilarity, as in Dream House when the team gathers in their
mobile headquarters to audio- and video-monitor a meeting between the
homeowner and - oooh, the heart races - his realtor.
"He's changed his mind," Doyle says urgently, as the men dicker
over price.
"Come on, come on," urges a team member.
Real edge of the seat stuff.
For all its gizmos, Psi Factor is most in love with old-fashioned hypnotic
regression, a technique featured in all four of the episodes sent for
screening.
Here's one mystery solved: It is possible to overact an introduction.
Host Dan Aykroyd, called upon to introduce and wrap-up each case, delivers
his lines in the clipped diction of his Joe Friday Dragnet performance.
And what lines they are.
"Blayne learned the somewhat elusive but ultimately obvious truth,"
Aykroyd says in insipid homily number one.
"That sometimes a dream home is not built with wood, brick or stone
but rather on the foundation of love, the contentment and happiness of one's
family."
Deadpan and dead serious, Psi Factor is absolutely ridiculous.
October 4, 1996
By CLAIRE BICKLEY, Toronto Sun
HOLLYWOOD
-- When some supernatural monster is killinng thousands of goats in Florida
and Puerto Rico, "Who ya gonna call? Goatbusters!"
Dan Aykroyd cracks the joke but he's still deadly serious about paranormal
and supernatural phenomena. So much so he plans to launch and host an
independent television series called PSI Factor. "I'm the Robert Stack
figure," he teases. "I'm hosting the show."
The series will investigate the weird, the wonderful, the wacky and -- yes
-- even the goat massacres Miami TV reporteer Maria Salas has queried him
about at a surreal press conference. "I'm not aware of that. If you can
give me a reference on that, I'll have our investigative group look into
it."
Ignoring obvious giggles and guffaws, Aykroyd calls PSI Factor "a very
interesting project." Aykroyd is soon to be seen in Celtic Pride with
Daniel Stern and Damon Wayans, and is currently in Sgt. Bilko with Steve
Martin, but it's PSI Factor that really scorches his belly.
"We are dramatizing real paranormal supernatural investigative cases
undertaken by a group called the Office for Scientific Investigation and
Research. They take supernatural events that have occurred around the world
and break them down scientifically to find out whether they're a hoax or
whether there is a logical explanation."
In some situations, the researchers have discounted the hoax factor and yet
found no logical reason for specific occurrences, Aykroyd says.
"In many cases, we have incredibly scary and stimulating, unresolved
cases pointing to the fact that we are living in a world that encompasses a
lot more than just the four dimensions we see. There is a tremendous amount
we don't see in this world and the mystical is going to come into play.
"As we approach the year 2000 mankind is going to be looking for a
spiritual answer and a more satisfying reason for why we're all here."
He cites a recent report from the People's Republic of China about Mongolians
swarmed by killer fleas: "People were dying from flea bites. When you
think fleas you think of fleas like this (he pinches his digits together
indicating something minuscule). These fleas were the size of Chow dogs!"
PSI Factor will investigate. (No one mentions Fleabusters.)
Aykroyd is gearing for a fall release and plans to shoot the initial
22-part series with Toronto's Atlantis Films. For Aykroyd, whose roots are
in Kingston and the Ottawa Valley, this is a family obsession stretching back
four generations. His great-grandfather corresponded with Arthur Conan Doyle
and Bertrand Russell "on matters of spirituality." His grandfather
held seances in the old family farmhouse" (near Kingston), and
"my dad also had that stuff going on."
The laughter that talking about the supernatural inspires -- including open
ridicule at the press conference -- is of no concern, Aykroyd says. "I'm
approaching this in a very serious manner. In the first episode, I'm going
to introduce myself saying that: 'You know me from comedies but we're
dealing with cases that actually happened.' I'm committed. It's one of the
most exciting things I've worked on in my life!"
Tuesday, April 9, 1996
By BRUCE KIRKLAND, Toronto Sun
PSI FACTOR: All you'll need to know!
The
Premise: Each episode is based on true cases from the files of the
Office of Scientific Investigation and Research – OSIR. Each story follows
the investigation by a team of OSIR experts of an incident that apparently
defies explanation by all the standard means of enquiry and forensic science.
Often the team’s conclusions support the existence of extraterrestrial life
or the supernatural, but occasionally a more down-to-Earth explanation is
uncovered in the grand old tradition of Scooby-Doo.
Background: Dan Ghostbusters Aykroyd, who introduces each episode of
Psi Factor Rod Serling style, has been a lifelong student of the paranormal
and, along with his brother Peter Aykroyd, is one of the main driving forces
behind the show. Undoubtedly the popularity of the similarly-themed The
X-Files made selling the show a somewhat easier task.
First Run: The show debuted on 11th April 1996 in the States but
eventually made it over to the UK in 1998 when the Sci-Fi Channel acquired
Seasons One and Two. Sci-Fi will be showing the third season later this year.
Number of Episodes: By the end of the third season, which is still in
production, the show will number 66 one-hour episodes. However, most of the
first season shows were made up of two half-hour stories.
The Good Guys: In the first season the OSIR team comprised Case
Managers Professor Connor Doyle (Paul Miller) and Dr Curtis Rollins (Maurice
Dean Wint), rookie Lindsay Donner (Nancy Anne Skovich), physicist and
statistician Peter Axon (Barclay Hope), psychiatrist Professor Anton
Hendricks (Colin Fox) and anthropologist and former journalist Natasha
Constantine (Lisa LaCroix). For Season Two, Connor Doyle was replaced by
Matt Praeger (Matt Max Headroom Frewer), and in Season Three the team was
joined by Director of Operations Frank Elsinger (Nigel Bennett) and Security
Co-ordinator Ray Donahue (Peter MacNeill).
The Bad Guys: Well, it’s not quite that black and white on this show.
As with The X-Files the bad guys are sometimes not as bad as they seem… and
vice versa! Semi-regular Michael Kelly (Michael Moriarty) is effectively
Psi Factor’s equivalent of Deep Throat and pops up in several stories to
give a helping hand.
And Isn’t That... War of the Worlds stars Lynda Mason Green and
Philip Akin pop up in the Season One episodes Reptilian Revenge and The
Undead respectively. Teen heart-throb Corey Haim is in the final episode
of Season Two, The Egress.
Overdone Cliches: Well, although quite a good show, Psi Factor
is very obviously ‘borrowing’ from The X-Files on a weekly basis and they
do rather overplay the serious docu-drama angle, particularly in the early
episodes.
Fashion Statements: Definitely smart suits, rain coats and sensible
skirts. Dull.
Psyched Up:
The Light -- First hour-length episode in which team member Curtis
has a near-death experience which releases a doppelganger into the world at
large.
Perestroika -- The closing episode to Season One has the OSIR team
battling a prehistoric monster in the Russian wastes… with fatal results.
The Egress -- An excellent cliff-hanger ending to Season Two when the
OSIR discover a gateway to another dimension, and we learn that one of the
team is a traitor.
Psyched Out:
UFO Encounter -- The team investigate UFO sightings in a small town
and discover that low flying helicopters are to blame. Yawn.
Cult Times Special #09
By John Ainsworth
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