Richard Dean Anderson is a dab-hand at using pocket knives: “The best thing you can do with a Swiss army knife is cut your nose hairs. In fact I may have done it recently.”
The 64-year-old, best known for his role the as innovative MacGyver, is in Auckland for the Armageddon pop culture expo this weekend.
Also known as Jack O’Neill from Stargate –” he was a little bit more fun to play because I could be a smart ass” – Anderson is something of a pop culture icon, so what do fans have to look forward to when they make the trip to see him?
“I’m not sure what I am doing. Talk to people, have pictures taken…Why do you know something I don’t know?”
The role that kick-started the fame, the glory and the selfies begun with the decision to don glasses at an audition.
“My own personality was not so vain, it was humble enough to be able to wear glasses during an interview. They all looked at each other and said ‘that’s the quality we want’.
“My hair was also blowing all over the place, it was long and I had a leather jacket. I had just gotten off my motorcycle and raced over for the auditions so all the stars aligned that fateful day in 1985.”
Now, however, he is more self conscious: “as the years go on I become less and less recognisable as MacGyver because that’s time marching on and gravity having its effect on skin and fat and such things as people acquire during the aging process.”
MacGyver’s refusal to use guns was seen as a brave move in America at the time but Anderson says the crew hadn’t anticipated the reaction.
“Instead of using a gun he had a science background and the whole concept was based on his knowledge of things. The science of things.
“That concept caught on with the younger audience initially and then the families, the mums and dads realised their kids were looking at something wholesome-ish.”
As for those famous garage-door-rolls that created a generation of kids with cuts and bruises from attempting to “MacGyver it”?
“Came to me like that. I used to do it in real life. My parents would lock me out and the only place I could sleep was the garage. They’d close it on me and I’d have to roll under because that’s where my sleeping bag was.”
He’s joking.
“But it sounds good.”
Jess McAllen, stuff.co.nz , October 24, 2014
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