Jamie Bamber wants his “horrendous green flight suit.”
That’s the one thing the actor, who plays Commander Lee Adama on Sci Fi Channel’s popular “Battlestar Galactica” series, wants to take home after the series concludes.
“I was thinking about it the other day,” Bamber said during a recent conference call with reporters. “That would look good framed, hung on the wall. So I think I might do that.”
Bamber is now filming the fourth and final season of the series (set to premiere in April) and promoting “Battlestar Galactica: Razor” (tonight at 9 on Sci Fi Channel).
The movie flashes back to Lee’s first mission as commander of the Battlestar Pegasus.
“It’s interesting to reminisce,” he said. “I was harking back to where Lee was and where Jamie was a couple of seasons ago. It was a lot of fun. Every one of us in the ‘Galactica’ family has always nurtured a not-so-secret passion to try and make a movie out of the show.”
“Razor” also gave Bamber the opportunity to explore Lee’s contentious relationship with his father, Admiral William Adama (Edward James Olmos).
“There’s this difficult figure in (Lee’s) life that he kind of envied, looked up to, admired, worshiped and also had a great many problems with,” Bamber said. “A man who he felt distant from and didn’t really understand and felt was disconnected with his own upbringing and his own life. So to get the chance in ‘Razor’ to flesh out that process with him gradually assuming command was really fun and really interesting.”
The London native, who will appear in a GLAAD public service announcement against homophobia immediately following the movie, appreciates the show’s willingness to explore such contemporary issues as Abu Ghraib and suicide bombers.
“Science fiction has always been about the world in which we live and looking at the logical conclusions for the directions were headed in,” he said. “We have the privilege of being set in space, and so nobody really puts the microscope on us. And we’re able to tell these stories in ways that are general enough to be resonant for future generations as well. . . . The aim I would say of ‘Battlestar’ is to really make a stink about our civilization and what we do to ourselves on this planet.”
Bamber doesn’t know the final fate of his character, but he does offer some hints for the upcoming season.
“He butts heads with characters that previously he would not have butt heads with. And he finds himself in line with characters he figured he wouldn’t be in line (with). And there’s a new side of me, a new ambitious side of me that comes out, too.”
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