Actor-athlete goes the distance

JAG veteran making Impact on set of TV mini-series
Michael D. Reid, Times ColonistPublished: Monday, May 26, 2008

There's something to that axiom about how everyone loves a man in uniform.

Just ask David James Elliott. The Canadian actor developed a whole new fan base in 1995 when he was cast as the star of JAG, the hit CBS military adventure series that ran for 10 years.

"Women were never interested in me before that," deadpans Elliott, 48. "It's flattering."

It's easy to see why readers have been calling this desk with dinner invitations, photo requests and queries as to the whereabouts of the actor best known as Cmdr. Harmon Rabb Jr. in the show conceived as "Top Gun meets A Few Good Men."

Smartly dressed in a navy blazer, slacks and gleaming black dress shoes, the Milton, Ont.-born actor is the epitome of the head-turning hunk, oozing smooth charm and quick wit as he puffs on a cigar outside his trailer near the set of Impact.

No stranger to wearing uniforms -- from playing head-injured Canadian football star Terry Evanshen in The Man Who Lost Himself to David Renwald, a coast guard officer with multiple sclerosis on Global's The Guard -- he's doing it again.

Elliott is stepping into a spacesuit for one of his many scenes as Dr. Alex Kinter, an Ottawa-based astrophysicist and single father who with a German scientist (Benjamin Sadler) has to rocket to the moon in a bid to avert a global catastrophe.

The $14-million TV mini-series being filmed here charts the worldwide mayhem that ensues when an asteroid hits the moon, sending it on a collision course with Earth. It co-stars Natasha Henstridge and James Cromwell.

Although Impact is loaded with visual effects and action in multiple locations, Elliott's challenges lie elsewhere.

"I have to call on my memory a lot. There's a lot of scientific dialogue to cram in," he says. "But we've got a great cast and crew and we're having fun. I think it'll translate well to the screen."

Elliott can relate to Kinter's paternal aspects, being a devoted family man himself. The Los Angeles-based actor is married to actress Nanci Chambers, who played Lt. Loren Singer in JAG. They have two children -- Stephanie, 14, and Wyatt, 5.

He just wishes he could be at home as much as he was while shooting episodic television in L.A.

"They understand. It's what I do. I've been doing a lot more movies and other things and travelling more, which makes it a little difficult. It's never ideal but what am I going to do? This is the business we've chosen."

Elliott chose it after briefly dropping out of high school to pursue his dream of becoming a rock star. Inspired by a teacher who praised his reading of King Lear, he went to Ryerson and became a member of Stratford's Young Company.

Since then, the six-foot-four actor has appeared in films and dozens of TV shows including Street Legal, Knot's Landing, The Untouchables, Melrose Place (as a sex-addicted football player), Seinfeld, Medium and JAG, as well as playing egocentric district attorney James Conlon in the CBS legal series Close to Home.

Doing JAG for 10 years gave Elliott the freedom to pick projects more for artistic merit than megabucks, he says.

When his interviewer confesses he wasn't one of JAG's millions of fans, he feigns anger.

"We didn't need you, man," he deadpans. "It's still on the air."

He says he had "a blast" recently playing the father of a lonely lad with a beloved stuffed toy in Gooby, Canadian writer-director Wilson Coneybeare's family-friendly blend of live-action and computer-generated effects. Described as "Harvey meets Harry and the Hendersons," the upcoming film also features Robbie Coltrane and Eugene Levy.

Elliott is also pumped about The Rainbow Tribe, an indie charmer in which he plays a middle-aged man with a brain tumour who finds fulfilment "and a reason to go on" as a counsellor for a ragtag group of kids at a beloved summer camp of his childhood.

"There was no money in it but the script was one of the best I've ever read."

Like Robert Downey, Jr., Elliott has also strutted his stuff as Iron Man -- albeit a different variety.
An endurance athlete who also loves to fish and golf -- often in charity tournaments -- Elliott has done the Ironman World Championship in Hawaii, several half-Ironmans and Olympic-distance triathlons, and 15 marathons from Boston to Lake Tahoe.

Laughing, he says he can't help himself.

"I'm an obsessive-compulsive guy," he says. "It lends itself well because you can hyper-focus. I started doing it because it behooves me to stay in shape. I can go the distance. I may not be the fastest guy on the track but I'll probably be the last guy to stop."

mreid@tc.canwest.com
Had this in a Google news alert... quite an interesting article. Can't wait until we see him back on television!