Caprica (series)

From Battlestar Wiki, the free, open content Battlestar Galactica encyclopedia and episode guide

For information on the colony in the Re-imagined Series, see Caprica (RDM). For other uses, see Caprica.

Caprica
Created by	Remi Aubuchon
Starring
Theme music by
Statistics
Production company	NBC Universal
Number of seasons
Number of episodes	(list)
Debut channel	Sci Fi Channel
US first-run airdates
UK first-run airdates	Spring 2009[1]
DVD release
Production staff
Executive producer(s)	Ronald D. Moore David Eick Remi Aubuchon
Producer(s)
Supervising producer(s)
Associate producer(s)
Co-producer(s)
Story editor(s)
Online Purchasing
Available at iTunes – [ Purchase]

Caprica is a future television spin-off of the Re-imagined Series to be produced by Remi Aubuchon, Ronald D. Moore, David Eick for the Sci Fi Channel. It is currently in post-production with two scripts for a tentative series having been ordered.

Caprica is a prequel to the Re-imagined Series that deals with the Adama and Graystone families on the planet Caprica and the invention of the Cylons.

Contents 1 Overview 2 Plot summary 3 Cast and characters 4 Production history 4.1 Initial concept 4.2 Development hell 4.3 New life 5 References

Overview

The Sci Fi Channel will delve into the backstory of Battlestar Galactica with a new series that looks at the creation of the race of robots known as Cylons by the humans of the Twelve Colonies of Kobol and the eventual revolt of the Cylons against their human masters, which will lead the two races to become locked to the death in a bitter war for their respective survivals. Caprica begins over 50 years before the Ronald D. Moore-created Battlestar Galactica series.

As Battlestar Galactica is about a lot more than space battles, Caprica will be as much family drama as sci-fi tale. Remi Aubuchon (The Lyon's Den, 24) is writing the pilot script with co-writer (and executive producer) Ronald D. Moore; "Galactica" veterans Ronald D. Moore and David Eick will executive produce it. The two-hour pilot will be directed by Jeff Reiner (Friday Night Lights).^[2]

Plot summary

It should be kept in mind that, while this information comes from reliable sources, the series is still in production, and some details - such as names, events and character backgrounds - may still change to a certain degree.

Caprica will take place more than fifty years before the events of the Re-imagined Series. It will follow the lives of two families, the Graystones and the Adams^[3] (the family of William Adama). When the series begins, a startling development is about to occur - the creation of the first cybernetic life-form node or "Cylon"^[4].

The Graystone family includes the father Daniel and mother Amanda, a computer scientist and surgeon respectively. When their daughter Zoe dies due to the religious fanaticism of her boyfriend, Ben Stark, her father manages to resurrect her - after a fashion. Already having Zoe-A, a digital clone of her personality, he uses stolen technology to create a robotic version of his daughter, known as Zoe-R, the first step towards creating the Cylon race.

The same terrorist attack claimed the lives of Joseph Adama's wife and daughter, Tamara. Together with Daniel Graystone he works on bringing back their children, but is appalled at his partner's methods and ethics. However, as a result of this tragedy, he grows closer to his 9-year old son, William Adama. ^[5]

Cast and characters

Casting info concerning main characters has been revealed ^[6], including:

The main cast/characters will include:

• Eric Stoltz as Daniel Graystone ^[7]
• Paula Malcolmson as Amanda Graystone ^[8]
• Esai Morales as Joseph Adama ^[9]
• Polly Walker as Clarice Willow ^[10]
• Alessandra Toressani as Zoe Graystone ^[7]
• Avan Jogia^[11] as Ben Stark ^[12]
• Sina Najafi as William Adama^[13]

Other known characters include:

• Genevieve Buechner^[11] as Tamara Adama^[14]
• Hiro Kanagawa^[15] as Cyrus Xander^[14]
• Veena Sood^[15] as Joan Leyte^[14]
• Brian Markinson^[15] as Jordan Duram^[14]
• Sasha Roiz as Sam^[14]
• Jared Keeso as Rod Jenkins^[14]
• Katie Keating as Caston^[14]
• Magda Apanowicz as Lacy Rand^[14]
• Vicky Lambert as Hectate^[14]
• Roger R. Cross as Tomas Vergis^[14]
• Unknown as Evelyn Adama

Production history

Initial concept

According to an interview with IFmagazine, David Eick said that they had been contemplating a spinoff prequel series since Season 2 began and were tossing around ideas. About the same time, 24 writer Remi Aubuchon pitched a series that had a lot of similarities to the Cylon storyline. Realizing that they could not devote their full time to both Battlestar Galactica and a spinoff, Moore and Eick decided to merge with Auchubon, seeing it as an opportunity: "We took some of what we had and some of what he had ".

According to a post on the official Scifi.com messageboard by Ron Moore's wife Terry Dresbach, executive producer Remi Aubochon will be the showrunner for "Caprica", in charge of the writing staff. Ron Moore will oversee and approve the story arcs, casting, sets, and read the scripts, though Moore will probably rarely write an individual episode for Caprica.

In an interview in Dreamwatch Magazine in May 2006, Remi Aubuchon said that he originally pitched a series which was an "allegorical story about slavery with robots", when approached by Moore and Eick. Aubuchon stated that William Adama will be 11 years old when the series begins. Aubuchon described the new show by saying, "This is a very human story about how our own hubris can lead us to disaster". He goes on to say that Caprica is meant to stand on its own from BSG: while still addressing backstory issues from Battlestar, it will not be required to have watched it to enjoy Caprica. However, "certain elements have been embedded into the first few episodes of season 3" of Battlestar Galactica, which might refer to things which will be further fleshed-out in the prequel series.

On November 6, 2006, the Sci Fi Pulse website reported that Ron D. Moore updated Dreamwatch magazine regarding the new series:

"It's actually a prequel, and this would be a one hour pilot not a mini – series. It takes place 50 years before the events of Battlestar Galactica and it's essentially about the creation of the Cylons.

"It's a very different show; it's not action – adventure and it's not even in space. It takes place on the Planet (sic) Caprica and it’s more of a family drama, with political and corporate intrigue. We're well into the writing of it actually; we're doing re-writes on the script right now and Sci Fi has been very happy so far. At the moment, we're just waiting to see if they greenlight it or not. Generally, there’s always a two step process: there's ordering the pilot and then there's ordering the series, but because we're not designing it as a mini – series, I don't know that anybody would even see the pilot if they chose not to go to series with it.

"Tonally, it will be very different," promises Moore. “This is Caprica before the fall. It's a decadent world, but also a world that's going at a very fast pace. It's a prosperous society that hasn’t experienced the devastation of the first Cylon war yet, so this culture has really not been taken down a peg, and their hubris is getting the better of them. It's a go – go society that's teetering on the brink, so it’s not that apocalyptic survival scenario of Galactica. The whole thing is tonally very different." ^[16]

Development hell

Since April 26, 2006, Caprica was in "development hell" (major rewrites and resubmissions to network executives), until it was seriously considered during the WGA strike of 2007-08. On March 24, 2007, Moore discussed the status of Caprica with Salon.com's Laura Miller:

"It's possible [that the series will still happen]. It's been in development at SciFi for a while and they haven't picked it up. And I don't know if they're going to pick it up at this point. There's talk of doing it as a TV movie and seeing how that works, as a back-door pilot, much as we did with the "Galactica" Miniseries. Right now there's nothing telling me that they're going to move on it anytime soon, so I'm starting to feel that it's going to remain on the development shelf.

"It was a different kind of show. Instead of an action-adventure sci-fi piece, it was more of a prime-time soap, a sci-fi "Dallas." It was about a family, the Adamas, and a company, and it was about the creation of the cylons (sic) 50 years ago. It was not going to be space-based, but set entirely on the planet of Caprica. But it would have sci-fi touches, and it would deal with issues like artificial intelligence and the various schemings and backbitings that you get in the traditional soap opera."^[17]

New life

On September 18, 2007, it was reported that with the end of Battlestar Galactica around the corner and Moore poised to leave Sci Fi for NBC, Sci Fi executives were considering green-lighting the 2-hour pilot for production as a means of keeping Moore with the channel. Contingent on the performance of "Razor", it was reported that Caprica might also see a release in the form of a direct-to-DVD movie that is simultaneously premiered on television ^[18]. Furthermore, with the writer's strike (the first since 1988), networks scrambled to stockpile finished scripts for various productions, and thus Caprica became a front runner for production because its script had already been completed before said strike.^[19]

In March of 2008, it was announced by the SciFi Channel during a news conference that Caprica will get a two-hour pilot episode^[20], the filming for which ended June 19th.^[15][21]

References