GENERATION KILL INSIDER

What comes to your mind when you hear Generation Kill? The word “surreal” springs to mine. I stand here today, reeling in astonishment that a seven hour mini series has changed my life. Strange but true.

Generation Kill is a work of brilliance, based on the experience of Rolling Stone reporter, Evan Wright, who was embedded with a battalion of Recon Marines in 2003. The ensemble cast, featured actors such as Alexander Skarsgard, James Ransone, Lee Tergesen, Jon Huertas, Stark Sands, Chance Kelly, Neal Jones, Michael Kelly and Kellan Lutz, just to name a few. The casting was absolutely spot on for this eye opening tale of deployment. The casting is what drew me in.

In all honesty, for me, it started with Alex. Skarsgard has rocked my world from the instant that I laid eyes on him. I became friends with a girl who ran a fan page and she suggested I see GenKill. How I could I possibly refuse?? Seven hours jam packed with a hot Swede dropping the f-bomb and Marines? I watched, amazed, entertained, heart broken and moved. I was a fan for life. Let’s start at the beginning…

True Blood introduced me to the Swede Dream. Soon I found myself looking for every minute of the man’s work. I joined message boards and fan pages, including a group called the Alexander Skarsgard Addicts. I immediately fell head over heels for the kindred spirits I met there. These ladies just got me. I was no longer alone in the world! The girls and I would spend hours quoting the awesomeness of GK. The insanity was, (and still is) here we were, a group of women who loved and admired this show about war, violence and Marines. It was a guy’s party, but we crashed it anyway. We look like sweet ladies, but we can damn near quote the whole show in its entirety. And we LOVE it! After my Shreveport adventure, where I met Alex and saw Billy Lush, the bonds that I’d created with my girls grew to what they are today.

One night after a crazy three way phone conversation with two of my favorite partners in crime, I had the idea to start a Facebook page. The page was quite appropriately dubbed So I Watched Generation Kill and the Rest is History. I thought it was just going to be a place for the die hard fans (us, basically) to come quote and post pics and videos, but man, oh man, was I in for a surprise! It spread like wildfire! We had 300 fans overnight. Erin, Deanne, Jeanette, Sintia and I had our work cut out for us.

Deanne Cooper (one of my nearest and dearest) told me that she was thinking of launching a full blown dot com for GK. Seeing that there was nothing out there for the fans of the show, it was set in motion. We were on it like a mother fucker, Brad, setting out to establish contact with the actors who portrayed our favorite Marines and the actual Marines themselves. (Facebook has been a vital tool!) Our idea was pitched to them and much to our surprise most were more than willing to contribute in any way they could. After many late night emails, tweets and instant messaging chats with our dear friend, Bjorn Steinbach (mostly on D’s end) and word of mouth, our baby was born. It was crawling, then, walking on its own and we were totally floored!

Our first interview came about as kind of a joke. Gail Fox, our fantastic Cali girl, was having none other than Rudy Reyes, “The Unicorn” himself as a guest for WonderCon. In an email thread between, GFoxxy, Deanne and I we were told that Sal Alvarez was also joining the fracas at Casa de la Fox! We were squeeing all the way from Louisiana to Georgia and back. This pipe dream was about to hit reality status.

A time was set for D and me to interview Rudy via telephone. D calls me and asks me if I’m ready to do this because Gail and Rudy are on the other line. Hell NO I wasn’t ready for this and didn’t think I ever would be. Sweating and feeling quite nauseated, I was about to speak with Rudy Reyes! (Holy shit, talk about go big or go home.) It was now or never. The line clicks over and I hear D on the other end, then she asks if I’m in on the call. I squeak out that I am indeed here and then I hear him speak. My heart literally skipped a beat. (You might think I’m being a little dramatic about this, but it’s absolute truth.) Rudy Reyes was talking to me!! I think I was more nervous about being on the phone with Rudy than I was to ask Alex for pictures and his autograph in person. (Let’s keep that between us, shall we?) Rudy was a complete doll! He is so soft spoken and polite. The man is such an inspiration to many and the reasons are too numerous to name here. I was still in shock that he had to audition to play himself! The interview runs super smoothly, maybe because he was so easy to talk to. The both of us say our thank yous and goodbyes. It’s over. In fact, looking back I’m smiling like a fool while typing. Back to the story, now the proverbial ball was rolling, down a ginormous hill, picking up speed like mad.

Sal Alvarez (Leon) was our next interview. S. Jiggy was the first to be asked our now, standard first interview question: How did you find out about and be cast in GenKill? Being the cool guy that he is, Sal answered all of our questions and was awesome about it.

Next on our list was Stefan Otto (Christopher), our other major contributor from South Africa. Stefan, D and I did our interview via Skype. This was, hands down, one of the best conversations of my life. It was like talking to an old friend, rather than an interview. Stefan speaks with the proper “Queen’s English” so we were enthralled with hearing him speak, however, he would say the same about our Southernese. (We get “where are you from” lots! =P) Stefan has been more than fantastical, contributing pictures and candid stories for us!! Ha, he even introduced us to his girlfriend! I’ve been promised “politics, religion and sports” when he comes to the states!

Bjorn Steinbach (Steintorf) fell next on our calendar. Our Bjorno has been the back bone of our labor of love. South Africa’s “Man to Watch” played an instrumental role in spreading the word for this project among his esteemed co-stars. He’s been a mentor, a shoulder and more than anything, a friend to the both of us. We were more than psyched to finally get to talk to him! After an unfortunate cell phone and international call snafu, we settled on Skype. We laughed, we sang, we talked True Blood, it was incredible. Deanne Cooper and Beth Randolph were aptly crowned “The Belles” that night.

Due to scheduling, life or other reasons, we’ve had a few email interviews. Salome Martinez (Dirty Earl), Langley Kirkwood (Lovell) and Josh Barrett (Pappy) have been generous enough to share their stories and time with us as well. We’re more than grateful for participation in any capacity. A huge “thanks” goes to them for it!

David Barrera (Casey Kasem) on deck for the interview process. IMDB spilled the beans on our boy Bjorn and the nightly poker games in Namibia. It’s crazy how they’ve made us feel like we were actually part of the process. We’ve been clued many of the misdeeds of our boys while in South Africa.

Stay Tuned for part II 

•Beth•

(aka QueenB)