Forever Young

Louis Ferreira has had a journeyman’s career in film and television. Now in his fourth decade of acting, the former Stargate Universe star feels much more at ease in his own skin.

Ferreira once went by the screen name “Justin Louis.” But after he booked his gig as Colonel Everett Young on SGU, he started using his real name. He says it was a decision to stop running away from who he is.

In this brand new interview, Louis talks with GateWorld about his two years on Stargate, plus the career path that led him to the Destiny. He also shares about his more recent work, including his recent turn on the Facebook Watch original drama Limetown. (Watch out for some spoilers for that series.)

GateWorld’s audio interview with Louis Ferreira runs about 35 minutes. Click on the player above, or look for “GateWorld Interviews” wherever you get your podcasts to take this conversation on the go! Our conversation is also transcribed below.

Be the first to see the latest interviews from Stargate’s cast and crew! Subscribe to GateWorld’s YouTube channel, and click the bell icon to turn on alerts.

---

GateWorld: Hello and welcome to GateWorld.net. My name is Adam Barnard and today I’m sitting down via phone with the lovely Louis Ferreira to talk about days of Stargate past, Limetown, and Louis’ I think three decades long acting career right now. Is that correct?

Louis Ferreira: Yeah. I think I’m in — year 33 is coming up!

GW: Well, Louis, thank you so much for sitting down with us today. Just to start things off again: How did you get into acting and what do you attribute that passion to? What lit the fire inside you to become a performer and really have that be your full-time career and your lifestyle?

LF: I think it really started off very accidental from the perspective of — like I was the kid who came from a very broken childhood. Teachers sort of mentored me throughout my school years and always encouraged me to start participating. As a matter of fact I was born in the Azores, and when I got to Toronto, where we emigrated from, I was in kindergarten and I was six years old. So kind of older and sort of bigger than most kindergarten students who were like, “I think we start kindergarten at four or five.”

But I quickly got onto and found the love of the English language through a book actually called Mr. Mugs, which was an English sheepdog. And I connected only because I have had three sheepdogs throughout my life. So it was like a tribute back to that day, because I really think that’s what kind of started it off for me — my love of reading.

And I remember by grade 2 (so just two years later) I was already at the Catholic Church in Toronto that I attended (the school St. Mary’s). I was already doing the readings from “The Gospel According to X.” And so I think that, sort of looking way back, it was just acting right away from the get-go. Anytime I did anything, I could escape. I could escape. I could run away.

And that was the other thing. I literally did that! And then I was a cross-country runner for years.

Then, back to my regular life, my dad died when I was 11. We moved into a subsidized welfare housing in Toronto in a notorious area called — it was the Jane and Finch corridor. Which for me ended up being one of the greatest experiences of my life. I spent about ten years there.

But I was working, and I was pretty much working from a very, very young age. A very blue-collar family and a wonderful family that I have. Because it’s all about the things that ultimately matter, and that stayed with me throughout my entire life.

So I’m working at this factory and the owners there are like, “Hey, just stay here!” And so I’m probably thinking that’s going to be my life. So 17, 18, 19 … all those years there. And then I had a grade 12 teacher, Mr. Allen, who sort of directed me in a couple high school plays. And he was adamant about me giving this a shot. So two things happened kind of simultaneously.

I’m just kind of jumping the gun here, but what ended up happening is that man kind of became like a father figure to me. And again, connecting the dots, I now do a lot of mentoring with younger actors. And it’s something that I’m very prideful for, but it all comes full circle for me.

But what really happened was there was this girl in high school. Her name was Laura. And she was like, “You have this Jimmy Dean look! And there’s this open casting call, and you should go in because I really think you could do this.” And I just went … “Okay.” So we stood in line for like three hours one day in Toronto. And I went in and that casting director was a woman by the name of Diane Paulie, who was Sarah Paulie’s mom. And I ended up working with her on Dawn of the Dead [and got] to say, “Your mom changed my life.”

You see what I tend to do is connect these dots, always … I come back. She got me an agent. Literally, like it was one line on a film called The Return of Billy Jack. I got the part and then she got me an agent, Clibby Verrian, at an agency called Faces and Places. I think that was 1984, and I think it was my high school graduating year. And I pretty much from then started working, and I somehow was luckily enough to really sort of just start booking things and learning the hard way, I guess, by clawing at my face on film.

I think because of all the experiences up to that point and my life, the outlet thing really connected for me and I really enjoyed the acting. But again — when I started acting I thought it was just going to be like, “Alright, I’ll do this for a little bit.” It wasn’t that any part of me was like, “I’m going to do this as a career!”

I didn’t even connect the two. All I knew is it was better work, it was more fun, and it paid more than the $5.50 an hour I was getting at the factory. And that allowed me to help my mom and take care of her because she was raising me on $410 a month welfare … and our rent was $280. I’ll never forget that. So it allowed me to help out.

So again, I don’t think for the first five or six years I was even thinking I would remain an actor. I was just doing it as a thing. So I hope that answers your question?

GW: No, absolutely! And I mean, just looking at the diversity of roles you’ve taken on in your career, you know viewing acting as a catharsis and a way to emotionally process things, it really makes sense that you seem drawn to so many different roles and can play so many different kinds of dynamics.

STARGATE IN RETROSPECT

GateWorld: Speaking of that, I want to start off with Stargate Universe which — I can’t believe it — the show premiered ten years ago. So it’s a decade ago! You guys were probably working on it a little bit earlier than that.

In retrospect, now having a decade in the rear-view mirror: How do you look back upon that experience and what does it mean to you? You know, when that job came along at that time in your career, what was the significance of that?

Louis Ferreira: There was a lot of factors for me. One of them was simply that before that I had a career in L.A. that was about ten years, where I did nine different shows. And I think eight of the nine pilots were picked up. So I did a season of a different show every year. So in other words I was kind of grooving, and I was kind of like coming into my own. And I was going from sitcom to the hour[-long], and I was working with the guys who did The X-Files, to Gary David Goldberg, to Steven Bochco, to John Wells. I was on that list.

And then I had gotten divorced. And when that happened my ex took my children to Toronto, where I’m from originally. And I made a decision then that I was not going to be the dad that I had, and said, “I’m going to put the career in the States on pause and just simply go back up and do right by my children.” So that was the first thing that happened — and that was like 2002 or 2003.

So I did that. I ended up getting a show in Toronto, and I was there for a while. I ended up getting full custody of my son. And when I finally got full custody of my son — it’s now 2007 or whatever it was — it was just before Stargate.

So now I’m going back to L.A. after being gone for a number of years, and I was in L.A. for about two or three months when this Stargate audition happened. So here I am now, a single dad with my boy, I just put him in school — and this opportunity arises. And I thought nothing of it because it was sort of just almost like, “Hey, I’m just getting acclimated again.”

And then look, there’s an audition, and it’s the show Stargate! I knew I loved SG-1. I really enjoyed [it]. I hadn’t seen Atlantis much. But all that happened for me was I remember putting myself on tape, and then I forgot about it. And then I got a call back or something … and then all of a sudden I was like, “I’m in the mix for this thing!” And it kind of got serious really quickly.

The other big thing for me — it was Stargate Universe where I decided to go from a stage name after 25 years to my legal birth name. Because my mom had passed in 2008 and I wanted … that was the first credit that I had where I was credited as Louis Ferreira. Which was big.

You know, as far as the business and how it works and the idea of “branding,” I’m sort of not big on [that] particularly. Because I believe if I am nothing, then anything is possible. And that’s almost like a spiritual concept, but it’s something I have always believed in very strongly. I did it for the right reasons. I did it for my children’s names, and I did it to honor my mom.

The interesting thing about it, with everything going on right now … I just went back to my full name which is actually Louis Ferreira, and so it just made sense for me. So that had great significance for me. And to not have those guys at Stargate give me any hard time about it was really appreciated and respected. So that ended up being — just that whole experience for me was just nothing but lovely and fantastic for a lot of reasons.

Like I said, I tend to ramble. So maybe you want to, you know, put me on track again as to what you’re wanting exactly out of this!

GW: [Laughs]

LF: So does that answer your question?

GW: Yeah! No, that was wonderful. It’s a great background.

In terms of the character of Colonel Young himself, he is a very strong leader — but he’s also a bit of a broken man, I feel like. For you, when you had to craft such a layered and dynamic character, a character who had a lot of sides, did you get a chance to talk with the writers and really put a part of yourself in the character? And how did you approach playing someone who from episode to episode the audience might either love or hate, depending on what they do in the show?

LF: I mean, I think the truth of it is there’s always a part of you in every character that you play. I think the beautiful thing about is your experiences or the sum of your experiences — and it was interesting because when I changed my name part of me was like, I really feel that I spent my career as Justin Louis trying to not embrace anything that I was.

I ran away from it because there was shame, there was embarrassment, there was pain and there was hurt. So acting was a way to just escape all of that thing and so I was able to lose myself in some of those characters.

When I came to my own name, I was then able to make the adjustment where all of a sudden [I was] embracing who I was and the journey that I had been on, seeing the value in that and the truth in that. So things all of a sudden that started happening for me was like personal evolution equated with integrity, with honesty, with truth, with nobleness. And wanting to be ethical. And these were things that were — again, I was impacted [by] by Mr. Allen. I never had it up until then. I would probably have been very easily diagnosed with ADHD as a kid, and up until my twenties and thirties, most likely.

But Colonel Young was the kind of man that I truly wanted to be. Like there was a part of Colonel Young that I wish was in me. I loved his strength, his character, his integrity, his stillness, his quietness. It wasn’t about anyone pleasing anyone else, but it was about doing the job first and foremost. And the cracks that happened were results of the fact [of] these dire circumstances that they were all thrust into.

But in terms of his core — to be that steadfast in your truth is something that I (more than ever now) really appreciate. Especially as we watch the world crumbling around us and with lack of leadership in that way. I really admire men who have that quality. It certainly wasn’t something I grew up with, and I certainly never saw it — but I saw it in someone like Mr. Allen. I saw it with these guys who are committed to what they do, whether they be soldiers or officers or [who just say], “There is no movement here.”

GW: Yeah.

LF: There is no apologizing for who they are. That had a great appeal to me. And it was a really fun thing for me to explore. I mean, listen — between the takes (for example on the pilot), we would be doing that and then … you know, I had a fart machine.

GW: [Laughs]

LF: I still had some work to do, even on that. Do you know what I mean? [Laughs] It was like I was on that ground I think for like 20 hours. And during or in between … I mean, I was putting this thing — it was one of those remote-control ones. So I would go and put them in many different areas and just throughout the day … just like, you know?

There was always that joke with me. It was always like, “Oh, he’s so serious” as soon as they say “Action.” But the minute it was “Cut!” it was back to the antics of the clowning. And I was always that class clown growing up, which was fun!

GW: Do you find going back and forth between that — because you know, your own personality is so lively and a character like Colonel Young is so grounded and seemingly unmoved by such chaos around him — how do you make the transition when they yell “Action”? Is it just something that’s instinctual, or did you have to learn where you end and where a character begins when you’re shooting a project?

LF: I used to — I would say in my 20s and 30s — really be big on the method acting. And I loved it. And because of my past I could have easily fallen under the guise of like, “Hey! The tortured artist who gets pats on the back” —

GW: [Laughs]

LF: — but then you’re left pretty miserable. And I, at some point, chose that first and foremost I want to be a happy, loving human being. That was a conscious choice.

So the ability to sort of go back and forth [came] with time and with experience. I think it’s like you do all the different types of painting and then you just sort of find your own thing, and the work becomes … not the easy part, but you’re grounded in who you are, and therefore it’s there. It’s accessible because you’ve earned it. And that’s a great feeling! If that makes sense? You know?

I think it’s just our own … when they say we’re all “works in progress,” it’s because it really is true. I was always someone who fought for personal growth because I didn’t want to — you know, I did want to be the father that I didn’t have. I did want to be the great partner to my lady that I wasn’t in the past. So that to me had great … it all connects again.

And the idea that you can find a profession that allows you — and that you can take your experiences and grow into and grow with — I mean, that’s the gift of it and why I love what I do! As hard as it is, I can’t imagine myself doing anything else with as much passion and love for that reason.

GW: Wow, that’s amazing. So you’ve got to the place where you don’t have to take your work back with you and kind of live of the place of the character — just to stay in character when you’re shooting something?

LF: Yes. What I’m saying is I was very clear. I remember when I did that. You know what? That caused me a lot of pain, truthfully, because I remember playing certain roles and especially in my first ten to fifteen years [of] roles there was a lot of stuff that it was just like tortured souls. And I was like … it wasn’t feeling good.

Now, I have come from a very different place. Like literally my favorite book currently on acting is literally called Acting From a Spiritual Perspective, which is part of my personal journey. And it’s a wonderful book because it really covers that journey that we’re talking about. And this woman, her name is Kathryn Marie Bild, B-I-L-D.

I think this book is for anyone. Anyone who is thinking about becoming an actor, and anyone who has been doing it forever. Because it really does allow you to make choices that ultimately benefit you in your life first — and then second is the work.

GW: And speaking of Stargate Universe, it seemed like the actors really became like a bit of a family. Like on social media, on Ming-Na or Brian J. Smith’s Twitter, every now and then I’ll see a picture of a lot of the main cast and some of the recurring cast. And it seems like every year or so you guys meet up, and have formed a real family.

In retrospect, in terms of days on set or episodes, what was a standout for you, looking back?

LF: Well, I’ll tell you. I think it was very much a family. And I was very much proud to be in that family. And I think the nickname I got from some of the cast members was “Papa Smurf.”

GW: [Laughs]

LF: To this day I still get calls, and I’m still very close to a lot of the actors who played my friends. Just yesterday I was talking to Alaina [Huffman]. I saw Brian [J. Smith] a little while ago.

I love my Robert Carlyle. I love Ming [-Na Wen]. I see David Blue at the gym all the time. [Laughs] And so we’re still — it was that special thing.

You know, that was the other thing that came together for me. I had done a lot of leads in different shows, but there was always this thing that happened sometimes on set where there’s dynamics — whether you want to call them “hierarchy” dynamics or whatever — you know, amidst it you have to deal with that. And Stargate was the first time where I was kind of in the lead position. And I really think Bobby and I were kind of the older, veteran guys. And he was kind of like the “Mama,” and he stayed in his trailer and stuff. And I was the guy who was more like the “Papa” who is out there and encouraging and all that. And we worked really well together.

Robert was like literally my brother from a different country, the bond that we immediately had. Although I will say, when we first walked down Robson Street for the first time and we were talking about our characters, I could barely understand him. And I was like, “Is that the accent you’re going to be using?”

GW: [Laughs]

LF: And he was like, “Oh, no, no, no.” And he switched it on a dime for me. And I said, “Oh, thank God! Thank you so much for doing that!”

GW: Wow …

LF: And we started laughing so hard, because he really had it thick. And he has a thick throat when he wants it. But he’s a brilliant actor, as you know. And that relationship for us was kind of the core relationship that kind of split the team in two between the science and the military. And so that was really key.

But yeah, all of those wonderful young actors that were there doing their first series — it really was a beautiful family. And even, you know, Patrick Gilmore, Peter Kelamis, Jen Spence … I mean, I’m super close with all those guys here in Vancouver. And they’re all doing great and doing well. So we have stayed in touch. And it really was a blessing in every way.

Here, I’ll give you a little quote from this book that I love. So the word is “reciprocity.” And in acting — and this, I’m quoting this — “in acting it means mutual honor and appreciation between actor and director, actor and producer, actor and actor, and actor and audience. It means I am recognized as a valuable player by you and you are recognized as a valuable player by me. It excludes either the tendency to look down one’s nose or up from the ground at another. It means the universal respect, appreciation, and love that life has for each of its manifestations as well as that which each manifestation has for every other.” … Isn’t that beautiful?

GW: That’s great.

LF: And that is the first time I felt like that — that’s how I felt on that set. And that had great value. Because I then took that to every set — or I tried to take it, let’s put it this way — onto every set that I am on. That to me is the ideal scenario, not just for myself, but for any group of people working together under the circumstances of filmmaking.

Because I’ll tell you … first and foremost, the crew! It’s the crews that are the heroes. They’re there 70- to 80-hour weeks. I mean, I have done that as an actor, but it’s a very different scenario for me. And so that, across the board when you have that sort of feeling, that starts at the top. That starts with Brad Wright, that starts with Robert Cooper. And if they had that ability — and they did on this particular job — it’s the best case scenario, in my humble opinion, for everyone involved.

GW: Yeah. And that’s just amazing to hear. I know for the cast and for a lot of the crew and for many fans like myself, the show was such a transformative experience, and so seminal.

A quick last question about Stargate Universe. It ended prematurely, I think it’s fair to say. While the series finale is a very beautiful story and episode of television, it was not intended to be the finale. Not that you have to disclose it to us, but did Brad Wright ever tell the actors the ending he had in mind? I know that’s been alluded to — that he had a very specific ending in mind.

And also a follow-up to that: Would you play Colonel Young again if you got a call to return to the Stargate universe?

LF: I would play Colonel Young again in a heartbeat!

And the answer to the Brad Wright question I think is — I may paraphrasing, but it was something like, “It was going to be great!” [Laughs]

GW: [Laughs] So you never got the scoop?

LF: He would never give away those secrets! No, no … we all guessed. I felt like — I remember — oh, and actually that was a beautiful moment. That moment of the last episode. We’re in the mess hall, and we’re all there sitting down. We knew of the possibility of the show not coming back. And again, I am a little foggy as to whether — I think we already knew the show was cancelled. But there was such love in that room, in that moment. There was such a connection for all of us.

And even just going into those pods at the end. I mean, there’s something crazy about the idea that we’re still just floating through space, and that at any point we could be brought back. I was thinking we would all have like, super long beards —

GW: [Laughs]

LF: — and it would be the visual, like some sort of “Jesus Christ Superstar” moment. I was like, coming back with the musical version! Obviously I am kidding.

But my point is I think everyone would have had a different crazy idea of where it could have ended up. But, again, the possibilities are kind of endless. But it’s kind of stayed with Brad. And I think it’s still with Brad at this point, to be honest. Because I ended up working with him on Travelers again.

GW: Oh, right! Yeah.

LF: You know, when I see him there’s always — I have such fond memories of just sitting there in the Stargate offices with him and just talking. We would talk about everything else but the show sometimes. It was like we were friends. It was family there. I’d go in there for some therapy once in a while, and we were there for each other in that way.

And that’s the rare exception. But I think that’s part of what we chase in life. We’re looking for those exceptions. So to experience that once in a while — that was a home run, you know?

LIMETOWN

GateWorld: So let’s talk a bit about Limetown, which is a show that you were in a couple episodes of that just came out on Facebook Watch. The show itself is about a bunch of people at a research lab that go missing, and Jessica Biel’s character Lia Haddock unravels the mystery of what exactly happened in this little scientific community called Limetown.

So, just a question for you: Did you know about the podcast? Because the show itself is based on an audio podcast that was out in 2015. It was one of the most downloaded podcasts of the year, I believe. Are you a podcast guy? Had you heard of Limetown before you got the audition?

Louis Ferreira: I am very old school — and I say that with pride. I am happy to say that. I am not on social media. That’s pretty old school. It’s pretty crazy, especially right now in terms of my business and how it works, but it is for a reason. Again, going back to the idea of — I love the idea of what social media can do. I want to get behind causes I believe in, and let’s change the world and collectively and consciously we all need to come together for the greater good. But the idea of ever self-branding myself — it goes against just my wanting to remain a blank canvas.

So if I can remain a blank canvas, then I can possibly create anything. If I am falling for the idea of what it is I think I want to be or branding, then that’s taking up space on my canvas. It interferes with the possibility of what could be. And that’s just kind of how I see it, to keep it in very simple terms.

But when Limetown came around, I remember it was a self-tape. A self-tape is a weird thing, you know? It used to be — you know, again, [I am] old school. My favorite thing was that you would get auditions, and you would go into a room, and the 30, 40, 50 guys or however [many] would be there. And you’d battle it out and “May the best man win.” That’s what I was used to.

Now you could literally, on your iPhone, do an audition up against … I’ll do it in my small little apartment here in Vancouver. I’ve probably got about 20 inches across the wall between the edge of the TV, so I am up against this little blank wall. Nobody knows that, but I here I am with my beautiful lady being my partner, reading for me while she has the computer on her lap and the phone up in one hand trying to keep it balanced. That’s what it’s become! [Laughs]

It’s such a different thing. And Limetown was one of those where I had a friend just come and meet me at my friend’s house where I was staying in L.A. And I said, “I’ve got to throw myself on tape for this.” And I did it, completely forgot about [it], and I think we got a call like five weeks later or six weeks later.

When they expressed interest, I then listened to the podcast. By the way, I am just getting into podcasts now. So if you have any recommendations, I would love to hear them —

GW: [Laughs]

LF: — because I am kind of digging them. I loved it! I completely got hooked. I thought it was so well done. And then when I actually got to meet the writers and listened to Skip [Bronkie] and Zack [Akers] and their story about why they did it and how it came about, I was huge fans of them from the get go.

Then when I got this character — for me, again, my evolution is going from playing cops, blue collar, blue collar — and now I get to play a neuroscientist. I’m like, “What? This is awesome!” And that was the exciting part for me, first and foremost. And I also love Max Finlayson because I saw him right away as very, very multi-layered, very complex, very sort of like — just the idea that you’re going to meet him and then 15 years later you’re going to meet him again. And this impact, and what was the impact, and how does he change? How does he change what he sounds like, what he talks like? What’s the impact? What’s the effect?

And at the end of the day what was interesting for me on Limetown was that Marlee Matlin didn’t come in until very late. And so I was not aware that it was going to be Marlee, which is different from the podcast as far as Max’s wife — and it gave it a very different texture.

And then for me, it changed because the root of Max, when you meet him initially in Episode 6, is a broken man who has lost his love. And the science thing for him was more than just science, even though really at the core with that level of who he is and the type of person he is, science is the thing that had to come first for him. But it wasn’t just about that. There was that other component to it that added a different dimension. So I really love the idea of him being out in the middle of nowhere.

One of the things that they didn’t go for but I pitched [was], “Let him have big, long gray hair with the ponytail in the back and the glasses.” And I was really trying to [get] him to look as old as he could look. And broken, and skinny and thin. … I had pitched the whole thing with the gun, with the sort of intellectual “suicide” as opposed to the crazy tension that sometimes you’ll see, most of the time.

I just wanted it to be like this methodical person, just contemplating why at this point. And after that moment where he sees that they have his wife and there seems to be no hope in that moment, he’s like, “I’m thinking of just maybe killing myself as probably the smartest option.” And it wasn’t so much heavy as it was just like, fact. So all of those elements made it really interesting for me.

But I loved all the range, I think, of colors. And I really feel – I am pleased with the way it turned out, to be honest. I was very happy about those dynamics working.

GW: So were you able to read all the scripts when you signed up, or did they just give your scripts? Were you able to put the puzzle piece together? Because the show is a lot different than the podcast. There’s a lot of blanks that are filled in because we’re not listening to Lia’s recordings. We’re kind of watching it unfold in real time.

LF: Yeah. My partner and I read all the scripts together, and she and I loved them. We loved all of them. We were like really, really into it. It was exciting just to be part of something that we thought had great, great potential.

GW: So in regards to the character of Max Finlayson, as you said he is very multi-layered, very dynamic. Deidre points that out. I think we just picked that up from the way his character was written. Were there any real-life figures or performances or real-life geniuses that you based the character off of when approaching the material?

LF: There really was not, for me. I didn’t really have anybody that I looked to. Again, I was very excited about the idea of being able to explore this kind of role, which I normally don’t play. So the fact that I was a little bit out of my comfort zone, I wanted to just enjoy that challenge. Part of the fun in the journey is always to go, “Hey! Here is a box I haven’t ticked before. I haven’t played this type of role.”

So what I loved really was the idea of meeting him first later in his years in life, and then kind of going backwards the way they did that with the show, which is one of the things I kind of liked in terms of how they jump the timeline stuff. What had been his journey from Limetown where he felt like he was the king of the world and he was operating probably from an ego basis. But I didn’t want to really make it like the typical ego thing as much as he really believed in the science. And he really believed that what he was doing was going to change the world and make it a better place, you know? And the idea that his technology at some point started crumbling …

And here is the other element. I really felt [for] Max, one of his biggest driving forces — and it was really kind of almost a thing where I kind of personally played it more than anything — was the love of his wife.

GW: Sure!

LF: I felt what really, when you first meet Max in Episode 6, really what that is is a man who is broken and crumbling after losing the person whom he loved most in the world — his wife. I wanted to feel that Max in Limetown was not the same guy who you obviously met 15 years later, obviously. He’s literally forced into isolation, forced to confront his part in the demise of it all.

I remember one of the cool things that had happened, which was rare in television just in terms of the fast pace, was I shot all the Limetown stuff first. And then [I] sort of had the luxury of weeks for me, which was again something I hadn’t experienced, because it was over the Christmas holidays. And then I wasn’t really going to work for my Episode 6, which was like the last week of shooting. So I had all of that time to really think about the differences.

I was happy with the way that was done. I really felt like I saw three different versions of that particular character throughout the show. For me personally, that was a pretty cool thing to have experienced, if that makes sense.

GW: Yeah, absolutely! Then, just speaking about the character motivations — like you said, so much of it is about the love of his life. But some of it is still about his ego. When he hears Lia over the radio and she kind of baits him, he pours the coffee into the radio and gets really frustrated and reaches out to her and says, “Wait, I want to set the record straight.” What do you think is the motivation? Does he snap in the moment? Does the isolation finally get to him, or is he just trying to set the record straight?

LF: I think it is a combination of things — and thank you for reminding me. I literally had forgotten that. That’s exactly what happened. That is the ego of Max. I mean, again, he very much had that ego. I mean, that was the writer’s intentions throughout. So the idea that someone else would be taking credit for his invention was kind of just the line.

And it ends with — you know, Lia was smart enough to have picked up on that. So when she doctored that particular recording to make it sound as it if as Oscar was the guy, she triggered him exactly the way she hoped to, and got exactly what she wanted.

But in one way, Max I think at the end of the day realized what was happening. You know, that first scene where they’re walking and talking through the forest? He’s just like moving at a super-fast speed, talking super fast — because for me it was a sense that he knew that his end was coming soon. He didn’t really want to involve anyone else. But his ego was big enough that he was willing to risk her coming to his place and possibly getting her killed, for just saying that. So that’s clearly someone with some ego issues. [Laughs] Narcissistic tendencies, for sure.

BEING ‘LOUIS’

GateWorld: I have a quick just last question about your process and looking at Limetown, or any of the shows you’ve done — because you have done a lot of recurring, irregular guests spots on TV shows, but you also seem like a real character actor. How do you find the time to prepare when TV works on such a fast timetable?

Do you make that time for yourself or is it just an instinct — that you have just gotten used to coming in with very little preparation and making a character really pop off the screen?

Louis Ferreira: A lot of it is instinctual for me. But again — we are products of our experience. And I am at a point where I feel like there’s nothing really that I can’t play at this point. I just look for opportunities that are maybe different.

To be honest, right now it’s a very, very tough time in the industry. There’s a lot of different factors happening that have nothing to do necessarily with the art, as you know. There’s always levels of things.

So just right now, my whole thing is I’ve gotten back to L.A. and I am recurring currently on, I think, SEAL Team and S.W.A.T. And I am trying to pick up what I left in 2004 or [2005], or whenever I left. You know, the kinds of shows that I am loving that are on the streaming [services]. Really generally, the streaming shows are stuff that really excites me. You know, the opportunities are there.

But as far my personal process, you know — it’s doing the work. I have always enjoyed that. And it’s the “thinking couch.” Find yourself a good chair, sit down, and create. That’s where you spend your time — and then hopefully you get to set and you forget about it all. And it’s there, because you’ve put the work in.

I think that’s, for me, that’s most of it. And there’s always that [question of] what side of me, what experience in me, connects with the character first and foremost? And if not, then it becomes this game of imagination. Which is just as fun for me.

But like I said, with Justin Louis I used to run away. And I am now, as Louis Ferreira, very much embracing. And I think that to me feels really — you know, I feel good about that as far as the bigger journey that I am on.