Emily Rose, known to UNCHARTED fans as Elena Fisher in the first and second game, is also across television, having been in HBO’s John From Cincinnati, ABC’s Brothers & Sisters, CBS’ Jericho, NBC’s ER, and now Syfy’s Haven. Emily took the time during her hiatus between filming Haven’s first and second season to chat with us about the show and UNCHARTED.

At the time of the interview, UNCHARTED 3: Drake’s Deception was just announced and explored, yet there is still no mention of Elena Fisher’s 3rd outing. Did Emily Rose give any hints? What she said comes in this two-page exclusive interview!

This interview was originally done during the 2010 holiday season. After an incredibly-rough few months later, including a brief stint in self-employment, and back to a very demanding work schedule, here we are! Sorry for the delay. -Chris

Chris Fullman: You’ve been working throughout television during your involvement with the first two UNCHARTED games. What’s filming like compared to your work with UNCHARTED?

Emily Rose: It’s different, you know, going from a supporting character on a television series to a leading character on something like UNCHARTED, which is in production for about a year.

With television, you tend to concentrate your work over a period of five months or so and 16-hour days. So it’s absolutely crazy in terms of the workload, and UNCHARTED is a bit more calm. With a TV show, you have writers and the producers and the networks working with you during the shoot and rewrites are coming in all the time. With UNCHARTED, we working together on the dialogue we get from the writer and are allowed to collaborate on the dialogue as we go along while the developers are making the magic you see on screen.

Emily Rose can be seen in Syfy's original series Haven, returning with new episodes Friday, July 15, 2011.

Syfy’s Haven’s second season starts shooting in the spring?

Yes, we’ll start shooting about the same time we started for the first season in April [2011]. I’ll take the long journey to Nova Scotia, and I’ll live there for about five months. Kinda crazy, you’d never think that by moving yourself to LA just to get a career in Hollywood to audition for a show, you’re sent far from it for a long time. [Laughs]

You recently got married; congratulations by the way! Does your husband get to travel with you when you go to these locations?

Thank you! My husband actually got to come with me for the first season, because he was gearing up to get a graduate degree in marriage and family counseling, but that wouldn’t start until September, so he joined me.

It was great to get married then get right to moving up there [to Nova Scotia] together and then come back in September. Sadly this year it’ll be a little more back and forth.

Was he on the set with you (behind the cameras) goofing off or just in the city for support?

He comes on set and enjoys the people and sense of family there, but Nova Scotia is just such a beautiful place that he takes our doggie out to explore. When entertainment isn’t your profession it’s exciting to see and be a part of, but when it’s your career it’s just a regular part of the business. In this location in particular, our sets are freezing so it’s not really something you’d want to go hang out with if you don’t have to be there. [Laughs]

Will we see him in a walk-on role this next season?

It was something the producers would joke around with last season but it didn’t work out… I’m not so sure about the next season, but you never know!

Emily joined the cast of CBS' Jericho as Trish Merrick in the second season.

With your work on CBS’ Jericho, there weren’t too many CGI effects that you had to shoot with, but with UNCHARTED, you were introduced to motion capture and trying to visualize where things needed to be to react to them the right way. Did your work with UNCHARTED make it easier to deal with special effects shots on Haven?

Now see, I’d like to think that I’m hopefully pulling off the suspension of disbelief for a science fiction show since I’m used to these types of effects shoots. That hasn’t stopped armchair actors, if you will, who tell me I need to work better on imagining what I’m supposed to be seeing while acting. [Laughs.]

I’m certainly not a pro, but I’m getting used to it, and of course there are actors that are just amazing at figuring all that out, like Tom Cruise in most of his recent films¨ or Robert Downey Jr., in films like Iron Man. As actors, you have to live in the imaginary, to work in science fiction, but it’s also hard on those putting together the final shots to make everything mesh.

UNCHARTED certainly made for a great “boot camp” when it comes to this type of acting with green screens and looking at a tennis ball on a stick and acting as if it’s literally about to kill you. [Laughs.]

So it sounds like working on UNCHARTED effectively makes actors “green screen-ready.”

[Laughs] Yeah, I’d say that. Sometimes people who don’t quite realize how this latest generation’s games are made still assume that everyone just records their voice in a sound room, and I’m quick to explain “no, this is the new wave of games, and it’s a whole group of actors in a room that act the scene, and our movements are filmed along with the audio, so it’s not just voice on someone else’s animations.”

It’s quite a different way of filming, in that you have dozens to hundreds of red lights on cameras around you. Sometimes I dream of red cat eyes all around me [laughs] since I see those red-lighted-cameras all day long wherever I look.

Other than your work on Haven, and I know you can’t even acknowledge any participation on UNCHARTED 3 since they’re keeping things so close to the chest, is there any other projects you have coming up?

Oh man, I wish I could. I’ve been doing a bunch of auditions and I’d love to get some film work on my career, but at the same time I really like the downtime and rest especially since I know what’s coming up on the second season of Haven in terms of demand and any other projects that come along. When I’m in Nova Scotia, I’m very far away from my friends and family, and after the season is done shooting, I’m on an international tour promoting the show, so I’ll take any downtime I can between projects. [Laughs]

Any other shows that you’d like to tip your hat in for outside of Haven?

Wow, well I know it’s already wrapped and done at this point, but I would have loved to have been in Friday Night Lights! I’d also love to be on Mad Men, I think that’d be fantastic. But you know, I’ve been doing so much work with drama and fantasy, I’d really like to do work in comedy, and even though Haven has it’s quirky elements, it’d be really fun to be on a comedy.

Hmm, so how about The Big Bang Theory, given it’s focus on pop culture and fantasy?

Exactly! [Laughs] Actually, I auditioned for that when it was in it’s preproduction stages. The things we audition for, Chris, the things!

Did you audition for Kaley Cuoco’s (Penny’s) part?

I believe I did! I was going through my old auditions looking for things to send to friends and it’s just awesome seeing all these random parts you try for.

Now that Syfy’s growing in online series, like their hit Riese, any chances you might be picked up in one of those?

You know, I’ve been asked about it, but I’m giving all I can to Haven, and I’m loving my work so far and can’t wait for this next season.

With the second season of Haven, is there anything you want to specifically accomplish as Audrey Parker or wrapping up a specific story from the first season, or adding a new element?

Well, last season we left Audrey with a huge question in the finale regarding her identity, so right now I know my character will have a huge identity crisis (you think?? [laughs]). I think that’ll all fit in with the second season with who I am and why I’m there and how that all fits in with ‘The Troubles’ element of the series. It’s exciting to try to prepare for the next season during hiatus especially when I don’t really know where they’re taking my character, you get all these possibilities your head.

This wraps up part one of our two-part interview with UNCHARTED’s Emily Rose. Visit the second page where Emily talks about her work on UNCHARTED, and if we might see her character in UNCHARTED 3: Drake’s Deception. Continue »