MARG ON THE TALK – TRANSCRIPT
September 25, 2015
Aisha Tyler: Please welcome the wonderful Marg Helgenberger!
Marg: What a nice welcome, thank you, thank you. It’s always great to be back here.
Sharon Osbourne: So after 15 incredible series, CSI is coming to an end with a two hour special this Sunday.
Marg: This Sunday, yes.
Sharon Osbourne: Now how did it feel for you to go back and be special agent Catherine Willows again?
Marg: Well, you know, I left midway through season 12 and it’s one of those shows that you think you’re out and they pull you back in. Because it was one of the, you know, who couldn’t come back after the length of this show and what it spawned and everything? So it was fantastic seeing everybody again and we had such great chemistry. The cast and, you know, the show was, well, it was what it was. You know, it was special, really special.
Aisha Tyler: A lot of faces that have become very familiar to CSI fans came back to join the cast of the finale, including the incredible actor William Petersen, who I got to work with when I was on CSI and I absolutely adore. And he played Gil Grissom and you guys had this very special relationship on the show. What was it like, you know, as characters, what was it like to reunite with him just the two of you as people and actors.
Marg: Well, when he left the show, I guess in season 9, I was really heartbroken about the whole thing. Because I guess we spent so many hours together late at night in obscure locations and so on. So I was thrilled that he agreed to come back and, you know, it’s like one of those great relationships — you just pick up where you left off. A week goes by, really seven years goes by, but it feels like a week.
Sheryl Underwood: So Marg, over the years, where was the strangest place you ever went to shoot the show?
Marg: There were several, for sure. Strip clubs being, you know, a lot of it. The champagne room. But the exterior locations were also rather tasty. There was one which we shot on an actual landfill and it was — the plot began with an eyeball being found in a bird’s nest from like some bird watchers and that eyeball we find led to a body dump that had led to a landfill.
(Audience and hosts: Eeeewww)
Marg: Yes, yes I know. So the route that crimes would take and the evidence lead us on was really fascinating, and that one. So anyway, that was the director who was Ken Fink, who’s a wonderful director and a great guy, but he was — he would really get into it. He said, ‘Okay, get on top of that landfill, higher, higher, higher.’ Right, and Jorja Fox and George Eads were not happy about the whole situation at all. And then especially when one of them said they saw a needle, like medical waste.
Julie Chen: Medical waste?
Marg: That’s it! We’re giving up. We’re coming down off the trash!
Sharon Osbourne: Outta here.
Marg: We’ve done our part.
Julie Chen: The things you do for your art. Seriously.
Sara Gilbert: As we mentioned earlier, CSI really was a ground breaking show. It changed the shows we watched. It even changed the way people are brought to justice. So it’s been called the ‘CSI Effect’.
Marg: Yes.
Sara Gilbert: What part of the ‘CSI Effect’ are you most proud of?
Marg: I suppose the fact that we inspired so many young people to become criminalists. And, in particular ,young woman, young girls, you know. There was girls as young as 12. I’m not exactly sure they should have been watching the show when they were…Having said that, it’s just that they come up to me and say, you know, ‘I really became interested in science because of your show. I really, you know this is the field I want to go into when I get older.’ And so the show illuminated what criminalists do — they were the heroes all of a sudden. It had been, you know, cops or detectives or DAs and so on and I really love the fact that they finally got their due. And the way they solve crimes.
Julie Chen: I’ve also heard the ‘CSI Effect’ like some, you know, real life investigators they’re like ‘Darn that CSI. They’ve made our jobs harder because you guys wrap it up in an hour. It’s television, it’s Hollywood. They’re like when we done have a crime that’s solved yet, they’re like ‘Well, on CSI, they would have had it solved.’
Marg: Yes, I know. We did sort of like have thae effect on…the jury’s always did expect results like immediately.
Aisha Tyler: Because also on the set, there was a real actual functioning DNA analysis machine and I remember them telling me, ‘Oh some police departments don’t have this and we have a real one on the set’. And people would think ‘Oh DNA comes back, you know, just walk down the hallway and the tech would be like I’ve got this.’ It takes weeks and months in the real world.
Marg: Yes and it’s true that a lot of the crime labs don’t have the resources to afford this equipment and I always felt badly for them.
Sharon Osbourne: They should have sent it over to the show.
Marg: We would have solved it in 28 minutes.
Julie Chen: Alright, so obviously, it’s the end of an era this Sunday night, the 2 hour finale. What plans do you have? Are you going to watch it at home? Where are you going to be? What are you going to do?
Marg: Well, Jorja Fox has graciously invited the cast over to her home to watch it together, which I think is a great idea because we can all, you know, have a good group hug or a group laugh. And I think that’s a fitting way to go out — is to share the experience with your cast mates.
Julie Chen: All right, we’ll come. We’ll bring the popcorn.
Julie Chen: Marg Helgenberger, ladies and gentlemen. The series finale of CSI airs this Sunday night at 9, right here on CBS.