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DEAN HAGLUND - "X-Files" / "The Lone Gunmen"
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 K2K: We’re here with Dean Haglund.DH: Hey, how are you? K2K: Haglund. So you’re Swedish? DH: Well, my dad’s Swedish. I’m technically Canadian. And now that would make me Swedish-Canadian. K2K: Could it also be [pronounced] “Haglünd”? DH: Yes, but then it would be German, with the umlauts above the “u.” K2K: How very Motörhead of you. DH: Far too metal. K2K: Metalocalypse. DH: Yeah, Dethklok. K2K: So, other than Dean, you’re of course known as Richard “Ringo” Langly, of the Lone Gunmen, on “X-Files.” DH: I am. K2K: Has that haunted you, or do you enjoy being that? DH: I enjoy it. It’s a pleasure. That was the least amount of work for the most amount of exposure that any actor could possibly do. Just one or two episodes. I got to wear my own jeans. I didn’t have to put on alien make-up. Nothing like that. Just say your lines in English and they send you home. K2K: Was that your own hair? DH: That was my own hair. Yeah. That was my own hair, and then I cut it all off on stage, as a comedy bit at the Improv on Melrose [Ave, Los Angeles]. Then two years ago, one of the [trading] card companies came up and said, “What’d you do with your hair?” They showed me wardrobe cards and some sand, from the Sports Illustrated swimsuit model. Do you remember that card? It’s worth $175. It’s just the sand from her ass. So they take my hair, and they put it in trading cards. K2K: Hmm… that’s creepy, and maybe cool. DH: I don’t know. The jury’s out. But he said they’re selling like hot cakes downstairs [in the Exhibit Hall of Comic Con], so I don’t know. So if they can figure out my DNA and clone me, I’d like them to send me a clone. K2K: Wow. I didn’t even think about that aspect. DH: Yeah. K2K: Well, better if it’s the Upper Deck trading card company. DH: Yeah, yeah. (laughs) K2K: As opposed to Lower Deck. That would be another company. DH: Yeah, that would be weird. K2K: I’m getting creepier now. DH: (laughs) K2K: How close are you, personally, to your [Langly] character? DH: Well, let’s see. I don’t hack into government sites. I pay my taxes. Ixnay on whatever… K2K: You’re Canadian. DH: Well, I’m paying U.S. taxes now. But I do know my way around computers. And I had a major in theater, and I did my electives in physics and electrothermal dynamics. K2K: What about the other two? How close were they to their characters? DH: Ahh… Tom [Braidwood], who played [Melvin] Frohike, he’s pretty close. When they were casting, they had trouble finding Frohike. They said, “We need someone short and weasel-y who always hits on Scully… like the First AD, Tom. Why don’t we just have him come in.” K2K: He was an AD? DH: Yeah, he was the Assistant Director on the “X-Files,” for all nine seasons. He maintained, even after he was [done] acting, he still AD’d all the other shows. K2K: Did he always hit on Gillian [Anderson]? DH: Yeah, he always did. He was always flirting. It was very funny, charming. You knew it was never going to happen. K2K: What about the other guy [Bruce Harwood]? DH: The other guy. He’s bookish. He likes to read. He has a subscription to The Guardian. K2K: Isn’t that a Jehovah’s [Witness] thing? DH: No! It’s a British newspaper. He’s a sweatshirts and jeans guy. He felt uncomfortable in a suit, and he’s normally clean-shaven. He grew the beard for another role, but they said, “Keep the beard.” K2K: Is that true that they told Gillian, “We have no room for moles here.”? And that was why they covered it [Gillian’s facial mole] up with make-up? DH: No. I didn’t hear that one. K2K: Chris Carter, when they were doing the make-up, apparently had said, “We don’t have room for moles. Cover it up.”, or something to that effect. That’s why she never had it [visible] on the show. DH: You know what, I don’t the answer to that. I never really hung out with Gillian’s make-up people to hear that story. K2K: Keeping in that you had your real hair… did you use conditioner? DH: Did I ever! Holy Crap, did I have to! Deya Lazatrique (sic), was a brand that only professionals use. They would buy that for me. Then after the series ended, I thought, “Oh, I should get that Lazatrique.” It was like $172. for a 12-ounce tube, that they’d been putting in my hair that whole time. K2K: Geez! DH: I know! That’s what I said, “Jesus!” K2K: Mayonnaise works better. DH: Cutting it off is the easiest thing. K2K: How was it working with David [Duchovny] and Gillian, and Chris Carter? DH: Everyone was great. Family. They’re all hilarious. Ouch! [As we were speaking outside in the back patio of the convention hall, a kid had come running past, attempted to run around a circular table, and promptly slipped on some littered fliers, hitting the ground full force, full body, like a simulated skateboarding accident.] K2K: Wow! Could you do that again please? Welcome to YouTube. And the best part, no skateboard. DH: Note to anyone who comes to Comic Con, I recommend that you do not run past the flier trash. That’s real brilliance. (everyone laughing) K2K: OK, so… DH: So everyone was hilarious, that’s the thing. When you saw the show, it was almost different personalities than how you knew them. K2K: How is Chris? Is he cool? A dictator? DH: Oh, he’s the most laid-back executive producer that you ever saw in your life. He wrote for Surfing Magazine for 13 years. So he’s like the total, “Hey man, how are ya?” But, what a memory! He remembers almost everybody who ever auditioned for him. He did this thing… A friend of mine, Phil Hayes, a great actor, superb voice-over. On Season Two, he played a sheriff, for one day, in Season Two, up in Vancouver. The show moved down to Los Angeles. I’m living down to Los Angeles. Phil comes down. I said, “I’m going to set.” He said, “Hey, do you mind if I come with you to set? I’d like to reintroduce myself to Chris. You know, maybe get on another episode.” [Chris says]“Oh yeah, come on in.” I said, “Hey Chris, how are you?” And I was just about to say, “This is…” when [Chris says] “Hey, you were the sheriff in Season Two. Phil, Phil Hayes.” Just like that. And that had been a span of five or six years. He had to have seen how many hundreds of actors, how many thousands of people? And he had all that memorized. K2K: Wow. DH: He’s [Chris] also a potter. K2K: A potter? You mean like a Harry Potter? DH: No. Like a professional, spin the clay on the wheel, potter. K2K: I thought this was going to be a 420 comment. DH: No, no, no. No pot. Nothing like that. (laughs) He would do 300 plates per day, before he made it big. That was one of his day jobs. So when he would be really stressed out and ripe, he would actually go to a studio and just spin clay, spin plates. Just zen out and clear his mind. K2K: You mean on set? DH: No, there was a place out in Santa Monica that was still manufacturing plates. He would just go, sit down, and grab a wheel. It was the weirdest thing. K2K: You had the spin-off series, “The Lone Gunmen.” How did that come about? Why did you do it? And why did it end? DH: Wow! You know what?… K2K: Buy the comic book? DH: That’s how long a story it is, that I drew a comic book. It came about a shock to us. Everybody loved it. Reviews were great. And then it ended so abruptly that there was something else going on. K2K: How many episodes? DH: 13 episodes. Midseason replacement. K2K: One season? Or, half. DH: Half. Unless you’re from England, that’s a full series, as they say. Then they had three more seasons, ready to go, all sketched out. K2K: What was the purpose of doing the spin-off series on the Lone Gunmen? The characters were great, but I didn’t see a reason to do it. DH: I think the idea was that the “X-Files” arc had gone. They wanted to explore more conspiracy theories going on, but have a humorous bent to it, so that it wasn’t so dark and pedantic. K2K: Was that Chris saying that? DH: It was Chris. But it was the other writers too. They really had a sense of humor. Vince Gilligan, he just wrote “Hancock” and “Breaking Bad.” He, more than anyone, embraced the Lone Gunmen ethos really hardcore. He’s the one who took [the show ending] the hardest. K2K: Even though you weren’t on this show, but [Chris Carter’s] “Millennium” got changed in the middle because it got “too dark,” right? DH: Yeah. Well, also Chris went back to muscle the “X-Files” back into shape, because there was a time when he split and they thought “X-Files” was suffering. “Space: Above & Beyond” was canceled. So James Wong and Glen Morgan were told, “Hey, man. Don’t worry about your series being canceled. You can go work on ‘Millennium’. Just go back and do whatever you were doing before.” So they were so pissed off that wrote this really dark “X-Files” episode. K2K: Which one was that? DH: “Home.” With the Peacock brothers and the mother… K2K: Yeah, yeah. You know, I had a problem watching the end of that. DH: Yeah, that was never meant to be filmed. They wrote something so toxic that they thought it would never make it past. K2K: I don’t even know how it made it on TV, or even cable. DH: Here’s what happened. Everybody thought, “Oh good, Glen and Jim are writing a script. We have nothing to worry about. We’re really behind on production. Blah, blah, blah. OK, we have three days to look at the next series. Let’s see what Glen and Jim wrote. WHAT THE?!? Holy crap! K2K: Incest. Cannibalism. What else was in there? DH: It was a mother with no limbs, who lived under the bed, whom the brothers would have sex with, to have other brothers with. Oh God! That was really well written. K2K: Me and my girlfriend were really hardcore fans. You have no idea what a religion that show was. I just remember when [that episode] came on. We watched it, and about halfway in, we didn’t know if we were going to puke or what. I like dark, but that was way over bounds. DH: Here’s the thing - Fox said that was too dark. We will never air that again. But then FX did the Thanksgiving [“X-Files”] Marathon, and you had to vote for your favorite episode. So, “Home” won. So of course Fox said, “Oh yeah, that’s our favorite too. We’ll rerun it all the time.” So, that changed everything. K2K: Oh God. DH: I know. K2K: In the spinoff series [“The Lone Gunmen”], did you expect to get canceled that fast? DH: No, no. They were telling us, “This is going for a long time.” They were building permanent sets on the stage. It felt like it was going to be a long time there. K2K: But the show didn’t really have anything to do with “X-Files” did it? DH: Yeah. No. Well, Skinner showed up. Scully showed up in different episodes. So we were still the guys in the universe. But once they realized, “Of course. They have a little newspaper called, ‘The Lone Gunmen.’ They’re like reporters.” It’s almost more like “Kolchak: The Night Stalker.” K2K: What about you guys getting killed off. That bothered me. It really bothered me. That show was such a religion. DH: Well, thank you. Even The Ramones called me and said they cried. K2K: The Ramones? DH: Well, Joey died. Then I went to do Joey Ramones’ birthday party, which is a benefit for Lymphoma Cancer [Research]. There I met Johnny, Joey’s mother, the Ramones’ financial planner, and of course Marky. Dee Dee had just passed on. Anyway, it was weird to hear The Ramones cry. I preferred that we went like that, as opposed to walking off into the sunset with a stick and a hobo bag. K2K: Really? DH: Yeah. That would have just said we don’t care. K2K: Well, that would have given some hope then. DH: Hope? Well, you never saw our bodies in the coffins. When you are infected with a virus, the Level 5 quarantine hermetically sealed steel coffins are supposed to be fitted to the size of the person who’s infected. So, all three coffins were the exact same size, one gunmen is shorter than the other two. That means that we may not have been in them. Aah? Come on! Let your secret out. K2K: Is there a possibility that they’ll do another [“X-Files”] series, or even a mini-series? DH: There are some top-secret things going on. K2K: Does it depend on how the [new] movie [“X-Files: I Want To Believe”] does? DH: No. It’s completely independent of how the movie does. I’ll tell you. Go to my website to find out more. http://www.deanhaglund.com K2K: Of course. I did that yesterday. DH: (laughs) Did you? K2K: Four in the morning, bleary-eyed, doing my research on everybody [for interviews]. DH: I thought you just knew the stuff off the top of your head. K2K: I know a lot of stuff. Just not the later stuff. Were you as sad about dying as… Are you sad about dying? (laughs) DH: I was happy, actually. I got a call from Frank [Spotnitz, producer], who said, “Dude, we’re going to kill you off.” I said, “Thank God.” Absolutely. It was the last season. There should be a go out in a blaze of glory, as opposed to, “Oh yeah, and the Gunmen. Eh.” K2K: What ever happened to the other freaky conspiracy guy in the trailer? DH: Oh, you’re thinking of Max. He died when that airplane and abduction, and was never seen again. (As crowds were gathering in line for a panel meeting in the building, we took a break to move our seats and then continued.) K2K: Were you afraid of dying? DH: No. No, it was great. It was fantastic and fun to do and I was happy. All the fans disagree, but I thought it was awesome. K2K: I have the companion book to the “X-Files.” [“The Real Science Behind The X-Files” by Anne Simon, Ph.D.] DH: The one that Brian Lowry wrote. K2K: Depends which one you’re talking about. It’s the one that talks about Chris Carter being a fan of the paranormal, and that a lot of the [series’] stories are based on facts. DH: Yes. K2K: Like “Firestarter,” is based on actual people who can start fires with their minds. There are two people in the world who can do that. One in Italy and one in Russia. DH: Right. K2K: To your knowledge, how close is that to the truth, that Chris based the stories on those? DH: You know what’s interesting, is that when you go to their writer’s office - Vince, Chris, and even Frank - normally, when you see a Hollywood writer, you see “The History Of Hollywood,” Sid Fields’ “How To Write A Screenplay” book. You know, a couple of New York Times reference library books. That sort of general library. When you go see Frank and Chris and Vince’s library, it’s “Early Religions Before Mythra,” “19th Century Occult Dealings.” There are a ton of different, obscure books like that. The Ricky Jay book. All of that stuff. They would heavily research this stuff and that would be all they’re into. I do a lot of standup comedy, so I knew a lot of people. I’ve had FBI guys come up to me and ask, “OK, some of that stuff you do is really close to what we’re working on. But I can’t tell you about it. But you’re doing it.” It’s freaking them out with how we know some of that stuff. K2K: Really? Government conspiracy stuff? DH: They won’t even say what episode they’re referencing. They just say, “That show. The subject we’re dealing with is really close.” K2K: Are they happy about it? DH: Yeah, they all watched it. They all loved it. They knew it was entertainment. Perry Farrell of Jane’s Addiction actually hated the “X-Files.” He thought that by putting conspiracy theories into popular entertainment, you undermine the ability to get to the truth, because anytime you try to go after that conspiracy, they go, “Woo hoo! You’re watching too many ‘X-Files’.” K2K: That was part of the “X-Files” episode too. DH: The episode where they show the popularization of it? K2K: That’s a good way for the government to cover everything up is by popularizing it. DH: Exactly. And so Perry Farrell’s quote is, “’X-Files’ has set back human-alien relations by about 20 years.” K2K: That’s of course assuming… DH: Right. And he, of course, believes there is alien-human interaction. And now Astronaut [Edgar] Mitchell just went on a newscast and said, “I’ve seen ET’s. We have government proof that they’re here.” And that’s Mitchell, who went up in Apollo 7. [Actually Apollo 14 - Dr. Edgar Dean Mitchell, ret. astronaut, and sixth man to walk on the moon. - Ed.] K2K: But you know, the UFO thing, you hear people explaining it as spots and lights. DH: And the whole ham-radio operators hearing Neil Armstrong when touching down on the moon. The second thing he said. K2K: “Oh my God, look at how big it is.”? [Referring to a supposed giant UFO over the horizon.] DH: No, “Look at them all.” Apparently all these space craft came over the horizon. About 12 or 15 of them. He started commenting, “Oh my God. I see them all. Look at them all.” They didn’t transmit that on television, but ham radio operators picked all that up. It’s never talked about. K2K: He did say, “Look how big it is.” He saw a craft behind a hill. DH: That’s right. “Look at that size.” That’s where they cut off the transmission. He was saying, “Houston. I’m seeing five or six things.” There’s more to that, and only ham radio operators could pick that up. K2K: Where could one pick that up [now]? DH: I saw it at the 60th Anniversary of the Roswell Incident, in Roswell, New Mexico. They had the transcripts of the moon landing as recorded by ham radio operators. K2K: Do you yourself have any interest in this stuff? DH: Well, you know, I researched my character, so I’m good friends with Jordan Maxwell, Dr. Roger Lear. All these guys. So it’s quite fascinating. I try to be skeptical. I may have compelling arguments with evidence. I get invited to the conspiracy and UFO conventions. I’m compelled by their evidence and their intellect, and they’re not wild-eyed crazy. They’re more “take it or leave it.” K2K: Taking what Perry Farrell said, I wouldn’t say that popularizing it makes drags it down. I would say that in news interviews, when they interview the “right” side, they interview somebody clean-cut in a suit. When they interview somebody else, then it’s the hippie guy who dropped one too many hits of the wrong acid. DH: Well, Stephen Bassett is changing that. He’s part of the disclosure project. This is an idea that if UFOs and aliens are here, then making it classified and top secret is not helping the human race. So he’s taken seriously, and for the first time, at Roswell, was front page on the Washington Post. It was a story that wasn’t “You are crazy.” K2K: And the governor of Arizona [Fife Symington], he finally came out and said that he indeed saw a UFO over Phoenix in 1998. I was there. I didn’t see it, I was in the house. But four hours later, I saw it on the news. He said he had to downplay it [at that time], but now he came out and said he had to do that [downplay it] for political reasons, but it was all true [about the UFO sighting]. Outside of “X-Files,” what got you into acting? DH: I was a ham. A child hilarity. A child class-clown. I was predestined. I had no choice. K2K: What about your standup? What came first, acting or comedy? DH: I actually started acting first. I was a child actor and couldn’t get into comedy clubs. I was doing theater first. Then when I was old enough, I started doing comedy to pay for theater school and my way through college. So I did both. K2K: What did you do [in comedy]? DH: I did standup, and Theatre Sports. I was in the same group with [?] styles and common mockery for ten years. I blended the two together, where I now improvise by myself onstage. I improve episodes of the “X-Files” live. I’m going to Scotland to do the French Festival, tomorrow. K2K: Tomorrow? DH: Yeah, tomorrow I fly to Scotland. K2K: Have you worked on sitcoms? DH: I have briefly worked on sitcoms. I was mistaken for Jenny McCarthy on “Home Improvements.” I travel so much that I’m not in town enough to audition for sitcoms. You get to this stage that you become such a successful road comic, that you can’t stay in town to audition for stuff. I haven’t done enough sitcoms. That will change. K2K: So you’re looking to do more stuff. DH: Absolutely. K2K: What would you be doing if not acting? DH: What would I be doing, if not acting? I would be cartooning, I would say. That was my first love. K2K: You’re an artist then. DH: Yeah. I actually drew my own comic book called, “Why The Lone Gunmen Was Canceled.” That’s all my own artwork in there. My mom still wonders why I went into acting instead of cartooning. K2K: She knows that people have heard of you now, right? It was something about some show… DH: Yeah. Yeah. (laughs) K2K: Who have been your best influences, as actors, and film influences? DH: Wow! That is so good. You know, I actually love silent films. Chaplin, Keaton, those are the ones I was watching as a kid. So those were really influential. Then, of course get the comedy albums of George Carlin and Woody Allen. I didn’t collect rock albums, like normal kids. I collected comedy albums. K2K: [George Carlin’s] “Class Clown.” [Cheech & Chong’s] “Big Bamboo.” DH: “Class Clown” I had. I had Groucho Marx “Live At Carnegie Hall.” K2K: Someone brought up something the other day. He was quoting something, thinking I would never know what he was talking about. “2000 Year Old Man.” DH: Oh right! [Carl] Reiner and [Mel] Brooks. That’s a classic one. K2K: I have that on vinyl. DH: I have a vinyl of Don Adams doing his standup in Las Vegas, which is him as a super spy. That’s how “Get Smart” got started, as a standup. K2K: Remember Red Foxx, or the other “party” albums? DH: Oh yeah. I didn’t get into that so much. I was looking for more obscure comedy albums. Lenny Bruce albums. Richard Pryor, sort of. He was breaking later when I was already on stage. But I was also collecting Swedish comedy albums. K2K: You speak Swedish? DH: No. But that was the thing. You heard timing and phrasing. So if you don’t know the actual language, you’re still laughing because comedy is about the timing. The best way to learn that is to pick up a comedy album in a language that you can’t speak. They would actually do George Carlin bits, in Swedish. So you knew what the bit was about, but you would hear how they phrased it. K2K: Now you’re with the Groundlings? DH: No. I do their Thursday night “Cooking With Gas” shows. They have guest improvisers come in and do scenes. I haven’t done that in a couple of years. I do that quite often. K2K: How was it working with Pam Anderson on “V.I.P.”? DH: (laughs) She was great, because she’s a Vancouver girl. I knew her because one of her first boyfriends was the bartender at the comedy club I started at. He was responsible for taking her to the football game, where she showed up on the Jumbotron, where the Playboy photographer saw her. So I knew her when she was still a model for LaBlatt’s Blue Beer. She was the Blue Girl. K2K: Did you know her back then? What’s changed? DH: She’s actually very smart. She comes off dumb, because she has incredible stage fright. She’s absolutely nervous. I’ve never seen anything like it. She was freaked out being in a scene with a real actor, because she doesn’t think she’s a real actor. But she was executive producing that show. She’s hilarious. We were doing a scene, where she improvised a line, “Stop, or I’ll lip gloss!” We all cracked up. That’s hilarious. I said to her, “That’s funny.” She said, “Really? Because I’m going on Jay Leno tonight and I’m really nervous.” I said, “What are you nervous about? You’re hilarious.” So [on the Jay Leno show], they [introduced her], “Pam, how are you?” “Stop, or I’ll lip gloss.” (shows audience silent) Oh! You have to set that bit up, Pam. Oh, geez! K2K: She didn’t really say that. DH: She did that. That was the first thing out of her mouth. She got a big laugh [with us], and thought it would be funny. K2K: There’s in-jokes, and then there’s out-jokes. DH: And then there’s timing. You talk, and everyone hears your voice, and then you lay on the hilarity. That was unfortunate, because she’s sweet. K2K: But it makes a good story. DH: It does. K2K: Tell me about “Rice Girl.” DH: “Rice Girl.” I got to improvise all my lines. I’m in the front, and the back, and I’m not sure what happens in the middle. K2K: Now, outside of entertainment, let’s get to the crux of who you are. The inventor. DH: Yes. K2K: Are you an inventor or just a one-time “had a good idea”? DH: I’m always tinkering and thinking of things, and trying to come up with innovative solutions. But I don’t actually have a workshop with machines, and lathes. I don’t have any of that. When you think of an inventor, you think of a giant garage full of tools and stuff.  K2K: You did the Chill Pak.DH: Yes. Bring it on. It’s a laptop cooling system. It goes in the freezer. It goes under the laptop and draws the heat away from the CPU. The whole thing speeds up. It’s got a condensation-proof sleeve on it, so no moisture builds up on it. It’s insulated on the bottom, so you can use your notebook in your lap again. It can actually be a laptop. K2K: And for those who haven’t heard the current news stories, why do you want to protect your nuts? DH: (laughs) Well, you know, as a guy, your nuts are important. The British Medical Journal just came out and said that it can actually reduce your ability to conceive. K2K: Which a lot of guys wouldn’t mind, at least not on specific Friday or Saturday nights? DH: (laughs) Yeah, but it’s also not 100% effective. So if you’re just putting your laptop on your nuts before you go out to party, you may get into trouble nine months later. So I’m not recommending that either way. K2K: Are you a Mac guy? DH: Mac and PC. K2K: So on the MacBooks, I was looking to do film editing. Ultimately you need a 7200 rpm [hard drive], which heats up the [laptop more], which Apple recommends that you not do if you can avoid it. Keep it at 5400 rpm, or the computer will heat up. DH: Yeah. K2K: How will it work with a faster, hotter drive? DH: Well, that’s the thing. It will keep it cooler. Fans don’t actually keep anything cool. Fans take ambient air and push it closer to the CPU. Hopefully your ambient air is cooler than the air around the CPU and your hard drive. When it starts heating up, your processor works slower, and your hard drive actually starts to warp, so the head can’t read the disc. Which is why you get your [spinning] rainbow if you’re Mac, hourglass if you’re PC. So the Chill Pak is the direct application of cold. When you sprain your wrist, do you put a fan on it, or actually put a cold compress on it. This gets so cold that, while you’re editing, the keys will actually be cool to the touch. It will chill right through. K2K: That’s not a problem at all? DH: That’s not a problem. In fact, it speeds up everything, but it doesn’t freeze it. It’s not going to lock it up. It’s not going to crystalize. And the condensation-proof sleeve on it allows no moisture develop. So nothing inside is going to reach to a dew-point, where it’s going to get condensation, and no moisture is going to shut down your system. K2K: The basic thing to look at it is to think of an ice-pack that you would chill your beer with. But you got [the idea] from your knee injury. DH: That’s right. The long story is that I got invited to Apple’s launch of OS X. It’s “X”, “X-Files.” They brought the Gunmen in. We got drunk and had a huge party. We had the raffles. We got drunk with the engineers. They started telling me everything that’s wrong with it. With the G4’s, the Titaniums, the G5’s that were coming out. That heat was going to be a problem. Heat was the byproduct of these computers getting thinner and faster. So sure enough, they give me a gift. A lovely G4 Titanium to take home. I’m watching a movie on it, and sure enough, within one hour into the movie, the whole thing locks up. At the same time, I had a knee injury and I had a cold gel-pack on my knee. I moved the laptop to my knee to start something else, and the movie started playing again. Just like that. I thought, “What the hell?” I did courses in physics and electrothermal dynamics. So I went, “Of course. Heat transference. Heat’s not in the process of work again.” So I went, “Watson, come here. I need you.”  K2K: What’s the basis of the Chill Pak? What’s it made out of?DH: Inside, it’s a polymer cellulose gel, that actually retains heat longer than ice, because there’s no phase change. When you freeze ice, and it starts melting, that phase change releases faster. Cold dissipates way too quick. With the polymer gel, it actually retains the cold much longer. So this lasts one to four hours, whereas with ice, when it melts, goes right away. The surface is used in the medical industry to transfer organs, so that the organs stay cold. But if they get wet, they start rotting. This is the way to do dry-cold transfer. The bottom is an insulator. K2K: How would you use Chill Pak for a cross-country air trip? DH: What you do is put it in the freezer, for an hour or so. We’re making a special bag as an insulator. You through that in there, so that when you get to your plane, it will still be cold. You bring your laptop for a four-hour flight, you can edit while you’re flying and have your presentation ready by the time you get to New York. K2K: Is it available currently? DH: Yes it is. At ChillPak.com - http://www.chillpak.com It’s spelled P-A-K. We have them there. We’re getting a series of distributors around the country so they should be in stores by the end of [2009]. K2K: Have you shown this at CES yet? DH: No, because they charge a lot for a booth. So we’re waiting to get our next level of investment capital out together. Any investors out there? Maybe CES this year, but for sure the next. K2K: What are you doing at Comic Con? Are you promoting Chill Pak or just hanging out? DH: I’ve got some friends here. Just hanging out. Everyone always wants an autograph who didn’t get one years ago. There’s the comic book. I also have a film production company, so I’m meeting up with other filmmakers and writers and getting that together. K2K: You’ve also worked for companies like Coca-Cola, right? DH: Yes. I would do corporate trade shows, on stage. You know when they would have their annual general meetings, they would often have some comedic entertainment. So we would often write hilarious musical numbers and comedy sketch shows that would be about the year’s problems. I believe with Coca-Cola, it was the launch of “Power-Ade.” I was Hans & Franz rip-offs. We came in on a dragster. When the dragster took off, we both fell off the thing. “Power-Ade will pump you up.” K2K: And hilarity ensued. How many patents do you currently hold? DH: I hold three for this one [Chill Pak]. There’s three different elements in there. But we have more. But patents are expensive. They start at $5,000. K2K: What else have you got coming down the pike? What else have you invented? DH: Well, we’ve got something for eye strain? People’s eyes are strained when they look at the computer monitor because they’re not blinking as often. So we’re coming up with a problem that will relieve that. K2K: Um, would that be called, “eye drops”? DH: (laughs) No. That doesn’t make you blink more. This is a whole other thing. K2K: Electroshock therapy, perhaps, to induce eye-blinking? DH: Hey! Patent office. K2K: Are you talking about a blink-inducer? DH: Yes, a blink-inducer. K2K: What else? DH: We’re working on something for carpal tunnel. Often when you get carpal tunnel, they tell you not to type anymore. We’re working on something that will allow that. I’ve done a lot of body work over the years, due to my knee injury. So there’s something that will be built into the keyboard that will reduce carpal tunnel. K2K: How do you like Comic Con? DH: Love it! This is my seventh year. I see all my friends here every year. Some years I sell and have a table, some years I just hang out. K2K: Isn’t it nice to know that you always meet new friends here? I have friends from all over the world here. DH: I know! Yeah! Exactly. K2K: There’s talk that it’s getting too big. What do you think? DH: What’s too big? Everyone’s getting into their cliques, right? There you have anime. Disney fans. There’s Poison Ivy. I don’t know what that is. (Pointing around the hall.) K2K: Masquerade Ball. DH: Masquerade Ball, which I’ve only been to once. But it’s like a little city that forms these little factions. It would be a shame to tear that all apart and throw it to the wind. K2K: But a lot of people - celebs and fans - don’t like it because, they’ve said, it’s too hard to meet up with people. I have no problem with running into people, but others do. Some think it’s too hard to see everything. DH: Yeah, but that’s the idea that you can see everything. You come back next year. You split it up into two years. K2K: So we’ve pretty much talked about everything here. The “X-Files.” Maybe a new “Lone Gunmen.” Maybe? DH: Maybe. Hush, hush. Go to my website. Say no more. Wink, wink. K2K: Well, it’s like the Marvel [Comics] universe, no one ever really dies. DH: No one dies in science fiction. That’s right. K2K: Where can people see your standup comedy? DH: Well, if you’re in Scotland this weekend, I’ll be at the Edinburgh French Festival. After that, I’ll be in Vancouver at GateCon, the largest Stargate convention. Then I’ll be at Dragon Con in Atlanta, GA. After that my next standup will be in October somewhere. Then I’m shooting a movie in Rome. Oh, New Year’s Eve, Kansas City (KS) at Stanford & Sons. Kansas City, New Year’s Eve. That’s probably a good place. (http://www.stanfordscomedyclub.com) K2K: Do you ever perform in LA to hang out? DH: Well, LA, it’s like 9,000 comics live there. So when they do stage time, everybody gets five minutes. My show is like an hour arc. It’s the story of the “X-Files.” So it’s kind of a drag to do five minutes and then, “Hey, thanks for coming.” I rarely do the five minute spots. K2K: Final thoughts? DH: I’d like to thank everyone for supporting the Chill Pak, and my website, visit me on MySpace, listen to the Podcast. My website is - http://www.deanhaglund.com, also http://www.chillpak.com. My Podcast - “From The Heart Of Hollywood” talks about movie and pop culture. It’s hilarious. Me and Phil Leirness. You can check that out at - http://www.fromtheheartofhollywood.com. And MySpace, Facebook, I’m there. I’m slow at responding, but I’m there.  K2K: Do you respond to people’s emails?DH: Oh yeah. It takes me two to three months, but I get there. I mean, there’s tons of emails. I’m still swamped. It’s great. K2K: You’ve had a good career with this. DH: It’s been awesome. K2K: You know how some get angry for being stereotyped. DH: Please. It’s been a gift. K2K: You seem genuinely happy with everything that’s come your way. DH: It’s totally awesome! Are you kidding? Who wouldn’t want that. Totally. K2K: Thanks a lot. DH: Thank you. And with that, we finally let Dean go to get dinner, as the convention was calming down for an hour before the Masquerade Ball crowd would be filling in.
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Philip Anderson is a musician, in addition to being a writer/photographer. He has performed as a guitarist/vocalist, as well as songwriter, in several bands over the past 20 years. As a writer and photographer, he has been published by several magazines and in several books, and had his works appear on television. |
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