Wed Nov 19, 2008 — by Robert Greenberger

'Eli Stone''s Marc Guggenheim on the Season so Far

AbC Series Deserves Your Attention

"I think in many ways we're following the Battlestar Galactica model of blowing the show up every other week and constantly raising the stakes," Marc Guggenheim told Sci FI Wire.

The co-creator and executive producer of ABC’s Eli Stone, Guggenheim added, "The name of the game here is just how can we expand the show in every conceivable way. How can we make the musical numbers bigger? How can we make the visual-effects sequences more cinematic? How can we expand and deepen the relationships among all of our characters? The show is going to bigger and bigger and bigger places."

The Tuesday night series features the title character, played by Johnny Lee Miller, as suffering from an aneurysm that also enables him to receive visions from Heaven, enabling him to come to the aid of others.  Of course, few believe him and hence drama ensues. After trying to get rid of the life-threatening spot in his brain, Eli accepted his role in life rather than see the responsibility shift to his brother. He’s also continued to practice law at Wethersby, Posner & Klein where several of his coworkers, notably Victor Garber and Loretta Divine, tend to burst into hallucinating song and dance.

The show has tried to gain notice with stunt casting such as Sigourney Weaver in the season opener followed by Katie Holmes a week later. Coming up will be singer Seal in the seventh episode. "We've got some cool visual effects happening in episode 207...where we literally put Eli in the middle of a movie," Guggenheim said. "We do it in a way that you've never seen on the show before, where we're trying to push the envelope in terms of the way Eli has his visions."

Guggenheim, who works on the show with his pal Greg Berlanti, form two-thirds of the team behind the Green Lantern screenplay and continues to write Wolverine stories for Marvel.  Still, his weekly series is his baby and intends to get as many people to try it out as possible.  The character is out to make Earth a nicer place to live.

"I think it's all a part of being true to the concept of the show, because the concept of the show is about changing the world," Guggenheim said. "In the first season, we did a flash-forward to the future, where Eli's talking to thousands of people in Times Square in New York, and we're always keeping that in the back of our minds as we plot out these stories. Like knowing that's ultimately where we'd like to go."
 

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