‘Quantum Leap’ EPs on Ziggy, What Next for Ben, Shooting in Egypt & More in Season 2
Three episodes into Quantum Leap Season 2, and we’re still very much enjoying Ben’s (Raymond Lee) journey on these jumps through time. (“If he gets home, it’s the end of the series,” executive producer Deborah Pratt points out.)
And one such leap is going to take Ben to 1961 for an episode that was filmed in Egypt. “That was beyond exciting,” Pratt tells TV Insider about shooting on location. “To actually physically get on a plane and go to something as historic and wonderful culturally was, I think, a real opportunity for the show. I hope we get to do it more. It’s a fun episode with some really great twists to it, and it’s a good action ride as well.”
Quantum Leap has shown, just over its first season and a few episodes into its second, that it can do smaller, intimate stories and larger, action-packed ones equally as well. “We’ll continue to have fun with what ifs of this show and then look at the history of the world and find out where you stand in a story,” Pratt says, naming as one of the “gifts” of the drama “that we tried very hard from the very beginning to lay out both sides of a situation and let the audience choose where they stand on one side or the other or in the middle to see and feel the emotion that drives this story.”
For Pratt, “that’s something that’s missing on television in many cases. I really feel like the show is addressing what has happened 50 years ago, and then you get to look at it from the perspective of someone that lives today and see that some things have not changed as much as you wish they could. That’s where the intelligence of the show and the emotion of the show lies and rides.”
As for the project itself that led to Ben making these jumps, the Season 2 premiere revealed it had been shut down because he’d been missing and presumed dead for three years — for the team. For Ben, no time had passed. Since Ben has been found — exactly how Ian (Mason Alexander Park) did that is something they’re not telling the others — everything is up and running again.
And now, in Season 2, when it comes to that project, “we’re exploring the leaps a little bit more and I think that what Ziggy’s plans are, what Ziggy is overall is explored a little bit more — the way that I think Ben is trying to come to terms with what exactly is happening, why is he leaping, why is he being sent to these places?” teases executive producer and directing producer Chris Grismer.
There is, of course, always the question of what the revival could reveal about the missing Dr. Sam Beckett (Scott Bakula, from the original series). “Everybody wants to bring Sam home,” Pratt allows, but adds, “personally, I’m hoping for the motion picture, $90-100 million motion picture or the interactive video game or the ride.”
Quantum Leap, Wednesdays, 8/7c, NBC
