Conceptual History
In the original casting call of the series, Matthew Scott was originally named Jared Nash. He was among the first of the main characters to have been created by Brad Wright and Robert C. Cooper. Scott was created as a flawed hero, since the viewers could identify with this better than a "perfect hero"; in SG-1 and Atlantis, all the characters often knew the solution to various problems, but the creators didn't want this to be the case in Universe. Wright and Cooper also made the character religious because they avoided doing so in characters in the past.
Before being cast, Brian J. Smith had been working as a stage actor in New York City for a year and a half and had seen a couple of Stargate episodes. When he was looking to start a television career, he saw himself to play for guest spots or multi-episode characters rather than series regulars. When he was approached for the role, he was attracted to the writing of the pilot episode and a talk with Robert C. Cooper, who outlined the new approach to shooting the series. He was also attracted to his character's backstory, and was impressed to see "a young man in his twenties portrayed this way," and that the writers did not create Scott in other series where actors Smith's age are portrayed as egotistical, mindless, and sex-craved players.
Smith taped his Stargate Universe audition and was invited to a screen test in Los Angeles. He received the news of being cast a few days after the screen test. He prepared for the role by doing military research, particularly by reading books based on the Vietnam War, and talking with Angelique McDonald, one of the series' Air Force advisers, about the nature of and how vulnerable First Lieutenants really are. He had not seen the Stargate TV series before being cast, but caught up with much of SG-1 afterwards. Smith has said that one of his favourite episodes in the first season was "Air", partly due to the filming in White Sands, New Mexico, but also said it was one of the most difficult to film, and "Life". When acting for the role, Smith wanted to make everything real. In an interview with SFX, Smith expressed being anxious and nervous over performing nude scenes in the series, stating "When you're doing a scene and you're very scantily clad, you can get a little bit nervous and don't know how it's going to turn out."
Read more about this topic: Matthew Scott (Stargate)
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