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"We&amp;#039;re big fans of The Vampire Diaries here at Digital Spy, so obviously we&amp;#039;re very excited about tuning into Canadian medical drama Saving Hope, which premieres in the UK this week and stars Daniel Gillies - who you might know as Elijah from TVD! Obviously we had to give him a call to talk about what we can expect from Saving Hope, his character Joel and the romances on the show (will he end up back with his ex Alex, played by Erica Durance?) And then of course we squeezed him for Originals stuff - like whether there&amp;#039;s hope for Elijah and Katherine. Oh, and what kind of uncle will Elijah be? Read on to find out...  Are you excited about Saving Hope coming to the UK? &amp;quot;I&amp;#039;m so excited that UK fans get to have it because they&amp;#039;re so awesome. I&amp;#039;ve met so many just travelling recently, and they&amp;#039;re bringing up the show to me which is really surprising. I&amp;#039;d always expect that they&amp;#039;d bring up The Vampire Diaries to me and not Saving Hope, just because of the amount of exposure The Vampire Diaries has had in recent years, and Saving Hope is so new.&amp;quot; Saving Hope is no ordinary medical drama - there&amp;#039;s a supernatural twist, with Alex&amp;#039;s fianc\u00E9 giving advice from beyond the grave. Is that what made you want to do the show? &amp;quot;You know, to be honest, at the time I took the show, I was trying to make money because I was very, very broke and in debt! But I was mostly drawn to the idea of the show after meeting with David Wellington at my first audition. He&amp;#039;s one of the executive producers and he&amp;#039;s directed several of the episodes - he directed the pilot. I don&amp;#039;t know, I just felt like he was a real talent and he had a real vision for it. And of course, I loved the script, but, you know, it was really sort of David&amp;#039;s presence at the beginning.&amp;quot; Your character Joel is quite confrontational - that must be fun to play. &amp;quot;Yeah, he is kind of confrontational. I mean, I feel he&amp;#039;s less confrontational and more... I think he&amp;#039;s very good at what he does. I do think that he has an ego which accompanies that kind of skill. And I think that he&amp;#039;s extraordinarily confident in his abilities. One of the things that we see that starts to dismantle his ego, essentially, is I guess his relationship with Alex Reid and the reveal that he still sort of carries a torch for her. And also a series of failures that he has surgically at Hope Zion. I think he&amp;#039;s learning more from his failures certainly than he is from any of his triumphs.&amp;quot; You mentioned Alex just then - do you think they could get together in the future? &amp;quot;Yes, 100%! Of course. I mean, anything&amp;#039;s possible, right? Do I think that people would be upset by that? Yes. Do I think that there&amp;#039;s potential for that? I mean, I think that&amp;#039;s why a lot of people tune in from week to week, honestly. The number of people that say to me, &amp;#039;Are they going to get together?&amp;#039; - the curiosity alone seems to have its own kind of weight and force. I&amp;#039;m not one of the writers, I don&amp;#039;t govern that. But do I think it can happen? I absolutely do. Do I think it should? I mean, that&amp;#039;s not really up to me, that&amp;#039;s the writers. But there&amp;#039;s certainly unfinished business.&amp;quot;  Well he&amp;#039;s in this relationship with Maggie... Do you see that as a real romance? &amp;quot;I will definitely say that yes, he&amp;#039;s in a relationship with Maggie - it does feel a little bit more transitory and a lot less committed. I think it&amp;#039;s convenience that sort of forged this little dalliance between the two of them.&amp;quot; You mentioned The Vampire Diaries earlier and you&amp;#039;ve got The Originals coming up - it seems kind of darker, going from the backdoor pilot. &amp;quot;Yeah, it certainly does. I just don&amp;#039;t know what to expect. I know that there&amp;#039;s some fantastic writers - I know a couple already, they&amp;#039;re friends of mine. And I&amp;#039;m really, really excited that they&amp;#039;re a part of hammering out the architecture for this new universe. I don&amp;#039;t know what to expect - it&amp;#039;s just such early days, to be honest with you. But I do know that the frequency that we captured in the pilot was certainly a lot more adult.&amp;quot; Klaus is obviously trying to take back New Orleans and Elijah seems to be supporting him for now, but do you think there could be clashes in the future? &amp;quot;Yes! 100%. I think that&amp;#039;s going to be the essence of so much of the drama. I think that they&amp;#039;re both probably pointed in the same direction in terms of their ambitions, but their methods are what create rifts and enormous conflicts. Klaus is so much more malevolent and reckless, and I think Elijah&amp;#039;s a lot more strategic and lethal.&amp;quot; How do you think Rebekah will play into things? &amp;quot;She&amp;#039;s such a fantastic actress and a character. I love Claire Holt. I also love the new boy, Charles Michael Davis [who plays Marcel]. He&amp;#039;s unbelievable. He&amp;#039;s such a force in the show. The whole cast is phenomenal, but I think that Claire&amp;#039;s character lies somewhere in between the sensibilities of Elijah and the lunacy of Klaus. I mean, I don&amp;#039;t want to say lunacy - the kind of tempestuousness of Klaus.&amp;quot;  We also saw Elijah and Katherine together in the last season of The Vampire Diaries - what do you see coming up for his romantic life in the future? &amp;quot;You saw us in the pilot as well, and they said their goodbyes. Look, to me that&amp;#039;s a question for Warner Bros and The CW and if they can afford to have Nina Dobrev go between two shows! It&amp;#039;s probably rather pricey, to be honest with you. I mean, let&amp;#039;s be frank about it, and I don&amp;#039;t think I&amp;#039;m insulting anybody by saying that. And frankly, I think they&amp;#039;d love crossovers too. The powers that be I&amp;#039;m sure are more than eager to have people cross over and I would love for Elijah to continue a relationship - however staggered and flawed - with Katherine throughout. It&amp;#039;s weird - at a certain point, I remember thinking, &amp;#039;Oh, I hope I&amp;#039;m not creating him too asexually&amp;#039;. It&amp;#039;s odd - the opposite has happened with him. People consider him quite sexual which is interesting for me, because I thought he might be a little bit more almost robotic in the beginning. In a weird way, it&amp;#039;s kind of appealed to some sort of sensibility which I don&amp;#039;t understand whatsoever!&amp;quot; Elijah really has become a fan favourite - did you expect that? &amp;quot;No! But I did know that he was a great character. I did know that he was a really interesting character and I did know from the moment I began with him that something was going to happen with him. I felt very strongly that something interesting was going to happen with him. But did I think he would become what he became? Absolutely not.&amp;quot; Marcel really stood out in the backdoor pilot for The Originals. Is Elijah going to have many dealings with him? &amp;quot;Well, it&amp;#039;s disappointing for me that Elijah and Marcel didn&amp;#039;t have anything to do with each other in the pilot, but we&amp;#039;ve got seasons and seasons of that to go. Yeah, I do think we&amp;#039;ll see them together. I just look forward to working with that actor.&amp;quot;  Have you had much of a chance to spend time with the cast yet? &amp;quot;I have! I became good friends with Daniella Pineda who plays one of the witches. She&amp;#039;s very, very funny and we laughed a lot. I didn&amp;#039;t get to spend as much time with Charles, because I wasn&amp;#039;t in as many scenes with him - I wasn&amp;#039;t in any scenes with him, actually. And Leah Pipes is a charming beautiful girl. Oh my God, I never got to work with her but the young lady who plays Davina, she&amp;#039;s going to be a big star, this girl. Her name is Danielle Campbell. She&amp;#039;s the other big star of the show - I think she&amp;#039;s going to be [big]. And of course, Phoebe Tonkin. I don&amp;#039;t know why I haven&amp;#039;t mentioned Phoebe yet - Phoebe I love. Phoebe I got to know a lot better during the pilot than I ever have before - I&amp;#039;ve never really spent much time with her during the show, but I got to spend some time with her during the pilot and it&amp;#039;s just always nice for me to hang around the Aussies because their humour&amp;#039;s a little bit closer to mine in that it&amp;#039;s utterly vulgar and awful!&amp;quot; Obviously Phoebe&amp;#039;s character Hayley is pregnant with Klaus&amp;#039;s child - how good an uncle do you think Elijah would be? &amp;quot;The best! He&amp;#039;d be the best. If you could choose one person in that universe to be a minder for your kid, who better than Elijah? There&amp;#039;s nobody better on that show. If he&amp;#039;s looking out for you, that&amp;#039;s it. He&amp;#039;s got you, he&amp;#039;s got your back!&amp;quot; Saving Hope premieres in the UK on Wednesday (August 7) at 9pm on Watch. "^^<http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema#string>
<http://www.digitalspy.com/tv/the-originals/interviews/a504201/daniel-gillies-on-saving-hope-the-originals-interview/>