`Medium' Channels Paranormal and Normal

By BRIDGET BYRNE, For The Associated Press

Tuesday, December 12, 2006

There's a naked hush on the set of "Medium."

The associate director has called for everyone to be especially quiet as Patricia Arquette and Jake Weber wait for the camera to roll.

The script instructions read "snuggled together in the darkened Dubois bedroom — both of them naked beneath the covers — Allison staring at the ceiling, Joe staring at Allison."

"Privacy garments" are listed as a necessity on the day's call sheet, but whether the stars are wearing anything like that under the sheets can't be seen.

"Well, I was wearing a pasty," Weber jokes in his customary low-key style as he pads around in track suit and bedroom slippers following the scene.

"They have sex and after they have sex they have no clothes on," Weber adds. "It's not like we are walking around in the buff. This isn't a Steven Bochco show."

No, it's a Glenn Gordon Caron show.

"These are things you do to make ends meet," Caron laughs, teasing that not having to provide stars with clothing in all scenes keeps the budget down. In reality, this bit of stagecraft simply reflects that natural intimacy between a married couple that Caron has always tried to depict.

One of the factors that drew the executive producer (whose credits include "Moonlighting" and "Now and Again") to the series was that within the framework of a psychic crime drama he could paint a vividly real portrait of a working marriage.

The relationship between paranormal expert Allison Dubois (Arquette), who "sees what others can't," and husband Joe (Weber) is the heart and soul of the successful NBC series, which airs Wednesdays at 10 p.m. EST.

"When I met the real Allison and she started to tell me about her life and the way she perceived the world, I found that fascinating," says Caron. "But when she told me her husband was a scientist, it seemed to fly in the face of everything she was saying, and I thought, `What happens when these two people crawl into bed at night? What must that pillow talk be like?'"

The meld of actors and characters is "exactly what you want at this moment in the life of a show," says Caron about the series, now in its third season.

"The synthesis between actor and character is seamless and the actors and the writers become a check and balance to each other," he explains.

Weber says, however, there were some initial conflicts revealed in the couple's relationship when Allison's psychic gift was a newer event in their marriage. But he says Caron is now focusing on a situation where, "Whatever gets thrown at these folks, they are going to make it."

There are apparently no plans for melodramatic events like terminal illness or infidelity. "The things they are going to deal with are those things that solid, committed parents would deal with — kids, family stuff, financial stuff. They have fights about family choices, professional choices, but they aren't a threat to the relationship," Weber explains.

Arquette, who won an Emmy in 2005 for her portrayal of Dubois, says the producers "don't seem to plot things long term ... and that's kind of interesting, I think, because it's more like life."

Wrapped in a bedsheet and robe, Arquette is talking in her dressing room between camera setups. "You change very slowly. She's more confident about the way she believes in herself now. Just little things like that."

There are still eerie horrors to be faced, terrible things seen in dreams and ghastly crimes to be solved. Yet the biggest change comes from a natural progression of time, most vividly reflected in the way the couple's three children are growing up. Ariel (Sofia Vassilieva) is now 13, Bridgette (Maria Lark) is 8 and Marie (Madison Carabello), 3.

"It's a great thing because every year there's a whole new reservoir of material as the children get older and get to bring new sensibilities with them," says Caron. "It's a real godsend. So when people say, `How is the series evolving?' I go `Look at the kids.'"

Arquette did bring one abrupt change. During summer hiatus, she cut her previously long, blonde hair into a very stylish fringed bob. Some of the producers panicked, but not Caron.

"I told them I'd wear extensions if they wanted. I'd wear a wig if they wanted," recalls Arquette. "Then Glenn saw it and went, `So what's the big deal. People cut their hair.'"

Even before the scissors chop, she'd been "trying to make the argument that these people are in a marriage — you gain weight, you get pregnant, you lose weight, you lose your hair, you grow your hair - and then you go bald! The kids get braces. They take 'em off. That's just the way it goes."