Kenji Maeda

New TV Series: Endgame on Showcase

Endgame is a new TV series airing on Showcase here in Canada. It stars many wonderful actors. In the image below, from left to right: Katharine Isabelle, Melanie Papalia, Patrick Gallagher, Shawn Doyle, Carmen Aguirre, and Torrance Coombs.

A chess grandmaster becomes a master detective in Showcase’s new original drama Endgame. Premiering Monday, March 14th at 10pm ET/PT, Endgame stars Shawn Doyle (Big Love, Lost), as the former World Chess Champion Arkady Balagan. After witnessing the murder of his fiancée, Balagan develops a debilitating case of agoraphobia. Unable to leave his hotel and running out of money, the arrogant and charismatic Russian inadvertently becomes a detective – using his fierce analytical skills to solve the crimes that baffle others.

Balagan relies on friends and hotel employees to do his legwork; from conducting interviews and trailing suspects to bringing back clues. Balagan then uses his strategic thinking to stage imaginative, and often amusing, reenactments in his own mind-until he finds the solution.

I had the great opportunity to work on this show’s second episode, entitled Turkish Hold’em (originally aired March 21 2011), working alongside some great actors.  My character, Chi Tang, is a math genius who gets involved with a high stakes poker game in one of the hotel suites.

Thus far I’ve seen the first two episodes and I truly feel that it’s a beautifully shot show and I really like the characters and how the story is told.  I’ll continue watching for sure.

Will my character ever come back in future episodes? Fingers crossed. ;-)

Check out their IMDB page for more details about this show and episode. Endgame also has a great website where you can stream the episodes online and check out their online interactive episode.

Other great poker playing actors I had the privilege of working with in our scene were:
April Telek (Twitter | IMDB), Zachary Throne (IMDB), Edward Foy (IMDB), and Harvey Gold (IMDB).

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