Robert Carlyle: 'I wasn't a fan of SG-1'

Robert Carlyle has admitted that he was not a fan of the original Stargate series before landing a role on latest spinoff Universe.

Speaking exclusively to Digital Spy, the 48-year-old Scottish actor, who previously starred as Francis Begbie in 1990s movie Trainspotting, revealed that he "hadn't really seen much" of SG-1 or Atlantis.

"It's funny," he said. "After I'd agreed to do the show and I got sent all the DVDs - two hundred f**king hours of SG-1 and all the rest of it! - I was surprised how much of it I had actually seen.

"I'd probably seen about 20 episodes of SG-1 over the years and I didn't see anything at all of Stargate Atlantis but that didn't seem to matter. This is a whole new deal, so I didn't have to sit and watch the whole back catalogue - that would have been a bridge too far!"

Carlyle plays the role of Dr Nicholas Rush in Stargate Universe, which premieres October 2 on Syfy in the US and October 6 on Sky1 in the UK.

> Click here to read our full interview with Robert Carlyle