Conan is Goliath in History Channels "The Bible"

Goliath of Gath (played by Conan Stevens) returns for one night only in the historical season rematch The Philistines vs. The Israelites.

Don't miss it - "The Bible " only with History Channel (and affiliate International networks).

How cool is that?

One of the best known big bad guys from history. I mean really, how many people world wide know  the name Goliath? And how many people worldwide will watch History Channel's rendering of  these historical events covering both the Old and the New Testaments?  

History Channel contacted me a few months ago to just pop over to Morocco, dirve 6 hours to the edge of the Sahara desert, way up in the  Atlas mountains, where some crew had already got nosebleeds. Would I be interested? If so could I tape an audition for them?  

Massive character recognition with massive public exposure? Where do I sign up?  

Yes I could do an audition 'tape' (does anyone still use tape?).

So I was defintely interested, but there were two potential problems.  

Where could I get a hold of a video camera at such short notice? Thinking carefully about this I  reached into my pocket and grabbed my trusty Nokia N8 with HD (720) video recording at 30fps (now updated to the Nokia 808, and yes with a 41 MP camera size does matter) again and shot my audition takes, uploaded them to one of my servers and waited for the response.

The second potential issue is that I was on location in New Zealand for Peter Jackson's "The Hobbit " and had to get permission from  production to leave for the 9 days to shoot.

Thankfully Peter and the studios were most accommodating in my request AND the  History  Channel guys liked my audition.

And so I found myself with 42 hours (yes, forty two hours) of flying from windy, wet, wintery Wellington, NZ to summer in the 1160m high Atlas mountain range of "the door of the desert"  Ouarzazate, Morocco.  

Let me explain that bit again from a wet and windy 9C (48F) to a high and very dry 45C (113F) in  the Atlas mountains.

Another legendary reference to immense height and strength - the Atlas mountains (in Greek mythology Atlas was a Titan who as punishment was to carry the heavens upon his shoulders - easy to see where the mountain range and legendary Titan share the burden).

Flying over the Red Sea, Luxor (Really? I thought that was only in Serious Sam?), Malta and so many ancient and historical places was exciting. Then flying over Tubruk, as an Australian, was just as exhilarating - for an explaination see The Rats of Tobruk .  

So what was Morocco like - well let me explain in 1000 words:

That is a pretty much standard village that I saw in the area we were filming. I think that helps explain why the location was so fantastic for filming ancient biblical dramas.

And my opponent? I don't think I'll need a spoiler alert to say it was young David, in this case  played by UK actor Jassa Ahluwalia .

Some smart alec thought it'd be funny to put Jassa and myself in the same trailer since our  
characters are such good friends:

Since I cannot yet talk about the story (as if you don't know it) or any details I can say that despite  the long total travel time of almost 4 days in the air that I trully enjoyed the entire experience from  visiting Africa for my first time, visiting an Arabic nation for my first time, digging up my rather rusty French language skills (it was Arabic, Berber or French and sometimes English as language  choices), the production crew, the Director, the other actors, the weather, the food, pretty much everything except the 7 days of stomach bugs was brilliant.

Oh and for my good friend Michael who enjoys a good lamb dish I must point out that travelling between the two countries world famous for their lamb was a culinary adventure in lamb. New  Zealand lamb or Moroccan lamb? Both were equally mouth watering . Lamb envy  - I know you have it.

The last piece of info that I can give - this will be a big 10 part series for History Channel and it'll be airing starting 3rd March 2013 in the US, other nations to follow.

The Bible Series on IMDB

Official The Bible Series website.