Ebonie Smith and William Gregory Lee

After the breakfast we went straight to the Convention in the next building over. The first guest was Ebonie Smith, but she hadn't eaten at the breakfast so she got there later. Only 35 minutes scheduled for her appearance, which isn't that long. But she did a good job. She's only been in one or two Xena episodes and her enthusiasm for the show is a bit strange to me.

Ebonie talked about her early career (starting as The Jefferson's grand- daughter in the last season of that show, age 9) and mentioning several roles in relatively well-known movies and television. And not bit parts either, she is quite good about blending into the role. She knows several South-east Asian languages, has her college degree in SE Asian-something, has a small side- business with her mom. Likes 1940's big band music. Ebonie played M'Lila, Xena's first known teacher who taught her how to do "the pinch" and also showed her the "jumping around" fighting style. Ebonie also has a good singing voice and sang a song for the crowd.

William Gregory Lee plays Virgil, Joxer's son, in the sixth season of Xena. Now that Joxer is dead Virgil is sometimes shown as a comedic element like Joxer and sometimes is more serious. William says he likes the comedic elements of the characters, which is different than other roles he's had (usually being cast in straight roles because of his good looks). He also mentioned that he was going to be in this week's Dark Angel, although not mentioning the character I looked it up and he's first "brother" that Max finds. He said that Jessica Alba gets up at 05:30, works out, then works at the show all day -- quite impressive the dedication she has.

The women went wild over William, who has a girlfriend already. They kept asking him to take off his shirt and asked some rather personal questions and made some rather personal remarks. William blushed a lot and kept walking to the other side of the stage and taking a sip from his water bottle as he tried to regain his composure (this was his first Con appearance, lots of "no longer a virgin" jokes).

A woman came up (there is a microphone at the side of the stage so that people can ask questions and have everyone else hear the question) and said she had a web site dedicated to William. At which point he asked if she was Kiara, which she was and it totally blew her, reducing her to saying "oh my God" a lot. Apparently Williams friends told him that Kiara's site was pretty good. She asked him for his birthday (January something) and hugged him. William did mention that his role on Xena is episode to episode. He was supposed to die in the first episode but midway through shooting he was asked to return for another episode and it's been like that since.

After William was done there was a costume competition with William and Ebonie and one other person judging. A guy dressed up as a viking barbarian won, with Dark Cupid coming in second and an Asian Xena wearing black glasses coming in third. Then it was time for the autograph lines again. This time though we didn't stay around for the photographs as we were all tired from two days of Conning so we headed home. I dropped off Christine, who onced again thanked me for the tickets and the ride, then I dropped off Sarah who thanked me for the ride, then I went home.

For me this third Creation Convention was the best. It had the most guests, the breakfast especially was great, I got to meet a couple of nice people. Not being a huge Xena fan it was interesting to hear Christine and Sarah talk about the show. I had a good time, maybe I'll do it again once my financial status is a bit better.