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First, some comments from previous columns . . .
Corey Hines, Hamilton, ON: Johnathan Frakes - Played a lawyer on "Matlock" the series, not the TV movies. Robert Duncan-McNeil - Co-stared with Courney Cox as teenagers in "Masters of the Universe".
James R. Dolan: Rene Auberjonois was in the original Broadway cast of "Big River."
I made this discovery back in college. Or rather, my roommate did. I had the "Big River" soundtrack in. The song was "Nonsuch." Suddenly, my roommate yells out, "That's Odo!" This situation is made even more humorous by the fact that my roommate was not the type to listen to showtunes, and that after this, he always went around singing that song.
Phil: (Note to James) James! Ever time I try to send you an acknowledgement for one of your emails, it bounces back! What am I doing wrong?!
Jason Barnes: In regards to Brian Lombard's response about Armin Shimmerman's recent roles, I would be very remiss if I didn't say that his role before DS9 was as Pascal in CBS's "Beauty and the Beast." He was only in a few episodes but his was an important charcter.
Joshua Truax: Kate Mulgrew mentioned at last year's Star Trek 30th Anniversary Convention in Minneapolis that she once had a recurring role on Cheers. I used to watch Cheers, but unfortunately I can't recall her appearances (although I do remember Brent Spiner's)... My aunt Rebecca tells me that Mulgrew also appeared in the 1984 movie "Remo Williams: The Adventure Begins". In fact, she said Joel Gray also starred in this film, twelve years before they appeared together again in the Voyager episode "Resistance". None of the video stores in Platteville seem to have this movie, so I can't confirm this either...
Although he was best known as a Shakespearean stage actor in his native England before his Star Trek days, Patrick Stewart did appear in a few movies Stateside. Probably his most noteworthy pre-TNG film role was in "Dune" as Gurney Halleck, the right-hand man to Duke Leto Atreides, and later to his son Paul and his newfound Fremen allies. In fact, I've even heard that when casting began for ST:TNG, it was his "Dune" role that attracted Gene Roddenberry and company to Stewart in the first place...
Avery Brooks starred in a movie of "Uncle Tom's Cabin" in 1987. Before DS9, however, he was best known as Hawk (not to be confused with ST:FC's Lt. Hawk) from ABC's "Spenser: For Hire" TV series...
Also before DS9, Rene Auberjonois was best known for his role on another ABC series, "Benson". He also did the voice of the French Chef in "The Little Mermaid". And, of course, we can't forget his cut-and-later-restored-for-video role as Col. West in what Wayne and Garth would have called the "Scooby-Doo ending" of Star Trek VI. (You know, where Col. Worf notices that the dead "Klingon" assassin's blood isn't pink, they rip off his mask and find that it's really West.)
Wil Wheaton co-starred in "Stand By Me" in 1985, opposite the late River Phoenix...
Besides "Roots", LeVar Burton had also played the title role in "The Ron LeFlore Story". (LeFlore was a baseball player who made it to the major leagues after serving prison time for robbery.)
As for Star Trek guest stars, we already know about the likes of Whoopi Goldberg, but others have had noteworthy pre-Trek roles as well. I already mentioned Joel Gray. There were also Bebe Neuwirth ("First Contact" [TNG]) and Kelsey Grammer ("Cause and Effect" [TNG]) from Cheers, former Mamas and Papas singer Michelle Phillips ("We'll Always Have Paris" [TNG]), well-known veteran actor and voice-over artist Frank Langella (as Minister Jaro Esa in DS9's so-called Circle Trilogy), SCTV's Andrea Martin (as Moogie in "Family Business" [DS9]), and NYPD Blue's Sharon Lawrence ("The 37's" [VGR]). Also, Bernie Casey (Cal Hudson from "The Maquis" [DS9]) played Felix Leiter in the James Bond 007 movie "Never Say Never Again" -- one of three different actors (and the only African-American) to play Leiter in the span of four 007 films! (Then again, four different actors have played Bond himself in the last five movies...)
Phil: Thanks to Matt Cotnoir of Coventry, RI for sending some of this information along as well.
Bob Sabatini of Albuquerque, NM: Kate Mulgrew: three episode apperance on Cherrs as counsel person Janet Eldridge
Rene Aberjounis: Father Mulochey in the move M*A*S*H
Matthias Roth: Some weeks ago I asked if LeVar Burton was in the music video "Word Up" from a group named Cameo. Yes, he was there! The information comes from the IMDB, but is placed in his "Biography" and not in the credits section.
Thanks to you and the supporting guild members !
Eric S. Moore: I have a copy of Marc Okrand's Klingon Dictionary. It does not explicitly list a word for "teacher". However, the Klingon word meaning "to teach" or "to instruct" is "ghojmoH". The Klingon suffix "-wI'" has the same meaning as "-or" and "-er" in English (e.g. "actor", "driver", etc.) Therefore, the Klingon word for "teacher" would most likely be "ghojmoHwI'".
Robert Cook of Anacortes, WA: There's an example of [a temporary agreement reached between the distant outposts of hostile groups], sort of, in Washington state history. (Washington = U.S. state, for international readers.) When this territory was being settled by white people, the English and Americans squabbled constantly over who would own it. A treaty was finally reached, but it left the ownership of a group of islands (the San Jauns) unclear. People of both nationalities settled the islands, and soon petty conflicts started. Hotheads on both sides almost managed to start a war, but calmer heads prevailed. The local leaders of both sides placed the islands under official joint occupation, until the governments back home could work out something more permanent. For several years, there was a British fort and an American fort on one of the islands. Finally, an international committee gave the islands to the U.S., and the English left.
Dave Craig from Waterloo, Ontario: I'm not sure if this is good proof, but I seem to recall hearing that during World War One, the soldiers out in the trenches would occasionally call truces with the enemy. I believe the most common example of this is when German and British soldiers had a cease fire on Christmas Day. They exchanged gifts with each other and sang Christmas Carols. Of course, the high commands on both sides of the war managed to put a stop to that practice.
Robert Cook of Anacortes, WA: The OS episode "Balance of Terror" is basically a reworking of the World War II submarine movie "The Enemy Below". The Roumlan cloaker's bridge even looks like that of a submarine.
Murray Leeder: Oh yes, "Sub Rosa" is VERY much like "The Witching Hour" (except for certain bits, which are more like its sequel "Lasher"!) However, I've got to admit that those books were not quite fountains of originality in the first place, so it's hard to say if Trek was ripping them off, or just ripping off the same sources!
Gareth Wilson: The Voyager episode "The Chute" bears a remarkable resemblance to the short story "Borders of Infinity" by Lois McMaster Bujold. The story has the same prison without guards idea, the same casual violence among the prisoners, and even a crazed character with a "manifesto". One major difference is there is no "clamp" so when the viewpoint character tries to organise the prisoners, he succeeds, unlike Harry Kim.
Brian Lombard: Shane Tourtellotte's recent question about the similarity between the TNG episode "Tin Man" and a book entitled "Tin Woodman" reminded me that I had an interview with "Tin Man"'s writers on tape. Back in 1994, when TNG went off the air, our Washington, DC affiliate ran a special called "A Trek Through Washington". It highlighted four Washingtonians who had contributed to TNG. Two of them were Dennis Russell Bailey and Lisa Putnam White. You will notice that Dennis Russell Bailey is also one of the authors of "Tin Woodman". Here is a direct quote of him from that special: "The idea for Tin Man actually came from a short story I had written with a friend, Dave Bischoff, when we were both in college. And, the story was published in 1976, and it was a sci-fi story about an exploratory spacecraft, which made contact with an alien and very difficult to communicate with form of life. When Dave and Lisa and I Became interested in submitting scripts to Star Trek in 1989, and were looking for ideas, I took another look at the story and I said to Dave.....maybe we can do something with it".
This special also contained an interview with Marc Okrand, author of the Klingon Dictionary. Okrand was a linguist who was brought in for Star Trek II to write some Vulcan dialogue for Spock and Saavik. When it came time to do Star Trek III, Harve Bennett brought Okrand back to create the Klingon language. To do this, Okrand went back to the first on-screen instance of actual Klingonese, which appears during the first 5 minutes of Star Trek: The Motion Picture, in which those three Klingon ships meet V'Ger. Okrand based the entire language of that scene, and then he told us who wrote that original Klingonese. It was none other than James "Scotty" Doohan!
Phil: Fun stuff! By the way, I looked up "Tin Man" in the encyclopedia and Brian's correct! It was written by the same guys who wrote the short story! I guess they have a right to re-issue their own material. ;-)
Eric S. Moore: About 1989 or 1990, a Habib Torbey posted a message to rec.arts.startrek regarding a very interesting story parallel. He said he had read a French story by authors K.H. Sheer and C. Darlton, in which earth (naturally!) leads a Galactic Federation ruling much of the Milky Way. The Federation is attacked by invaders from beyond the Milky Way. They are called the Bioposis. They are a cybernetic race with cube-shaped ships, shields that are temporally displaced a few hours into the future, and weapons that they can dematerialize and then rematerialize behind enemy shields. They quickly adapt to the Federations new defenses. (Earth escapes attack because its galactic coordinates are kept secret, a lesson certainly worth learning!) Their hatred of organic life is due to a faulty interaction between their organic and mechanical halves, causing the mechanical half to regard all organic life as a threat. Their trademark greeting before opening fire is "Etes-vous la vie reelle?", which I believe is French for "Are you true life forms?" A mischievous, god-like being is also featured in the story.
Torbey went on to say that the story was part of an ongoing series published by Fleuve Noir in Paris. The Bioposis story line was featured during the years 1984-1988.
Kevin Weiler: In response to Shawn Tourtellotte's question about Star Trek adaptations, I believe The Schizoid Man, written by Tracy Torme, was an homage to the series The Prisoner. One of their episodes had the same name. At one point, Patrick McGoohan, who starred in The Prisoner, was considered for the part of Ira Graves
Chris George: Just wanted to add my thoughts to the question regarding Cloaking and the Federation. For being ultra-secretive about their cloaking technology, the Romulans seem to be rather free with it where the situation involves them. Exhibit A: the Defiant. They felt the Dominion threat was such that they needed some protection, so they equipped the Defiant with a cloak. (BTW: Whatever happened to the Romulan security officer? Did she just take a wrong turn out an airlock...and no one noticed?) Exhibit B: The "faked" Dominion invasion. They thought the Dominion would be bad enough again to somehow affect them, so suddenly, Romulans show up in cloaked vessels and report for orders.
Now, the mine field. Again, the Dominion is involved...so who knows? Maybe the Romulans let them use the cloaking device yet again?
Just another note on the Romulans: have you noticed that the only time we've seen them recently is when they are scared silly by the Dominion?
Murray Leeder: Isn't it possible that in the future we'll remember some of the music of this century more for the reason we remember the great poets than the great composers? Might we remember The Rolling Stones for the same reason we remember Byron and Keats?
Phil: Only time will tell! ;-)
Corey Hines, Hamilton, ON: You even pointed out in the Classic Guide that the writers of Star Trek already paid for the mistake with using present day music with "The Way To Eden". If they played alternative music in the Star Trek series today, thirty years from now, we'll probably be laughing ourselves to death when we saw how dumb it was.
Phil: Probably!
Scott Vogt: Reading your views on music needing to last a lot longer than decades. Is there any kind of music that has completely died out? I'm considering technical civilizations here, not tribes 1,000 years ago who died out. Look, "Magic Carpet Ride" made it to 2076, won't there always be fans of ALL types of music? There's alot of good Rock and Roll out there, and bad. But there's good and bad in every category. Don't you think the good stuff will always be around? Or even the bad. "The Royale" was in the Enterprise computer and everyone agreed that book was awful!
Phil: It is true that we are in an odd time when it comes to the phrase "standing the test of time." In the past, it was largely the efforts and adoration of humans that kept certain art pieces alive. This continued chain of discriminant appreciation was a fairly good indication that the piece contained something of transcendant value since it survived the changing tides of culture and taste. Technology has put an odd twist on this. I can easily foresee a time when stable memory becomes so cheap that everything published will "stand the test of time" because it will be available in some form for centuries to come. So, yes, someone, somewhere--maybe even lots-o-people lots-o-wheres will have recordings of Rock and Roll. But . . . how will those recordings be viewed? For instance, "Stepping Out To Eden" from the "The Way To Eden" is aweful. I haven't met anyone who thinks it's a great song. On the other hand, "Louie, Louie" (what ever the words are to the rest of the song ;-) is a lot of fun. Yet . . . "Louie, Louie" is not Bach, or Chopin, or Mozart and I haven't met anyone who has ever claimed that it is. Perhaps--in the light of technological persistence--"standing the test of time" will come to mean not only that the piece is still available but that it is still regarded as something of high value?
On to the questions . . .
Scott Vogt: How many Orbs do the Bajorans have now? They always had one. The only others I can remember are the one Zek sold to them and the one the Cardassians gave back in "Trials And Tribble-ations". Have they gotten back any others?
Phil: Those are the only ones that I can recall!
Scott Vogt: Doesn't the station run on the Bajoran clock (26 hours in a day)? I've heard Sisko say things like have a guard on 26 hours a day, etc.. So how does this translate when characters use days of the week? Which they often do. Do they use two systems? That seems confusing. I would expect them to say something like Trakorsday. Maybe their Sunday is Opakasday.
Phil: All the references to time in DS9 seem to indicate that the Bajoran day is 26 hours long. However, they characters have also referred to Terran days of the week like Tuesday. Beats me how it converts! Maybe the Universal Translator automagically takes care of it?!
Scott Vogt: Do you think fooling around in the holodeck is considered cheating? O'Brien seemed eager in "A Simple Investigation" to take Odo's place when he finds out he gets to steal Falcon's girl.
Phil: Well . . . it all depends on your viewpoint. Personally, I think infidelity occurs in the mind long before an actual act occurs. And, I would expect Keiko to react the same if she saw Miles learing at a Dabo girl or panting over Falcon's holographic bunny. There are some interesting legal issues here that we are beginning to encounter even here in the backwards twentieth-century: Given the proliferation of cyber-sex, is an "on-line affair" the same as a physical affair? From what I've seen--with most couples--on-line affairs wreak the same kind of emotional damage. Has there been a court case on this yet? Are couples getting divorce because of on-line infidelity yet?
Jason Barnes: Something I've noticed about Voyager. The Next Gen Tech Manual says that the front of the ship's nacelles (the red parts) are called Bussard ramscoops. They can be used to collect a "tenuous gas found within the Milky Way galaxy." This can be used to "distill" deuterium or antimatter as a supply of fuel. Voyager seems to be missing these devices on it's nacelles. It would sure be a nice thing to have when you're trying to conserve fuel, eh? Wonder if that was done intentionally.
Phil: No idea! Anybody?
Murray Leeder: I recently finished reading Arthur C. Clarke's latest book, 3001: The Final Odyssey. Interestingly enough, there were several lines which implied people were still watching Star Trek in that far-flung year! That begs the question... are they still nitpicking it? Are they still buying your books?
Phil: Hope so! ;-) All serious aside, however, unless the human brain undergoes a radica transformation in the next few millennia, I can't see that nitpicking as spectator sport will ever die off. It's too much fun!
Joanna Cravit: The questions [last] week reminded me of the tng episode where we first saw the borg. There was a borg nursery with a little borg baby. But I though the borg increased by assimilating other people. So why do they have a nursery?
Phil: Funny thing that! (Wink, wink.) In fact, if you go back to "Q Who"--the first episode where we saw the Borg and listen closely you'll discover an interesting oddity. In that episode, the Borg were only interested in the Enterprise's technology. There was no mention of assimilation. As originally cast, the Borg were simply looking for better parts. Of course along comes "Best of Both Worlds"--written by Michael Pillar, not Maurice Hurley, who wrote "Q Who"--and suddenly the Borg want to assimilate Picard. Hmmmm.
Tom Bondurant: Don't know if this question has been asked and answered yet or not, but it's right up the Guild's alley. Here goes: How many different ship types did you (or anyone else) spot in the FANTASTIC last scene of DS9's season finale? The obvious ones were two Galaxy-class, a couple of Mirandas, and a couple of Excelsiors (one of which I originally thought was a movie-era Constitution, but sadly not). I also think I saw a couple of new Sovereign-class starships. Are we finally going to see some of the new Starfleet ship classes glimpsed all too briefly in First Contact?
Along the same lines, I wonder what sort of lame excuse the DS9 writers will give us why the Enterprise-E won't be part of the action in the season opener. (This, of course, assumes that the season opener doesn't open with Sisko and company licking their wounds on the Defiant and saying, "Boy, that big battle for DS9 was sure tough! Not even that last-minute attack from Picard's battle group helped!")
Phil: I am out of time for this column so I'll throw this one out to the Guild. Anybody notice any other classes of ships in the armada at the end of the DS9 finale besides Galaxy, Miranda, Excelsior and Defiant? As for the worries over a quick resolution to the cliff-hanger, I was just at a convention with Andrew Robinson--who plays Garak on DS9--and he mentioned that the first six or seven episodes of the sixth season will be a large plot arc. My guess is that it will have something to do with the battle with the Dominion!
Craig Cicero: I know this is picayune bordering on the ridiculous, but how does citizenship work in Star Trek? Take, for example, Worf. He has to have Federation citizenship (raised on Earth, joined Starfleet, etc.). Yet he "resigns" and fights in the Klingon Civil war! Do the Klingons care about citizenship? Does Worf hold dual citizenship? And how about Nog? I assume that the Federation only allows its citizens to join Starfleet, but this issue was never discussed (to my memory, that is). I'm sure there are many others with questionable citizenship statuses. (I know this comes under the heading of "The Creators didn't care or thought no one would notice," but that's what nitpicking is all about. (I also admit that I don't know the details of how citizenship works in the real world.)
Phil: As far as I know there is very little (read that: "almost no" and perhaps "simply no") information on how Federal citizenry works. Planets are given the opportunity to join the Federation. I'm assuming that all the inhabitants of that planet then become citizens of the Federation (although in the case of Keprit III from "Attached" that provision was waived). Your guess is as good as mine!
Amber Heinzel: I vaguely remember that I read somewhere (a newsletter, maybe) that the creators put the number 47 in First Contact as a joke. I didn't see it, and what was the big joke? (Sorry - after graduation I had a major brain cramp and I'm a little slow. . .)
Phil: "47"s are routinely include in Trek scripts and on Trek displays just for the fun of it. There were several in Star Trek: First Contact. For instance, Picard's command code is "Picard four seven Alpha Tango."
Have a great weekend, everybody!
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Copyright 1997 by Phil Farrand. All rights reserved.