I think the credit and money goes to the person who wrote their first episode.
Ensign Clancy (from “Elementary, My Dear Data” and “The Emissary”)
- Thread starter Captain Clark Terrell
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I think the credit and money goes to the person who wrote their first episode.
I'll take Ensign Lian T'Su.
She wasn't a helm officer
I would take her, too.
Details, detailsShe wasn't a helm officer
The first they appeared in?
Or the first with a single line specifically written for them?
Or the first where they had something that could legitimately be called "a part?"
Even if they had a single line, does that make them a character?
When the three breasted woman spilled chocolate on LaForge, she had multiple lines, the scene involved some actual acting, and she had a name and rank.
While somewhat minimum, I'd say she was a established character.
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Lycia Naff, who played Ensign Sonya Gomez.
I am not entirely sure about the details. But a character doesn't have to have lines to be a character, so my guess would be their first appearance.
I am not entirely sure about the details. But a character doesn't have to have lines to be a character, so my guess would be their first appearance.
Fundamentally, I'd say anyone ever seen or mentioned is a character, whether it be the nameless skant wearing blonde officer who's evacuating, in the pilot episode, or even the mysterious alien form that Geordi has to recreate from a shadow in the holodeck during Identity Crisis. Picard's mother, who we see, Riker's mother, who we don't. They're all characters. That said, I don't think writers get paid based on the characters they introduce
"Established" characters, however, seems to me to be a term for characters with identities that have been written about, names, personalities, their own dialog, etc...
"Established" characters, however, seems to me to be a term for characters with identities that have been written about, names, personalities, their own dialog, etc...
Interesting thing about Ensign Gates, aside from honorable service at the helm in 46 episodes, she also appears as the helm officer in the Super Nintendo/SEGA Genesis videogame "Days Of Future Past". You can only see the back of the characters head but the haircut is distinctly hers. 
I think the original plan was to replace Wesley full-time with a new female regular cast member. I've seen a few references to Michael Piller saying as much.
Although they never did get around to replacing him, Ensign Ro was basically that character, but she was recurring rather than regular cast.
Although they never did get around to replacing him, Ensign Ro was basically that character, but she was recurring rather than regular cast.
Forgiving the unimpressive female representation in the lead cast, I kind of liked a few rotating personnel happening, & relief people etc... it added to the "vast crew" dynamic. You don't have a ship with 1000 people on board, & only 5 or 6 of them are ever running the whole thing. I just wish they'd had the budget to give them a little more substance
It wasn't so much the budget as the nature of TV at the time - you focused on your regulars and only brought in someone else if they would bring in a new type of interaction with the main people. For example Barclay and Ro were both different types of Starfleet officer who conflicted with the regulars.
Deep Space Nine brought in many more characters, but I always thought it was odd that Voyager never bothered to do the same. The Enterprise was a huge ship with a fair degree of crew rotation, but Voyager was isolated with only 150 people. Every redshirt death should have felt like a real blow, hitting the crew hard.
Aside from a couple of attempts early on (Seska, Carey, Jonas, Samantha Wildman) there was pretty much no one until later on when we got Naomi Wildman and Icheb.
There were a couple of episodes which kind of addressed this - Tuvok's ''cadets" in Learning Curve, and that one where Janeway takes a few people on the Delta Flyer. Plus the Equinox survivors. None of them were ever seen again.
Deep Space Nine brought in many more characters, but I always thought it was odd that Voyager never bothered to do the same. The Enterprise was a huge ship with a fair degree of crew rotation, but Voyager was isolated with only 150 people. Every redshirt death should have felt like a real blow, hitting the crew hard.
Aside from a couple of attempts early on (Seska, Carey, Jonas, Samantha Wildman) there was pretty much no one until later on when we got Naomi Wildman and Icheb.
There were a couple of episodes which kind of addressed this - Tuvok's ''cadets" in Learning Curve, and that one where Janeway takes a few people on the Delta Flyer. Plus the Equinox survivors. None of them were ever seen again.
But the business of Hollywood is a bit more arcane than that. This is why Tom Paris wasn't actually Nick Locarno. When they brought Robert McNeill in for Voyager it was with every intention that he be reprising his role from "The First Duty" [TNG] but then they realized they'd have to pay some kind of royalty to the writer who invented Nick Locarno. So they invented Tom Paris by subtle tweaks to Locarno.
Oh yeah, they did! I recall one episode late in the series (can't recall the episode's name) where some dude I never saw before had all these lines and was set up as some guy the regular cast all knew and loved and inside of ten minutes I was like 'this dude's gonna die and we'll never hear about him again.' And sure enough....
--Alex
I thought this only applied to freelance writers, not staff writers? Naren Shankar and Ron Moore wrote First Duty. If that were the case wouldn't they have to pay Gene Roddenberry's estate every time they used Q? Or Bob Justman every time Worf was on DS9?
The main reason for the change was that Locarno was an asshole who got his friend killed and lied about it, and pressured his other friends to cover it up. Tom Paris is basically a good guy who made a mistake and lost his way. None of the other Voyager characters are flat out bad people - the Maquis on Voyager are presented more as freedom fighters than criminals. We never really find out what Paris did to get those officers killed, but it seemed more like Ro's screw up than Locarno's criminal act.
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I never heard anything about McNeill's character having to be rewritten over royalty stuff. I alway just took the producers at their claim that the character was too unusable. After all, Locarno never even graduated from the academy. It would be one thing to give a Ro Laren a 2nd shot. She'd already been an officer. Locarno had not.
But regardless, a background character hardly falls into that category anyhow. Some of them like Jae don't even really have a name in the canon, & if they're wholly unestablished with zero backstory & only have one name like Gates or Martinez, it would be pretty hard to claim ownership of an IP so vague
But regardless, a background character hardly falls into that category anyhow. Some of them like Jae don't even really have a name in the canon, & if they're wholly unestablished with zero backstory & only have one name like Gates or Martinez, it would be pretty hard to claim ownership of an IP so vague
Oh, I have actual knowledge on this one! I used to be involved in character payments in my previous career, when I worked in casting. I worked on some procedural shows that had lots of "helmsman" type roles -- crime scene techs and detectives and so on who come through for 2 or 3 lines. Sometimes the writers became fans of a specific performer and then the scripts would show up with "Detective Locarno" in them, and I knew to book the actor who had already played that in a previous ep.
But much more commonly you get "Detective Smith" or "Detective TK" (name to come) or "Detective #1" in the script, and you might just say to your bosses "didn't you like that actor who played Detective Locarno last month, he's great, why don't we bring him back?" If this is approved, I make sure to mention to the script coordinator that this actor has an established character name, so that she can make sure it's changed in the next script revision to match.
I've worked on shows where the writers office carefully tracks any recurs, and who wrote the first appearance, and then turns that information over to accounting so they can process all the character payments at the end of the season. This setup is ideal.
I've worked on other shows where the writers office is too chaotic to manage this, or no one thinks of it, or no one cares, and THEN the end of the season has the phone call to me from the accountant, who first wants me to walk them through every recurring appearance, and then try to construct a rationale to avoid as many payments as possible. This is annoying but actually allowed, the WGA's own website describes this in a way that is more art than science:
So then the discussion I'm having with the accountant is, who first suggested this actor for this slot, casting or a producer? What were we talking about before the actor was suggested, abstract creative concerns or concrete production issues? Does this character have any specific qualities? Did we decide to use them again because of essential personality they bring to the character, or was the actress just pleasant and easy-going on set so we want to work with her again? Since the script coordinator forgot to change the Detective name in episode X, can we claim that this actress is now playing her previous characters twin? (Actual example. And possible inspiration for fanfic about the Rager quintuplets)
I remember one that was a lot like the issues @Tenacity outlines -- the actor was core background, had been in the background almost every episode the entire series, after 4 or 5 years they started throwing him lines in one episode a season. The writer who did the first ep where he spoke got the character payment.
I try to appear cooperative with this while actually cooperating as little as possible, because I'd rather just pay all the writers and not go looking for reasons to nickel and dime them, but the final decision was never mine anyway. But it can be legitimately gray and hard to make a determination. If a writer thinks they've been cheated out of a character payment, they can file a grievance, but I don't think it happens that often, I just don't think the money you get is worth the hassle.
Oh god, typing this out I remembered something I had completely forgotten, which is when I worked on another show that had a rich stable of great actors in recurring roles. At one point well into this show's run, a new showrunner and writing staff were brought on. Almost all the well-established recurs were never used again and were replaced by a whole new crop. I at first took this to be laziness -- they just didn't want to learn what had come before -- but I later came to feel this was just about these writers coordinating to make sure they were directing every possible dollar back to their own pockets. Burning down the show's history for a few paltry character payments! It was so gross. (And.... hmm... is this why Voyager never kept recurring crewmembers around very long?)
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An interesting point about VOYAGER and recurring characters.
Out of all the spinoffs, VOYAGER probably had the highest amount of writing staff changes, other than TNG.
A lot of the recurring people from the first few two seasons... Suder, Jonas, Hogan, Seska... were killed by the end of season 2. ("BASICS, PART II" was produced in season 2, so I still count it as a second season episode. Seska, Suder, and Hogan were all killed there, though Seska was used again twice afterward.) Michael Piller left at the end of season 2, which "BASICS, PART II" was his final script for the franchise.
Interesting note about Seska... her character first appeared in "PARALLAX", which Brannon Braga did the teleplay for. Of all the recurring characters from back then, she and Carey were the only ones to be used after season 2.
The only new recurring character created in season 3 was Vorik... who 'happened' to be played by Jeri Taylor's son. He also played another Vulcan, Taurik, in TNG's "Lower Decks"... different writer, of course.
(Which brings up another question. "FAIR TRADE" and "ALTER EGO" both had Vorik, but "ALTER EGO" was produced first. Do they go by first airing appearance or first produced episode of said character? If by production, then that goes to Joe Menosky.)
And in the case of Naomi, her first appearance is as a baby in "DEADLOCK". Do they go by that or her first spoken line, which I believe was "MORTAL COIL" by Bryan Fuller?
You know, this can be made into a whole new thread...
Out of all the spinoffs, VOYAGER probably had the highest amount of writing staff changes, other than TNG.
A lot of the recurring people from the first few two seasons... Suder, Jonas, Hogan, Seska... were killed by the end of season 2. ("BASICS, PART II" was produced in season 2, so I still count it as a second season episode. Seska, Suder, and Hogan were all killed there, though Seska was used again twice afterward.) Michael Piller left at the end of season 2, which "BASICS, PART II" was his final script for the franchise.
Interesting note about Seska... her character first appeared in "PARALLAX", which Brannon Braga did the teleplay for. Of all the recurring characters from back then, she and Carey were the only ones to be used after season 2.
The only new recurring character created in season 3 was Vorik... who 'happened' to be played by Jeri Taylor's son. He also played another Vulcan, Taurik, in TNG's "Lower Decks"... different writer, of course.
(Which brings up another question. "FAIR TRADE" and "ALTER EGO" both had Vorik, but "ALTER EGO" was produced first. Do they go by first airing appearance or first produced episode of said character? If by production, then that goes to Joe Menosky.)
And in the case of Naomi, her first appearance is as a baby in "DEADLOCK". Do they go by that or her first spoken line, which I believe was "MORTAL COIL" by Bryan Fuller?
You know, this can be made into a whole new thread...
These are good ones! In my personal experience, first spoken line was most commonly when the character was considered to have been "invented", but I would guess no one got a character payment on Naomi, precisely because of how she fades in so gradually. It's hard for any one writer (maybe Fuller?) to credibly claim to have written the specific script that invented her, and there doesn't HAVE to be a character payment if the specific requirements for it just don't apply. So it would have been easy for the accountant or whoever was dealing with it on the Voyager staff to just not pay one, and then wait to see if anyone protested and felt they were owed it, and then it could get hashed out.
Oh god, this also leads me to wonder: "Is that why Naomi's the only recurring Voyager person that sticks around?!? Because she was the cheapest character to use?!?"
Back to TNG, this makes me hope the "Hollow Pursuits" writer kept getting her Barclay money! That script (and story on DS9 "Babel") are her only writing credits, and that's as clear cut a case for character payments as you'll ever see, this one-off freelancer coming in and inventing a character that is then used regularly for the next 11 years.
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Hey! Thank you for all this Sakonna! That's the most I've ever heard on this subject. From that perspective I'd say that it's very possible Locarno was renamed over royalties. His character is a very developed person in his one appearance. I'm pretty sure Worf's dad only shows up in Family, but he's obviously someone they invented & established. Sonya Gomez as well
However, the more I think about these background ensigns like Clancy, or Gates, etc... I'd say it's impossible for anyone to claim character rights on them, when they barely have names, have no identifiable character traits, & maybe only ever say "Aye sir," or "Course plotted, Sir." etc... until someone opts to develop them, & THEN that person gets the credit
Take Robin Lefler, for example. She only appeared twice, & her 1st appearance in Darmok, was just as set dressing, with a few standardized lines, not much different from Amy Pietz's security officer, Lt. Sandra Rhodes, who receives a rude exchange from Jason Vigo in Bloodlines. If they'd chosen her to feature in an episode like The Game, then it's an established character, but if she'd only had several more appearances like that one, with basic, standardized lines, like Yes, Sir" or whatnot, then I'd have a hard time seeing how anyone could collect on her. The same is probably true of our rotating conn officers, even Sariel Rager, who barely had any lines herself
Ogawa is maybe the best example of that kind of development, but I guess Chief O'Brien is too, maybe even more so
Edit: BTW, since we're on the subject, I really liked Sandra Rhodes
I'd have liked to smack Jason Vigo in the back of the head for his dickishness to her. She seemed friendly & sweet, & cute. Maybe not the best attributes for being on Worf's security team, mind you, but I bet she'd fit in just great covering Ops, for Data, maybe while he's in command on night shift or something. Seemed like the kind of girl that sad shlump Geordi ought to have been getting to know better
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Michelle Forbes didn't want to be tied down to a regular role (my understanding) at that time in her career, same reason she turned down DS9 (Ro then became the character of Kira).
That's REALLY open to interpretation. One of the great things about how the Marquis were developed and written is you're not completely sure how to categorize them as a group. Somewhat like with section 31, whether you support or vilify the Marquis comes down to your personal take.
Kira on DS9 was quite proud to of been a terrorist in her younger days.
Not specifically Worf's adopted father, but if a character is referred to, but not seen (no actor), does the creator still get credit?
Actually in real sea ships, civilian and military, operating the steering wheel is a job for enlisted personnel, not officers, who merely give the orders which way to steer. Of course sea ships don't have to land and take off, which requires skills more like those of airplane pilots or astronauts. But for steering ships between stars no great skill set is needed.
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