Was Flipping the Casting the Wrong Call?

Other than trek i saw her in a guest spot on one of those procedurals, ncis or csi. And wasn't she in deep impact?
But yeah, she never did much, since even in a cameo I'd remember her if i saw her due to trek.

 

Always felt that Frakes and Sirtis had no real on-screen chemistry, they came off more as pleasant friends, rather than two ex-lovers. No electricity.

Riker (the big flirt) never showed interest in Yar, but it's possible that there could have been interesting chemistry if Crosby were cast as Troi, and she was play off of Frakes.

Troi had many scenes with Picard, Patrick Stewart and Crosby were only two inches different in height, I wonder how that would effect the dynamic in scenes?

Also wonder how Crosby would look in that blue dress?

 

Isn't that pretty much why she came back to appear in TNG whenever they asked, because her movie career didn't take off?
Makes you wonder if they had allowed her to come back full-time and reintroduced Yar if they hadn't killed her off...Like, say if she had just ended up being trapped on a planet and the Enterprise could have rescued her in Season 3/4.

(Oh god, now I could see this really, really awful alternate version of Skin of Evil, where Yar stays behind on that planet to "teach Armus what love is" Don't lie people, that is totally something that could have happened in TNG season 1, and it would have made that episode even worse.)

 

Or she was assigned to Starfleet command college, came back a Lt. Commander.

 

Yar as Shelby. Yar as Jellico. Just keep bringing her back with unlikely promotions every couple of years.

Yar as Nechayev.

Yar as Jaresh-Inyo.

 

Yar as Q

 

If they got rid of Crosby-Troi, but kept Lt. Hernandez, Worf would make a great ship's counselor.

Picard: "Hernandez, cut off communications. Counselor, what do you think are their intentions."
Worf: "They are without honor. I say we obliterate them."
Picard: "I'll put that under advisement."

----

Ensign: "Ever since my husband died, I've been so overcome with grief."
Worf: "As you should be. Your husband died outside of battle, and you have not properly appeased Kortar, the Ferryman. He will never enter Sto-Vo-Kor, due to your reckless inaction."

 

I think Crosby still would have wanted to leave because there wasn't much to do for Troi in the first season and like Sirtis she would see the writing in the wall when she doesn't appear in several episodes. Roddenberry decided to kill Yar off to show it was dangerous and he might have done the same with Crosby-Troi unless he wanted to keep her around for Majel to still have a reason to show up, so I could see Crosby-Troi remaining off screen in her counselor's office and I don't think Crosby would have been opposed to doing occasional guest appearances.

With Hernandez staying Worf obviously doesn't become chief of security but there was an open job, chief engineer. With Worf not having a defined job it would have made sense to move him down there instead of Geordie.

The third seat doesn't need to be assigned to someone specific, it could just be an additional seat for the counselor or doctor, a visiting ambassador, a mission specialist or anyone else who has a reason to be on the bridge but doesn't have an assigned station.

With Geordie staying on the bridge Wesley doesn't get to fly the ship but that's a good thing. He could be an intern popping up everywhere, sometimes he's in engineering, sometimes in the transporter room, sometimes he works with Data or Hernandez. Wesley getting an officer's job as the permanent pilot was weird, it kinda devalues the position if they give the job to a kid with barely any training.

 

Lwaxana Troi was introduced early in Season 1 and possibly cast and conceived of independently of Sirtis as Troi. It's quite possible Barrett would still play Lwaxana with the same mannerisms towards Crosby-Troi (but perhaps with a blonde wig, again).

After Crosby-Troi's death in Season 1, possibly via Armus, it'd be interesting if they brought back Lwaxana. Maybe as just a Federation ambassador angry at her daughter's death in "Manhunt" but later rarely mentioning it and is just a comic foil or sympathetic character in later TNG appearances, like she was on DS9.

 

Personally I think they would have put Data in Troi's chair. Not as counselor, but in his rank as Second Officer of the Enterprise, so they could have put either Worf or Geordie in his chair as OPS officer.
I mean, they couldn't just have left the third centre seat be empty. Unless they would have remodeled the bridge between seasons to just have Picard's and Riker's chairs in the middle, in a sorta Voyager-like configuration.

 

I think Sirtis would make a better Yar than Crosby would have made a good Troi. Also the amount of dumb blonde jokes that would have come with Crosby doing the "I sense your pain" stuff would have been something that fans talked about. I still think though they made the right choice but if I got say if I had to choose I think I would have rather had Yar stay and the Troi character leave. Yar would have been a fun character once Pillar and Moore etc showed up.

Jason

 

I love this Marina Sirtis interview I heard on some podcast, where she pushed back hard on the idea that Tasha had no development in season one and asserting that if she had been in that role, Tasha would have been on the show all 7 years. She also talked about the "too many women" thing and how close she came to getting axed, before things went awry with Crosby and McFadden in other ways.

Troi is my favorite TNG character, and I always attributed most of that to Sirtis herself. That was the luckiest casting choice they made, that character played by a less interesting actress would have been a disaster. I definitely think the flip was a fantastic choice, but I also think it would have ultimately shaken out fine the other way, in that I suspect I'd have loved SirtisYar as much as I loved SirtisTroi.

I'm sure if they'd cast Crosby as Troi, she would have been gone at the end of season. It's not like the writing for any of the characters was that different, quality-wise. And with the writers obviously struggling with Troi, the actress being unhappy, and the producers feeling the show had too many women, what would have kept her around?

My suspicion is that Sirtis-as-Yar would have ultimately landed the same place Troi did (in the series)... paired off with Worf. And those two characters could have made much more sense together.

 

From another thread, I'm of the opinion that Worf would wind up as flight controller if the security chief position never opened up. Geordi seemed destined for chief engineer, and it isn't set in stone that Wesley would be flight controller. Perhaps Wesley might be the one given the third chair, if only to observe the actions of the bridge crew as an acting ensign, but not really get involved (until Picard orders him to take over the conn station or ops when the requisite officer beams down).

That, of course, brings to mind what will happen to the third chair in the fourth season and beyond when(/if) Wesley is written out of the show. At that point, it might just stay there mostly unoccupied. A more comfortable place for an observer to rest while on the bridge. Dr. Crusher can use it from time-to-time, and Admirals of the day can comfortably "advise" Picard when the episode calls for it. When you get that Saterran on the bridge claiming to be XO, Riker can have the third chair as a hypothetical second officer.

 

I liked Lwaxana too, if only for the way she scared Picard.

 

Honestly, besides Stewart, TNG's cast didn't have many strong actors. Denise Crosby was arguably the weakest of the main cast in the first season. In my opinion, she overestimated her star power because of her ancestry, and expected a much bigger career than she could actually achieve.

Marina Sirtis ended up in the crowning role of her career, and Denise Crosby has been a has-been.

It's Hollywood. Shit happens.

 

Sirtis and Crosby have both had a fairly comparable career post-TNG. Anecdotally, I've recognized Crosby (Prison Break, Walking Dead) on television more than Sirtis, who I will grant has more voice acting roles than live action. Genre shows, and really most shows in general, have a way of marginalizing careers, and it's tough to break into the Hollywood game. Patrick Stewart is probably the biggest star to come out of TNG (and Star Trek in general? Not including minor roles), and was the biggest going in, while Frakes went into directing.

 

But really in S1 if their character wasn't called Picard, Data or Wesley then the actor didn't get any real sense of development or standout moments.

I'm also finding it really off about the "too many women" thing on the show when, at one stage of development both Crushers, Troi, Hernandez and a Vulcan science officer were all female.

 

Casting Denise Crosby in any role at all was the wrong call.