The real question we have to answer is whether both actors who played Sisko are members of the SAG.
--Sran
--Sran
Extras never having any lines
- Thread starter mlk
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Of course! Kirk's chicken sandwich and coffee were ruined by Tribbles getting into the Enterprise's food processors. And Janeway said she ate peanut butter and jelly sandwiches while at the Academy.
--Sran
Except with Damar it was intentional. Casey Biggs claims he was persuaded to play the role in Return to Grace which at the time he wasn't too enthusiastic about since all the dialogue he had was just things like "aye sir" and other bridge jargon, and he felt "anyone could play this." The director of the episode hinted to him the writers had plans for the character and that he wouldn't regret taking it on.
Picard and Wesley eating sandwiches: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hjR08nB9rZ4
I'll bet they told Stephen Hawking "Well, technically you didn't use your own voice, so you just get the extra's wage. Thanks for showing up, though." 
I'll bet they told Stephen Hawking "Well, technically you didn't use your own voice, so you just get the extra's wage. Thanks for showing up, though."
No, because he was listed in the opening guest credits: "And Professor Stephen Hawking as Himself." That kind of credit -- at the end of the list, with an "And... as [role]" notation -- is a prestige credit which means he probably got paid more for his appearance than the other guest actors, or at least second to the first actor in the guest list (John Neville).
Indeed, when Hawking does a voice role on a show like The Simpsons or Futurama, he gets billed by name too, and thus gets paid for it. Evidently, as far as SAG is concerned, Hawking's speech synthesizer is counted as his own voice. They could just fake it with an equivalent synthesizer (though I think his is customized), but apparently they actually get him to record the lines himself, i.e. to personally encode them into his speech synthesizer. That way they can legitimately list/promote him as a guest star and get the benefit of his star power.
Back circa 1983 I had a Texas Instruments TI-99/4A home computer with an early model speech synthsizer. If my memory serves, it sounded very much like Hawking's when I've heard him.
I suspect that today, engineers could fashion a less synthetic-sounding voice for him (as they did for Roger Ebert), but I think he keeps the old one for familiarity.
I suspect that today, engineers could fashion a less synthetic-sounding voice for him (as they did for Roger Ebert), but I think he keeps the old one for familiarity.
Which is ironic, since he's actually English but he's stuck with an American accent.
I'm not an expert but one line of dialogue does require the actor to be paid, perhaps something like a few hundred dollars. Meanwhile an extra isn't even required to be paid at all.
Extras do get paid. The minimum rates for background actors, as they're called, are dictated by SAG-AFTRA in the US. Here's a PDF of the document that defines their pay rates. As of this month, the minimum pay for an extra is $148 per day.
They'd do the sensible thing and cast Ryan Hanigan, Devin Mesoroco or Corky Miller, and count themselves lucky!
Sir Rhosis, Reds Fan
I'm told that the holodeck program filters out artificial chemical performance enhancements, which means that some 21st Century Major Leaguers would appear in quite diminished physiques there.
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