Terrible TOS performances....

[plynch]

McCreedy as the barber is awesome. We reach on that ep, though. It has some great, small roles, the barber, the sheriff, Wyatt (or is it Morgan?). Love it. I truly cannot fathom the hatred some have for it.

 

[jayrath]

Bless his heart, but the actor who played John Gill wasn't too great.

 

[BillJ]

Bless his heart, but the actor who played John Gill wasn't too great.

But the script calls for him to be drugged pretty much the whole episode. Not sure I can hold it against him.

 

[TREK_GOD_1]

Oh, I forgot to say mine. LOL.

I guess I'd have to go with Angelique Pettyjohn--she wasn't hired for her acting.

...then that kind of gives her an excuse, since she served her purpose.

But in response to your topic: I cannot think of anyone bad enough to--err--stink up the joint, but I agree with AtoZ about Ed McCready as Dr. Carter. McCready's UUHHHEEEHEHHAAAHH death cry could have hurt the scene, if not for the principals giving such serious performances.

 

[Maurice]

You can't just blame the actors when it's a line here and there. The director and editors are complicit, as they might go for the blandest or most scenery chewing takes.

 

[lurok]

I have greater problems with other obligatory babes of the week, such as (I forget her name) the vacuous cloud city woman.

Yeah, Droxine was pretty bad.

Indeed. Then again, like Pettyjohn, you feel she wasn't hired principally for her acting talents. So I give her a pass. She does wear Ware Theiss well though. Slight off-track, but actress I thought did the Barbie-can-actually-act well was the one in that S3 speed-up time episode. That's still one of my personal underrated episodes.

 

[jayrath]

I have greater problems with other obligatory babes of the week, such as (I forget her name) the vacuous cloud city woman.

Yeah, Droxine was pretty bad.

Indeed. Then again, like Pettyjohn, you feel she wasn't hired principally for her acting talents. So I give her a pass. She does wear Ware Theiss well though. Slight off-track, but actress I thought did the Barbie-can-actually-act well was the one in that S3 speed-up time episode. That's still one of my personal underrated episodes.

That was Kathie Browne, Darren McGavin's wife. She had a long career and was really good. You can catch her in "The Rockford Files" as an evil small town mayor.

 

[Myko]

McCready was a personal friend, I believe, of director Vincent McEveety, and appears in all his episodes.

 

[TREK_GOD_1]

You can't just blame the actors when it's a line here and there. The director and editors are complicit, as they might go for the blandest or most scenery chewing takes.

Yeah, but would a director tell any actor to do what McCready did as Dr. Carter? He was fine delivering his recorded warning, but the death cry was cringe-worthy. Again, IMO, that was the one and only bad acting moment in an episode played seriously--often grim, with great effect.

 

[Doug Otte]

It's very interesting to read these opinions, especially from younger fans who are approaching the show for the first time.

I've been watching Trek for 40 years, and to me, all the performances seem right for the show and the time it was produced. I'm sure there were things that bugged me when I first saw them as a teen, but I can't remember them now.

 

[Greg Cox]

I have greater problems with other obligatory babes of the week, such as (I forget her name) the vacuous cloud city woman.

Yeah, Droxine was pretty bad.

Indeed. Then again, like Pettyjohn, you feel she wasn't hired principally for her acting talents. So I give her a pass. She does wear Ware Theiss well though. Slight off-track, but actress I thought did the Barbie-can-actually-act well was the one in that S3 speed-up time episode. That's still one of my personal underrated episodes.

"Wink of an Eye."

 

[Jose Tyler]

In no particular order of bad acting:

Antoinette Bower as Sylvia from Catspaw

Mary-Linda Rapelye as Irina from The Way to Eden

Stephen Brooks as Ensign Garrovick from Obsession

Phyllis Douglas as Yeoman Mears from The Galileo Seven

 

[Grant]

I have to say Shana (Pettyjohn) came off as 'stupid' not brainwashed, uninformed, uneducated, unenlightened as she was meant to be.

The actors who had to play unnatural accents (Irina) seemed to fair poorly as it seemed they were concentrating on their accent more than their performance.

Something about 'Sylvia' did strike me as bad--maybe acting, maybe lines as written.

 

[Grant]

The 'Roger Corby' actor really did blow one line.....

It was supposed to be....

"I AM Roger Corby!" not

"I am ROGER CORBY!"

 

[NTRPRZ]

Robert Brown (no relation) as Lazarus would get my vote.

Jeff Brown
Hartly, Del.

 

[TREK_GOD_1]

Phyllis Douglas as Yeoman Mears from The Galileo Seven

Curious choice. I thought she gave the right amount of frustration with Spock and the overall situation. Sure, she was no Janice Rand, but as a one-time guest actress, she was fine, imo.

 

[Harvey]

I'm not sure why Robert Brown is getting singled out here. His performance is fine, given the material (i.e. Don Ingalls' awful teleplay) and the especially rushed schedule (due to Barrymore, Jr.'s vanishing act).

 

[Mad Jack Wolfe]

Richard Webb as 'Ben Finney' in Court Martial, particularly when Finney learns his daughter, Jame, is aboard. Just horrid. The rest of the time he sounds straight-up bonkers.

 

[gottacook]

No one else has posted this yet, but it's my inevitable choice:

Sabrina Scharf as Miramanee

Not entirely her fault, perhaps, given lines such as "I have nothing to fear; you are here," "...the strange lodge which moves through the sky," etc. Despite her sporting what I believe to be the largest chest measurement of any (female) guest star, she simply was not equipped to breathe life into lines like that. (Who would have been, I wonder?)

 

[plynch]

No one else has posted this yet, but it's my inevitable choice:

Sabrina Scharf as Miramanee

Not entirely her fault, perhaps, given lines such as "I have nothing to fear; you are here," "...the strange lodge which moves through the sky," etc. Despite her sporting what I believe to be the largest chest measurement of any (female) guest star, she simply was not equipped to breathe life into lines like that. (Who would have been, I wonder?)

Yup, she was bad. Forgot about her. My kids like almost every episode uncritically. Not that one, though.