What was the plan with Diana Muldaur?
- Thread starter JesterFace
- Start date
Agreed about Dukat worship.... the whole Pah Wraith mess left me cold, actually. And while I was fine with S31, two issues...
1. Before DS9, it doesn't exist. After, it's everywhere, and not even a big secret anymore.
2. Introducing it right before Pale Moonlight. The WORST time to do so.
1. Before DS9, it doesn't exist. After, it's everywhere, and not even a big secret anymore.
2. Introducing it right before Pale Moonlight. The WORST time to do so.
I'm not defending Section 31, because I don't find them interesting and think they're cliche. But stuff like that happens a lot in Trek, and in many other franchises that have this "we're introducing elements to the world as we go along" mentality.
Examples in Star Trek, in my opinion, are the Borg, the Ferengi, the Trill and holodecks.
In actuality, I was referring to real-world fans of Gul Dukat who minimize (or even justify!) his actions.
To me, the mere presence of that covert organization is a rather overt middle finger to the spirit of Star Trek.
It encouraged a retcon-happy frenzy
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Correct. The "Return of McCloud" telemovie was going to make her unavailable for the first three episodes of Season Three. It was decided to recast the doctor and the easiest solution ended up being inviting Gates McFadden back.
The "Special Appearance by..." credit was requested by Muldaur (or her agent). She had actually retired from acting when Roddenberry asked her to do Season Two. And yes, she went from TNG to "LA Law" - and her "LA Law" appearances reached Australian TV screens before her TNG work.
Correct, but that didn't really come out for a few years.
Tracy Torme was pushing for an alien doctor.
(Selar was supposed to appear in three episodes of Season Two and eventually be revealed as Worf's love interest, after the running gag of Dr Selar treating his injuries each time - injuries of courtship.)
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One thing about Patrick Stewart is that he seems to be perfectly happy to play crap roles in crap movies. Literally, in the case of "The Emoji Movie". But he was also Sean Connery lite in "Robin Hood: Men in Tights", and the Hans Gruber equivalent in the teenybopper Die Hard clone "Masterminds". And I think he was a talking book in some Macaulay Culkin movie when he was a thing*. I get the sense that Stewart can just say to himself "this is absolute crap, so I'm going to have fun with it".
*Brief enough, thankfully. If you ever saw "The Good Son" (not saying you should have), you saw him absolutely get out-acted across the board by fellow child actor Elijah Wood.
*Brief enough, thankfully. If you ever saw "The Good Son" (not saying you should have), you saw him absolutely get out-acted across the board by fellow child actor Elijah Wood.
Until LA Law removed her from the series by having her step into an elevator shaft with no elevator present - still one of the funniest ways I have seen to have a character leave a show..
In her defence, she had just retired and moved away from LA when TNG came calling for Season Two. And she loved her role in "McCloud". So it was more a concern about tying herself down to a longterm contract in TV, not "not liking" TV productions.
In an appalling kind of way...
I like to think the same happened on TNG, just with a turbo lift.
Don’t forget Kira and her sui generis Bajoran uniform.
That happened to "Joey's" (Friends) parody character in Days of our Lives, too.
But at least that pretended to be a uniform (if some weird variation nobody else wore) Troi's T'Pol's and Seven's jumpsuits were clearly civilian attire.
I thought Kira wore the same uniform other Bajorans did. Ditto with Dax, Janeway, and Torres. And Kes's civvies were modest but flattering. Until Seven, the Trek powers that be seemed to have started to see that Trek women didn't need to be dressed like exotic dancers to be sexy.
Then... Seven. And T'Pol. Pricks.
Kira got a more streamlined, body-hugging, full-red jumpsuit variation of the (rather bulky) Bajoran uniform in Season 3 or 4, which, iirc also incorporated high-heels (you know, like a chief of security would wear
) Apparently Nana Visitor was not happy about it, since it didn't make sense for the character. And in the 3rd season of Voy they actually tried to sexualize Kes' clothing; they put her into tight, high-heeled jumpsuits and low cut dresses. Her new wardrobe still wasn't quite as revealing as those of Troi or Seven, but more so than her original costumes.
It happened around the same time she grew her hair out into that long, curly style (though to be fair, I think she looked worlds better with that haircut than her original pixie one that made her look like a blond Vulcan toddler, and it came about because Lienn developed an allergic reaction to the prosthetic glue used to apply her alien ears, so they had to cover those up in most shots)
Diana Muldaur signed a one year contract. She might have continued if she had enjoyed the experience, but she didn't.
Most of the cast took their anger and resentment they felt regarding Mcfadden being fired out on her.
It was very childish. She was treated horribly on set. People saying nasty things about her behind her back just loud enough so she would hear. Stewart actively lobbied for Mcfadden's return whilst Muldaur was there. Director Paul Lynch once said in an interview many years ago that Muldaur was lovely, but that the rest of the cast made her life miserable. She even left the set in tears once.
Muldaur originally was going to be in the opening credits, but because of her status in Hollywood at the time, she was going to be in the starring credits behind or Stewart or Frakes. Some of the cast objected.
Cast members also objected to her being paid more than they were and that she had a more comfortable uniform.
In a 1999 interview Muldaur called the whole experience one big nightmare and I think that was what it was for her. Her responses have become a little bit more politically correct in more recent years, but I feel her 1999 interview was closest to the truth.
The character of Pulaski was going to be a conflict creator for other characters like Picard and Data. But Roddenberry wrote all those interesting scenes out. What was left was mostly technobabble and that was something Muldaur wasn't good at. So she had to use some cue cards for that on set and was being ridiculed for it by some of the other actors.
All in all it wasn't a very pleasurable experience for Muldaur and when she was offered to star in the reunion McCloud movie and the Star Trek producers didn't want to accommodate her to be written out of the first three episodes of season 3 (partially because they didn't want her back in the first place), Muldaur opted not to renew her contract for another season and just left without any notice.
Most of the cast took their anger and resentment they felt regarding Mcfadden being fired out on her.
It was very childish. She was treated horribly on set. People saying nasty things about her behind her back just loud enough so she would hear. Stewart actively lobbied for Mcfadden's return whilst Muldaur was there. Director Paul Lynch once said in an interview many years ago that Muldaur was lovely, but that the rest of the cast made her life miserable. She even left the set in tears once.
Muldaur originally was going to be in the opening credits, but because of her status in Hollywood at the time, she was going to be in the starring credits behind or Stewart or Frakes. Some of the cast objected.
Cast members also objected to her being paid more than they were and that she had a more comfortable uniform.
In a 1999 interview Muldaur called the whole experience one big nightmare and I think that was what it was for her. Her responses have become a little bit more politically correct in more recent years, but I feel her 1999 interview was closest to the truth.
The character of Pulaski was going to be a conflict creator for other characters like Picard and Data. But Roddenberry wrote all those interesting scenes out. What was left was mostly technobabble and that was something Muldaur wasn't good at. So she had to use some cue cards for that on set and was being ridiculed for it by some of the other actors.
All in all it wasn't a very pleasurable experience for Muldaur and when she was offered to star in the reunion McCloud movie and the Star Trek producers didn't want to accommodate her to be written out of the first three episodes of season 3 (partially because they didn't want her back in the first place), Muldaur opted not to renew her contract for another season and just left without any notice.
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