From: zerobeat@intacc.uucp (Ferenc Szabo)
Subject: Frakes at Con (spoiler report)
Date: Sun, 11 Oct 1992 19:08:51 GMT
Distribution: na
Organization: Inter/Access' Matrix BBS


Jonathon Frakes was the guest of honor at a recent Creation Con the
weekend of Oct 10,11 here in Toronto.

The following info was either from Frakes himself, or the MC who
had lots of inside information....

First the NON spoilers:

There were two reasons that Gates McFadden was fired after the 1st
season.  1.  Her character wasn't working out...ie no friction
between her and Picard.  2.  Gates would often show up to work
with different colored hair or with a new hair cut or style.  For
obvious reasons (continuity of a single episode) this was causing
havoc in the makeup dept. 

In here contract for the 3rd season, there was a clause that stated
that she wasn't allowed to change her hair OR ELSE!  As of about the
5 episode of this season, she will not be wearing the wig anymore but
showing her real hair.  

Waitaminute?!?!?!  If she had been wearing a wig all this time 
anyway (this ain't new news to me) why the heck would it have been an
issue what her real hair looked like?????????????? Man, I hate talking
about stupid trivial things like this but TREKKIES do indeed read this
newsgroup I'm lead to believe.


The Deep Space Nine cast has a contract for 2 seasons.  The first
season will be a short season since it will start Jan 19/93 (or was
that Jan 16?)  The show will still serve a purpose even if it fails.
If so, it will considered a bridge to the next Star Trek tv series
which would be more like the first two (y'know...on the Enterprise)
THat's why only 2 seasons are in the contract.  Another reason for
cancelling the show might be that the actors demand way too much
money for a 3rd season.  Even if the show is a critical/ratings
hit, Paramount might still prefer to start again with cheap actors
because money and ONLY money is Paramounts reason for ANYTHING.


A word of advice about Creation Cons:  They are very unorganized and
incredibly lame.  They sold more tickets than they were supposed to and
many people didn't get seats and it was incredibly difficult to get into
the dealers room because of the longggggg lineups. The program had more
to do with sf in general than STar Trek.  Frakes' appearance was the ONLY
thing of merit and I wish it was longer than 45 minutes.  He's quite
a funny and intelligent man.  He looked more like late 2nd season RIKER
(gut wise) and he said he intends on losing even more weight and getting
in better shape.

He joked about his character 'before the beard'.  He did a really fun
mockery of the way he used to walk with his chest puffed out and with 
a forward lean.  He is very self aware of his character and the way
it is and was perceived.  He is very astute and quite able to recall
episode moments.  It comes across A LOT that he enjoys playing RIKER
and is quite gratefull for this excellent job. (Unlike certain other
actors whose attitude is: "Hey, I'm just an actor and I'm not at all
interested in the universe and philosophy and trivia surrounding ST")

Don't get me wrong..  Frakes doesn't pander to the audience at all.
When one woman asked why Worf's last name is never mentioned, he
sighed and replied "Don't tell this is gonna be one of those
conventions!  (in 'trekkie' voice)  'How do the transporters work?'
'Where do you go to the bathroom on the ship?' 'How does it feel
to get beamed?'  Worf *is* his last name.  His first name is
Lieutenant"  He was very good natured about this and the entire
audience was laughing hysterically including the woman who asked
the question.

Now for spoilers..................





















Not much but:

Frakes just directed an episode where the guest star is a little machine
that looks like a pig.

A two part episode is being filmed now with Ronny Cox (the bad exec in
Robocop and Total Recall).  A plot to discredit Picard succeeds and Cox 
replaces Picard as captain.  YOW! Shades of Drumhead!  Could this be
a real followup??

The Q episode coming up in a couple of weeks includes another (female)
Q.  Another Q episode will more than likely be filmed near the end of
the season.

An episode called 'A Fistful Of Datas' has just been filmed.  Alexander
programs the holodeck ala wild west and Data plays many characters in
it including somebody in full drag.  

On that wavelength,  an episode called Rascals is coming up where
Picard, Keiko and two others (Ro? I don't have total recall y'know)
are in a shuttlecraft and they get turned into 12 years olds but
still have the same mind.  This episode was tentatively scheduled
for the end of 3rd season as some may recall.

Shades of Lost In Space's 3rd season!

Since the actor who plays Alexander had changed between 4th and 5th
season (he's 7(?) years old), the writers had decided that Klingon
youths age rapidly between the ages of 3? and 15? and then age kinda
like humans. They were thinking of replacing him with a 12 year old 
kid next year or maybe replace him with Denise Crosby.

Data's cat (spot) died recently and Denise Crosby was a possible
replacement for the cat.  

Frakes said that he would indeed sign on for a 7th and 8th season.
Paramount said that they would go with more tv seasons if Patrick
Stewart signed on but wouldn't care if Dorn, Spiner etc decided
not to sign.  If Crosby replaced Stewart they are afraid that
some fans might notice.

Old news but>>>>>>>>>>>>  The DS9 2 hour pilot will feature the
Borg and Locutus (in a flashback, right??)  As you might know,
Captain Sisko's wife was killed at the battle of Wolf 359 and
Sisko hates Picard because he's back in Starfleet NO PROBLEMO
after being Locutus.
The DS9 uniforms are color inverted versions of TNG's (like 
Star Fleet Academy trainee uniforms)

Michael Auberjois' makeup is MORE OF THAT FACIAL STUFF that is
so prevalent in the TNG univers of aliens.  (He play's ODO,
the shapeshifting alien who can't quite get human looks right)

Leonard Nimoy got 4.5 MILLION dollars for being in Unification!
(4.6?)  Since an episode generally costs under 2 million to make,
Nimoy was given a credit as Executive Producer on the show to
justify his salary. (Still a big 'HUH?' as far as I'm concerned).
When Shatner heard that Nimoy was going to be in TNG, he became
quite jealous since he and Nimoy have always been very competitive.
After Nimoy directed STIII and STIV, Shatner just HAD to direct
STV (or else he said he wouldn't do the movie)

For the end of season 5, a cliffhanger episode where Spock is on
Romulus in trouble, the only person who can help is an ancient
Kirk who is pulled out of retirement or whatever.  This was 
strongly considered but Shatner demanded something like 6 Million
dollars.  NO WAY wigged one.  So they went with Time's Arrow
instead.

So the last few things weren't spoilers, but I only remembered them
now.

ferenc



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