page_title: Jennifer Lien
section_title: Career
hierarchical_section_title: Jennifer Lien / Career
caption_attribution_description: English: Group image of Roxann Dawson, Kate Mulgrew and Jennifer Lien taken by EJ Camp in 1995. Cropped low resolution version of photo taken by EJ Camp which first appeared on page 25 of an article by Diane Werts titled ‘The Bold and the Beautiful’ (TV Guide Collector's Edition, Star Trek: Four Generations, pp. 22-25, Spring 1995).
context_page_description: Jennifer Anne Lien is an American actress, best known for playing the alien Kes on the television series Star Trek: Voyager.
context_section_description: Lien's first television appearance was in a bubble gum commercial playing twins. Her first appearance on a television series was as a music academy student in a 1990 episode of Brewster Place, starring Oprah Winfrey. The same year she provided her voice for the dubbed English language version of Baby Blood, a French horror film. Lien moved to New York in 1991 after she was cast as Hannah Moore on the series Another World. She attended and graduated from the Professional Children's School while working on this series.
  In a 1992 interview, Lien said: "A couple of years ago, I was trying to get an audition for a baseball movie, so I said that I could play baseball. We'd always played a lot while I was growing up, like in the backyard. But when I showed up at the audition, I was faced with these Goliath-like, testosterone women who could really play. I did survive the two days of training and auditions, but I basically pulled every muscle in my body!"
  In 1993, Lien was cast as Roanne in Phenom, a sitcom starring Judith Light. She also participated in the recording of Adam Sandler's comedy album They're All Gonna Laugh At You in which she played the part of the Valedictorian on the track "The Buffoon And The Valedictorian", as well as one of the daughters on the track "Oh, mom...".
  In 1994, Lien was cast as Kes on Star Trek: Voyager. Her character is an Ocampan, a species in the Star Trek universe that lives for only eight to nine years, who joins the starship's crew after it is stranded 70,000 light-years from Earth.
  In the same year, Lien voiced the character Valerie Fox in the pilot episode of The Critic.
  Richard Lutz wrote, "The medical personnel in Star Trek best embody the humane values embedded in this franchise; the most notable of which is Kes, thanks in large part to Jennifer Lien whose remarkable performance brought to life a beautiful child-like being (Ocampa) whose short lifespan and humanity reminds us that the most important element in a life worth living is a loving connection with our fellow human beings."
  Lien's Voyager contract was not renewed after season three to allow Jeri Ryan to join the cast as Seven of Nine within the existing budget. In 2000, Lien returned for a season six episode titled "Fury".
  After Voyager, Lien appeared in the movie American History X as Edward Norton's younger sister. In 1998, she appeared in SLC Punk! playing Sandy, the wild girlfriend of Matthew Lillard's character. She also voiced Agent "L" for the first three seasons of Men in Black: The Animated Series (1997–1999) and the first seven episodes of the 2000 season. She also voiced Vitani in the 1998 Disney direct-to-video film The Lion King 2: Simba's Pride.
caption: Jennifer Lien with Voyager actresses Kate Mulgrew and Roxann Dawson (1995)
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