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James Sloyan plays
Doctor Jetrel, also plays the Romulan Admiral called
Alidar Jarok in the TNG episode
"The Defector," K'mtar in
the TNG episode
"Firstborn," and Dr. Mora Pol in the
DS9
episode
"The Alternate." |
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Jeri Taylor:
"It's pretty clear that it was a
Hiroshima metaphor, but it also gave us the opportunity to
show a completely other side of Neelix. I thought that
Ethan Phillips was masterful in the way he plays something
heavy and serious as well as he plays some of the lighter
stuff. A thought-provoking episode, it had substance, was
really about something, and those are the things that I
think work very well for Star Trek." |
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Brannon Braga:
"It removed Neelix from being just
comic relief, which I think is important. You don't want
him to become the joke of the ship." |
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Kenneth Biller admits
that writing the script was extremely depressing for him -
"I did all of this research about
Hiroshima, yet it was a fascinating idea to say, 'What if
Oppenheimer was confronted by a survivor?' and then make
that person see how he would respond. I thought Ethan was
great and James Sloyan did a great job. They were
wonderful together, and it was great to sink my teeth into
something serious." |
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Michael Piller:
"I was very impressed with that
show. It was a very complex show to make work, and we had
a lot of trouble making the story interesting enough.
Fortunately, the two actors [Phillips and Sloyan] working
together was just terrific. And I found it extremely
moving." He rejects the idea that Jetrel's metreon
cascade weapon was a metaphor for the atomic bomb.
"You can't say that every show is
making a comment. It's not. Basically, we're using the
Oppenheimer character as an inspiration to tell something
about one of our guys. So is it unsympathetic? I don't
know. I look at that show and I find the Jetrel character
tortured. And I think Oppenheimer was. He's trying to
correct a grievous wrong. I think that the character is
not an unsympathetic one." The episode also further
develops the relationship between Neelix and Kes.
"They work very well together.
Jennifer [Lien] is just terrific. There's something about
an actor who gives you honesty that you can't buy or
teach. It just comes from inside. She's twenty-one years
old, and there's a depth in her eyes that just comes
through every time she's on camera." |
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James Sloyan's make-up
for the character Jetrel consisted of heavy eyebrow
appliances with ridges running up the sides of their
temples to the hairline, a sharp appliance over the ridge
of the nose, and a chin piece. |
