'Enterprise' Cast On Breaking With Tradition

With Enterprise attempting to blaze a bold new path for the Star Trek franchise, it's inevitable that the series will shed some of the old Trek formula. In a recent set of video interviews, the cast were asked what they felt made the series new and exciting.

"Jolene Blalock," Dominic Keating (Malcolm Reed) told Pulse24 more than a little tongue in cheek, before approaching the question more seriously. "Because we're making it in 2001, it has a style that it couldn't have back in 1961. So I think there's a nice sort of meshed mix of that initial format with the polished production that we can give it in this generation."

Keating added that the prequel setting allowed for a new spin on the typical Star Trek morality play. "There's one nice thing about this franchise, as it were - Star Trek's got a message," he said. "And it's fantasy, but because it's looking at humans in the future, and particularly in this invention of it, it has the luxury of hindsight with hindsight. So we're looking at humans as we might be, but we're also looking at them from the knowledge that the Trekkers have built up on human exploration [in the later series]. It's got a lot of tongue in cheek to it, and a lot of knowingness."

Some of the cast, such as Connor Trinneer (Charles 'Trip' Tucker) were dreading having to wear a spandex jumpsuit, and were relieved when they saw the more utilitarian uniforms. But that doesn't mean they totally escaped the skin-tight experience.

"We had to wear tights two episodes ago, and I had to put a dance belt on and all that crap," Trinner said. "All day long, wearing a dance belt - a lot of fun." The actor isn't fond of his conservative hairstyle either. "Our hair is very traditionally Star Trek. I've been fighting against that, I like to have a bit of lift in my hair."

The one cast member who does have a skin-tight uniform thinks it's great that the series is trying to be more sexy. "It's like Archer waking up in his quarters, and he's got no shirt on," said Jolene Blalock (T'Pol). "Or the decontamination chamber - there's body parts and body touching. Today we're doing a scene where Linda, Dominic and I are all in our underwear, because we're coming back from this mission, and it's the decontamination chamber again, just without the rubbing. It's so much more contemporary, it's going for a much wider audience."

According to Anthony Montgomery (Travis Mayweather), this new style of Star Trek enables viewers to see the series through fresh eyes. "We're a sci-fi show. Because people get this idea about Trekkies and what Star Trek means to them, and they get away from the fact that this is a sci-fi show. What you see in that, we're real people. I think that's what that decontamination scene was - you see a girl that just happens to have pointy ears. I think we're making it much more real, we're making it much closer to home."

Scott Bakula was also passionate about pushing the boundaries. "They joke about the things that they never used to do, and we keep saying 'Well, why not? We can do them. Let's break as many rules as we can.' We had a huge debate in the pilot about whether I would get hit and bleed [because] Captains don't bleed traditionally and you're not allowed to bleed and I said 'Come on, let's get dirty.' And they've done that. So yes, we have underwear, we sweat, we bleed, I think it's a new way to go and we've revitaised the show."

The full video interviews, together with some behind the scenes footage from the series can be found here at Pulse24. Thanks to BakulaNews for this!

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