Perlman: A Trek Fan
2 min readWhen the call came for a part in Star Trek: Nemesis, Ron Perlman was ready and willing to take on the role of the Reman Viceroy.
It was eight years ago today that Star Trek: Nemesis debuted, and Star Trek fans had their first glimpse of the Remans, a slave caste of the Romulans, and their leader.
Perlman had long wanted to be a part of the Star Trek franchise. “I think my manager said, ‘There’s interest in you for a Star Trek movie. They’re doing something called Nemesis.’ I went, ‘Yeah, man, just tell me the time and the place and I’ll be there.’ Then they said it’d be a heavy prosthetic makeup job and I said, ‘No problem. It’s still Star Trek.’ I’d been watching the franchise in all of its many forms from a distance all those years and it was high time that I sort of became part of the family. That was it. It became a reality. And it was great in a number of ways.”
One of the Star Trek actors in Nemesis was already known to Perlman. “[Jonathan] Frakes and I had done a strange little theater piece at the Tiffany Theatre on Sunset (in Los Angeles) when we both first hit town, which was, I guess, in the mid-80’s,” said Perlman. “It was an unwatchable comedy called My Life in Art (with Frakes playing a character named Billy the Goat). Maybe parts of it were watchable. Anyway, we became fast friends, and then I watched his ascent to power. We never worked with each other again after Nemesis, but we keep running into each other and I’m sure at some point we’ll find something to do again together. At least I hope so.”
Working with Tom Hardy was a good experience for Perlman and he is glad to see 
Hardy’s acting star rising. “Tom has become probably one of the most sought-after actors in the world,” said Perlman. “Did you see this movie he did, Bronson? It was brilliant. And now Tom is in everything. I loved him when I first met him. I loved working with him. I found him to be really smart, really a great kid. He was much younger then. He was also really humble and knew that he was kind of living a charmed life by playing major roles in major motion pictures. Everything I like about an actor was in this kid, and I’m so happy to see what’s happening to him now.”
Perlman will be seen next in Season of the Witch, in which a Crusader and his fellow soldier (Nicholas Cage and Perlman) must transport a woman accused of being a witch to a remote monastery.
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