Disclaimer:
Robbie said he would deny anything posted on the internet. That probably goes
for Max and Lolita as well. But I heard it with my own two ears…
Convention
Report,
Robert (Robbie) Duncan McNeill, Max Grodenchik and Lolita Fatjo
I
wasn’t going to go to this Convention. Honest. When Meg first told me it was
happening - two days before the April Kate Mulgrew
Con in
So
after I was back in Melbourne, I was swapping stories with a friend who’d gone
to Kate Mulgrew’s Melbourne Con, and who had already
signed up for the RDM Con (and who was the person who got me into Star Trek in
the first place!). ‘I’ll have no one to go with!’ she said, plaintively. ‘You
have to come.’
‘But
I’ve got an essay due the next day! And it’s my dratted property law essay,
which is already giving me problems. I just can’t!’ ‘Yes you can. With decent
time management, you can do anything.’ The conversation continued over a number
of phone calls, one trip to Planet Hollywood and a screening of Galaxy-Quest.
Which
was why, on a cold, dismal day late in May, I was in the car with Natalie on
the way to the Carlton Crest Hotel (which I had mistakenly thought was in
Anyway,
we got to the Carlton Crest, and I followed Natalie to where she said these
conventions are usually held. It was deserted. Absolutely
deserted. And ‘Holodiction Convention’ was not
listed on the Convention noticeboard.
To be
honest, I wasn’t that worried. I knew that if the Con had been cancelled, I
would have received a phone call the day before - if not two phone calls! I
mean, I got a phone call within ten minutes of Meg finding out that there would
be a cocktail party after Kate’s Convention. The problem, obviously, was to
FIND the convention. And let me tell you, it took a while. We started in the
Lobby proper. Which meant walking past all the hotel patrons
eating their breakfast in one of the hotel restaurants. The lobby was
crowded. Really crowded. And most of the people
weren’t there for the Convention - or at least not a Trek convention.
Eventually
I found a sign that did say ‘Holodiction Convention’.
The sign told us to go to the first floor. So we did. Another sign told us to
walk down a hallway. So we did. And we came up against Maria and George and
other Convention organisers who told us in no
uncertain terms that we were NOT supposed to be there, and that we should go
downstairs immediately. And it honestly isn’t worth trying to tell Maria that
the hotel sent us the wrong way. (After only two other conventions, I already
know this.) So we went down the stairs that they pointed us to - and came face
to face with a sea of people. Now we were definitely in the right place. There
were Voyager t-shirts and DS9 t-shirts and Red Dwarf/Next Gen t-shirts,
and, basically, a whole lot of trekkers. No uniforms, though.
Being
nice people, we went to the back of the group, and immediately began freezing
to death because we were standing right next to one of those revolving doors
that let in a blast of Arctic air every five seconds. Did I say that this
particular weekend was the coldest May weekend on record? Well, it was. It was bl***y freezing!
While
we were waiting to go back upstairs, one of the Holodiction
people, in an attempt, I think, to keep us from complaining, told us about
plans for a two and a half day Convention to be held next year, with six
guests, all from Voyager. You know how news can ripple through a crowd?
Well, that bit of news caused a Tsunami…especially when the guy said that all
the hotels in
Arriving
at the photo table at last, I got some really nice photos - I think the one I
got of Robbie was a late fifth season or sixth season picture - Tom’s only
wearing one pip. I also got a nice one of Max, and there was a really nice
black and white of Lolita. I kicked myself later for not getting that one.
That
done, I headed to the dealer’s room, on the off-chance that some of Meg’s
friends from "Friends of Science Fiction" would be there - and they
were! We chatted for a while, and they said that Meg had told them to look out
for me, and to give me a good deal! I bought a Voyager poster from them
- I’ve been wanting one for ages - then left them to
make some money rather than just talk to me. I wandered around the rest of the
dealer’s room - which was really a dealer’s corridor - but no one else had
anything I really wanted to buy, so I went into the main room with Natalie to
find our seats.
And,
as usual, holding court on stage was Peter, the MC. Now, some people (including
the people who were eventually sitting behind me) find him very annoying. I
don’t - his jokes are bad, but he’s got a pretty thankless job, if you ask me -
trying to keep hundreds of people interested when they’ve really come to see
people who won’t appear on stage for another couple of hours. Not that that
stopped me from heckling him - oh, no! I didn’t heckle as much as Meg did in
April, but I had fun…and I think he worked out who I was, too! You see, I found
out that Meg, at the Sydney Con the day before had, as usual, heckled. She had
also told Peter that a friend of hers was going to the Melbourne Con. After I’d
pointed out that his knowledge of the Muppets really wasn’t that good (don’t
ask!) and he’d pointed out that knowing the Muppets that well was an indicator
of age…Anyway, I think he recognised me from the
Sydney Con, when I’d been doing a little bit of heckling along with Meg and
Amanda and Sandy. Combine that with what Meg had told him…well, I think he
worked it out!
So
anyway, Peter was giving his update on which shows had been renewed for another
And
then began the auction. My main conclusion from the auction is that some people
are crazy. Someone bid eighty dollars for a signed black and white photo of
William Shatner, and that didn’t even reach the
reserve price. Then again, a signed photo of Kate Mulgrew
went for sixty dollars, and that kind of sounded reasonable - as much as
anything in a Convention auction goes for a reasonable price.
An
actor’s script, containing each days rewrites of
"The Voyager Conspiracy", and signed by Kate Mulgrew, opened bidding at $225. It eventually went for
$525, and Peter told us that a similar item went for over $700 in
Did I
buy anything? No - but I did bid on a couple of things. I almost bid on a
signed photo of Garrett Wang, and I did bid on what Peter called the ‘Helmboy’ photo of Robbie. It went for thirty dollars. I
also bid on a lovely photo of Paris and Chakotay. I
had the bid at twenty-five, and Peter had said ‘going twice’…and then some
idiot bid twenty-six dollars. It eventually went for thirty-five dollars.
By
the time the auction was over we were running late, as usual. (They really
shouldn’t have put ‘we do not anticipate the delays of the April Convention,’
on their brochures!) As a result, no lunch break, but we went straight into the
guest talks. It turned out that I was sitting right near the door where the
guests came in, so I’m hoping I got some good pictures!
Lolita Fatjo
Honestly,
I think Lolita was the best speaker of the lot of them. She’s the
Script-Coordinator for Voyager, had the same job for Deep Space Nine,
and The Next Generation as well, I think. She’s been working at the Star
Trek offices since 1987, which makes her a veteran in my eyes.
She
began her talk by announcing that she was doing her best to drink every variety
of beer in
There
was no logic in the order that the questions came, so I’ll try to organise the answers a little better than the audience
managed.
Lolita
joined the Star Trek staff at the end of the 1987 writers
strike (which came close to crippling the start of the second season of TNG, so
they used episodes which had been written for the second TOS series that never
happened. That wasn’t Lolita’s comment, that’s my own addition of trivia!) At
that time she was working as an actor, but she had been doing secretarial work
during the strike. After the strike ended, she was offered three different jobs
word processing - one at
She
talked a bit about DS9, and I didn’t take many notes then. But one interesting
thing she spoke of was the final day’s filming of "What You Leave Behind…" (Another aside - what’s the bet that the final
episode of Voyager will have a title that ends with ellipses? The last
two have.) Anyway. The scene at "Vic’s" was
the final scene to be filmed, and the club was meant to be packed. The extras
in that scene were all the recurring characters who
had been in prosthetic makeup - Jeffrey Combes, JG Hertzler, and Max Grodenchik were
the ones she mentioned - and the entire writing team. Next time I see that
episode, I’m going to look closely to see if I can find Lolita.
She
also gave us some details (not many) on upcoming Trek projects. Firstly, there
WILL be a new series; apparently the creators/executive producers are the
B-team (my term, just made it up) of Brannon Braga
and Rick Berman. It will begin shooting in the US Fall/Autumn - she said
November, as soon as Voyager finishes shooting. This accords with what I
read somewhere about the filming schedule being sped up so that Kate Mulgrew will be done before Christmas. Star Trek 10 - the
new TNG movie, is slated to start shooting in March
2001.
Okay,
on to the Voyager comments. She commented briefly on ‘Fury’, which I
don’t think ANYONE had seen yet, though most people seemed to know what it was
about. Lolita called it an ‘amazing’ episode, which was an interesting contrast
to Kate Mulgrew’s absolute hatred of the episode.
About the only other thing Lolita said was that Jennifer Lien did an incredible
job, and that personally, she’d love to have Jennifer come back for another
episode - after all, "No one EVER dies in Star Trek."
There
was a mixed reaction over a number of questions Lolita asked us; Too much Borg?
More people said no than said yes. (I said yes, way too much!) Too much Seven of Nine? Split on gender lines. Someone asked
why Seven was used so much, and before Lolita had a
chance to answer, a guy in the audience said, "two reasons." Quick as
a flash, Lolita answered, "Are they both in front?" It was very
funny. She did admit that Seven is "a bit"
overused, and said that there will be a conscious effort next season to deal
with all the characters.
She
mentioned the Borg kids - but only four kids. I almost asked about the
baby Borg, but she’d moved onto another topic. Someone else asked what had
happened to Vorik - her answer; "You know, I’d really like to know the answer to that, too!"
(Snide remark - she is the script co-ordinator. If
anyone should know it would be her.) On other aspects of Continuity, she admits
that they have gotten sloppy - in a recent episode they aged Tuvok 100 years the wrong way. She pleads the increased
possibility for continuity errors when you have almost twenty-five seasons’
worth of data to keep in mind. I suppose this is reasonable, though if I can go
hunting up details in an attempt to get things right in my stories, I
personally expect TPTB and their underlings to at least TRY!
Harry’s
promotion - or lack thereof - got a mention, Lolita saying that Garrett Wang is
actively lobbying for Harry to get a promotion, and soon. (Having now read
Jim’s review of UMZ, I can understand why!) Apparently, though the Borg will
obviously have to be in the final season, there will be no more species 8472.
They’re history.
Which leads me to the most amusing exchange of Lolita’s talk. A female
audience member yelled out, ‘What about romance?’ Lolita’s
answer? "What romance? This is Voyager you’re talking
about.’ She then went on to comment that she felt it was a pity that romances
were not being developed, as she felt that the romantic background stories on
DS9 gave it a lot of appeal. (This is true - I couldn’t handle Dominion War
week after week.) In response the woman who had initially asked the question
yelled out "What about J/C?" "Yes, well," said Lolita, and
went on to tell a story I’d never picked up anywhere else. According to her,
the first draft of "Resolutions" had Kathryn and Chakotay
getting together. "Like, really together," was Lolita’s comment.
However, Rick Berman vetoed the draft, and it was re-written. (<Berman’s Stardate pic joins
The
final question was amusing; why has Chakotay become Janeway’s lapdog? Once Lolita (and the rest of us) stopped
choking with laughter, she agreed that Chakotay’s
character has been underdeveloped and that, "to be blunt, Chakkers has wimped out".
The best explanation she could give us (and it sounds reasonable to me) was
that it’s a legacy of the ‘Jeri (
Max Grodenchik
Max,
being a DS9 person, spoke entirely about DS9, with one diversion to talk about
Apollo 13 (one of my absolute favourite movies). If
you want to skip this part of the report, feel free - but you can’t miss this
first gem.
During
his talk, Max recited two limericks that I’m assuming he wrote. I didn’t get
the first one down, but this was the second one;
A Ferengi
from
Said, "I hope Captain Sisko’s not mad at me.
My miscalibration
Blew up the
station.
Now we’re unemployed Sunday through Saturday."
Okay,
now you can skip down to what Robbie said. If you’ve stayed, thank you! I
thought Max was quite funny, and I really enjoyed listening to him and his
stories. Then again, Rom is my favourite Ferengi. Lolita stayed onstage with Max for a little while,
mostly helping him put in his Ferengi teeth!
Max Grodenchick (and his teeth, which were making their first
visit to
I’ll
stop talking about the teeth soon, but just one more comment. It was really
quite startling - as soon as Max had the top set of teeth in, he started
sounding like
Considering
the production number the teeth had become, it was not surprising that the
first question was about the prosthetic makeup, and whether Max had ever left
the studio done up as Rom. Max himself said he hadn’t, but he told a marvellous story about Armin (Shimmerman, who plays Quark). On the day of the Martin
Luther King Day earthquake in
From
what Max said, he and Armin get along great. They met
when Max was sitting on the steps outside
Max
talked a bit about the role in Apollo 13, which he says he got because the
Producer was a huge Trek fan, and the Producer’s kids were even huger Trek
fans. Mostly he talked about the audition: people were auditioned two at a
time, and the other person in Max’s audition had played a Bajoran-of-the-week
on DS9. Ron got mixed up between the two CV’s, and asked this other guy about
what it was like to wear all the prosthetic makeup, and the other guy made a
big fuss about it. (Think about it - Bajoran, slight
nose-job. Ferengi - total face reconstruction!) Max said he was sitting there
trying to decide how to deal with it and not seem like he was trying to one-up
the other guy. Then he decided, this was an audition, it was supposed to be
competitive. Max never did say whether the other guy got a part as well.
I
went back and watched Apollo 13 again last week (I watch it at least once or
twice every holidays, and I still get emotional in those four minutes at the
end) and could only find one line spoken by Max. But it would have been a great
movie to be involved in. They sent the entire cast off to ‘space school’ for a
few weeks - Max missed a lot of it because he was shooting "House of
Quark" at the time.
Lolita
came back in at this point, and the discussion turned to names. I already knew
that the villain in "The Most Toys", Kivas Fajo, was named after her, but while Max had been speaking,
I’d been wondering whether she had another namesake. Clearly the rest of the
audience had been wondering the same thing, and Lolita quickly confirmed it.
The dabo-girl Leeta was
named for her, and in one episode, a line had been deliberately written for Max
so that he said "Hellooo Leeta,"
so that what you really heard was ‘Lolita.’ I’d only just watched the episode a
couple of weeks before, so I knew exactly what he was talking about. (But do
you think I can remember the ep name? Of course not!)
They
finished off by praising the "Quark’s Place" at the Star Trek
Experience in
Waiting for Robbie
There
was about a ten-minute break after Max and Lolita left before Robbie arrived.
Peter hopped back up on stage, and went back to trying to interest us in his
complaints about the Rugby State of Origin - which
It
was during this time that I discovered that Jim Wright’s mythical ‘Rosie from
Terra Haute’ really does exist. I was sitting next to two Rosies,
and there were another 15 standing in the aisle beside me, waiting very
IM-patiently for Robbie to arrive.
To
make things even better, the three people behind me were a pack of whingers! I don’t know about you, but after only two
Conventions (this was my third) I’ve already worked out that the main activity
of a Convention is waiting. This is why you don’t go to a Con by yourself - you
need to have someone to talk to, to go to lunch with, etc. But
this lot just wouldn’t shut up - they complained about Peter, about the fact
that Max and Lolita had ‘talked for so long’, the fact that Robbie wasn’t up on
stage the whole day, etc.
The
amusing thing was that after I’d turned around to tell them to shut up (well, I
think I was more polite/wimpish than that), I heard
them comparing my hair to Princess Leia’s. No one’s
ever made that particular comment on my hair before, although I will admit that
when it is up, it makes a relatively large bun. But I don’t think it would be
possible to do my hair like Leia’s - I don’t think
it’s humanly possible. But then, she wasn’t human, was she? J
Robbie Duncan McNeill
My
first impression of Robbie, as he came through the door to the accompaniment of
teenage squeals, was that he’s a lot taller than I thought. My second
impression (once I'd sat down from taking photos - I sure hope they turn out!)
was that he seemed to be getting along well in
Like
Tim Russ and Ethan Phillips, Robbie got into Trek through a TNG episode - in
his case, 'The First Duty', where he played the disgraced Cadet Locarno. "Back when he had more hair," as Robbie
said, he had just been cast in a show called "Going to Extremes" by
the creators of Northern Exposure, Brand and Falsey.
At the time, everyone had been certain "Going to Extremes" was set to
be as big a hit as NX was, and Robbie was reluctant to play
Seeing
as Kate was here only two months ago, there were quite a few people who wanted
to run things past Robbie to confirm what Kate told them. His reaction was
"I'll tell you more than Kate did - I'll tell the truth!" Naturally,
after some of Kate's stories, the most popular topic of conversation was
practical jokes; apparently, Robbie and Kate had a $50 bet. (Meg and Amanda can
correct me if I'm wrong, but somehow I don't think Kate told this story in
Robbie
was also asked about Weinerville…if you don't know
about this one, I’m not explaining it! Robbie managed to look suitably shocked,
but did admit that by the end of the week, the jokes on the bridge set managed
to get pretty raunchy. He also admitted that it must be a little tough for her
to be the only woman on the bridge with all that flying around her.
Asked
if he'd ever played a practical joke on Kate, Robbie prevaricated, and then
admitted that he had. He had discovered that the base of the action figures is
a communicator, and had some velcro
attached to the back of a base (minus figure). Then, at one point in a scene
with Kate in the ready room, he stuck the big communicator on while his back
was to her, then whirled around to tell her 'mine's
bigger than yours'. He didn't say when this was, but I'm guessing that either
it was inspired by the tattoo scene in "Q and the Gray", or the
tattoo scene was inspired by it.
Robbie
says that of all the regular cast, he was initially
the worst at getting the technobabble right. In the
first few seasons, he found it to be an absolute nightmare. Then, one day, he
was up near Tuvok's station on the bridge, and
noticed that Tim Russ had his lines sticky-taped to the console (or at least
the technobabble bits - Robbie wasn't very clear on
that.) Out of interest, Robbie checked Harry's station; and sure enough,
Garrett had done the same thing. Then Robbie checked out Chakotay's
console, and yes, Robert Beltran also had a cheat sheet neatly tucked away.
Robbie realised he was the only one actually memorising the technobabble.
Since then, he, too, has had a cheat sheet taped to the console.
Robbie
sees the character of the first-season Tom as the 'Lone Wolf' type - a real
rebel. Early on, he thinks Tom was too much of a rebel. Now, however, Robbie
thinks they've taken Tom too far the other way. Now, he says, Tom is
"everybody's sidekick." What he'd like to see in Tom is some positive
rebelliousness. (Meg, don't show this to Renaye, but
when he said that I was thinking that Thirty Days was a perfect example of
positive rebelliousness.) "Tom has screwed up in both the Maquis and Starfleet," said Robbie. "He ought to
be in the middle of it all," in terms of action and outlook. I got the
feeling that what Robbie meant was that maybe Tom shouldn't be totally sure of
his loyalties even now, and that maybe there should be some lingering problems
of trust - on both sides.
Some
of his favourite scenes and episodes, Robbie says,
have come from the Captain Proton thread in season five. In the second of the
Captain Proton episodes Robbie had to shoot a scene where Tom-as-Proton was
flying though space with a jetpack and goggles, but no oxygen tank. Apart from
the simple amusement value of the idea, Robbie still had a good story to tell
about this scene. For the shoot, he was going to be strapped to a
teeter-totter/see-saw kind of thing which was hoisted 30 feet (ten to fifteen
meters, I think) into the air. There were going to be sparklers in the jetpack
to give the sparks out the back. "It's not dangerous," said the stunt
co-ordinator to Robbie, "but how about you wear
this fireproof underwear. And these fireproof longjohns.
And this fireproof top. And your costume has been fireproofed…but it's not
dangerous AT ALL." Well, Robbie got all kitted up in five to six layers of
fireproofing, got strapped onto the teeter-totter/see-saw thing, and was
hoisted up into the air. Then they lit the sparklers.
Well,
these weren't your ordinary sparklers…the sparks from these ones went clear
across the soundstage. But Robbie had been told that they needed to get a good
shot, so he just had to stay up there until the sparklers ran out. Suddenly, he
realised that things were getting a bit warm 'down
there' (his phrase). Within seconds, it wasn't just warm, but extremely hot -
and he yelled at the crew to get him down. NOW! When he got back down to earth
three guys came at him with fire extinguishers…his pants were on fire. (Note:
his fireproof pants were on fire.) When the fire extinguishers had done
their job, Robbie discovered that he had two strategically placed holes in his
trousers, and third degree burns to his backside. When he got back to work
after a visit to the hospital, one of the crew presented Robbie with a still
from the film, taken at the point Robbie had realised
what was happening. That still is now framed and hanging in his trailer.
Galaxy
Quest was the talk of the April Con. Someone asked Robbie what he thought of it
- he loved it. Especially the bit where the guy is trying to
work out how to drive the ship. Robbie says that he saw that part and
immediately began to laugh, because he was thinking that he would have the
exact same reaction.
Robbie
was asked about the episodes he had directed, which include "Sacred
Ground", "Someone to Watch Over Me,"
and a third one which I can't remember, but I’m sure someone on my lists will
be able to tell me. (If not, I'll trawl through Continuum or Delta Blues to
find the answer.) In the first two episodes he directed, he didn't have much screentime, so he was able to concentrate on the directing.
In "Someone…", he had a small, but
relatively pivotal role to play (he said!) in acting
as the Doc's romance adviser. As the director, he knew the storyline and the
interactions so well, that he said he was able to do those scenes very easily,
and when he and Rick Berman viewed the dailies, Berman told him that this was
some of the best acting he'd seen in the five years of the show to that point.
Robbie was also asked whether he'd like to direct a Star Trek movie, but he
replied that Jonathan Frakes seems to have the movies
all sewn up. In actual fact, he didn't answer the question…I think he probably
would like to, but he's right. Jonathan Frakes has
first dibs at the moment.
Asked
what he thought of the internet, Robbie's reaction was mixed. He admitted that
"it can be such a great thing," but followed that up by saying
that he will deny anything - ANYTHING - up on the web about what he said. Which of course includes this report. His concern is the
anonymity of the web, and the resulting lack of accountability.
Garrett
Wang, on the other hand, is, from Robbie's description, very much into the
internet. Apparently, Garrrett prints out fanfic and brings it to read between scenes; by the stage
of the afternoon when this was said I think I had worked out the sort of tone
Robbie used when he was joking about something - and when he said Garrett reads
fanfic, he wasn't using a 'jokey'
tone of voice. I do believe my reaction to his statement was a slightly audible
(to the people around me in any case) "oh, help!"
This was far worse than finding out that Rene Auberjonois
reads fanfic - because I haven't posted any DS9 fic. But to think that Garrett Wang might accidentally
stumble across my stories…I repeat - oh, help!
Robbie
also told us a story about one of Garrett's forays onto the web; apparently, he
found a slash site (Robbie never said if it was a Paris/Kim slash site…) which
included some picture manipulations of Garrett's head and a naked male body.
Robbie said they were very GOOD picture manipulations - they almost looked
real, "but trust me, they weren't." Garrett printed them out and
brought them on set to show Robbie (and possibly others.) But at some point, either Robbie, Robert, Bob Picardo
or Ethan (who seems to be generally known as Johnny) Phillips, grabbed the pics from Garrett and showed the entire cast and crew.
Robbie said Garrett was as red as a beetroot.
What
will Robbie do after Voyager finishes shooting? Well, he's been invited
to direct some episodes of "
The
final question was; "What was your favourite
experience?" After some laughter and rephrasing, Robbie said that his favourite Voyager experience was making "Threshhold." He said he loved making that episode, and
added some remark which I honestly can't remember about having lizard babies
with Kate. But I'm sure his comment had us rolling with laughter as he left the
room. He's a funny guy, and quite charming.
The autograph line and the end of the
Con…
I was
sitting in row L, which meant I had plenty of time to wait before I could go up
for an autograph. I got sick and tired of listening to the two ‘Rosie’s from
Terra Haute’ sitting next to me and the whingers
behind me, so I went back into the dealer’s corridor to talk to the FSF people
again. We talked about the Stargate Con planned for
next year, and the Buffy one, I introduced Natalie to ‘Sev
Trek’ - and I bought two Sev Trek bookmarks. Next
convention I’ll get either a poster or the book. I think the poster would be
more fun, though.
The
autograph line itself was boring, and you don’t need a description of that. But
I will say that Robbie and I chatted about Garrison Keillor
until Maria told me to get going, but the woman taking a photo for me hadn’t
taken it yet, so Robbie told the next person in the line to go back while I had
my photo taken. Robbie is such a nice guy!
For
some reason there was a huge holdup in the line for Max and Lolita, so by the
time I got to them, Robbie was finishing, and left amidst huge applause. Lolita
and Max both personalised a photo I had bought later
of the two of them (it’s a photo of Lolita kissing ‘Rom’, quite cute,
actually), and Max signed another one of just
As I
was packing up my camera I heard Lolita complain that Robbie was already done
and they still had over sixty autographs to do…she looked exhausted. That was
the end of the Con for me, but they still had to do the cocktail party.
By
the time I got to the tram it was
With
this two and half day Con coming up next year, I have to save my pennies…so
this was the last Con for this year for me. From now on I’ll be content to
write my stories and send e-mails…and to hope that Garrett Wang NEVER finds my
website!