GEEKchocolate

On Sunday 8^th May, Terry Farrell, Lieutenant Jadzia Dax of Star Trek Deep Space Nine, the headline guest of the Starfury Invasion convention at Heathrow's Radisson Edwardian Hotel spent a few minutes with GeekChocolate to share her memories of that character and her work on the show.

Geek Chocolate – Jadzia Dax started off as a unique character, old and young at the same time, approachable yet always enigmatic, fiercely intelligent, yet always the centre of fun.  How much of that was written into the scripts, and how much came from discussions with the producers, and how much was what Terry brought to the set?

Terry Farrell - Well, of course I'd like to think that it was all me!  I think it was a little of everything, truthfully.  I worked with a coach, because it was really hard for me to learn the lines, and she was really good.  Ivana Chubbuck, she was an awesome teacher.  She helped me work my own sense of humour into the lines when it wasn't written for me, and help me work with my inner life, not just what was typed on the page.  I would have to say that Ivana was a huge part in helping me find Dax.

GC – I remember you saying at the time how frustrating it was, as the science officer, to be landed with so much of the technical dialogue.  Did any of the scientific process rub off on you, or do you still shudder at the memory?

TF - There are some days I can shudder at it, and there are times I remember crying, thinking "Oh my god, I'm never going to get this right," or feeling badly that there were so many takes, but I think I did a pretty good job considering the hours, the lack of sleep and how many times it changed. It definitely is not something that is my forte, but I think I swam through it okay in the end.

GC – And yet I understand that in 2001 an asteroid was named 26734Terryfarrell.  How does it feel to have part of the solar system named after you?

TF - Awesome!  Because, you know what, CBS, when we did Becker, gave us all stars one year for our Christmas present, and I thought that was awesome, and I think I have something else in Orion's Belt that fans gave me on one trip, so it's really a little overwhelming to think that there's really something out there.  I mean, obviously we can't go out to it! Did you see the Hubble IMAX?

GC - I'm a huge Hubble fan.

TF - Did you see the IMAX?

GC - I've seen one about the space shuttle launch and the ISS, but I've not seen one about the Hubble.

TF - Watch the next one.  We've just seen it.  It's just so amazing that you can see that far out into space.

GC - The London Planetarium used to have a show, only about half an hour - I had no idea until we sat down, it was narrated by Patrick Stewart.

TF - Oh my god!

GC - And similarly, the IMAX Space Shuttle film, I had no idea, it starts up, it's Leonard Nimoy's voice.

TF - Oh, that's awesome!  I went to one, I think it was in Washington DC, and my son said "Oh, mommy, that's Whoopi!"

GC - Star Trek has often been cited as an inspiration for people to choose science as a career.  During the Bush administration, there was almost a resentment of science prevalent in America.  Has the tide turned again, or are we still stuck on the fence?

TF - I don't know, I really don't know.  I'm super focused on my world with my child and my husband, so I think I have a limited view.  My spectrum is very narrow right now, but I have to say, I think science, the easier they make it for me to understand, the more excited I am to learn about it.  I think, for me, if there was a show about how the world began, what an atom is, anything that's scientific, that I'm interested in knowing about, I think it's fascinating.  I'm so grateful the way there are so many channels now, there is so much information.

GC - I don't know if BBC America has carried them, but we've had some brilliant shows, Professor Brian Cox's Wonders of the Solar System and Wonders of the Universe, and Professor Iain Stewart did Earth: Power of the Planet and How the Earth Made Us, which is geology as entertainment.  So if those come over, catch them.

TF - Wow!  That's so exciting for me.  Even just listening to Christopher Hitchens and Richard Dawkins, I just think "Where where they when I was growing up?" I wish I would have been able to hear them speak then.  I just find them fascinating.

GC - You had Carl Sagan.

TF - I guess I wasn't paying attention!

GC - Cosmos has finally been released on DVD in Britain, but if you buy it in America, it goes towards the Carl Sagan Foundation for public science education. So check it out.

TF - I will - thank you!