As Vulcan Ambassador Soval, Gary Graham notched up 12 episodes of Star Trek: Enterprise, being only one of three actors besides the regulars to appear in all four seasons of the show. Nick Joy caught up with Gary at the Sci-Fi Ball where the previous night he was rocking out with his band, The Sons of Kirk, playing such classics as No Seats on the Enterprise. Gary shares his perspective on Star Trek fan films, why Discovery is great, and how making TV is a lot cooler than it used to be…

Hi Gary, a few years back your Alien Nation co-star [and Enterprise recurring actor] Eric Pierpoint told me how glad he was that you were playing a Vulcan, as finally you’d find out what it was like to wear a rubber head!

Wow, that curmudgeon! Eric is so naive – he thinks that I have no career life outside of Alien Nation and Star Trek. People actually do ask me that: “Do you do anything aside from science fiction?” Well, I’ve got a resume like 30 feet long, it’s just that they don’t do conventions. Yeah, Eric is a big whiner and a complainer and he’s actually just really jealous of me overall, but in particular because I was in and out of the chair in five minutes and he was two and a half hours. What a diva. He’s just unworkable. So demanding, never on time, never knows his lines.

(Pauses)

Actually the preceding was completely false. Everything that I said was exactly the opposite. So my opinion of Eric is exactly opposite what I just said (laughs).

I hear you were rocking out with The Sons of Kirk last night?

We were having some fun. I hope it looked like it because we sure were. I tell people that it’s better than sex. I don’t swear by that.

It probably lasts longer.

Ha! Yes, it certainly lasts longer! Those guys are great. If you fall you won’t hurt yourself with those guys.

When you come along to these conventions, what are most people interested in?

Having sex with me! And it’s really a bother, but I somehow I soldier through it… No, again, it’s the opposite of that. They want to know about Star Trek and there’s some fascinating questions that come up, mostly about things that I’ve never thought about, which opens up all kind of introspection and recounting my experiences. So, for that, it’s great fun for me, answering questions from people who I regard as friends rather than fans.

Soval is a stoic Vulcan. Growing up, watching the original show, did you see yourself as the Vulcan type, or as more of a Klingon?

The thing I appreciate about Klingons is their blind, violent aggression. If you want to play football, what you need to have coming out of the locker room is violent aggression; you want to rip into your opponents – just deck them. Even in the locker room you’re bashing your helmet against the lockers, so that kind of adrenaline rush I really love. Vulcans of course are exactly the opposite – it’s a day for opposites – very difficult to play. If somebody were just cerebral you could play that, but people who are cerebral – and have done that out of survival against their natural nature – are explosive, organic and emotional. To subliminate that into a passive, intellectual outlook is a great challenge and a great mental game to play as an actor.

You played a very different role as Ocampan Tannis in Voyager’s Cold Fire and now as Ragnar in Star Trek: Of Gods and Men and Star Trek: Renegades (latterly now just Renegades).

So crazy, and to go from Of Gods and Men to Renegades I had to ask them: “When when last we visited, I was playing a shapeshifter. Have I now lost the ability to be a shapeshifter?” The shape shifting was interesting because half the time I didn’t need to be on set – it was Garrett Wang or someone else being me! Then I’d just come back on and resume the scene as they do their CGI.

Star Trek is in rude health now, with Discovery finding its audience.

I saw the pilot and said ‘Holy moly, this is terrific. It’s just really good. Engaging characters that you want to follow, production values that are just awesome. I love it all, even if I’m not a part of it, just as a fan. I want to work on Discovery. My buddy Doug Jones works on it, and I wanna work with him.

Saru is a great role for Doug.

He’s always in prosthetics or some kind of costume because he has such incredible control and just pulls that off so great. I worked with him in a little internet thing dealing with zombies called Universal Dead and he was a human. I hoped people got to see it because nobody sees what a charming actor he is without prosthetics and mask. He’s just such a charming, brilliant actor and it was great to see him unmasked.

I was looking at your resume of classic network shows – The Incredible Hulk, Starsky and Hutch, T J Hooker, CHiPs. I imagine you’ve seen a huge shift in the way that TV is produced.

The main thing is that the lighting they used was so big, bulky and hot. You’d do these interiors in a set on location somewhere and they’d wheel in these big lights. The rooms would heat up to 120 degrees and you’re playing a calm, cool, collected lawyer or something and you’re sweating so profusely that they have to keep mopping you down. Now the lights are so cool – it’s quite lovely and comfortable. Dollies are not these big bulky things; the dolly track they run the camera on is so beautiful. The technology has evolved to the point where it so so easy to create wonderful shots with very lightweight, affordable equipment.

Are there any other projects that you’re working on that we should be looking out for?

Yes, if I can ever stop working on these other things and get my co-executive producer to stop making all these other movies! We have a thing coming out about the music industry – it’s autobiographical.

A few years back I had a meeting with my agents about the time I started playing in my garage and started inviting musicians over for a jam night, which later turned into band practice because we were playing the same songs and learning them and building a set list. My agents asked me what I’d been doing lately and I started going in to the usual things that actors tell their agents: “Well, I did this play, then I was working in this other movie…” and I just stopped and said “Why lie? I’ve been playing rock and roll in my garage” and started telling them about my life and what it was like playing in band practice, setting up gigs in local bars in the valley, dealing with my ex wife, raising a daughter. My agent said: “Write that up; I could sell that as a pilot.” So I wrote that up and was talking to a producer friend who said: “Screw it man, don’t wait for your agent, let’s do it through my new company.” So we’ve been working on that. He wrote a pilot, I refined it, we’ve got two other writers working on it, and we’re looking to do that in the spring – it’s called Cheaper than Therapy, which is basically what music is to me.

 

Sci-Fi Ball is a not-for-profit convention that raises funds for the Teenage Cancer Trust. Thanks to Ann Lindup, Andrew Keates and the Ball’s directors for arranging this interview and Steven Wright for the images from the convention.