Trek Expo 2007 recap
This is fairly short Ok, so I rambled on a bit more than I thought I would but only by a bit, I promise. I was only able to attend the convention one day, I would have really liked to stayed today (Sunday) as well but time and money were of the essence and it just wasn't going to work out.
First off, it just wasn't the same without rithmah there! :( And I swear this convention gets smaller every year. This time it was at the Crowne Plaza Hotel, the hotel was very nice but it was kind of awkward the way they had booths and tables set up. They had the registration area in the lower lobby and had the guest tables set up in a crescent shape around it. Then off in one of the adjoining rooms they had the art gallery, in another the exhibitors area set up and yet another where they had the stage set up. It seems every year the space used is less and less and they try to cram as much stuff in it as humanly possible. It was very crowded walking through the exhibitors area, not so bad in the stage area though. Sadly, there just aren't as many "guests" as there used to be either.
Also, I tried taking some pictures without the flash and must have gaged the lighting wrong because nearly every one of them turned out terrible. They looked real good when viewed on the camera though :/ As for the pictures, there's a few scattered about in the post but all the rest will be located in my scrapbook gallery.
While out browsing by the tables I spoke briefly with Robert Picardo (The Doctor from VOY, Richard Woosley from Stargate and numerous other things) who said he liked my spiky hair. He was so damn funny. Ethan Phillips (Neelix from VOY) was funny as well and they both seemed genuinely nice and down to Earth.
Robert Picardo
Ethan Phillips
Bonnie Piesse (Aunt Beru from Star Wars Ep 2 & 3) was nice and had a wonderful Australian accent. I love hearing other people's accents. While on stage she said when she auditioned for the role she told them she hadn't seen Star Wars since she was 5 and that she didn't even remember the movies but she went home and watched them over and over a dozen times to familiarize herself with it. Watching Star Wars (the originals) this much is always a good thing anyway, everyone should follow this practice ;P
Bonnie Piesse
All the above pictures are of guests at the tables where you can walk up and chat with them and get autographs/pictures and such. I like to ask if I can just take their picture to kind of see their reaction. I'd say probably 97% are really nice and have no problems with it but there's always some that say not unless you buy something of theirs. Sean Kenney (Captain Pike from TOS) and Claudia Christian (B5) were like that though he was at least nice about it. Claudia Christian on the other hand was rude and dismissive. This always makes me curious why some people think they are so important and especially when they haven't been in anything in forever or only in off-shoot and little-known productions. And it's not like you can't just take pictures of them when they're on stage anyway. pfft. Anyway, everyone else was nice and friendly.
Glenn Sixbury, a sci-fi author told quite an interesting tale about how his family was stalked by a murderer when he was a kid. He also said never to trust a writer because they can tell the best lies. I don't know if it was true or not, but it was a interesting story.
Glenn Sixbury
Sean Kenney talked about how he got started in acting and his time working on Star Trek, though I don't think he did many other things. He mostly talked about the make-up and how they made him die his hair white to be Capt. Pike and how when they didn't like the scar, one of the prop guys ripped a part of his jeans off and stuck it on his face and said they loved it and went with it from there.
Sean Kenney
Richard Anderson (Forbidden Planet & Six Million Dollar Man) talked mostly about the Six Million Dollar Man & Bionic Woman and that he didn't like the new Bionic Woman for reasons that he didn't want to go into. He said it had something to do with distribution rights and royalties, in other words $$$. He wasn't the most interesting of people to listen to really but did occasionally crack an amusing joke. I might also feel this way because I'd never watched any of those shows nor had even heard of him before.
Richard Anderson
Suzie Plakson (K'Ehleyr on TNG and some other minor characters on VOY & ENT) was quite spunky, she was very energetic and all over the stage. Unfortunately, I missed most of her time on stage because I went to eat.
Suzie Plakson
Now, definitely the best and most amusing part of the day was when Robert Picardo, Ethan Phillips & Kate Mulgrew were on stage. Robert Picardo is such a funny guy, he really is hilarious and his personality his very similar to The Doctor, even Ethan Phillips said he doesn't know where Bob (he goes by Bob) beings and The Doctor ends.
He started off by singing a comedic song about the Borg Invasion ride in Las Vegas. I happened to have snagged video of it, rithmah you might have enjoyed the probe part ;P Oh and at about 00:17 when the camera goes all wonky, that's because someone stepped on me.
Click to viewEthan Phillips is quite the bathroom humorist (rithmah I think you may have enjoyed him too ;P) and would say the darnedest things just out of the blue. Someone would ask a question about an episode or something and he'd make up a bunch of stuff like the episode production number and kept saying there were deer in the episodes, he'd just interrupt and say "oh, that was the one with the deer!" lol it was quite amusing.
Kate Mulgrew joined them on stage (they were all up there nearly 2 hours) and I'll admit I wasn't expecting anything great because I just hadn't had much interest in anything the people I've seen from VOY had to say. Surprisenly, she was very pleasant and funny. And her voice wasn't nearly as irritating in person as it was on the show :P Anyway, all 3 of them were hilarious and told funny stories about the cast/crew & set. She said once (after Ethan interrupted about another deer) a monkey got loose on the set and they couldn't get it down from the rafters so she coaxed it down with a Big Mac. lolz @ loose monkeys.
She told a story about another cast member (she didn't say who at first) who would have one line in an entire episode and it would be "Aye, Captain!" and that he would write the words on a little piece of paper and stick it in the bottom of his coffee cup and walk around studying his coffee cup intently, and when the time came for the shot, they always usually had to do re-takes because he'd forget his lines. They let it slip later that it was Robert Beltran they were talking, but that doesn't surprise me. He did not impress me in the least bit last year. I also kind of got the feeling from all three of them just by the way they danced around certain questions that they didn't have the best working relationship with him.
They said that Ethan Phillips would purposely bend over (saying something like "oh here Captain, you dropped this!") and moon people just to make them laugh during shots. He said Robert Picardo and Kate Mulgrew were the hardest people to get to crack and that Roxann Dawson and Robert Beltran were the easiest.
Kate Mulgrew also nearly got emotional saying that of all the cast/crew of VOY that Robert Picardo & Ethan Phillips were the two people she considers family and that they are the sort of people who would do anything for you, even staying all night to help out when they could have gone home.
There were lots of people asking questions about the show and they told funny stories about just about everything. It really was interesting and amusing and this coming from someone who isn't even a VOY fan. Like I said, I was surprised it was as enjoyable as it was.
Robert Picardo on stage
Ethan Phillips on stage
Kate Mulgrew on stage
All 3 on stage
And a few random pictures of other things and people attending the convention:
Resistance is Futile!
The guy in the Darth Vader costume is the same guy in the Jedi Costume. He was very nice, I talked with him for probably 25 minutes about Star Wars and costuming.
The stage area
Some pretty paintings
And last but not least... Big Hat Guy. That's the view I had most the time when I wasn't sitting (and getting stepped on) on the floor up front. He was nice though, we chatted in between people on stage.
Still with me? And I said this was going to be short ;P Anyway, there are more pictures in my scrapbook gallery if anyone would like to view them.
Warning: It's kind of image heavy (plus 1 embedded video) and only a little lengthy :P If you just want to see the pictures they are here but the video is pretty funny, you should watch it. hehe