February/March 2004

Star Trek Magazine

Issue 113

TRUE BRIT

It's not often you see Brits playing action heroes on US TV, but Englishman Dominic Keating not only gets to wave the Union Jack in Star Trek: Enterprise ,but he also gets to kick alien backside as the show's heroic tactical officer, Malcolm Reed. And with the current season featuring even more action and adventure, the actor reveals to Ian Spelling whether he's enjoying putting the right royal boot into the Xindi...

Dominic Keating was not a major proponent of making changes to Star Trek: Enterprise. He believed that the show was warping along just fine and didn't need the MACOs, the Delphic Expanse, a sexed-up T'Pol (Jolene Blalock) or a name change. He said as much, on the record, while the changes were still in the rumour phase, and again when they were first implemented at the beginning of Season Three. Even now, despite the fact that he appreciates some of the tinkering, he still sounds fairly unconvinced about the necessity to meddle.

"I didn't think we were turning out a bad product," Keating says. "I've watched all of the episodes we've done religiously and I thought that given the constrictions of episodic television, we were turning out a pretty good show. I thought the show was entertaining, well crafted and well acted. And it looked good. Having said that, I can't argue about the last nine or 10 episodes, through the first half of the third season, haven't been better. They have been - perhaps better than the [previous] good ones. So they've really raised the bar from what I felt was a pretty elevated bar already.

I'm not sure what the fan reaction to the changes has really been. My contact with the fans, other than meeting them at conventions, is pretty limited. I do know that the episodes we did a few weeks ago, Similitude , was our highest rated episode since last year. It got a 3.0 national and a 5.0 perfect score, which is pretty big. Millions of people watched that show, and that's a good sign. We only ever get a 2.0, so it tells us that people right in the heart of America liked that show. That's a considerable uptick."

The changes have certainly impacted on Keating directly, with his character, Malcolm Reed, having a lot more to do in the conflict with the Xindi. There's also a nice bit of tension building between Reed and the military force, the MACOs, based on the ship. They usurp his power as the Enterprise NX-01's tactical officer, and trouble seems to be brewing between Reed and the MACO leader, Major Hayes (Steven Culp).

"I'm getting to run around a lot more since we got started in the changes," Keating says. "I've got to jump and duck considerably more. There's a lot more action for me. And I guess that I'm in the show more than I was during the first season and most of the second season. The thing I liked about the first two seasons, in retrospect, was that I got a bone thrown at me at least once or twice a year, with a good solid episode that was just Reed, or with Reed as the A-story. That hasn't happened yet this year and I don't know if it will. I'm not ruling it out, but it seems that the accent is much more on this arc apropos the Xindi, and the race to get them before they get to Earth. And I don't know if there's particularly time in the timeline for a character-driven Reed episode. We'll see. You never know. 

"But just from watching the show, I do like the MACOs," he continues. "I think they are a good addition. I was not sure about it initially, to be honest. I thought it could be a bit hackneyed, but I think they've been well introduced and assimilated in to the show. I think when they are brought online, they add a really good dose of salt and pepper to the action sequences. Where I can look quite athletic and jump and run, I'm not about to break my neck in the process. Most of the MACO guys are our stuntmen, and they'll happily do somersaults over railings all day long. God bless them.

"I can't give too much away, but we're shooting an episode right now with [director] David Livingston at the helm again, and the episode brings to the fore the friction that was first alluded to between Reed and Major Hayes. We'd dropped that conflict for a while, because Reed seemed to be accepting the need for MACOs and the [show's] powers-that-be wanted the characters on the same page. But in this episode, finally the bubble bursts and all hell breaks loose, and Reed and Hayes have a massive fight. It's good stuff."

Shooting not just that fight, but other interactions between Reed and Major Hayes has meant that Keating has spent a good deal of time in the company of Culp. And to hear Keating tell it, he's got no complaints about doing so. "Steven is great," the actor notes. "I actually met Steven while doing a radio play for KCRW about four years ago, think it was. Richard Dreyfus was in it as well. It was a play about one of the generals during the American Civil War, and Steven and I met doing it. And we kept in touch. We also happen to go to the same gym together. So we sort of saw each other over the years and then it was just terrific that he was brought on board to play Hayes on the show. He's great on the show. He's just a very, very hard working actor. He's just come fresh off The West Wing and he was going on to do ER . He'd done a couple of episodes of Lyon's Den, the Rob Lowe show, and he's just a very happening actor around town at the moment.

Not to dwell on the negative, but Keating acknowledges that the Enterprise set was a bit of a gloomy place mid-way through Season Two. The ratings were down. Various magazines were devoting cover stories about ways in which the show could be saved. And several of the actors, Keating among them, worried about their job status.

There were a few weeks, I have to say, where there was the spectre that Star Trek may be in the grasp...in the vagaries of episodic telly, and that we might get cancelled or at least not renewed, just like any other show," he notes. "Scott [Bakula] shook all of our hands the other night and said '66'. I wasn't sure what he meant. I was thinking bingo. He said, 'Episode 66, pal in he can. That's something to be proud of, especially I this day and age, when most shows don't last three days.'

"And it's true," Keating nods. "He's right. I noticed they dropped Tarzan after, what, maybe five episodes? And I know that Skin was cancelled after just three episodes. Skin was a good TV show. It was a modern-day reworking of the Romeo and Juliet story and it was well done. They had some good actors in there, starting with Ron Silver, And it's terrible that nobody is giving anything a chance."

Keating cracks up when asked if Bakula is more often than not the cheerleader on the Enterprise set, the guy who lifts everyone's spirits when they require lifting. "It certainly isn't John Billingsley!" he jokes. "No, I'm kidding. I'm the worrywart. I'm the one who rings up on Thursday morning to see what the ratings were like the night before. I don't know if everyone realises that, but they must because I'm always the one taking command of the fax.
"I guess I'm also the cheerleader. I like our show, I really do. I like what we're doing. Scott's much more of the mind that, 'We can only do what we do, and leave it at that.' Connor [Trinneer] is kind of that way, too. I don't know if it's a good thing, but I guess I am [the cheerleader]. You want some sort of stability inside this very dodgy framework, in this business. It's not easy to hold on to. There's just not a lot of time to celebrate the good news. After the ratings came out for Similitude , I went up to Scott and said, 'Great job.' I rang Connor and said, 'Fantastic show, mate. You didn't miss a beat. Really great job.' I don't know that everyone else does that kind of thing. [Director of photography] Marvin Rush tends to come up to you and say, ' I saw yesterday's dailies. That scene with you and Connor is fantastic. You're going to love it.' Marvin watches the show religiously. He sees the dailies and he TiVos the episodes."

Getting into the specifics of Season Three, Keating reiterates his earlier point that while it's true that there's not been a Reed-centric episode per se, Reed's been an active force in several shows. "I've quite enjoyed most of what I've gotten to do this season," he notes. "As I say, I haven't had the big bone thrown at me. But I've been a very good supporting actor this year, if I can say that myself, when I've been called upon to support scenes or do B-lines. I've done a lot of B-lines this season. And I'm happy to be in that place.

"I've been working more hours than the first couple of seasons, but I still get a bit of time out and can do the shopping and get the laundry done and so on. God knows, I think about the rest of the cast and crew, and unless you're married I don't know how you run your life. I really don't. They work 70 to 80 hours a week and the weekend has got to be spent doing laundry, going shopping, then sleeping on Sunday, and it's back to work on Monday. It's pretty gruelling for 10 months a year.

"People who do sitcoms, they have the easiest job in town, mate," Keating laughs. "Once you get down to doing a show in front of a live audience, that's pretty fun. Once you've done it two or three times, then you don't mind the audience. I did a sitcom in England. I did five or six years of sitcom. I'd been in front of a couple of cameras before, but when you're in front of five cameras and 500 people...I was sweating bullets that first time. But once you've done it a few times, it's actually quite enjoyable. Hour-long episodes, that's hard. Matthew Perry just did The West Wing and he said it was quite an awakening for him after having done Friends for so long."

But back to Reed and this season of Enterprise. Keating agrees to offer up some more detail about the episode that finds him butting heads and going mano to mano with Major Hayes. "I think it's going to be called Harbinger ,' " the actor says. "It's going to be for the February sweeps. [Co-executive producer] Manny Coto wrote it. He also wrote Similitude , and I think this one is going to be just as good. He's a really, really welcome addition to the team. I can tell he just loves writing Star Trek . He throws so many balls into the air and then deftly flourishes it into a big ball, with a bow at the end.

"In Harbinger, the Captain suggests that the MACOs give us the benefit of their advanced combat training, and that really gets up my nose. I'm pressed-ganged by the Captain into accepting the Major's proposal, which Hayes had gone behind my back to Archer with, and when the Major tries to figure out the logistics of this training and how it's going to be conducted, I really let him have it. 

"Beyond that episode, I have no idea what's coming up. I get asked 'What's coming up?' a lot and I wish I could answer it whenever somebody asks it. We haven't got a clue. I have no idea. I would imagine that we are going to fight the Xindi for the rest of this season. Whether they decide to take the storyline through to the next season, I don't know. But I have a feeling that the mission is quite important. I think a sense of purpose has got to be introduced. You either stick with the Xindi or you introduce a new mission next season and we go on that arc."

"However, I think just reverting back to episodic, one-hour complete stories won't work at this juncture," he continues. "When I look around at shows like Alias and 24 ,these big shows that seem to be garnering so much attention, they're episodic and you could watch one episode, but its much, much more fun and more meaningful if you're following the story. That seems to be what audiences like at the moment.

"I've got ideas, but I don't want to bug [executive producer] Brannon Braga too much, to be honest." Keating adds as the conversation comes to an end. "He's got enough on his plate without actors ringing up and going, 'What about my character?' So we'll just see. But if I were going to ring Brannon, the only thing I would say was, 'You might flesh him out a bit.' I just don't know if there's time, as I say, in this timeline the show is on right now. I don't know that Reed having a love interest of whatever description or an episode that got into his backstory and added some emotional depth, can happen at the moment. I don't know that there's time. They want to do that story with Trip, and they're really pushing the Trip-T'Pol storyline.

I have to think privately, to myself, ' I'm an English actor on an American TV show and I ain't done too badly,' I'm an English actor not playing the captain on an American TV show, so I'm quite happy with what they give me. You've got to come back down to basics in the end, and that's one of the basics, that I'm a British actor on an American show. And the cheques clear!"

DIRECT CONTROL

Dominic Keating will direct Star Trek: Enterprise one of these days. That's been a goal of his from the get-go. He took a course at the Los Angeles film school and he's been shadowing director's on the Enterprise set. Unfortunately, his plan has taken a little bit of a back seat this season. 

"That's only because I've had so many more hours spent in front of the camera rather than time out to look behind the camera," says Keating, who hopes to write and direct a short film based on a story Scott Bakula told him about his son, Will. "I had some time out. I had a week at one point, but I was sick. I wanted to shadow Robbie McNeill and spend some time in the edit suite, but I got the damn flu and I spent five days banged up here in bed. It was the worst flu I've had in....forever. But directing is still a plan of action, and whenever I'm even just working on set I'm always earwigging the conversations between the director and Marvin Rush and watching the compilation of a shot. Then when I look at the shows themselves, part of me is watching the show and watching performance, but 65-70 per cent of me is watching how it's framed, how it's cut and how it's jig-sawed together.