Star Trek Articles (13)
                Taken from the Public Domain

Interview with / Profile of Wil Wheaton/Wesley Crusher
                            & Gates McFadden/Dr Beverly Crusher

(1) Profile

Apart from the odd corridor scene and a couple of specific
episodes, the only regular reminder of existence of family groups
aboard the Enterprise is the case of Beverly Crusher (played by
Gates McFadden) and her teenage son Wesley (Will Wheaton). Bev
Crusher is the ship's Chief Medical Officer ('Doctor' to you and
me!), and in keeping with current Federation thinking, her son has
joined her aboard her tour of duty.

Although Captain Picard approved her posting to the Enterprise,
there is initially an air of tension between the two.  It
transpires early in the pilot story that Bev's late husband, Jack
Crusher, had been serving under Picard's command aboard the
Stargazer when he met his death.  Torn by feelings of guilt,
Picard felt that as an old friend of the family he should be the
one to break the news to Beverly - and that memory still returns
to haunt her occasionally, although she certainly doesn't blame
Captain Picard for the accident.

As time passes, Beverly seems to come to terms with the presence
of Captain Picard, and there are even a few hints that if it
weren't for their respective responsibilities, and the memory of
Jack, a romance could quite easily develop between the captain and
his doctor.  This is emphasised in the first season story The
Naked Now in which an alien disease infects the crew, causing a
loss of inhibitions and the general inability to make rational
judgements.  While under the intoxicating influence of this virus,
both try valiantly to maintain an air of dignity and
professionalism - with varying degrees of success.

Young Wesley Crusher, Bev's son, has accompanied his mother aboard
the Enterprise with the aim of continuing his schooling and
eventually of graduating into Starfleet Academy and then serving
aboard a starship himself.  Very early on we are shown that
Wesley's greatest strength, and ironically his most major handicap
in life, is his amazing intelligence.  He has a special aptitude
for starship design and engineering, and an ability to visualise
and understand even the most complex elements of shipboard
technology.  Very early in the series he redesigns a tractor beam
to act as a powerful directional deflector, and then adapts the
ship's long range sensor array for greater efficiency.

His experiences with The Traveller in the episode Where No One Has
Gone Before lead Picard to the conclusion that Wesley is a genius
who is being actively held back by his largely theoretical
schoolwork, and he appoints Wesley as an Acting Ensign, serving
under his own watchful eye on the bridge.  Following Jack
Crusher's death, Picard feels partly responsible for the boy's
upbringing, and perhaps this is just his way of showing it.

Thankfully, Wesley's slightly annoying tendency to save the ship
from disaster every other week is quickly dropped from the series,

and he becomes simply a young, likeable junior officer who just
happens to be extremely bright.
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(2) Interview with (a) Wil Wheaton/Wesley Crusher

When you first got the part, what did you know about the character
of Wesley?

"They just said that there's a kid on the Enterprise now, and they
told me the story about the families and all that, and I said,
"Ok, that sounds like fun."  I went in and read for it, and then
when I got the role, I mean they really didn't... I didn't know
that much about the character.  I kind of developed him myself,
you know, I mean within the boundaries... I've tried to read as
much into "Aye, aye Captain" as I can every week."

I feel that Wesley can be the audience's point of view, asking
many of the same questions that we would.  We can identify with
him.

"I guess I've reached a new audience, sort of.  I've reached the
teeny-boppers according to the demographics, and brought in a
younger market, because with the younger market there's a... they
can relate, I guess a little more.  There's all these television
shows that I love, but as a kid I could never relate to them.  I
mean, as a kind we could all relate to Batman, because Robin asked
all the stupid questions that we were all going to ask.  And then
we all learned those nifty lessons every week, like 'pedestrian
safety first chum' and things like that."

I feel that now, in the third season, Wesley is treated as an
equal, especially on the bridge.

"Well, you really haven't heard anything to dispute that.  You
haven't really heard anything that would say that Wesley is an
inferior.  I mean, some of the writers like to keep that tone, and
they'll put in young Ensign Crusher, and young Wesley, and the
actors won't say it.  They'll be like, "Wesley said this", which
is very cool."

How do you feel Wesley has changed in the three seasons?

"He's kind of gone from the wide eyed, dorky little kid to the
Starfleet officer on the bridge, and that's... I mean, they really
haven't done anything, so I couldn't really tell you exactly what
he's done.  In the first episode of this season they originally
had me with my buddies who were going "Why don't you ever come
down and hang out with us anymore?" and I was going, "Guys, I'm on
the bridge" you know.  There were these babes everywhere going
"Wes, we dig ya" and Wes goes "Sorry".  They just cut it all out.
They've kind of scratched the surface of things like that, but
they really haven't done anything [to develop the character]."

I'd also like to see more interaction with Beverly.

"Everyone would like to see more interaction with Beverly
[laughs].  Actually, I heard about next week's script, that we
actually confront each other because... I mean, it seems that
within every scene she's going [in a whiny voice] "Why aren't you
doing this?" [and Wes is going] "Get of my back".  That's been
underplayed in all of our interactions so far this season.
There's a scene in the next show where we have this argument, and
we were [saying to each other], well how can we be having an
argument when we haven't talked to each other this season?  We've
seen each other face to face once, you know.  I mean, there's lots
of things that we'd all like to see, but I don't know, maybe they
can't get an acceptable story, or they just don't have the
resources."

That relationship is very true to life though.  Mothers still
treat their sons like that sometimes.

"I've fortunately grown past that with my own parents.  I'm 17
now, and from about three months before I turned 17 to the present
I mean it's just taken an entire turnaround, from
mother-father-son into like, adult.  I would expect the doctor to
have kind of respect for Wesley, especially after he held his own
for a year without mommy around.  Maybe the writers haven't gotten
hip to that yet."

What would a typical day on the set involve for you, especially
with your tutor and school?

"I live 15 miles from the studio.  It takes me about an hour to
get in - [sarcastically] lovely Los Angeles.  So, I get up an hour
and a half before I'm supposed to come to work.  I come down and
either I'll go straight into school or into make-up.  I usually
get all made-up, sit around for five or six hours [laughs], do my
three hours of school, and go to work.  Then I'll work for a
little while, and I'll go see who's on The Arsenio Hall Show
[which is filmed at the same studio], depending on if it's close
to when they tape, or I'll go home... or if there's a hockey game
I usually bail and go to the [Los Angeles] Forum [to see the Los
Angeles Kings hockey team].  Depending on how much I'm working
that day either I go to school-work-school-work and just kind of
work it all together.  I only have to do three hours of school
every day, but it's three hours of just [school] work.  It's not
three hours [consisting of] twenty minutes and a five minute
break, twenty minutes... I just work straight through.  When I'm
working a lot it can be kind of tough because we have to juggle
school and work, like today.  I'm in a lot of stuff today... and I
don't really have that much to do.  I'm just on the bridge.  So,
they see me a lot."

What's your school like?

"I have a little schoolhouse that we've customized and added our
own to over the years, and it's very cool, I like it a lot.  I
would not go back to regular high school for anything right now.
Just because I love the way that I do it [here], and I love my
teacher, and I love my whole situation."

I wanted to bring up The Dauphin, which I feel is one of the best
Wesley episodes.

"Yes, Wesley falls in love with a girl and she turns into a
hideous monster.  Not unlike real life [laughs].  That was a lot
of fun to do.  Actually, it was really different for me, because
rarely does a show focus on me, and to have so much to do in the
show was a lot of fun - especially working with Jamie [Hubbard].
Jamie was just a doll.  She was wonderful.  Too bad she's twenty
seven!"

Another great story for you is Samaritan Snare, especially the
scene when he's taking a long shuttlecraft journey with Captain
Picard.

"That was awesome, that was the most bitchin' time I've ever had
on the show.  Sitting with Patrick Stewart in that little tiny
shuttlecraft that's not much bigger than his office for all those
hours was awesome.  We had so much fun, because... you wouldn't
know it, but Patrick is a very, very funny man.  He's a very cool
guy, and just spending that kind of time with him was really
great.  I mean, we added a lot to it.  Originally we were just
sitting there [in the scene], and we both said to the director, "I
think this would be a lot more interesting if we moved to the
back, and ate the sandwiches, and all that stuff.  That was all
added in the last minute before we shot it.  We were saying that
the scene was very slow and we needed to move it up a little bit.
Yeah, that was a lot of fun."

Would Evolution be your favorite episode so far this season -
because it focuses on Wesley?

"No, the one we shot last week called Hollow Pursuits.  It's about
this guy who is essentially a Holodeck addict.  It was my favorite
for many reasons.  Among the top three were: Marina's Holodeck
incarnation, my Holodeck incarnation [dressed as Gainsborough's
'Blue Boy'], and getting off of the bridge."

What in your opinion makes a great Next Generation episode rather
than just a good one?

"I don't know if we've had any great, great episodes.  I have very
high expectations of the show, and because we have such a... I
mean, I work with the greatest actors in the world.  We have
wonderful crew, and wonderful effects people, and [make-up artist]
Michael Westmore, and the people who do the visuals and things
like that, and... I think Hollow Pursuits is going to be an
awesome episode.  It's a really good story.  I've read so many of
these scripts and I've gotten to the fifth act and gone, "That's
it?" - you know, because I'm as much a watcher of the show as I am
an employee of the show.  I'm as much a critic of the show as I am
an actor on the show.  All the way up to the end of Hollow
Pursuits I was going, "This is great!" [it's] like Yesterday's
Enterprise.  That was an awesome episode, brilliantly written.  It
needed to be a two-part episode, it needed to be a little longer I
thought.  But I'm very critical of the show because I'm on it."

You mentioned that you're also a big fan of Science Fiction.

"Yes.  I prefer the dark future type [of Sci-Fi], like Aliens, Mad
Max, Outland... I guess Logan's Run kind of is, if you think about
it in a bizarre way.  I really like The Prisoner - one of my
all-time favourite series.  I've heard rumours that they're going
to remake it, and that just nauseates me."

What would you like to see happen with Wesley in the upcoming
fourth season?

"I would like to get out of my ugly grey spacesuit [laughs].  I'd
like to get off the bridge.  I would like to do something as
opposed to flying the ship... which is great, flying the ship is a
far cry from saving the ship, and much better, but it's getting a
little... dull, just sitting in my chair every year.  I'd like to
see some Holodeck stuff, like Wesley goes and plays hockey with
the Kings in the Holodeck, and Wesley goes to the planet of 18-24
year old babes without inhibitions [laughs]!  Mom just disappears,
and Wes doesn't have to deal with her on the planet of babes!"

@~Next issue, the interview with Gates McFadden/Dr Beverly Crusher








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