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Robert Picardo Interview

By Amy
October 31, 2000 - 4:54 AM

Michelle Erica Green over at Fandom has posted an interview with Robert Picardo (the Doctor). The interview, which is quite extensive, goes into detail on a number of up-coming Doctor-centric episodes, 'Critical Care', 'Body and Soul' and 'Flesh and Blood', including a description of the last scene for 'Flesh and Blood'.

"Picardo compares the Doctor`s situation in "Flesh and Blood" to Patty Hearst in the Symbionese Liberation Army. "He is kidnapped, and becomes sympathetic to his kidnappers, and now he`s a married housewife in the Midwest—just kidding," the actor jokes, referring to Sara Olson, the former SLA member who disappeared into suburbia for many years. "He thinks he`s pursuing a higher cause, and he trusts whom he believes to be his friend. He never wants to see Voyager harmed."

In the end, of course, Janeway must dress down her disobedient crewmember. Since viewers have seen the captain and the Doctor argue repeatedly over the years, Picardo was afraid the final scene would seem redundant to long-time fans, so made a proposal to the director about how the scene should be filmed to change the tone. "I suggested that we have the Doctor working alone. Suddenly, he looks up and seems to sense something. He`s in the back of sickbay and walks forward, around the corner. You see that he looks into his office and sees Janeway sitting in his office chair, lost in thought, as if she has come to speak to him but has not completely formulated her thoughts.

"I thought that would not only be a different beginning to the scene we`ve played a dozen times in her ready room or in sickbay, but it would also suggest her own sense of conflict with what she`s about to discuss—her own sense of culpability in what`s happened. She is weighing her own guilt in with mine. It makes the scene quite different, more ambiguous and ultimately more real than had it just been another `Doctor, shame on you,` with his tail between his legs."

For the full interview, which also contains information on 'Shattered' and how, if his character was the one to die, he'd like to see the Doctor go out (in Seven's arms in a hot-tub), click here.

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