Kellie Waymire played Crewman Elizabeth Cutler on Enterprise in "Strange New World," "Dear Doctor" and "Two Nights and Two Days." She also played an alien actress in the Star Trek: Voyager episode "Muse." We talked to her in May of 2002.
This is the transcript of the video interview .
STARTREK.COM: How were you cast on Voyager and Enterprise?
Kellie Waymire: I got cast on the show pretty much I think the same way that most guest stars get cast — your agent submits you and then they call you in and say you have an appointment for Voyager, to go in and I went in and read with Ron Surma, the casting director first, and he said, "Ok, c'mon, we're going to have you read for the producer's of the show". And, of course, I was very excited because it's a great show and you always want, at least, get to do one. And it was an alien, which I was also very excited about. So I went in. I remember there was sort of long line of other women there and I waited and waited and waited and waited. I walked in and I sort of did my thing and god bless them, they're wonderful people — and really lovely to work with - but not terribly effusive in the audition room (laughs). So I left and sort of threw up my hands and went, "Oh well, that was a big waste of time. They'll never call me in for anything ever again." And then I got a call a couple of weeks later, er ... a couple of days later, excuse me, and said, "Oh yea, they want to use you for Voyager" and I, of course, was shocked, completely shocked, because I had completely blown it off. And exactly the same thing happened again when I went in to read for Enterprise. I went in and sort of did my thing and they went, "Ok, thanks." (laughs).
Q: What is a typical day on the set like?
KW: Well, a typical day generally starts with a long line of cars outside the Paramount lot because of the situation now. So there's that to contend with so you have to make an extra 20 minutes extra time. And then you come, and makeup — I'm a human, very cush compared to most people. Interestingly enough, I've never actually seen John Billingsley without his makeup on because he's always in hours before me and hours after. And I suppose if I were really nice, I would just sort of hang out and wait until he finished his makeup but I'm not. I go home — I'm tired.
We do rehearsal of the scenes and we shoot them on set. Of the two episodes that I've done now, the one I'm shooting now, which is the "Two days, two nights" and "Dear Doctor" were mostly on the stages and so they were, sort of, a normal actor day. The one that was really crazy was the "A Strange New World" because we had to go to the Bronson caves, I think they're called — the Bat caves, where they actually shot a lot of the early Batman stuff. That was pretty crazy because we were sort of like running around in caves and its dark and there's 20 crew members in there and they have to spray everything down so everything's wet and moist and everybody's sick. Because whatever is floating around in there is now airborne because its been kicked up. As unbelievably crazy as all that was, it was an incredible blast, too.
Q: Was it a different experience working on Voyager?
KW: It's a different experience for me, certainly, because I was an alien in one of the episodes and the episode that was a pretty big guest star show. It was guest star heavy. I guess they had a couple of scenes on the ship, which I wasn't really a part of and then Roxann [Dawson] crashes on what I call the "Greek Theater Planet" and craziness ensues. All sorts of alien antics. It was fun and it was actually fun for the crew from what I understand because it was a new environment for them so they could figure out new shots. There's a whole group of new people that were around. So it really didn't have much to do with most of the cast as opposed to Enterprise where it was all about the cast. It was most of the cast and it was fun. I knew Conner Trinneer from before, in fact, and it was sort of fun to work with him in a different situation. And Anthony was great. Everybody was so warm and inviting, I really felt like I was part of the cast.
Q: Can you tell us about your relationship with Dr. Phlox?
KW: You know who's really anxious to know what happens? Me. And I'm the last person to know. You'll know — the entire world will know before they tell me what's going to happen. I dunno ... I adore working with John. He's so great, so fabulous. And I really love the fact that they chose to have a little sort of romantic thing. I mean, you saw the obvious choices - the big, strapping Starfleet commander or you know, they're all sort of bouncing around and I'm sure there will be plenty of that (laughs) to go around. But its nice to have this sort of quirky, romantic thing and I don't know ... I'm also afraid — I'm always afraid to make any decisions about how I feel about where the character should go or shouldn't go because ultimately we have so little control as actors about what happens so you don't want to get too set because you may have to change your mind about it. But I'm certainly anxious to see what happens.
Q: Do you have a favorite Star Trek episode?
KW: Oh god, its so obvious. "The Trouble with Tribbles." Its so ... I know ... I'm not very interesting. I'm a lemming right off the cliff with everyone into the basin of tribbles. (laughs). Its hideous. I'm a girl, too. How can you not love a fluffy little thing that's cute and makes a little sound? How can you not? I think I probably, you know, maybe as a kid, played with one or tried to make one out of fur.
Q: Do you have a favorite Star Trek captain?
KW: My sort of childhood favorite would obviously be Shatner — of course, the only one that was around at the time, Captain Kirk. You know, he was so dreamy and fabulous and I watched them every day after school so that's sort of the first one I think of. It was always exciting to see which sort of new, unbelievably beautiful alien woman he was going to kiss and leave ... typical ... in the episode. And I loved the whole style of the show and fantastic kind of quality of the show and the look. I think they've found a way to let each of the separate captains have there only kind of powerful qualities. I loved the fact that Kate, I thought, brought a certain kind of — even though she was very strong, there was a certain vulnerability about her and I really loved that. And I loved Picard's humility. It'd be hard to have a favorite, honestly. I liked them all so much.
Kellie Waymire passed away in November of 2003. She was a talented performer and a warm and generous person who is deeply missed by all those who knew her.
