Robert Picardo may play an ultra-modern holographic version of a doctor, but he infuses the part with such humanity that you forget the character is a mere machine. He's creative, vocal and funny too. For more on the flesh and blood behind the EMH, we hope you enjoy his answers to your questions.
Question: I was wondering which [Star Trek: Voyager] episode that dealt with an ethical situation you found particularly interesting and why?
Chris
Robert Picardo: I would say "Latent Image" because the Doctor, in choosing to save one life, he has to sacrifice another. What the story proposes is that with two equally injured patients [the Doctor] has a moment of indecision and, even acting as quickly as he can, cannot save them both. So, he chooses Harry Kim because he has a closer personal relationship with him, and Ensign Lyndsay Ballard dies. I remember [Co-executive Producer] Joe Menosky said that the Doctor discovers his human soul in that episode because he cannot reconcile that in choosing one life he took another. It's his "Sophie's Choice" moment. That was the most interesting and exciting one to play, although "Critical Care" posed another interesting ethical dilemma about managed healthcare, which is basically where an institution is deciding for you who to save and who to let go. And the institution has limited resources and how do you apply those resources. In many ways it's the same decision, but there it wasn't the Doctor's decision, it was the Doctor being forced to work within a structure where someone was making those decision and he rebelled. But, it's a re-examination of a similar ethical dilemma.
Q: What would you say if you met your character?
Robert
RP: "God you're cute!" Or "Lighten up once in awhile" or "What is the holographic equivalent of Viagra?"
Q: In the upcoming episode "Body and Soul," the Doctor's program must hide out in Seven's implants. How did both you and Jeri Ryan prepare for this experience and will Seven now realize that the Doctor loves her as a result of this incident?
CCBloom
RP: Jeri and I spent a week in the Caribbean together sharing a beautiful hotel room! Actually, this was my suggestion. She didn't see how that was going to necessarily help her prepare for the role. I insisted that she take my word on it. We couldn't get the time off anyway. Of course I'm kidding. Jeri had the task of basically performing my role. What I suggested to Robbie [Duncan] McNeill, who directed—and directed beautifully—was that he video me playing the scenes where I am in her body [to show] both my choices for how to deliver the lines and the different physical gestures and comic ideas I might have for those scenes were I actually to play them myself. Jeri could then sit down, look at the tape and decide what to use and what to discard. And that's we did. I think that was helpful, but at a certain point Jeri just had to go out on a limb and let her instincts and imagination take over as me, and she did a really great job. Every time I came to the set, the crew would say, "Boy, Jeri does you even better than you do you." There was lots of innuendo last week and many jokes that traveled the circuit, but ultimately, it ended with Jeri saying to me on the last day, "It's a lot of fun being you." And I said, "Yes, it is!"
Q: What's your favorite animal?
Jewel2587
RP: Of my own pets, my California Desert Tortoise. I have, along with my wife and children, seven cats, two parrots and the Desert Tortoise. My favorite of all animals? That's a tough question, but if I could have my dream pet it would be a Galapagos Tortoise.
Q: Do you believe there is some other form of life out there besides us?
LuvVaCat
RP: I have to believe. I go along with Carl Sagan's ["Cosmos"] logic that if we are such an infinitesimal point in a universe that we can't even conceive of, then how preposterous that the accident of sentient life would have only happened once. It's actually far more challenging to assume that we are the only sentient life in the universe. It's a much more difficult hypothesis to defend, I think, than the opposite.
Q: Are there any aspects of the Doctor that you wanted to bring to the role, but never got the chance?
Neil S.
RP: His irresistible sexuality! There was one story idea that I brought up years ago, and they've taken a lot of my notions about the character seriously, so I certainly can't complain that the writers have not listened to my suggestions. They have, and often took off with them. For example, my relationship with Seven developing through my coaching her on the social graces was an idea of mine that ended up going farther and being richer than I'd ever imagined. But, I've always wanted to do a show about possessions, and having the Doctor being given his first possession, a gift from someone, a little token of someone's esteem, and his entire life on Voyager unravels because he has no place to put it. He has no personal space at all. I always felt it would be fun if the Doctor went from getting permission from Janeway to have a little personal space in Sickbay, a little personal corner dedicated to himself that he then became obsessed with collecting things and defining himself through his possessions. I thought it would be an interesting parallel for human life where we arrive, obviously with nothing, and then, depending on the type of person we are and what our talents and abilities are, we begin accumulating things and wealth and how people define themselves through everything that they surround themselves with. I thought it would be a fun story idea that was never done. And it looks like it ain't gonna be done this year. I would say that was my only disappointment with the Doctor, to examine the whole notion of 'You can't take it with you.'
Q: How much vocal and/or musical training have you actually had? And what is your favorite music to sing?
Jon B.
RP: I had very little formal training. I studied voice for a few months in college and I've sung on stage a few times. I enjoy singing in my personal life and have been delighted with the opportunities I've had to do it on Voyager. Another one of my ideas that I went to [Voyager co-creator] Jeri Taylor with back in season one was that I would like the Doctor to be an opera fan. It just struck me as so ridiculous that a computer generated personality, that at that time was relatively rigid and not terribly colorful in his own personality, would choose to be a fan of the most emotional and expressive form of human performance. It just seemed to be a funny irony. I enjoy all kinds of music. I love to sing in the shower, I love to sing karaoke and I love to sing in the car, to the humiliation and embarrassment of my two daughters. I have very broad tastes.
Q: What do you like to do in your spare time when you're not filming?
Will W.
RP: I like to spend time with my wife and children, I love to cook—I cook all the time. I like to exercise and try to stay healthy. I also like to have the occasional cigar, which is not part of my staying healthy regime. I love to travel and read. Lately I've been going to a lot of my daughter's soccer games. I'm a soccer mom.
Click here for Part II of the interview.
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