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Star Trek: The Next Generation
Gates McFadden
Cheryl Gates McFadden
2 March 1949 -
chief medical officer Beverly Crusher
[Season 1] & [Season 3 - 7]
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About the character:
Beverly Crusher (2324) is married with Jack R. Crusher and together
they have the son Wesley. Jack dies
in duty and it is his friend, Jean-Luc
Picard, who notifies her and Wesley about what has happened.
Four years before the death of her husband she is fully trained
as doctor and gets fourteen years later the job as chief medical
officer aboard the USS Enterprise NCC-1701-D. But after only one
year she gets the position as chief of the Starfleets medical facility
on Earth, but Wesley, who is ensign, stays behind. But she is only
in the new job for a year and returns as chief medical officer on
the Enterprise. A position that in a year has been occupied by Katherine
Pulaski.
When Beverly Crusher is not on duty, she has her motherly concerns
for her teenage son, Wesley. Often she drinks morning coffee with
captain Jean-Luc Picard. Beverly plays cards with William
Riker, Data, Geordi
La Forge, Worf, and Deanna
Troi.
About the actor:
Gates McFadden has mostly worked with theater and was before she
joined "Star Trek: The Next Generation", puppeteer for
Jim Henson (the man behind the muppet puppets). In his production
company she also tries other things like being instructor of choreography
on the movie "Labyrinth" in 1986. But the beginning of
her career has been serious studies among others on the New York
University Graduate School of the Arts. In New York Gates McFadden
plays some theater, but has also directed some productions herself.
Before "Star Trek: The Next Generation" she is credited
as Cheryl McFadden.
She has also made a few minor parts in movies and TV series.
So the peak of her career has been the character as doctor Beverly
Crusher. Already during the production of season 1, Rick Berman,
one of the producers behind "Star Trek: The Next Generation",
shows his dissatisfaction in the way, Gates McFadden plays her part
as Beverly Crusher. She tries to improve her acting, but in spite
of that she is fired with the notice of not having been able to
play her character and develop it in proportion to her fellow actors.
So she is written out of the script as season 2 begins, which provokes
a good number of protest letters addressed to Paramount demanding
the return of Gates McFadden to the series. And so she does from
season 3 but demands, that at least 3 episodes each season has a
plot circling about her character, Beverly Crusher.
Two years after the death of Gene Roddenberry in 1991 Gates McFadden
along with Majel Barrett (the
wife of Gene Roddenberry) are trying to gain control on the rights
for the unused ideas of Gene Roddenberry to ensure his visions.
But it can only be done, when the rights expires, because the producer
Rick Berman, who since the death of Gene Roddenberry has taken over
his universe, has in the meantime ensured, that the rights stays
within Paramount. In spite of that Gates McFadden has in September
1993, along with several angry Gene Roddenberry supporters, a meeting
with Rick Berman, who is of the oppinion, that it makes more viewers
with the ideas of Gene Roddenberry belonging to Paramount.
When "Star Trek: The Next Generation" as planned has
conluded after its season 7 in 1994, Gates McFadden continues later
the same year her character as Beverly Crusher in the movie Star
Trek: Generations.
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Has directed the following episodes:
Star Trek: The Next Generation
 "Genesis"
(171)
Has appeared in:
1987: "The
Cosby Show" - tv series
episode
"Cliff's 50th Birthday" (69)
1992: "L.A.
Law " - tv series
episode
"Steal It again, Sam" (119)
1990: "The
Hunt for Red October" - movie
1992: "L.A.
Law" - tv series
episode
"Steal It Again, Sam" (118)
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