Raphael Sbarge as Michael Jonas in Star Trek: Voyager. Photo copyright of Paramount Pictures.
In today's Sci-Fi Blast From The Past, actor Raphael Sbarge talks about playing former-Maquis-turned-Kazon-informant Michael Jonas in Star Trek: Voyager.
It is not all smooth sailing ahead when Starfleet officers and Maquis crewmembers join forces to fight their way back to the Alpha Quadrant in Star Trek: Voyager. While the Maquis must learn to abide by the rules and regulations of the Federation, Starfleet officers find themselves required to work alongside and, in some cases, take orders from individuals who never made it through the academy.
As attacks against Voyager by the Kazon become more frequent, one Maquis rebel, Michael Jonas, decides that he has had enough. In an attempt to buy safe passage home he begins leaking information to Seska, a former member of the Maquis who is now working with the Kazon. Unfortunately, the crewman’s misplaced loyalties have disastrous consequences for those around him and in particular prove fatal for Jonas himself.
“Jonas is a Maquis who comes with a past,” says actor Raphael Sbarge who played the Maquis rebel-turned-traitor. “He obviously knew Seska [Martha Hackett] and had a relationship with her at one time. My sense was that they probably knew each other when they were young and maybe there was even a romantic thing that went on there. That was my thought. Whether that is what was in the producers minds, I don’t know,” he laughs. “Some of these things aren’t filled in, so, you sort of make them up yourself.
“He clearly saw that Voyager was going into some very dangerous territory without any sort of help. I think he began to feel that they were surrounded by the Kazon and would eventually be blown to bits unless they made some genuine and serious moves towards making peace or creating a balance with them.
“In his own way, at least initially, I think he did what he did from a sort of benevolent point of view. It wasn’t completely good for everyone because it was really self-motivated but I don’t think he intended for it to get as bad as it did. He eventually got himself in a position where Seska was blackmailing him and then he was stuck. When you lie you have to cover your lies. One lie leads to another lie and that’s what happened to Jonas. He got in too deep.”
Sbarge had watched both the original Star Trek and Star Trek: The Next Generation long before being asked to appear on Voyager. He almost turned the part of Jonas down because at first glance there was not that much to the character. “I really wanted to work on Star Trek but was willing to take a chance and wait for something of real substance,” he recalls. “My agent said, ‘No, no, no. They’re developing this guy and want to do something with him.’ I said, ‘OK, it’ll really be a kick to be on the show.
“I was familiar with Voyager and know Kate Mulgrew [Captain Kathryn Janeway] because she and I were in a theatre group together. After I got the part I wrote the casting director a letter and said, ‘You know, you get a lot of jobs in your life, but how many people can say that they’ve worked on Star Trek? What a wonderful opportunity to have this type of experience.’ I really meant that and was looking forward to working on the series.”
Sbarge made his debut as Jonas in the second season story Alliances. In this episode the Voyager crew makes contact with a race known as the Trabe who once lived alongside the Kazon in anything but harmony. In the first of what would become many such scenes, Jonas contacts the Kazon and informs them of the proposed alliance between the Federation and the Trabe.
“They have a crackerjack cast and crew on Voyager,” comments the actor. “Most of the show’s regulars have done a lot of theatre work and are solidly versed in their craft. They’re not just pretty faces. Everyone really knows what to do and moves very quickly, so, when you come in it’s hard not to feel a bit like you’re playing catch-up because it’s such a well-oiled machine. LeVar Burton [Lt. Commander Geordi La Forge on The Next Generation] directed one of the episodes I appeared in [Dreadnought]. It was nice to work with him. Because he’s also an actor he knows how to talk to actors. There’s sort of an actor’s language and when you’re on the front lines you know what it’s like to be there, so, it’s nice to have another actor who’s on your side.
“The most difficult thing about the part, and I guess this is true of anyone who is in engineering, is the technobabble. It was difficult and it really kicked my ass,” he chuckles. “I’m very good at memorizing - I’ve learned entire plays in six days - but it’s pretty hard when you’re saying words that basically don’t mean anything.
“Garrett Wang [Ensign Harry Kim] was a real friend to me about it. He took me aside and told me about the tricks he used to help memorize things when he first started and gave me some tips on how to make things work for me. He said, ‘During our first year everyone really had a hard time with the words. It’s even harder for the guest-stars because they’re saying these things for the first time.’ Simon Billig [Mr. Hogan] and I used to get together and commiserate on how hard it was to learn the lines, but all that aside, it was just a thrill to be up there and doing it.”
Over the next three episodes, Threshold, Dreadnought and Life Signs, Jonas persists with his covert communications with the Kazon. Unknown to the crewman, both Captain Janeway and Tuvok [Tim Russ] are aware that information is being leaked to the enemy. In an effort to expose the traitor, Tom Paris [Robert Duncan McNeill] gets himself captured by the Kazon in Investigationswhile Neelix [Ethan Phillips] carries out his own style of detective work aboard Voyager. The episode ends in a battle between Neelix and Jonas as the crewman foolishly makes one final effort to honour his deal with the Kazon.
“They developed Jonas for a while and were trying to figure out exactly which way they wanted to go and how to expose him. Apparently, it’s unusual to develop a character like this over five episodes because of how things work in syndication. With most programmes it doesn’t matter if you show an episode or two out of order, but in this case they had an idea and wanted it to culminate in ‘Investigations.’
“Out of all the episodes I did this one is definitely my favorite and the one which was the most interesting for me. I did just about all of the stunt work, but I did have a stunt man who did the fall when Jonas tumbles over the railing in engineering and gets vaporized.
“I had a wacky thing happen to me while we were shooting this episode,” laughs the actor. “I’m not a klutz but I sort of banged myself up a bit that night while shooting those fight scenes with Ethan. I hit my head on the railing, sliced the tip of one of my fingers open on an exposed nail and, in the scene where Jonas finally goes over the railing, I bruised my rib and I ended up not being able to sleep on that side for a month. Of course,” he chuckles, “I became a joke on the set. It was like, ‘Be careful, there’s a paper clip! Don’t trip!’ I guess it was bad astrology or something.”
One of Sbarge’s less painful and more amusing anecdotes comes from working with Voyager’s resident morale officer and set comic Ethan Phillips. “When you’re filming you first shoot what is called a master and then you shoot singles, which are closeups. When you shoot a single you sometimes get what is called a dirty single. This just means that someone else got in the shot. Ethan sort of hooked onto this while we were filming Investigations and, right before the camera would roll, would say in his best Irish accent, ‘Oh, it’s a dirty single.’ We then both got into this Irish accent and it became, ‘Oh, it’s a dirty, dirty single. You’re a dirty, dirty dog, you,’ and we went on and on with that. The crew kept looking at us as if we were nuts but every time we said it we would fall over laughing. Ethan just doesn’t stop. He is constantly telling jokes and is just so funny!
“Everyone on the show is terrific,” he continues. “They’re all very appreciative and realize that Voyager is, in a sense, the job of a lifetime. There’s an aura surrounding Star Trek which surpasses everything else. I went to Star Trek conventions as a kid and I remember going to see Gene Roddenberry speak. During his speech he said something like, ‘One day we’ll be able to go out, get any movie we want, put it in our television and watch it at will.’ I remember thinking, ‘My God, how does he know these things? He’s so amazing.’ Here was this man who conceived all this and is someone who touched people’s imaginations in a very profound way.”
As a child Sbarge spent a lot of time at work with his mother who was a theatrical costume designer. He first appeared on television at the age of five on the children’s educational series Sesame Street. The actor was offered the chance to become a regular on the show but his mother turned it down. “She didn’t want to become a stage mother,” he says, “and looking back at it now I think it was the best thing. There’s nothing worse than child actors and their stage parents. I just don’t think it’s right. It’s too hard a business to put kids through.”
Sbarge was only thirteen when he decided to pursue seriously an acting career. His father, a professional photographer, took some head and shoulder shots of his son, while at the advice of an actress friend the youngster began looking through the weekly casting papers Backstage and Showbusiness. “At this point my mother said, ‘It’s fine if you want to do this but you have to do it on your own. I’m not going to hold your hand.’ She was very wise,” he laughs. “She encouraged me in this way because it was going to be my thing.
“I called an agent and bicycled over to the East Side of New York [City] to meet him. During our chat he asked who had been representing me before I came to him. I asked, ‘What’s representation?’ because I didn’t know what that was. They then asked me if I sang. I had been in a boys’ choir and we had travelled to Canterbury Cathedral to sing. I said, ‘Oh, yeah,’ and broke into Handel’s Messiah in the office. They had no child clients and had no intention of taking any on, but apparently they were charmed by this little thirteen-year-old kid and started sending me out on auditions.”
Sbarge made his Broadway debut at sixteen alongside Faye Dunaway in Curse of an Aching Heart. A year later he was in the film Risky Business and, upon graduating from high school, moved to California and continued working in other films and on television as well as on the stage. My Science Project, Vision Quest and Letters Home from Vietnam are just a few of the movies in which the actor has appeared. His television work includes Final Verdict with Treat Williams, Murder 101 with Pierce Brosnan, The Billionaire Boys Club with Judd Nelson and A Streetcar Named Desire with Ann-Margret.
“One of the things I love about being an actor is having the chance to develop my craft so that I can become even better at it and bring more to the job. There’s an Olympic motto, ‘Faster, higher, stronger.’ As an actor I think about that sometimes. I like to think of it in that way and that’s where it becomes challenging to me because it comes down to me and it [acting]. It’s not as if I’m competing with anyone else. I’m reaching for my own personal best.”
Sbarge was seen recently in the NBC television movie Deadly Web as well as in episodes of both Murder, She Wrote and Nowhere Man. His latest film work includes Babes in Toyland and this past summer’s blockbuster science fiction epic Independence Day. Despite his character’s untimely demise on Star Trek: Voyager, the actor’s work on the series continues to impress people halfway around the world.
“My wife and I were in Italy last Thanksgiving [1995],” he recalls. “When you meet people in cafes they’ll often ask you, ‘What do you do?’ I tell them I’m an actor and they ask, ‘What have you done?’ I tell them that I’ve done this movie and that television series and then I tell them that I did Star Trek and they say, ‘My God, Star Trek!’ Even people on the other side of the world get excited about the program.
“I just received a whole bunch of fan mail from viewers who saw the episodes I was in. Audiences who regularly watch the series have a certain passion for it and it holds a special place in their hearts. I guess that’s what really sets it apart from so many other shows. Star Trek has touched so many people and has really transcended anything anyone could ever have imagined,” he says thoughtfully.
Steve Eramo
As noted above, photo copyright of Paramount Pictures, so please no unauthorized copying or duplicating of any kind. Thanks!
