Patrick Stewart Used His Bald Head As A Teleprompter To Help Out A Star Trek Co-Star
One of the more infamous behind-the-scenes stories on "Star Trek: The Next Generation" involves the unceremonious firing of actress Gates McFadden who played Dr. Beverly Crusher. Trekkies will likely be able to tell you that McFadden and the show's first-season head writer Maurice Hurley didn't get along in the slightest and that it was their antagonistic relationship that ultimately led to her being fired. Hurley also reportedly didn't like Dr. Crusher as a character, and nixing her from the show was likely a move to make writing easier for him. Or perhaps done out of spite. Hurley didn't go on record on the matter and passed in 2015. Hurley left the show at the end of its second season and executive producer Rick Berman took the opportunity to immediately re-hire McFadden.
Dr. Crusher was replaced by the grouchier, much more McCoy-like Kate Pulaski, played by actress Diana Muldaur. Back in the 1960s, Muldaur appeared in the "Star Trek" episodes "Return to Tomorrow" (February 9, 1968) and "Is There In Truth No Beauty?" (October 18, 1968) playing different characters. So she was familiar with the franchise.
Despite her familiarity, however, Muldaur struggled with learning lines. The shooting schedules for "Star Trek: The Next Generation" were fast and brutal, and actors were often handed speeches they only had several hours to memorize.
Patrick Stewart, who played Captain Picard on "Next Generation" recalled working with Muldaur in his new autobiography "Making It So: A Memoir." It seems that he and Muldaur weren't entirely friendly. Not that they fought or hated each other, but Muldaur didn't seem to mix with the rest of the cast well. Regardless, Stewart wanted to help her in the scenes where she was struggling and used his head in a clever way to help her with dialogue ... literally.
That's using your head
Elsewhere in "Making It So," Stewart revealed that he started to lose his hair when he was only 17. He was bald, then, for most of his life. His outsize forehead, however, gave him an advantage when appearing on TV. It seems that he was willing to paste a small piece of paper, with his co-star's lines to his brow. It seemingly worked. Stewart wrote:
"Diana Muldaur came aboard as the Enterprise's new chief medical officer, Dr. Katherine Pulaski. Diana is a fine actress who had been twice featured in the Original Series, but she never established much in the way of a rapport with me and seemed to function at a remove from the rest of the cast. Our one memorable moment came on a day when Diana was assigned a rather complex speech to deliver to Picard. She was given only a couple of hours to learn it. We didn't have teleprompters on [TNG] so I kindly offered to tape a printout of her dialogue on my hairless forehead."
Stewart doesn't relate the speech or the episode in question, so it will take sharp-eyed Trekkies to determine which scenes the actor had a piece of paper taped to his head. Perhaps one can look to see if Muldaur is making eye contact. Stewart wrote that the scene went well, but lamented the lack of chemistry. He continued:
"Diana played the scene without a hitch, grateful to me for serving as her flesh-and-blood teleprompter. By season's end, however, it was evident that she was not a good fit for TNG, and Diana left the show. Fortunately, the departure of Maurice Hurley after the second season cleared the way for Gates to return."
Some like Pulaski, but many — myself included — prefer Dr. Crusher.