Alexander Siddig's Audition For Star Trek's Bashir Was Anything But Normal
Actor Alexander Siddig, who played the plucky, handsome young medical officer Dr. Julian Bashir on "Star Trek: Deep Space Nine," began the series credited as Siddig El Fadil, his professional name from the start of his career until he changed it in 1995. Dr. Bashir was something of a naïf in the show's first few seasons, and would, in subsequent seasons, come to outgrow his once-firmly-held immature notions that practicing medicine in desperate locations is a bright, plucky adventure. He quickly came to realize that he merely needed to work hard to help people in need, and that righteousness was a reward unto itself. Unlike a lot of the "young" characters on "Star Trek" (Wesley Crusher and Harry Kim come to mind), Dr. Bashir was allowed to grow up; he had personality traits other than his youth.
In the indispensable oral history book "The Fifty-Year Mission: The Next 25 Years: From The Next Generation to J. J. Abrams," edited by Mark A. Altman and Edward Gross, Sidding recalled receiving a call from his agent about the possibility of appearing on "Star Trek." The actor was game — who hadn't at least heard of "Star Trek?" — but there was an element of mystery to his audition. Siddig received the pages he was meant to audition with but hadn't yet been told what role he was auditioning for, or even that it was for an all-new TV series. Indeed, Sidding assumed that he was going to be playing the relative of another well-known "Star Trek" character.
Siddig recalled not being terribly nervous about the gig as he had no idea how big his role was supposed to be. It wouldn't be later until he learned that it was for one of the main characters on a new program.
Deanna Troi's brother?
Siddg recalled:
"My agent gets in touch and kind of talked out what my audition potentials were. She tells me, 'It's Wednesday night, off you go. It's "Star Trek," you've got this scene. Learn it. Do a good job. See you later.' And this is in London. So I thought it was for 'Next Generation,' and I was wracking my brain, because I knew the show. I thought maybe it could be for Deanna Troi's brother or something. I had no idea whether or not she had a brother, but it seemed that might be a fit — I was quite a pale young Arab at the time."
Actress Marina Sirtis who played Deanna Troi on "Star Trek: The Next Generation" is of Greek descent, but a Trekkie might easily imagine she and Sidding playing siblings on "Star Trek: The Next Generation." Both actors are experts at playing poised, intellectual characters. Siddig recalled how casual the entire affair was, not knowing how beloved he was by the "Deep Space Nine" producers. The actor said:
"I went along and did my few lines and was astonished to find out that they wanted to see me again. I had no thought at the time about how potentially big this was or that it was a big deal. Turns out I was kind of a shoo-in at that point. I didn't realize it, but looking back I see that Rick Berman had already approved me for a role, so I just came and took it."
It seems that Rick Berman was already fond of Sidding from a film he had seen a few years before, and that the actor was more or less already guaranteed a spot on "Deep Space Nine," even if he didn't know it.
Dr. Amoros
Indeed, Sidding eventually — through the rumor mill — learned which performance of his Berman was fond of. He also learned that he was briefly considered for an even more prominent role on "Deep Space Nine." He was almost the captain. He said:
"What trickled down to me is that Rick Berman saw me do a movie called 'A Dangerous Man' with Ralph Fiennes. It must have been 1991. I looked a little older than I was, and he thought that I might make an interesting captain. Kudos to him, because he was already thinking multiculturally for the lead. And so he asked me along to see him."
Trekkies' minds may already be racing at the possibility of a Captain Bashir sitting at the central desk at Ops on Deep Space Nine. It seems that, at that point during production, Benjamin Sisko (the role that would eventually be played by Avery Brooks) was still in the prototype phase. Siddig figured that it was only his youth that prevented him from taking the captain role; in 1993, he was only 28.
"Somewhere along the line someone told him — I think it was Junie Lowry, who was the casting director at the time — 'This guy's a kid. He's not going to be a great captain.' So he said, 'Okay, let's look for another part.' And when I first received the script, the part that I was doing was actually Amoros and he was Hispanic."
Some deep-cut Trekkies might know that Constantin Amoros was a Maquis character that Bashir served under. In the original "Deep Space Nine" series bible, however, Dr. Bashir was to be named Dr. Amoros, and he would be a Latino character. The character was changed to Bashir specifically for Siddig.
I think you're really going to enjoy it here
Through all of this, Siddig never quite realized that he was Berman's golden child. He honestly thought he was merely auditioning for a small role, and that people merely liked it. No one ever really pulled him aside and told him that his place in "Star Trek" was all but guaranteed. It wasn't until after his reading that Siddig began to put the pieces together. He said:
"[B]ecause Rick had already anointed me, my audition was just a formality. I just had to come in and say a couple of lines. I didn't realize that until just after the audition and some bigwig came out and said, 'Well, I think you're really going to enjoy it here.' I was, like, 'What do you mean?' So I kind of knew everything by inference right there."
When Sidding traveled to Los Angeles to meet the studio executives, then, it wasn't to learn whether or not he had the part of Dr. Bashir, or that he was about to perform a secondary addition for the bigwigs. It was to congratulate him. Sidding acknowledged that actors hardly ever get that kind of treatment, especially working actors who aren't massive movie stars. Sidding had worked, but he was hardly a household name. "Deep Space Nine" changed all that. Siddig said:
"The moment I got off the plane and went to the studio — which is all pretty intimidating because there are twenty people in the room — they came up and patted me on the back and welcomed me to the family. Which is lovely, my goodness. That never happened again."
Sidding appeared in all seven seasons of "Deep Space Nine" and was married to his co-star Nana Visitor from 1997 until 2001.