Movies - TV
Why Gates McFadden Struggled With Gene Roddenberry’s Star Trek Writing
By WITNEY SEIBOLD
“Star Trek: The Next Generation” creator Gene Roddenberry wrote frustrating female characters that were noticed by his cast, mainly Gates McFadden, who played Dr. Beverly Crusher.
McFadden told “Jake’s Takes,” “I have enormous, endless respect for Gene’s [...] concept of the future [...] but I [...] struggled with some of the roles that women were in.”
Dr. Crusher was too often pushed off to the side when it came to her relationship with her son Wesley (Wil Wheaton). Very few scenes showed them meaningfully interacting.
Since Roddenberry had never been a mother himself, McFadden felt he didn’t grasp the relationship a mother can have with her son, so he didn’t depict it in the show.
“[T]hat was part of where I had problems,” McFadden revealed, adding, “because Gene didn’t have that particular experience that I had being a mother.”
McFadden lamented, “Any time Wesley Crusher needed some advice it was always from one of the male characters. [...] What about these single parents, be [they] male or female?”
McFadden added, “As a mother, I have had huge philosophical discussions with my son about all kinds of things. It’s not just, ‘Honey, do what I’m saying and here’s your lunchbox.’”