Actress Jeri Ryan has played Seven of Nine since season 4 of Star Trek: Voyager. The former Borg’s journey from being saved by the Voyager crew to deprogramming herself from the Borg community to being human is one of the most interesting arcs in the show. Her dynamic with Captain Janeway was also one to look out for.
While Ryan won the Saturn Award twice for her role as Seven of Nine, the actress reportedly almost quit the show while auditioning due to being given a particularly uncomfortable scene. The actress called the scene cheesy and in bad taste and even claimed that had she not read more scenes, she would have never joined the show.
Jeri Ryan Was So Uncomfortable With An Early Star Trek: Voyager Scene That She Almost Quit
Jeri Ryan’s Seven of Nine was overly s*xualized throughout Star Trek: Voyager. Be it her outfits or her portrayal, the character was often accused of being created to appeal to the franchise’s young adult male audience, which was hypocritical after having the first female captain as the central character of a show.
While Seven’s overall journey took the center seat in subsequent episodes, one early scene reportedly rubbed everyone off the wrong way. In fact, Jeri Ryan’s first audition was the scene in the episode ‘Revulsion,’ where she is hit on by Harry Kim, only for her to nonchalantly ask him to undress himself.
Ryan mentioned in an interview with TV Zone (via Red Shirts Always Die) that she found the episode to be in bad taste and that she would have never joined if it was only that scene. She said,
It was not one of my favorites, I personally found it terribly predictable and a bit cheesy. If it had been that scene alone there wouldn’t have been a question in my mind; I would have never done the audition.
The scene was intended to show Seven’s immaturity with respect to human emotions but just came off in a wrong way.
Jeri Ryan Feels She Did Her Best Work On Star Trek: Picard
While Jeri Ryan won her first Saturn Award for Best Supporting Actress for her role in Star Trek: Voyager, she reportedly loved her comeback in the recent Star Trek: Picard. Though she was not part of the original cast of Star Trek: The Next Generation, Ryan’s character found a way to meet the crew and be a part of their missions.
Ryan reportedly echoed co-star Jonathan Frakes’ sentiment that they did their best work yet on Picard. She said to Trek Movie,
I think it was some of my best work as this character because we had some of the best writing as this character. I’ve been so lucky. She’s had such an arc over the years, starting out not even human 20-something years ago, and to end up as the captain of the Enterprise was pretty big character growth.
The actress also won a Saturn Award for her performance in the series, proving that other audiences too felt that she had done her best work.
Star Trek: Voyager is available to stream on Paramount+.
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