Majel Barrett
Series: TOS, TNG, DS9 (Also provided the voice of the onboard computers of Federation starships for Star Trek: The Original Series, Star Trek: The Next Generation, Star Trek: Deep Space Nine, Star Trek: Voyager, and most of the Star Trek movies. Plus 2 episodes of Enterprise.).
Movies: Star Trek: The Motion Picture, Star Trek IV: The Voyage Home
Character(s): “Number One” (in pilot episode of TOS), Christine Chapel (TOS & Movies), Lwaxana Troi (TNG, DS9)
In various roles, Barrett participated in every incarnation of the popular science fiction Star Trek franchise produced during her lifetime, including live-action and animated versions, television and cinema, and all of the time periods in which the various series have been set.
She first appeared in Star Trek’s initial pilot, “The Cage” (1964), as the USS Enterprise’s brunette unnamed first officer, “Number One”. Barrett was romantically involved with Roddenberry, whose marriage was on the verge of failing at the time, and the idea of having an otherwise unknown woman in a leading role just because she was the producer’s girlfriend is said to have infuriated NBC network executives who insisted that Roddenberry give the role to a man.
When Roddenberry was casting for the second Star Trek pilot, “Where No Man Has Gone Before”, she changed her last name from Hudec to Barrett and wore a blonde wig for the role of nurse Christine Chapel, a frequently recurring character. Her first appearance as Chapel in film dailies prompted NBC executive Jerry Stanley to yodel “Well, well—look who’s back!”. In an early scene in Star Trek: The Motion Picture, viewers are informed that she has now become Doctor Chapel, a role which she reprised briefly in Star Trek IV: The Voyage Home, as Commander Chapel.
Barrett returned years later in Star Trek: The Next Generation, cast as the outrageously self-assertive, iconoclastic, Betazoid ambassador, Lwaxana Troi, who appeared as a recurring character in the series. Her character often vexed the captain of the Enterprise, Jean-Luc Picard, who spurned her amorous advances. She later appeared as Ambassador Troi in several episodes of Star Trek: Deep Space Nine, where her character developed a strong relationship with Constable Odo.
She provided the regular voice of the onboard computers of Federation starships for Star Trek: The Original Series, Star Trek: The Next Generation, Star Trek: Deep Space Nine, Star Trek: Voyager, and most of the Star Trek movies. She reprised her role as a shipboard computer’s voice in two episodes of the prequel series Star Trek: Enterprise, thus making her the only actor to have a role in all six televised Star Trek series produced up to that time.
On December 9, 2008, less than ten days before her death, Roddenberry Productions announced that she would be providing the voice of the ship’s computer once again, this time for the 2009 motion picture reboot of Star Trek.[15] Sean Rossall, a Roddenberry family spokesman, stated that she had already completed the voiceover work, around December 4, 2008. The film is dedicated to Roddenberry and Barrett.