LOS ANGELES -- As Kate Mulgrew guides a few television critics around Stage 8 of Paramount Studios she is brimming
with enthusiasm for Star Trek: Voyager.
Mulgrew is smiling even while complaining about particularly "diabolical" special effects which complicate
shoots.
It is a much different scenario than last season, when Mulgrew expressed unhappiness with the role and fans wondered
if Capt. Janeway would relinquish control of the USS Voyager.
"I wouldn't say I was tired of the show. I was preoccupied with my private life -- which I think is fair,"
she explains of the period.
"I was very much in love."
Mulgrew had fallen in love with Tim Hagan, a Cleveland politician, and the couple didn't think their relationship
could survive both careers.
Mulgrew and Hagan were married last year and she reports things are now going smoothly at home and work.
"I am delighted. I love this group. I can assure you, you cannot walk onto a soundstage, any other company,
that is as solid as we are," Mulgrew says.
"I can come in in the morning -- certainly now, I didn't at the beginning -- I can come in and do what I want
to do as an actor. It's fun. Four o'clock I got up this morning and I'm not tired."
When Voyager ends its mission, Mulgrew plans to pursue her career from New York so she can be closer to Cleveland.
That occasion, by the way, she expects at the end of next season.
"I think so. It makes sense -- seven years seems to be the lucky number for this franchise," Mulgrew
says.
"They will not reveal (when the series will wrap) because I think they have not decided themselves. But if
I was in charge, I would get us home either at the end of this season or early on in the next."
Mulgrew is looking forward to returning to the Alpha Quadrant.
"Can you imagine the stories that could evolve out of that premise? The Maquis are criminals, Tom Paris is
supposed to be in jail, Seven of Nine is a Borg! The possibilities are absolutely endless."
By TYLER McLEOD
Calgary Sun
