Interview with Linda Park, by Ian Spelling:
http://199.97.97.16/contWriter/endinsidetrek/2001/11/21/enter/8384-0306-pat_nytimes.html
Linda Park, Enterprising Lady
Ian Spelling
c. Ian Spelling
Linda Park loved ``Star Trek: The Next Generation,'' but the ``Enterprise'' star never got hooked on the original ``Trek.''
``Everyone else around here seems to have grown up on Kirk and Spock and Bones, and I didn't have that,'' Park says, sitting in an ``Enterprise'' makeup trailer on the Paramount Pictures lot in Hollywood. ``I'm fairly young - I'm the youngest in the cast. I was in high school or maybe junior high when `The Next Generation' was starting, so that's the show I watched.''
It doesn't much matter which ``Trek'' the 23-year-old Park pledged her allegiance to, however, because ``Enterprise'' predates them all. The action unfolds back when everything was brand-spanking-new so far as man boldly going where no one had gone before.
Her character, Hoshi Sato, traces a personal journey that mirrors that of the human race itself. She's the skittish traveler taking baby steps into the cosmos, the brilliant exolinguist who's got plenty of growing up to do.
``Hoshi's a great character,'' Park says. ``We did `Fight or Flight,' and she picked up an alien language in two days. Of course she freaked out, but she pulled it off. And it was incredible, because the language was bimodal.
``Captain Archer (Scott Bakula) recruited her specifically for Enterprise,'' the actress says, ``even though she'd been perfectly happy teaching at a university. While she loves languages, she hates aliens and hates traveling. She's a very fearful person, but if you or I were sent out into space and saw an alien climbing backward on a grid, about to kill you, you'd freak out a little, too.''
Park laughs.
``So she's on a journey of overcoming her fears,'' she adds. ``In `Fight or Flight' I was very close to leaving and going back to the university, but I decided to stay because my love of languages was so strong and because I did finally find a sense of purpose on the ship. I realized I wasn't a weak link.''
Born in Korea and raised in San Jose, Calif., Park made a trek to ``Trek'' that was remarkably swift. She debuted on stage as a 7-year-old in a local production of ``Meet Me in St. Louis,'' performed throughout her school years and studied acting at Boston University. Upon arriving in Los Angeles little more than a year ago, she promptly landed a guest spot on the sitcom ``Popular'' and a small role as Laura Dern's assistant in ``Jurassic Park III.''
Park then auditioned for ``Enterprise'' and, figuring that the producers would tap someone with more experience, prepared to return to the stage for a play in San Jose. About a week before rehearsals were to begin, however, she received word that Sato was hers.
``I felt so bad about pulling out of the play,'' Park says, ``but since the second I started work on the pilot I haven't had a single doubt. The `Broken Bow' script was really well written. The characters were so well fleshed out. The personal relationships, I could see so much promise for what was going to happen. I could see the complexities that could develop between the characters.
``I was so excited by what I read that the whole fear of it being an external, reactive SF show totally vanished.''
It's all about the characters, she believes.
``Whatever happens out there - whatever planets we come across, whatever aliens and other things we have to deal with - they're just catalysts for the relationships,'' Park says. ''`Enterprise' is really about the interpersonal relationships between these people who are setting out on this journey together.''
Park's own journey as an actor is only beginning, but here she is, part of a phenomenon that has been a boon for some who came before her and an inescapable cage for others. No one can guarantee that ``Enterprise'' will fly for seven years, as ``Next Generation,'' ``Deep Space 9'' and ``Voyager'' did, but a ``Trek'' series remains as close to a sure thing as there is in latter-day Hollywood.
`The idea of seven years is really exciting to me,'' Park says, ``because this is my first television series. In theater, you have a beginning, a middle and an end - you know where your character is going. Here, every week, I have to readjust myself to the idea that there's a new script, that there's more story and more to Hoshi.
`The way I have to think about it is, I'll take it day by day and year by year and see what happens.''
Park's makeup man puts the final touches on her eyebrows.
``Right now I'm incredibly happy,'' the actress says as she heads back to the ``Enterprise'' set. ``I'm so excited about developing Hoshi, because I really love her and I think she has a lot of places to go. Her life is kind of parallel to my life, and it's always exciting when you can relate a role back to yourself.''
(Ian Spelling is a New York-based free-lance writer.)
