Gay Characters In Star Trek Never A Priority

"We've just failed at it," said Ronald D. Moore, a former executive producer in the Star Trek universe who really made his name as the developer of SciFi Channel's signature series "Battlestar Galactica."

"At Star Trek, we used to have all these stock answers for why we didn't do it. The truth is that it was not really a priority for any of us on the staff, so it wasn't really something that was strong on anybody's radar," Moore told AfterElton. "And then I think there's a certain inertia that you're not used to writing those characters into these dramas and then you just don't.

Science-fiction has been behind the curve in including gay characters, something Moore admits to. That's partially why "Battlestar" has included both defined gay characters, like Michelle Forbes' Adm. Cain in the telemovie "Razor," and more ambiguous gay and bisexual characters, like Number Three and Number Six, played by Lucy Lawless and Tricia Helfer respectively, in their relationship with James Callis' Dr. Baltar.

Moore, however, is working on the pilot of what he hopes will be a new science-fiction series for Fox called "Virtuality," and both he and Michael Taylor made sure there were not only gay characters on the show, but a married gay couple.

"They were all sorts of symbols for specific reasons for this particular mission, and for almost [public relations] reasons, they were put on the ship and the [gay couple] sort of struggle with that role of, 'Is that the only reason we are here?' kind of thing," Moore said. "But they're professionals in their own right. They have a complicated sort of storyline of what they're willing to show."

As revealed last August by SciFi Wire, the gay couple is portrayed by Jose Pablo Cantillo and Valentin Orlovsky. They play mathematician Manny Rodriguez and geologist Valentin Orlovsky.

"Virtuality" is set on a starship that is making a 10-year voyage to a nearby star, and the crew entertains itself by using a virtual reality program similar to a holodeck, that at some point, goes haywire.

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