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Ronald D. Moore

Revision as of 21:57, 1 July 2013 by 86.26.12.71 (contribs) (→‎Producing credits)
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Template:Disambiguate Ronald "Ron" Dowl Moore (born 5 July 1964; age 59) is a writer and producer of several Star Trek series and films, as well as several other science fiction and genre programs.

Biography

Moore attended Cornell University through the US Navy's Reserve Officer Training Corps program, intending to be commissioned as an officer in the Navy upon graduation, with his ultimate ambition to pilot the F-14 Tomcat. When he was later medically disqualified from flying, that career path was no longer possible.

However, while at Cornell, Moore had enjoyed "writing on the side", as he put it, and joined a number of campus literary societies. Graduating with a Bachelor of Arts degree in political science, Moore decided to move to Los Angeles to pursue a career as a writer. His career was not doing well, but he began dating a woman who worked on the set of Star Trek: The Next Generation. In 1989, Moore, an avid fan of the original Star Trek, convinced her to take him on a tour of the lot. He had written a script for the show, which the producers liked enough to actually film. It became "The Bonding", and Moore was soon hired as a staff writer.

He remained at that position until the end of the series. He co-wrote 27 episodes of Star Trek: The Next Generation including the series finale, "All Good Things..." for which he won the Hugo Award for excellence in science fiction writing along with Brannon Braga. Moore and Braga also co-wrote two films featuring the Next Generation cast, Star Trek Generations and Star Trek: First Contact. As producer of TNG in 1994, Moore shared an Emmy Award nomination when the series was nominated as Outstanding Drama Series that year.

After The Next Generation ended in 1994, Moore joined the writing staff of Star Trek: Deep Space Nine as a supervising producer, a post which he held from that show's third to fifth seasons. In 1997, he was promoted to co-executive producer. He is credited as writer or co-writer of thirty episodes of DS9. Moore is something of an innovator in fan interaction via the internet. He regularly ran online chats with fellow fans via AOL during his tenure on Deep Space Nine.

In 1999, after DS9 finished its run, Moore briefly joined the staff of Star Trek: Voyager and publicly suggested he might co-write with his one-time writing partner and Voyager Executive Producer Brannon Braga again. [1] Moore quickly became frustrated by the atmosphere in Voyager's writers' room and left the series after writing one episode and co-writing the story for another; as a result of this experience his relationship with Braga soured for a time. However, the two later recorded a commentary for the DVD release of Star Trek Generations together in which they indicated that any problems between them were now in the past.

Ron Moore and Gene Roddenberry

Moore and Gene Roddenberry

Moore's love of the original series showed itself through a myriad of allusions to the show, presented in many of Moore's episodes, such as the mention of the Tholians in "Reunion" and the first appearance of Starfleet Academy in "The First Duty". It is perhaps because of this fondness that Moore was chosen to write "Relics", which featured Montgomery Scott and the bridge of the original USS Enterprise, and "Trials and Tribble-ations", set during an episode of the original series. His favorite TOS episode is "The Conscience of the King". (AOL chat, 1997) This inspired his first attempt at writing Star Trek, an unfinished novel that would have told the story of Tarsus IV. (AOL chat, 1998)

Moore's hand in "Sins of the Father" gave him the nickname of "the Klingon guy", and he went on to write nearly every Klingon-centric episode of TNG and DS9.

Over the years, a character named after Moore was mentioned in a few pieces of background artwork, such as starships' dedication plaques. On his role in the franchise, Moore has commented, "Personally, I think of myself and other writers as artists. I believe in a fairly loose definition of "art" as almost any creative form of expression and that writing (and screenwriting) certainly falls within that category." (AOL chat, 1997)

Life after Trek

Moore soon left Voyager to pursue other writing opportunities, including the series Roswell and Carnivàle and the updated version of Battlestar Galactica.

The re-imagined Battlestar Galactica ran for four seasons and two TV-movies, receiving accolades from fans of the original Galactica movie and series, including veteran Galactica actor Richard Hatch (who guest starred as a major character in several episodes), as well as media outlets, critics, and fans in both the US and the UK. The series received a Peabody Award in 2006. Ron Moore won the 2005 Hugo Award for Best Dramatic Presentation, Short Form for writing the first season's premiere episode, "33". It was the second Hugo Award that Moore has received to date, following up from "All Good Things..." In addition, Moore was nominated for a 2007 Emmy Award in the Outstanding Writing For A Drama Series category for writing the "Occupation/Precipice" episode of Battlestar Galactica, his first Emmy nomination in thirteen years. Damon Lindelof was nominated in the same category for co-writing the season three finale of Lost, but both lost to David Chase, who won the award for writing the final episode of the hit HBO TV series, The Sopranos.

Battlestar Galactica proved to be so successful that the second season was announced just as the second week's episode of the first season was being aired. The Sci-Fi Channel had even ordered advance scripts for the first six episodes of the second season before it was officially renewed or had even aired in the United States. Galactica's first season aired during the same time as Star Trek: Enterprise's fourth season, and Galactica received higher ratings even though it was on a cable channel and Enterprise was on a broadcast network.

The Sci-Fi Channel announced in late April 2006 (near the end of the second season) that it was planning on producing a prequel series named Caprica, detailing the initial creation and revolt of the Cylon robots, and that this new show would also be helmed by Moore. [2]

Continuing his interest in fan interaction, Moore maintains a blog on Sci-Fi.com in which he answers a multitude of fan questions in unerring detail and attention. He also provides podcast audio commentaries for each episode in which he often mentions his involvement with Star Trek and criticisms of what he felt led to its decline. References to Star Trek occasionally appear in Battlestar Galactica; for example, a hatchway on board the Galactica behind which vital plot movements take place is labeled "1701D".

The fourth and final season of Moore's Battlestar Galactica concluded in March 2009. Moore himself made his directorial debut on the fourth season episode, "A Disquiet Follows My Soul." He also went on to write and appear in the finale, "Daybreak." [3] A final miniseries was aired late in 2009, followed by a second Galactica-based TV series, Caprica.

A two-hour TV pilot for a potential series entitled Virtuality, co-written by Moore and Michael Taylor, was greenlit by the FOX network in April, 2008. [4]. It was aired as a made-for-TV movie in June, 2009, though it was not picked up as a series.

In 2011, Moore began work on a new supernatural police drama series titled 17th Precinct, which was to heavily feature many actors who had previously worked with Moore on Battlestar Galactica; this pilot was also not picked up for series, nor has it ever aired to the public.

He also had a cameo in the Trek-spoofing CSI episode "A Space Oddity," which was written by Naren Shankar and featured Liz Vassey, Wallace Langham, and Kate Vernon.

Writing credits

Producing credits

On-screen appearances

Star Trek interviews

  • TNG Season 4 DVD special feature "Chronicles from the Final Frontier" ("Lt. Yar's Legacy Endures", "Writing for Klingons"), interviewed on 14 March 2002
  • TNG Season 5 DVD special feature "Departmental Briefing Year Five" ("The First Duty"), interviewed on 14 March 2002
  • TNG Season 5 DVD special feature "Memorable Missions Year Five" ("Disaster"), interviewed on 14 March 2002
  • TNG Season 5 DVD special feature "Intergalactic Guest Stars" ("Crew Profile: Ensign Ro Laren", "Presidential Visit: Ronald Reagan"), interviewed on 14 March 2002
  • TNG Season 5 DVD special feature "A Tribute to Gene Roddenberry" ("Gene's Final Voyage"), interviewed on 14 March 2002
  • TNG Season 6 DVD special feature "Mission Overview Year Six" (Main segment, "A Visit from Scotty", "Descent - Part 1 Featuring Stephen Hawking"), interviewed on 14 March 2002
  • TNG Season 6 DVD special feature "Departmental Briefing Year Six" ("Production", "Writing", "Special Crew Profile: Lt. Cmdr. Data"), interviewed on 14 March 2002
  • TNG Season 7 DVD special feature "Mission Overview Year Seven", interviewed on 14 March 2002
  • TNG Season 7 DVD special feature "Starfleet Moments & Memories Year Seven" ("A Unique Legacy"), interviewed on 14 March 2002
  • TNG Season 7 DVD special feature "The Making of "All Good Things..." Year Seven" ("Writing The Final Episode", "On Location"), interviewed on 14 March 2002
  • "Ronald D. Moore - Yesterday's Fan", The Official Star Trek: The Next Generation Magazine Vol. 13, pp. 20-25, interviewed by Maurice Molyneaux

See also

External links

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