In 1994, Bujold was perhaps best known her Oscar-nominated performance in the 1969 drama “Anne of a Thousand Days.” She also received acclaim and recognition for films like “The Towering Inferno,” “The Trojan Women” (wherein she played opposite Katharine Hepburn and Vanessa Redgrave), Michael Crichton’s “Coma,” Clint Eastwood’s “Tightrope,” and “David Cronenberg’s “Dead Ringers.” She is a terse and downbeat actress, known for her soulful, embittered performances. On paper, she would make an ideal Starfleet captain, bringing a quiet, professorial dignity to the part.
It wasn’t easy to find her, though. Taylor recalled the rigorous casting process, and how their lead actress needed to do more than simply play a role: They also had to weather the press “Voyager” was getting at the time. Taylor said:
“The search for the captain was a long and difficult one. […] This is the person that gets the white-hot glare of publicity as the first female ever to head one of the Star Trek series and she had to be just right. We considered, auditioned, looked at tapes of what seemed like every actress between the ages of probably thirty and fifty-five in Los Angeles, New York, Chicago, Canada, London and Europe. We had several people we were happy with.”
Finally, the French-Canadian Bujold stepped in at the last minute. Taylor was happy that such a classy actress showed interest. Then, two days later, she was gone. Taylor continued:
“Finally, with days to go, we were made aware that Geneviève Bujold was interested and we were ecstatic. So we went ahead with that and thought, ‘Wow, we’ve got it,’ and, of course, when that didn’t work out it was distressing for everybody.”
It seems that TV was just too fast-paced for Bujold.
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