The DS9 actress you forgot played Jerry’s girlfriend on Seinfeld

The fictional Jerry Seinfeld (played by his namesake, the real Jerry Seinfeld) has never been particularly lucky in love. Sure, he dated a lot of women over the course of the show’s nine seasons, but he didn’t have a long, meaningful relationship with any of them. His closest female relationship is with him Elaine’s ex-girlfriend and constant friend (Julia Louis-Dreyfus), which is incredibly revealing for a guy like Jerry, but it also means that Seinfeld hasn’t had many long-term girlfriend roles. In fact, Seinfeld’s longest on-screen romance lasted just four episodes, and it was with Rachel (Melanie Smith), who made out with him during a screening of Schindler’s List and was absolutely horrified Seinfeld’s nemesis, Newman (Wayne Knight). While she’s not the most memorable of Seinfeld’s girlfriends because she’s at least okay, Smith gives a good performance and manages to hold her own with some of the funniest comedians on 90s television.

Perhaps it was her time playing a character who dealt with the crazy narcissism of the Seinfeld gang that helped land her next big role, as she was set to play the megalomaniac daughter of a deep-space dictator. Just three years after Rachel said goodbye to Jerry on Seinfeld, Smith returned to our screens in a completely different role: as Tora Zial, the half-Bajor daughter of Cardassian warlord Ghul Dukat (Mark Alaimo) in Star Trek : Deep Space Nine.”

Star Trek: Deep Space 9 was they are a little more willing to climb into difficult onesmorally sticky themes than his fellow franchises, and Zial was a great example of a complex character whose existence held no easy answers. Zial was half Cardassian and half Bajoran, the result of an affair between a married Cardassian Gul Dukat and a Bajoran woman who somehow fell in love with their colonizer Thor Naprem. Dukat sent them to live away from the Cardassians and Bajorans, unable to kill them, but knowing that their existence was a problem. Father and daughter eventually reunited, and Ziyal became close friends with Bajoran freedom fighter Major Kyra Nerys (Nana Visitor), though it was a rocky relationship for all involved. Ziyal also befriended the Cardassian tailor/spy Garak, played by Andrew Robinson, the only other Cardassian regular aboard Deep Space Nine.

The Cardassian occupation of Bajor has many real-world consequences and serves as the backdrop for some of the series’ darkest episodes, including one inspired by an Agatha Christie novel which examines the depravity necessary to survive in wartime, where Kira confronts a Cardassian assassin. Ziyal is one of the few good things to come out of the occupation, but she is unfortunately killed while helping her friends escape during the Cardassian takeover of the space station, leading to her father’s complete mental breakdown. She is truly a tragic figure in every sense, but thankfully Smith injects a great deal of humanity into the half-Cardassian, half-Bajoran with a heart of gold during her run as the character. (The younger versions of Ziel were played by Sia Batten and Tracy Middendorf.)

Rachel Smith’s claim to fame came when she infamously caught George in the buff in the scene that introduced many of us to the word “shrinking”, it’s a far cry from Ziyal’s role as the catalyst for her father’s eventual founding of an end-of-the-world cult, but she’s not the only guest star on Seinfeld who also has a spot on Deep Space Nine. Phil Morris, who played Jerry Kramer’s (Michael Richardson) neighbor lawyer Jackie Chiles, played several roles in Deep Space Nine, including a Klingon and Jem’Hadar, which is a lot of fun. Brian George, who played fake coffee shop owner Baba Bhatt on Seinfeld, also played the father of Dr. Julian Bashir (Alexander Siddig) on ​​Deep Space Nine. There are actually dozens of crossovers, which is pretty amazing considering the fact that one of the most important cast members in Deep Space 9 absolutely hated his time on the sitcom That Show.

In Florida SuperCon in 2017Shimerman was asked about his time guest-starring as Kramer’s caddie on Seinfeld Season 7, to which he said he “hated them” because “they were unconvincing, nasty, unresponsive, what’s the word? Island”. It’s not hard to imagine some of the cast becoming a little more like their self-centered characters and becoming a little detached after seven seasons together, but it’s still a shame to hear that Shimmerman had such a hard time. Fortunately, he had a much better time on “Deep Space Nine” because Quark is one of the best characters in the entire Star Trek franchise.. No Tarkaley tea for you!