Yes, it's been a great week for Marina Sirtis—and not just for a HAPPY BIRTHDAY shout-out today: Congrats to her on the news this week that she's signed on to play the new fictional head of Mossad, the Israeli intelligence agency, on CBS's venerable top-draw show NCIS.
Her first episodes are set to air in April, so she should be safely full of tales too tell by the time we next cross paths with fans at Sun City Sci-Fi in El Paso April 26-28.
Marina answered my brief congrats this week with a quick email: "I'm stoked!" And for her it's not about just any new role: Playing the head of the infamous spy agency is a far cry from Deanna Troi—and that's exactly the campaign that the beautiful Marina has been on with casting dfirectors lately: excising the memory of the iconic but soft, sensitive Starfleet counselor we all love, which can be maddening to expand an acting resume.
In fact, the news brought to mind a discussion she and I had on TREKLAND video back in 2009—ironically also filmed around her birthday, in Italy—where she recalls how thrilled she was to pay a bitchy prison matron, a role won only after her campaign to let the director know she was way more than Troi. Here's the fun little pre-HD clip (especially at 3:30), for all you newbies since then:
