We’ve got another interview for you this morning from last week’s jam-packed Star Trek: Discovery premiere event in New York City, this time with the newest member of the Klingon ruling class, Mary Chieffo!
We caught up with Discovery’s resident Klingon, who at the end of Season 1 was handed the keys to the kingdom, ascending to the position of High Chancellor after working with the Discovery crew to stop the Klingon-Federation war.
Note: This interview has been slightly edited for length and clarity.
TREKCORE: As L’Rell grows into her new role as High Chancellor of the Klingon Empire, does she experience the same kind of pushback that women have faced in leadership roles here on Earth?
MARY CHIEFFO: Yeah, and that’s something I actually was really thrilled about. Starfleet is this ideal situation, where we’ve kind of surpassed all that in a lot of way — and so L’Rell is actually one of the few characters who can can explore those things we see in 2019 in a Star Trek context.
A lot of what began to manifest in the first season – like, you saw how Kol treated her, and that’s part of why she says, “But I am no one!” when offered the chance to lead the Empire. She literally does not see herself as significant because her society has told her so.
So now that she’s been given this power, how does she maintain it, and also maybe find compromise? I’m really excited to see that, because for me embodying this storyline is about reflecting a mirror to our society. This is the extreme of where we could go; this is that we have to understand about the extent of the female power. t’s pretty epic, and pretty intense.
I’ve always appreciated that L’Rell is a strong female character, but she is flawed, and has made mistakes — and she admits her failures, which is a pretty un-Klingon thing to do. This season, we lean into that a bit, and have some quieter conversations. I’m interested to see what the audience takes from that.
ANOTHER INTERVIEWER: Are we going to see L’Rell and Tyler hash through their complicated relationship?
CHIEFFO: Yes, and I’ll be very interested to see exactly how the audience responds. It was very, very important to me that we got to see them touch on the topic — I can’t say much more on that now, but it’s coming, don’t worry. We’ll be having full-fledged discussions very soon, because it’s a lot to unpack, and I was grateful that we were given that opportunity.
It’s never quick and easy with the Klingons; it’s very complicated. There is a real respect that L’Rell and Tyler came to at the end of the first season, where there had been this love between Voq and L’Rell, and this other love between Burnham and Tyler, and now he embodies both of these entities.
TREKCORE: Did you have to do as much ADR voice work this year as you did last season?
CHIEFFO: I didn’t, actually! I went in do to the recordings for the season, and I did a handful of them, but when I asked about other scenes that I thought needed to address, they told me, “Oh no, the prosthetic doesn’t interfere.” And I was like, “What do you mean?”
I was so used to it, and I was kind of able to tweak my performance, and so now I can trust that it all worked. It’s better for everyone that I don’t have to redub every single one of my lines anymore.
Keep coming back to TrekCore for our continuing Star Trek: Discovery coverage!