Trivia for Star Trek: The Next Generation

Running for seven seasons, the show briefly held the record for longest-running American live-action science fiction TV series.

The decision to produce TNG for syndication rather than for a network was considered a gamble at the time. It was the most expensive project of its kind ever attempted, but it did so well it ended up opening the door for a tidal wave of made-for-syndication dramatic series (including Hercules, Xena, Andromeda, Star Trek: Deep Space Nine, and Baywatch), which continued for more than a decade.

When a writer's strike hit the series at the start of the second season, several stories from the proposed late 70's series "Star Trek: Phase II", which was eventually dropped in favor of becoming Star Trek: The Motion Picture (1979), were quickly dusted off and adapted for the Next Generation crew.

In 1994 the series became the first show in syndication to ever be nominated for an Emmy for Outstanding Drama Series.

The sliding doors were very loud on the show and have been compared to sliding glass doors. The actors were instructed to hold their dialogue until the doors stopped; you will rarely see an actor delivering lines while a door is opening or closing.

Most of the characters underwent minor changes before the show debuted: Picard's first name was Julien; Riker was spelled 'Ryker'; Data's name was pronounced 'dat-uh' instead of 'day-tah'; Wesley Crusher was Leslie Crusher, Dr. Crusher's daughter.

Denise Crosby was originally cast to play Counselor Troi, and Marina Sirtis was cast as a security chief named Lt. Macha Hernandez. Shortly before filming the pilot, the two switched roles and the security chief's name was changed to Lt. Natasha Yar.

Marina Sirtis wore dark contact lenses for her role as Deanna Troi. In reality her eyes are green, but the producers felt the characters eyes should reflect her dark hair.

Deanna Troi was nearly written out after the first season and, in fact, is absent from many of those episodes. But, after both Tasha Yar and Dr. Crusher were written out, Troi was kept.

The corridor, engineering, transporter room, and battle bridge sets were derived from sets originally built for the first four Star Trek movies. A majority of the sets also served as different locations on the Enterprise-A in the fifth and sixth Star Trek films.

The ceiling of the transporter chamber on the Enterprise D is in fact the floor of the transporter chamber from the Enterprise in the original series.

The Master Alarm sound was reused from the original Star Trek series.

As of fall 2003, pieces of the original bridge including the chairs and consoles, and a large Enterprise schematic, are preserved and on display at the Hollywood Entertainment Museum on Hollywood Blvd. in Los Angeles.

Data's cat "Spot" is a male throughout the history of the show, but is suddenly female in the episode "Force of Nature, and in the episode "Genesis" gives birth to kittens.

According his own diagnostics, Commander Data's data storage capacity is 800 quadrillion bits. This translates into 100 petabytes or 100 PB. For comparison purposes, the HTML content of the internet ca. 2005 is estimated at 1-2 PB.

Throughout the first two Star Trek crews (including in the movies), Picard and Data are the only characters to never receive a promotion. However, in at least two "alternate futures", they were both promoted - the episodes "Future Imperfect" (Data is a full Commander, Picard is an admiral) and "All Good Things..." (Picard, though retired, is referred to as Ambassador).
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Geordi LaForge has been promoted faster than any Star Trek character before or since. In the first season, Geordi was a Lieutenant junior grade; in the 2nd season, a full Lieutenant; 3rd season, a Lieutenant Commander.

Tim Russ, later to play Tuvok on Voyager, was a candidate for the role of Geordi.

The character of Geordi LaForge was originally conceived to be Jamaican. When LeVar Burton was cast in the role, this plan was dropped; although a Jamaican actress (Madge Sinclair) later appeared as Geordi's mother.

Geordi's VISOR was improvised on the first day of shooting using chiefly an automobile air filter.

Picard rose to his rank when his commanding officer aboard the USS Stargazer was killed in battle.

Captain Picard has a fish in his quarters named Livingston, named after David Livingston, the show's line producer. The fish has its own trading card in the ST:TNG card series as well.