MODERATOR: Please join me in welcoming the cast in alphabetical order: Scott Bakula, John Billingsley, Jolene Blalock, Dominic Keating, Anthony Montgomery, Linda Park and Connor Trinneer, as well as the executive producers and creators of Enterprise, Rick Berman and Brannon Braga. May we have your questions, please.

Q: Scott, let me start out here. Everything they've shown us makes it look like you're going to be the closest to Captain Kirk since Captain Kirk. They already show you waving a gun. They show you as more of an action hero and even getting close to a romance. Give us that feeling. Describe a little bit more how you feel the guy is, and does he have a little bit more of that bravado that Kirk has?

SCOTT BAKULA: Oh, yeah. And I'm still getting to know him also. But he's kind of a free-spirited guy. He's not afraid to say what he thinks. He's not afraid to buck authority. And these are the first pioneers going out into space, and their experiences are all for the first time and the first everything. So we're finding it all very interesting to try and make all these things new because we're all so familiar with what Star Trek has been. And we have to kind of unlearn all of that and start from scratch. So this character is bold and brash and, yes, the closest to Kirk — even though I'm a hundred years before Kirk — than any of the other captains.

Q: Scott, you've already dealt with one cult fan base. How are you going to deal with an even larger one?

SCOTT BAKULA: Hopefully we'll all blend together nicely and everybody will get along. It should be great, actually. I'm really looking forward to it.

Q: For Mr. Berman and Mr. Braga, how long ago did you begin working out what Enterprise would be, and have you had any trouble as far as things you couldn't do because of what's already been established that happens later?

RICK BERMAN: 1959 was when we started developing this, I think. Feels like it.

BRANNON BRAGA: About two and a half years ago.

RICK BERMAN: You know, there's a great irony about developing things that you don't want to be more advanced than things that you know are going to come in 90 years, let's say, at the time of Kirk. That's a problem right now that we have. The computer that sat on Captain Janeway's desk was bulkier than the one that sits on my desk now. There are cellular phones that are far more compact than the communicators that Captain Kirk used.

So we're always walking a very thin line in terms of developing things that are less advanced than from the time of Captain Kirk. But we think that one of the most fun elements of this series, especially for our fans, is going to be able to watch all of the things that they know are coming to "Star Trek" in their infant stages, to be able to see the development of things like transporters and phasers and tractor beams, etc. And we're having a lot of fun with seeing these things when they don't operate perfectly, when they're being developed and perfected.

Q: This question is for Miss Blalock. Could you tell us what special perspective you have from a female point of view on playing the character of a female Vulcan?

JOLENE BLALOCK: There's a great advantage in it because, in contrast to Scott's presence — his manly strength, his presence as a captain, his leadership, and it being a testosterone-driven team — the femininity is actually to our advantage, or to my advantage. And it's nothing that you have to push. It just is. And so it's easy to embody that, and it's a great contrast. There's power in femininity that I am still discovering. And it's slight, but it's beautiful. T'Pol is feline in her movements. She's diplomatic with her words. And she's dry. So in contrast to all the emotion ... it works well. It works well.

Q: Scott, a career question. As I recall, you had an either/or situation, this project or a series with CBS. Am I correct on that? Could you talk a minute what determined you to go with this one and not the other one?

SCOTT BAKULA: I actually did that. I played a guest star — it was called "Late Boomers," and it became "Boomers," and I don't know where it lies now. But we were in negotiations on this for a while, and I wasn't sure whether this was going to happen or not for a while. And they agreed to have me on that series. It was the actual lead in the pilot, but as a guest — strictly as a guest star. So do it and walk away. And it worked out happily that this came through and we were able to make a deal, and I'm here.

Q: How close did you come to doing a "Starfleet Academy" series, and how did you get from there to here?

BRANNON BRAGA: I don't think we ever considered a "Starfleet Academy" show, did we?

RICK BERMAN: It's something that we've never really discussed and never really developed in any way.

Q: Would you also discuss the absence of the "Star Trek" name in the title?

RICK BERMAN: Well, you know, if you think about it, since The Next Generation, we've had so many Star Trek entities that were called "Star Trek"-colon-something: Star Trek: The Next Generation, Star Trek: Deep Space Nine, Star Trek: Voyager, "Star Trek Generations," "Star Trek: First Contact," "Star Trek: Insurrection." It's just been one after another. Our feeling was, in trying to make this show dramatically different, which we are trying to do, that it might be fun not to have a divided main title like that. And I think that if there's any one word that says Star Trek without actually saying Star Trek, it's the word "Enterprise."

Q: Question for the producers. As you know, your fans are, let's say, attentive to details. In doing the prequel, did you find any problems in making sure that the mythology works out, that there aren't any sorts of dead ends?

BRANNON BRAGA: Not really. Because it's set before the first series, a lot of the continuity elements haven't even occurred yet. But we have paid close attention to all things Star Trek in conceiving the show and plan to utilize and exploit a lot of the things that people have come to appreciate about Star Trek.

RICK BERMAN: You know, there have been so many books written that if you really studied them, you find that they contradict each other, that the history between Captain Kirk and the present has been discussed in episodes and discussed in books and in novels. And we have to take some degree of liberty with just how closely we adhere to those things because they very often contradict each other.

BRANNON BRAGA: In the Original Series it was established that in 1996 half the human race was killed in the Eugenics Wars. Well, what do you do? Do you pay attention to that, or do you just glide on by? So you take it on a case-by-case basis.

Q: And one follow-up. You know, one of the questions raised when this was announced was, which Klingons will we see — wrinkles or nonwrinkles?

RICK BERMAN: I love this question. You know, in the Original Series the Klingons — we're just talking about makeup now — the makeup on the Klingons was a rather simple kind of eyebrow-mustache type of deal. With Worf, which was a hundred years later, people got to start looking at Klingons a different way. But if you are a true Star Trek aficionado, you realize that in a number of the movies, starting, I think, with "Star Trek II," which took place really at the same time as Captain Kirk, they were using makeup very similar to Worf.

So the new look of Klingons is something that in the "Star Trek" mythology actually began shortly after they changed from the original television series to the movies. So yes, we are going to be using the new look. We're not going back to old Klingon look.

BRANNON BRAGA: It was "Star Trek III," Rick.

RICK BERMAN: "Star Trek III."

(Editor's note: The new Klingon look was actually first used in "Star Trek: The Motion Picture.")

Q: For the producers, I know you're trying to get a little separation from the era of Deep Space Nine and Voyager and Next Generation, but come about May sweeps, are you going to be tempted to have the time-traveling Enterprise come crashing back from the future and pay a visit?

RICK BERMAN: Well, I think you're going to be surprised to find that there are elements of time travel and elements of the future that are going to exist from the pilot continuing throughout this series. But I doubt even in sweeps you'll see Jean-Luc Picard making a visit. Probably couldn't afford it anyway.

Q: Question for Mr. Billingsley and Miss Blalock. How are you finding working in the various makeups you have? Is this the most extreme makeup either of you have worked with, and does it help you with the character, or is it an annoyance?

JOLENE BLALOCK: It takes just shy of two hours to get in full wardrobe and makeup. But you don't feel the ears. You don't feel the wig. They're very well made. And once I'm in full costume, I am T'Pol. It's empowering, if anything.

JOHN BILLINGSLEY: I dig it. My wife started making me up about two weeks before the series started just so I could get a little practice. I echo Jolene. The makeup artists are terrific.

JOLENE BLALOCK: Fabulous.

JOHN BILLINGSLEY: Not coming from a background of having seen a ton of Star Trek, I've been kind of catching up. And, boy, the makeup on the show is just phenomenal. They're the best. It's actually very comfortable. Now, the "beam down to the weird planet" suit is a might problematic, but they're beautiful. They're beautiful. Scott's been wearing it for the last three days, and he was 6 feet 6 when this show started.