Martha Hackett (born February 21, 1961) is an American actress. She is known for her portrayal of Seska in thirteen episodes of the television series '' Star Trek: Voyager''. Hackett is an alumna of

Harvard University Harvard University is a Private university, private Ivy League research university in Cambridge, Massachusetts, United States. Founded in 1636 and named for its first benefactor, the History of the Puritans in North America, Puritan clergyma ...

Radcliffe College Radcliffe College was a Women's colleges in the United States, women's Liberal arts colleges in the United States, liberal arts college in Cambridge, Massachusetts, that was founded in 1879. In 1999, it was fully incorporated into Harvard Colle ...

, and was married to independent filmmaker Tim Disney.

Career

Hackett's first experience of ''Star Trek'' was when she auditioned for the role of

Jadzia Dax Jadzia Dax , played by Terry Farrell, is a fictional character from the science-fiction television series '' Star Trek: Deep Space Nine''. Jadzia Dax is a joined Trill. Though she appears to be a young woman, Jadzia lives in symbiosis with a l ...

in '' Star Trek: Deep Space Nine'', but lost out to Terry Farrell. She subsequently was cast as a member of the Terellian alien species in the finale of '' Star Trek: The Next Generation'', " All Good Things...". She appeared on ''Deep Space Nine'' as the

Romulan The Romulans () are an extraterrestrial race in the American science fiction franchise ''Star Trek''. Their adopted home world is Romulus, and within the same star system they have settled a sister planet Remus. Their original home world, Vulcan ...

Sub Commander T'Rul in the two-part episode "

The Search ''The Search'' is a 1948 American film directed by Fred Zinnemann that tells the story of a young Auschwitz survivor and his mother who search for each other across post-World War II Europe. It stars Montgomery Clift, Ivan Jandl, Jarmila Novot ...

" in season three. She was cast in '' Star Trek: Voyager'' in the recurring role of Seska, a

Bajoran The Bajorans (variously pronounced , , )Script notes
specify "bah-JOR-an" and "BAY-jor" as the correc ...

member of the Maquis crew who joined Voyager after it was stranded in the

Delta Quadrant Several films and episodes of the science fiction franchise ''Star Trek'' are set in distinct astrographical regions of space. Some of these fictional locations exhibit anomalous physical properties; others are defined as sensitive buffer zones ...

. She first appeared in the episode "

Parallax Parallax is a displacement or difference in the apparent position of an object viewed along two different sightline, lines of sight and is measured by the angle or half-angle of inclination between those two lines. Due to perspective (graphica ...

" where she wore the blue uniform of a

Starfleet Starfleet is a fictional organization in the ''Star Trek'' media franchise. Within this fictional universe, Starfleet is a uniformed space force maintained by the United Federation of Planets ("the Federation") as the principal means for conduct ...

science officer; this was later revealed to be a costuming error and she was subsequently seen in the uniform of the operations department. The original uniform sold for $1,276 ($ today) in the "It's a Wrap!" auction on

eBay eBay Inc. ( , often stylized as ebay) is an American multinational e-commerce company based in San Jose, California, that allows users to buy or view items via retail sales through online marketplaces and websites in 190 markets worldwide. ...

in 2008. When she was first cast in the role of Seska, she was not informed that she was a

Cardassian The Cardassians () are a fictional Extraterrestrial life in popular culture, extraterrestrial species in the American science fiction franchise ''Star Trek''. They were devised in 1991 for the series ''Star Trek: The Next Generation'' before b ...

spy. She later explained that "when I first started I was Seska the Bajoran Maquis member and they sort of worked everything else up in soap opera fashion." Hackett became pregnant, which was written into Seska's character. Hackett described Seska as being a character with several layers, saying that "Seska’s darker sides came from a certain emotional instability, at least that’s how I played her." Seska was killed off in the second part of " Basics", which came as a surprise to Hackett as she was previously sent a version of the script where Seska survived, but her baby died. She was only told that Seska was to die less than a day before filming. Following her character's death, Hackett as Seska returned to ''Voyager'' twice more in the episodes " Worst Case Scenario" and " Shattered". She appeared in a total of thirteen episodes of ''Voyager''. In 2001, she appeared in the independent film ''Question of Faith'', where she played the monk Anselm. Her character underwent a sex change from male to female as part of a divine miracle. The film was directed by her husband. In 2018, she appeared on the

game show A game show (or gameshow) is a genre of broadcast viewing entertainment where contestants compete in a game for rewards. The shows are typically directed by a game show host, host, who explains the rules of the program as well as commentating a ...

To Tell the Truth ''To Tell the Truth'' is an American television panel show. Four celebrity panelists are presented with three contestants (the "team of challengers", each an individual or pair) and must identify which is the "central character" whose unusual ...

''.

Personal life

Hackett was married to Tim Disney, and they have two sons together. Hackett has an A.B. ''cum laude'' from

Filmography

Film

Television

Video games

References

External links

* * * {{DEFAULTSORT:Hackett, Martha 1961 births American film actresses American television actresses Living people Actresses from Boston Radcliffe College alumni 21st-century American women