Now then. Full steam ahead.
\nWhat is the deal with Robert Beltran?<\/p>\n
Of the half a dozen episodes I think I saw, I remember two episodes of Star Trek: Voyager, that forgettable a series it is for me. One of the episodes I remember basically because it was a rip-off of a Next Generation episode, a premise later used — I think but am not certain on the X-Files and then later on with a wink and a nod on Buffy the Vampire Slayer. All of which is just as well, because Groundhog’s Day had a not dissimilar premise.<\/p>\n
It does look like the weakest link in the Star Trek franchise. I know nothing about Deep Space Nine, but I do remember that there was a one or two season story arc that my Star Trek fan siblings found fascinating. Even Enterprise looks as though it had more charm, or potential for charm, than Voyager. The Trek franchise is a bit on the rocks right now, and there isn’t any clear idea of how to jump-start it with new material. In the popular imagination of the casual civilian, Trek begins and ends with Kirk’s crew and Picard’s crew. It actually is enough of a feat that they managed to churn out The Next Generation; you can throw the darts twice and come up with something.<\/p>\n
So it is that Patrick Stewart, a classically trained Shakespearean actor, can be pretty damned comfortable with his role, known primarily as Jon Luc Picard.\u00c2\u00a0 Robert Beltran has a harder time as Commander Chakotay. From a 2001 New York Times:<\/p>\n
“Chakotay has not changed enough for my taste,” the outspoken actor said, referring to the character he’s played for seven years on Star Trek: Voyager. […] “Although they come up with a scene here or there that’s tolerable, I think the character has not progressed since season four,” Beltran said. “In fact, he may even have regressed a little.<\/em><\/p>\n “I would have explored his past, his spirituality, the inner conflicts he might have,” the actor said, “and most definitely his relationships, not just with the captain, but with everybody else on the ship. I would have liked more revealing scenes with the other cast members, which were sorely lacking with Chakotay.”<\/em><\/p>\n Though his frustration is palpable, Beltran insisted that he never let it seep into his performance or his on-set demeanor. The actor gave his all when called upon, and it wasn’t unusual to find him joking with cast and crew on the stage or tossing a football outside, in front of his trailer on the Paramount lot.<\/em><\/p>\n “When you’re given these throwaway scenes with not much thought put into who’s saying it and its importance to the whole story – and I’m talking mostly about seasons five and six here – it just makes me feel like the writers don’t care,” Beltran said.<\/em><\/p>\n “I just felt let down, ignored and insulted,” he said. “I think they did a grave disservice to what I thought could have been an interesting character.” […] “I just feel like it’s been a disappointment,” he said.<\/em><\/p>\n Beltran, however, is looking forward rather than back. Life after Voyager, he said, will resemble life before Voyager.<\/em><\/p>\n “I’m an actor,” he said. “I do television. I do films. I do stage. I’ll do whatever feels right.<\/em><\/p>\n “I can only do what’s offered to me,” he said, “and from the list of what’s offered to me I’ll just do what I think is the best thing to do. Ideally I want to do my own films – I’d like to have my own production company and tell the stories I like.”<\/em><\/p>\n I imagine Larouche and company getting wind of this disaffected actor, with it piquing their interest. I don’t think a Scientology approach per se could work at all with Larouche — a group of Big Name actors hamper the need to be above this silly pop culture world.\u00c2\u00a0 But a single well-regarded actor disillusioned shadows their recruitment base, and besides which he is in a position to wander in and out of Hollywood without much fret. Robert<\/span> Beltran<\/span>, perhaps best known for his work on “Star Trek: Voyager,” stars as Charlie Castle, a much-adored movie star who has sold his soul, metaphorically speaking, to satanic, all-powerful studio head Marcus Hoff (chilling Miguel Sandoval). When Charlie killed a child in a hit-and-run accident some months back, Hoff covered up the incident. Now, Hoff is pressuring Charlie to renew his 14-year contract — a Faustian bargain Charlie’s wife, Marion (effective Rita Rehn), will not tolerate.<\/em><\/p>\n Ever mindful of the period, beautifully evoked by Scott Siedman’s tacky-lush set, Melendez calibrates the distance between emotional truth and histrionics, seldom tumbling into the gap between. Reminiscent of John Garfield in his prime, Beltran is righteously passionate as a conscientious artist forced into an unholy compromise — Odets’ prescient nod to escalating McCarthyism. <\/em><\/p>\n It doesn’t take too much work to read into his motivations to that role.\u00c2\u00a0 It also managed the trick of putting some of Larouche’s words into Beltran’s mouth regarding a post – FDR let-down in society, a bridge into Larouche’s faux idealism. Robert Beltran later insisted that he basically hates the genre conventions of science fiction, and insisted that one of his projects not be compared with The Twilight Zone.<\/p>\n That explains why Robert Beltran is now teaching Drama at Larouche’s Academies. Actually, he is not too dissimilar from the Youth Recruits in respect to motivation. OR… Robert Beltran speaking before an excited conference of Youth: Now then. Full steam ahead. What is the deal with Robert Beltran? Of the half a dozen episodes I think I saw, I remember two episodes of Star Trek: Voyager, that forgettable a series it is for me. One of the episodes I remember basically because it was a rip-off of a Next Generation episode, […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4,1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2352","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-the-larouche-challenge","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.struat.com\/election\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2352","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.struat.com\/election\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.struat.com\/election\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.struat.com\/election\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.struat.com\/election\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2352"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/www.struat.com\/election\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2352\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.struat.com\/election\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2352"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.struat.com\/election\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2352"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.struat.com\/election\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2352"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
\n“I’m just sorry that it has gotten to the point where I’m feeling so unexcited, that I got to be so disillusioned with it,” he said. “I’m sorry that happened. I’m sorry the writers didn’t see the possibilities. I’m sorry for all the missed chances, not only for my character but for the whole Voyager story.<\/em><\/p>\n
\nNote the immediate post-Trek stage performance he took part in, which served as his “in” to the orbit of Larouche:<\/p>\n
\nInteresting to note what Larouche’s attitude toward Star Trek and Star Wars has been — largely negative “moronic space opera drivel”, but with the value of “getting kids interested” in his dreams of moon colonies and missile defense “Beam Weapon Technology”.<\/p>\n
\n
\nlhl scamed beltran with the truman story, and the generation gap story, and now beltran thinks he finally has modern american history – as well as the cause of all the world’s problems today – figured out…thanks to lhl – the world’s one and only non-solution.
\nlhl is very good at making up simple explanations to help make complicated things line up neatly…the only problem is that every now and then some new explanation will come along – but this doens’t mean that lhl was wrong – it just means that lhl was hypothezing the higher hypotheses,
\nthe org is using beltran to sucker in more youth…the idea of having a well-known actor give you acting classes is too good a pull.
\nthe org has used this trick before…get to know some well-known singer, musician or actor, get some rapport going with them, by having “intellectual” discussions with them about how bad movies or music or broadway is today…then the target will think that they have found someone who understands them, their problems, share their hopes and dreams, etc.
\nthen comes the ego stroking – you get an invitation to perform at a conference or something like that.
\nfinally, comes the “lyn is the only solution” line, with some explanation on how lyn is so clever that everybody just slanders him as a fascist and everyone who has left him – chris and carol white for example – are agents – real estate or otherwise.
\nthen, the org starts asking for money…which is what it was all about to begin with.
\nit happened to william warfield…and now that warfield is dead…beltran is next in line.<\/font><\/em><\/p>\n
\nThe final speaker was Mr. Robert Beltran, a Classical actor who has been working with the LaRouche Youth Movement for about five years.\u00c2\u00a0 He connected “the long arc of corruption and immorality from Nietzsche, Wagner, Kant, Liszt, Darwin, Freud, and various others like that.”\u00c2\u00a0 Beltran read from 19th and 20th Century poets such as Matthew Arnold, Thomas Hardy, Ezra Pound, and T.S. Eliot, which include such demoralizing, banal, and self-hating lines as, “Do I dare disturb the universe? In a minute there is time for decisions and revisions which a minute will reverse.\u00c2\u00a0 For I have known them all already, known them all-Have known the evenings, mornings, afternoons. I have measured out my life with coffee spoons”-which was written by T.S. Eliot in “The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock (1919).”
\nRobert then contrasted that by reading two sonnets by Shakespeare, two poems by John Keats, and the great “Ozymandias” by Percy Shelley, which, if you make it simpler for Bush and Cheney, would be nice for them to hear. “Ozymandias” is a political lesson for those who don’t know the consequences of an empire. He also read “On Peace” by Keats, which is a call for Europe to free itself from the chains of Empire, following the model of the just-created United States. (Hear Robert Beltran read the poems)
\nThe dialogue which ended the meeting rallied the audience to establish its responsibility as a social body, and to find self-inspired passion to change their own identity in order to create a renaissance. “How do you lift society up in a world jaded and bereft of beauty?” Beltran was asked. He replied, “All I can do is hope there is a project out there worth putting your time into. You have to do it yourselves, like what the musicians (Duckles and Levin) said, you do it because it’s in you. You will have to create it, you guys will have to create it, we have to create it. The world needs great poetry, a great chorale.”<\/em>
\nToo bad he couldn’t be Captain Picard.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"