Jack Quaid on The Boys in the post-Trump era and how Star Trek: Lower Decks made him a Trekkie
US actor Jack Quaid has revealed more about the new animated Star Trek series ahead of his upcoming roles in Scream 5 and The Boys.
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Jack Quaid is becoming very adept at keeping secrets. The affable American actor – the son of actors Dennis Quaid and Meg Ryan – is bunkered down in a hotel room in Toronto, completing his COVID quarantine period so he can start filming season three of The Boys.
The last season was one of the most streamed shows in the world but Quaid gets a slightly pained expression on his face when asked what audiences can expect from his character Hughie and his battle against a squad of debauched, corrupt, corporatised superheroes.
“I don’t know if I can say anything about Season 3 – all I know is that I am reading scripts and they are amazing and I think (creator) Eric Kripke has topped himself again, he says.
“There are a lot more insane moments, getting deeper with these characters and a lot of things that I didn’t even expect – twists and turns that were very interesting so we’re just going to have to wait and see. I know that’s the vaguest answer possible – but someone will literally kill me.”
He similarly fears for his life when pressed for details about his first live acting gig in the COVID era – the long-awaited and highly secretive new entry into the Scream horror franchise, which he filmed with series regulars Neve Campbell, Courteney Cox and David Arquette, late last year.
“This is going to be another vague answer because if I tell you anything from this, Paramount will send someone in a Ghostface outfit to kill me,” he says with a laugh.
“But the experience of that was amazing – the fact that I got to work at all during the pandemic was such a blessing. And I got to work with the coolest group of people. To me they are right up there with my Boys cast.”
Quaid also had a job last year that was so secretive that he didn’t know what he was auditioning for. It was only when he got there that it was revealed he was reading for the latest entry into the 55-year-old Star Trek universe, a hilarious animated series called Lower Decks, created by Mike McMahan, Rick and Morty fame.
“I was very nervous because I am a huge cartoon nerd and a huge sci-fi nerd so it really appealed to me even though I barely knew what it was,” says Quaid who voices Ensign Brad Boimler, an enthusiastic but somewhat clueless worker drone, stationed deep in the bowels of the USS Cerritos.
“More often when you see a Star Trek movie or a show you are focusing on the bridge crew and then sometimes you cut to the people working below decks and they are running around and things are exploding but you don’t really know who they are. This kind of gives you a little window into what they might be up to. It’s really fun. It’s a comedy, but it’s also very Trek in my opinion.”
Quaid says he was somewhat of a Star Trek fan – he’d seen and loved the J.J. Abrams reboot movies – but once he’d officially joined the universe, he felt compelled to dive deeper into the decades’ worth of material to do justice to a legacy that spans more than half a century. Lower Decks takes place in the timeline of the Next Generation series and while it’s played for laughs, it leans heavily into the Star Trek tropes both serious and silly.
“That’s why I wanted to watch as much as possible because I had a responsibility to know as much about the world as possible not only so I could give my best performance because my character is very much someone who is in love with Starfleet,” he says. “But also, so that I knew the basics.
“So, there was a little bit of pressure at first … but the more and more I get into it, the more and more I love Trek. It’s Earth in the future and it’s an aspirational future that if we play our cards right, maybe we can get to some day. When we put aside our prejudices and just focus on exploration and science, which is so cool and something we need right now.”
Quaid says Lower Decks got an immeasurable boost by the involvement of Jonathan Frakes and Marina Sirtis, who were both integral parts of the Next Generation cast and also returned as Riker and Troi in last year’s acclaimed Picard.
“That was amazing to have these iconic people who are such a huge part of this franchise give us their blessing and were cool enough to be in our show,” he says.
“Not only that, Jonathan Frakes is coming back next season and I can’t wait for you guys to see that. That has all been such a blessing and so cool and I am still geeking out about it for sure.”
Quaid met Frakes at a sci-fi convention before COVID shut the circuit down but he says he’d return “in a heartbeat” to a forum that lets him meet passionate fans face-to-face.
“Everyone I met at those conventions was so incredibly nice and so heartfelt and passionate about the things that they loved,” he says. “I even had really down-to-earth conversations with certain fans about their anxiety or something that was happening in their family. We had very real talks and it didn’t feel weird – it just felt awesome.”
Quaid was at the conventions as a result of his role in The Boys, which he believes particularly resonated with audiences in the Trump era of disinformation and a cult of personality, which he happily admits to being glad is over.
“That’s kind of what we do in the show – we display these superheroes who we think are altruistic and want the best for humanity but really they are just in it for themselves,” he says. “We have had a kind of reckoning over the past few years with people we think are so amazing and so nice and caring and altruistic and it turns out – not so much. I like that I get to be on a show that talks about world events, albeit though an insane lens.”
“Hopefully the world calms down a little bit so Eric Kripke gets a little less material – he has way too much right now. So, I am excited to see what happens in the world going forward and also what happens on our show.”
Star Trek: Lower Decks and The Boys are streaming now on Amazon Prime Video.
Originally published as Jack Quaid on The Boys in the post-Trump era and how Star Trek: Lower Decks made him a Trekkie
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