Episode Behind the Scenes

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Jonathan West, who directed this episode, is the Director of Photography for Seasons 6 and 7.
   
Mark Kalbfield's original promise was to have a Federation marked Romulan ship from a supposedly peaceful future that turned out to be a Trojan horse whose time travel and "future Riker" were both hoaxes.
   
Michael Piller nixed Joe Menosky's idea of Alexander accidentally yet permanently aging 30 years in a time portal. Piller remarks - "I think it's a hideous thing to steal somebody's youth from them."
   
Jeri Taylor was instrumental in getting actor James Sloyan (Old Alexander/K'Mtar) cast in the episode, after being extremely impressed with his guest spot in "The Defector". Both Rick Berman and Michael Piller initially objected after he had played Odo's mentor Dr Mora Pol in a DS9 episode earlier in the year. Taylor remembers - "I finally went to Michael and said, 'Look, we can take a lesser actor in this part or we can cast the actor who should be cast!'"
   
Patrick Stewart was able to miss five days of shooting to host the February 5 "Saturday Night Live".
   
Originally, Rene Echevarria had wanted Suzie Plakson to reprise her role of K'Ehlyr as Alexander's rescuer from K'Mtar, but the actress had to decline due to timing and the fact she'd only recently gone on hiatus after an exhaustive year on her sitcom "Love and War".
   
Joel Swetow (Yog) had played Gul Jasad in DS9's pilot "Emissary".
   
Wendy Neuss on Klingon Opera in "Firstborn" - "We did some temporary tracks for the stage, but we wound up doing the whole thing in post-production. It was one of our biggest jobs all year - figuring out what the on-camera instruments would sound like, breaking down all the syllables, figuring where the offstage line would be."
   
Echevarria named the U.S.S. Kearsage after the historic Civil War ship after a fan suggested. To express his appreciation, Echevarria named the Vodrey Nebula after the fan.

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