JULY 21, 2023 – On screen, The Chair belongs to the captain. Behind the cameras, it belongs to the director. In the case of the recent episode of Star Trek: Strange New Worlds, “Ad Astra Per Aspera,” the latter Chair belonged to Dr. Valerie Weiss. Weiss had been directing in film and television for twenty years before taking on her first job in the Star Trek franchise. She reflected on her experience in a recent interview with Space.

Weiss, who is also a scientist with a Ph.D. in biophysics from Harvard University, was brought on to do the SNW episode thanks in part to her “buddy Benji [Bakshi],” one of the cinematographers this season, with whom she had worked before. (By the way, check out our interview with Bakshi, if you haven’t already.)

She says, "I was only mildly familiar with the Trek franchise before I interviewed for it. He told me it was a prequel to the original series, so I watched a bunch of them and loved it. The same reason I went into science is his why I love doing Trek, which is an innate curiosity about the world and why we do what we do. It's a series that really gets its concepts, but it gets at them dramatically and narratively through character. And it's like the only utopian sci-fi series out there. I think we have to approach the problems of the world with optimism or we'll never get through them."

Weiss spent time with showrunner Henry Alonso Myers and each cast member, regardless of their role, to find out how they work and what they thought about the episode at hand. She also "did a deep dive into the predecessors like 'Court Martial,' 'The Menagerie' and 'The Measure Of A Man' to understand the dynamics. What they all have in common is this idea of dignity. If we're going to share this Earth with others and ask them to be part of this same universe, don't we at the very least owe them dignity, and being seen and heard and evaluated fairly?"

Weiss also talked about her understanding of Illyrians, the visuals of the episode and had glowing things to say about individual cast members. In the end, she said, “They all went so deep and shared personal stories about how this episode resonated. It's just one of the best experiences I’ve ever had with a cast."

For more from Dr. Valerie Weiss, head over to Space.