Star Trek fans know John de Lancie as the cosmic trickster god Q who made his biggest franchise mark in Star Trek: The Next Generation and continued to appear in the franchise’s different series. But at a small Star Trek convention over the weekend, De Lancie said it was a random encounter with a fan not of Trek, but of his recurring role of Donald Margolis in the acclaimed crime drama Breaking Bad, that gave him a new outlook on the power of acting.
“He looks at me, and he sees me, and then he looks kind of askance. He doesn’t catch me in the eye… but he goes, ‘hey man, are you Jane’s father?’ I go, ‘yeah.’ And he goes, ‘yeah, well, now I know what my parents went through.'”
-John de Lancie, on his encounter of a fan of Breaking BadOn the final day of Trekonderoga — a small Star Trek convention unfolding in Ticonderoga, New York — John de Lancie took the stage to answer fan questions. Most of the questions revolved around Trek, though De Lancie also took some time to talk about his experience on My Little Pony: Friendship Is Magic and the final question he answered was about Breaking Bad.
Explaining that the fan encounter was one he’d “never forget,” De Lancie said he was somewhere, possibly an airport, when he noticed a young man in his twenties who looked “pretty strung out.”
“He didn’t get it and he didn’t understand the pain that these other people were experiencing until he saw it in my face, and that he was able to be touched by. And that may be the biggest reason why… what I love about acting.”
-John de Lancie, on his encounter of a fan of Breaking Bad“He looks at me, and he sees me, and then he looks kind of askance,” De Lancie recalled. “He doesn’t catch me in the eye… but he goes, ‘hey man, are you Jane’s father?’ I go, ‘yeah.’ And he goes, ‘yeah, well, now I know what my parents went through.'”
After the Star Trek crowd reacted with gasps, John de Lancie continued, “I thought, ‘oh my gosh–that’s what the theater is.’ His parents had said to him, ‘you gotta stop this.’ His teachers had said, ‘no, what are you doing?’ His girlfriend must’ve said, ‘please, no more.’ His other friends said, ‘Jesus, you’re going downhill.’ He didn’t get it and he didn’t understand the pain that these other people were experiencing until he saw it in my face, and that he was able to be touched by. And that may be the biggest reason why… what I love about acting.”
John De Lancie On Breaking Bad
If you’ve never seen Breaking Bad, then rest assured that the Star Trek John de Lancie role and the one in Breaking Bad are two very different animals. De Lancie’s Donald Margolis is father of Jane (Krysten Ritter) who becomes romantically involved with Jesse Pinkman (Aaron Paul). Jane is a drug addict in recovery and her father rightly suspects Jesse will be a bad influence on her continued sobriety.
Not long after Jane begins using again, she dies in one of the most shocking scenes in the series.
Jane vomits in her sleep, chokes on her vomit, and dies. What makes the moment one of the most infamous in Breaking Bad history is that Walter White (Bryan Cranston) is in the room as it’s happening, and he chooses to let her die because of her influence on Jesse. Ironically, in the scene before this one, Walter and Donald — as complete strangers — have a brief heart-to-heart at a bar, with neither suspecting their connection.
Star Trek’s John de Lancie character is nothing like Donald Margolis. As Q, De Lancie plays a seemingly all-powerful cosmic entity who toys with many of the heroes of Trek, though he’s best known for his TNG appearances. Q seemingly dies in Season 2 of Star Trek: Picard, though he returns for a teasing cameo in that series’ final episode.
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