Hundreds of actors have portrayed characters in the Star Trek Universe, and it is common to see them in other roles. Sometimes you’ll find that a show features several actors from Star Trek, often purely by coincidence. You may be surprised to find out that many Star Trek actors also appeared in guest roles on The Golden Girls. This is probably due in no small part that both shows were aired about the same time in the late 80’s and early 90’s (and far beyond that for Star Trek).

Paul Dooley

Paul Dooley would eventually come to play Cardassian spymaster Enabran Tain four times on Deep Space Nine. Before he would wear all of those prosthetics, Dooley portrayed two different characters on The Golden Girls. He was George Corliss on the 1987 episode “Empty Nests”, which would be the spin-off pilot for a show with a similar name. He returned the next year as Isaac Q. Newton in “Love, Rose”.

Jerry Hardin

Jerry Hardin was on Star Trek four times as three different characters. His most famous ‘Trek role was of Samuel Clemens (Mark Twain) on the 2-part episode “Times Arrow” from The Next Generation. Prior to that he played Radue in “When the Bough Breaks” and later Dr. Neria in Voyager‘s “Emanations”.  Hardin also pulled double-duty on The Golden Girls, first as the creep Professor Cooper in “Adult Education”.  Later, he was Gary Tucker in the 1989 episode “Little Sister”.

Richard Riehle

Richard Riehle portrayed Detective Parres in the 2-part The Golden Girls episode “Never Yell Fire in a Crowded Retirement Home”. The next year, he played the first of his three Star Trek characters, Batai,  in the highly-praised The Next Generation episode “The Inner Light”. Riehle returned to the franchise as Seamus Driscol in two different “holodeck” episodes of Voyager. After the new millennium, he was on ‘Trek yet again in two Enterprise episodes as Dr. Jeremy Lucas.

John Schuck

Few actors have a Star Trek resume as impressive as John Schuck. He got started as Klingon Ambassador Kamarog in both the forth and sixth Star Trek movies: The Voyage Home in 1986 and The Undiscovered Country in 1991. He later played Cardassian Legate Parn on Deep Space Nine, and also landed a role on Voyager. Schuck returned to the Klingon makeup twice more as Antaak on Enterprise. Way back in 1987, he was transgender politician Gil Kessler on The Golden Girls.

Hilary Shepard

In 1989, Hilary Shepard appeared in The Golden Girls episode “Rites of Spring”. Several years later, Shepard would be on Deep Space Nine three times as two different characters. She portrayed the genetically-augmented human Lauren in “Chrysalis” and “Statistical Probabilities”. Much less recognizably, she was also the Benzite Hoya on “The Ship”.

Leland Orser

Before he played four different characters in the Star Trek Universe, Leland Orser had a small role as a waiter in the murder/mystery episode of The Golden Girls – “The Case of the Libertine Belle”. He would go on to be both Gai and the Romulan Lovok on Deep Space Nine, Voyager‘s homicidal hologram Dejaren, and Loomis on Enterprise.

One More, But First…

I had a hard time finding photographic proof that these actors were on The Golden Girls, but trust me, they were. Each had a single guest appearance, but were on Star Trek a total of seven times between them. Michael Ensign (L) portrayed Minister Kola on TNG, Lojal on DS9, The Bard on Voyager, and Dr. Oratt on Enterprise. Roy Brocksmith (C) was Sirna Kolrami on TNG and Razka Karn on DS9. Sam Anderson (R) played the Assistant Hotel Manager on the second season TNG episode “The Royale”.

Robert Picardo

The actor I saved for last has been on Star Trek more than everyone else on this list combined – several times over. Before he was The Doctor (EMH Mk.1) on seven seasons of Voyager and the eighth Star Trek film: First Contact, Picardo appeared on The Golden Girls as… you guessed it… a doctor! Dr. Revell attended to Dorothy in the first season episode where she had a benign growth on her foot. I’m sure that was a lot easier that dealing with hostile aliens like The Borg.