The Inner Light’s Lasting Legacy: Reflections with Star Trek’s Richard Riehle
Welcome to Trek Tuesday on Exploring Humanity Through Sci-Fi, where I dive deep into all things Star Trek. In this episode, host Tony Tellado celebrates one of the most beloved Star Trek: The Next Generation episodes—“The Inner Light.” Partly inspired by a George Harrison Beatles song and rooted in Taoist philosophy, “The Inner Light” takes Captain Picard on a powerful journey as he lives 4o years of the life of the scientist Kamin.
Joining Tony is actor Richard Riehle, known for playing Kamin’s close friend Batai , who shares behind-the-scenes stories about the making of this iconic episode, his experiences working alongside Patrick Stewart, and the camaraderie built on set. Richard also reminisces about his time on Star Trek: Voyager and the unforgettable moments he shared with the cast. Plus, we reflect on the legacy of Picard’s Ressikan flute and “The Inner Light’s” lasting impact on Star Trek fans and the franchise as a whole.
Richard Riehle: I had just come to Los Angeles and had gotten cast in Ferris Bueller.Which we shot. Which we shot on the Paramount lot right next to our Next Generation was shooting in the sound.Soundstage right next to it. And so I got to kind of. I would see a lot of those people all the time and they’d say, well, you got to come and got episode, come and do an episode. And I’d say, I say well sure, I’d love to. And so when, when Ferris was canceled, I got an audition for Next Generation and they cast me and they said, I’m gonna have to shave your mustache. I had a mustache for.And I said fine. You know, when I doing theater, I changed my look from show to show and so I did that. And then as it turned out, I probably wouldn’t have had to, but that didn’t make any difference. But Patrick is an amazing, you know, he’s an amazing actor and he’s a wonderful, wonderful person. And he. And there was something. He had a special feeling about this episode, I think, partly because his son was in it as well.
Yeah. But so once we got, you know, once we would set up a scene to shoot in between, we would sit and talk theater because, of course, he has a huge theater background. And I had just come from New York and doing almost 20 years of theater myself before I got out to LA. So we had that, that sort of interchange, I think, brought in the camaraderie that shows up in the performances. But he’s amazing.
He brought that all through the scene. A scene that you were in at the very end of the episode when you show up and you say, you know, hello, old friend. You know, we, you know, we’re part of your life. He gives that speech. You know, to him, it was just. It was just so moving. And you just, you just connected with his whole life. His whole life was lived in that one hour.
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