Dominic Keating: What Happened To Him After Star Trek
Dominic Keating is best known in these parts as Lieutenant Malcolm Reed on the series Star Trek: Enterprise.
Dominic Keating is best known in these parts as Lieutenant Malcolm Reed on the series Star Trek: Enterprise. The English-born actor, of course, learned the tricks of the trade in England, where he went to school and after a few various jobs, decided that acting was going to be his career.
DOMINIC KEATING IN DRAG
Dominic Keating began his career on stage. He was in Phillip Ridley’s The Pitchfork Disney, where he originated the role of Cosmo, then was in Michael Wall’s Amongst Barbarians, where he originated the role of Bryan. For this role, Keating took home the Mobil Award. His stage presence continued on in the UK as he was in the one-man play The Christian Brothers, The Best Years of Your Life, Screamers, and in his only United States performance, he starred in Alfie.
Before Keating hit the stage, though, he needed his Equity card, the trade union that represented actors and singers, etc. To get this, he was part of a drag act. He confessed to Metro, “We were called Feeling Mutual! Am I a fool for telling you about that one? Oh, who cares. I made my professional debut doing a drag act. I got my Equity card doing it. We first performed at the Vauxhall Tower, in 1985 or 1986. We were a double act, me and a boy called JonJon who I met in my dance class at the time.”
DESMOND IS GROUND-BREAKING
Dominic Keating moved on from his stage performances into British television. His early roles included Casualty, The Paradise Club, Inspector Morse, and Teenage Health Freak. But Keating also found time on The Bill in a recurring role but found a bigger part in the sitcom series Desmond’s, which was big at the time (the late ‘80s to mid-’90s) known for its insight into Black families, something British TV hadn’t truly delved into.
Desmond’s was not the first show featuring a Black cast, but it was the first one to show black family life in a way never before seen on British TV. “We were pretty hard-hitting at the time. You hadn’t seen a show with a Black cast being portrayed in a very realistic light. Up until Desmond’s the Black community in London had been marginalized. It really was a great place to cut my teeth,” Keating recalled in a 2010 interview with Union Jack.
He also spoke highly of his co-star Norman Beaton, who played the lead character, Desmond Ambrose. “He was an extraordinary figure, Norman. I learned so much standing next to him for five-and-a-half years. He was a very colorful character. He lived life, truly, to the hilt and beyond.”
AMERICA CALLS DOMINIC KEATING
Dominic Keating’s first jump into American movie theaters was in the 1997 Tim Allen Disney comedy Jungle 2 Jungle. He played Ian, not a big part, but enough to get his feet wet and begin to see what Hollywood had in store for him.
Keating began to see more and more time on screen in America with roles in Poltergeist: Legacy, Buffy the Vampire Slayer, and Good vs. Evil. In 2000, Keating found himself on the Lorenzo Lamas series The Immortal, which lasted 22 episodes, with Keating seeing six of those. Keating was also part of the feature The Hollywood Sign which co-starred Tom Berenger, Burt Reynolds, and Rod Steiger. Then came Keating’s big break.
MALCOLM REED ON STAR TREK: ENTERPRISE
Dominic Keating won the role as Chief Security and Tactical Officer Malcolm Reed on the Star Trek series, Star Trek: Enterprise after having already auditioned for a role on Star Trek: Voyager. His Malcolm Reed hailed from a long line of Royal Navy men but chose to join the Starfleet because of his intense fear of drowning.
As many are aware, Enterprise lasted only four seasons and was rife with issues pretty much the entire production. The four-year span was something that Dominic Keating touched on via Film Festival Traveler, “Yeah, it’s a shame we didn’t go the full seven [seasons]. Perhaps they’d gone so well one too many times. It’s hard to say. There was a desperation, bad blood started to creep in between Viacom and CBS when the UPN, the network, looked like it was changing, and it was.”
Keating continued, “We were still a flagship show, but then Viacom put Les Moonves in charge to get UPN up and that’s when the rot set in, when [Creator] Rick [Berman] started getting notes from Dawn Ostroff at UPN via Les Moonves, who had no interest in our show. He didn’t commission it, he didn’t watch it, he wasn’t a Star Trek fan.”
“We started getting some pretty dumb notes, apparently. That’s when the pissing match started. Behind the scenes, I guess Les just dismantled UPN and came up with the CW and there was no room for us on that network. So where were we to go? A shame — we definitely had at least another two or three years in us. We were just really finding our stride.”
That aside, Dominic Keating does have some fond memories of his time on the Enterprise. “I have to say, I pinch myself often. I introduce phase pistols into the whole damn story. I have the immortal line: “I have two settings, Captain: stun and kill. It would be best not to confuse them.” That’s pretty iconic stuff, yeah.”
DOMINIC KEATING AFTER ENTERPRISE
Dominic Keating’s time ended on Star Trek: Enterprise fifteen years ago. Yes, time flies. Since that time, Keating has remained working in Hollywood, with the occasional trip back to British television.
He was seen in the series Las Vegas, Heroes, Prison Break, CSI: NY, and Sons of Anarchy. He went over the pond to star in the BBC series Holby City. He was in the feature films Beowulf and Ninong, and most recently has been seen in A Killer Walks Amongst Us, Once Upon a Time in London, Unbelievable!!!, and The Host. But performing in front of the camera is not all Dominic Keating uses as his calling card.
HIS ICONIC VOICE
As his career moved forward, Dominic Keating found himself not behind the camera, but in the sound booth, voicing video games. The first game he lent his voice to was back in 2000 on the game Starlancer. Since that time, Keating has been part of over a dozen more games that include Dragon Age: Origins, Epic Mickey, Diablo III and Diablo III: Reaper of Souls, Destiny and Destiny 2, and World of Warcraft: Legion.
15 years is a long time, but with the many reboots or restructures or reimagining’s, don’t be surprised if Dominic Keating somehow finds his way back onto the Enterprise’s bridge.
