Star Trek’s Weirdest Klingon Cameo Went Completely Unnoticed
Star Trek is a franchise that has had some very high-profile cameos over the years, including everyone from Stephen Hawking to Dwayne Johnson. However, one of the weirdest cameos is one that most fans overlooked, mostly because the famous face was hidden, and the performer received no onscreen credit. However, look closely at the TNG episode “The Icarus Factor,” and you will see musician and entertainment reporter John Tesh playing a holographic Klingon.
John Tesh As A Klingon
As far as cameos go, John Tesh’s time as a Klingon is brief but very memorable. When Worf is acting even weirder than usual, Wesley Crusher, Data, and Geordi La Forge figure out that he is in the dumps because there are no other Klingons around to help him celebrate the 10th anniversary of his Age of Ascension. They solve this problem by programming the holodeck with holographic Klingons (Tesh hidden among them) who zap Worf with painstiks while he recites some gruff vows about (what else?) honor.
Tesh Revealed The Part On Entertainment Tonight
While the average fan of Star Trek has no idea that John Tesh played a Klingon in “The Icarus Factor,” it was never a secret to his own fans. He may be a Grammy-nominated musician, but Tesh is arguably best known to movie and TV buffs as the co-host of Entertainment Tonight, which is currently TV’s longest-running news program.
After he made his cameo on Star Trek: The Next Generation, Tesh aired a behind-the-scenes segment on Entertainment Tonight showing some of the process of applying his Klingon makeup and prosthetics (the makeup alone took two and a half hours to apply).
A Big Star Trek Fan
But why was John Tesh so interested in making a cameo (Klingon or otherwise) on The Next Generation? Growing up, his parents strictly controlled what he was and was not allowed to watch, which seems a bit ironic given his later stint as one of the world’s most recognizable entertainment reporters. Star Trek: The Original Series was all the young Tesh was allowed to watch, and he became a huge fan of the franchise from a young age.
Got A Behind The Scenes Look At Code Oh Honor
Once he began working for Entertainment Tonight, he could help put a spotlight on his favorite franchise once it received its first television spinoff. In 1987, after John Tesh visited the set of The Next Generation, he featured a behind-the-scenes segment focusing on “Code of Honor,” an episode with such a focus on battle and glory that it might have made the Klingons proud. Of course, this is now considered Star Trek’s most racist episode, so it might not have been the greatest one for Entertainment Tonight to shine a spotlight on.
A Major Honor
Like many of Star Trek’s biggest fans, John Tesh grew up watching Captain Kirk fighting the Klingons, so it likely felt like a major honor to get under all the makeup and appear onscreen as one of these fearsome warriors.
It may have been a quick cameo, but in showing us more of Worf’s strange (and strangely painful) rituals, Tesh even got to usher in some important lore about the franchise’s most famous aliens. And we’ll definitely be on the lookout for this musician-turned-reporter next time we check out the hurts-in-a-good-way climax of “The Icarus Factor.”
