Summary
- Whoopi Goldberg originally wanted to join Star Trek as the Chief of Security but the role didn't fit her. Instead, the character of Guinan the bartender was created for her, leading to the tradition of having bars on Starfleet ships.
- Guinan and the creation of Ten Forward in Star Trek: The Next Generation provided a common space for the characters to socialize and drink synthehol. This idea was adopted by other Star Trek series, resulting in bars on various starships.
- Star Trek: Strange New Worlds and Star Trek: Picard further expanded the concept of starship bars, introducing new bars and retconning Ten Forward as a bar in Los Angeles. Guinan continues to run Ten Forward decades after TNG.
When Whoopi Goldberg wanted to join Star Trek: The Next Generation, she was originally interested in Lieutenant Worf's (Michael Dorn) job as Chief of Security, says executive producer Rick Berman. TNG began with Denise Crosby's Lt. Tasha Yar as the Chief of Security of the USS Enterprise-D. Crosby was unhappy on TNG and left the series before season 1 ended. Tasha was killed off, and the Klingon Worf was promoted to Chief of Security to succeed Yar.
In the oral history "The Center Seat: 55 Years of Star Trek" by Peter Holmstrom, Star Trek: The Next Generation's executive producer Rick Berman describes a letter sent by Whoopi Goldberg asking to join TNG as the new Chief of Security, and how he and Star Trek's creator, Gene Roddenberry, decided to create the role of Guinan the bartender for the Academy Award-nominee. Read the quote below:
When Denise Crosby decided to leave the show, we got a call from Whoopi Goldberg saying that she wanted to be considered to take Denise’s role of head of security. But Whoopi wasn’t really the head of security type for us. Gene and I sat down and discussed it. “What a great idea to have a bartender?” To build a bar where people could socialize, and who better than Whoopi to play a bartender, who had some kind of strange, never quite explained, past relationship with Picard.
