Star Trek: Jonathan Frakes Boards Picard Series (But Not as Riker)

While Jonathan Frakes may be best known as portraying Commander William Riker on all four seasons of Star Trek: The Next Generation and its four films, the Star Trek actor has been very prolific as a director for decades.

In a new interview, Frakes confirmed that he will be helming the third and fourth episodes of CBS All Access' planned series starring Sir Patrick Stewart as Jean-Luc Picard while revealing that 18 years have passed since audiences last saw the former Enterprise captain at the end of 2002's Star Trek: Nemesis to when the series premieres.

"I think the fans are going to be thrilled and excited and surprised. I have had the privilege of reading the first couple of episodes and I have spent some time with Patrick who is so engaged," Frakes laughed in an interview with TrekMovie.com. "I feel so blessed to back. It’s so ironic that I spent so many years trying to expand where I was working."

Frakes had directed episodes of The Next Generation, Star Trek: Deep Space Nine and Star Trek: Voyager as well as the feature films Star Trek: First Contact and Star Trek: Insurrection. Recently, Frakes has directed episodes of The Orville and Star Trek: Discovery.

Picard's untitled Star Trek series stars Patrick Stewart, Santiago Cabrera Michelle Hurd and Evan Evagora and is set to debut later this year on CBS All Access.

Source: www.cbr.com