Welcome back to Character Insight! This week, we review ensign Billy, a background officer seen on Enterprise.
Billy is an operations division officer who also works some engineering and security shifts on board Archer's Enterprise. He can be remembered by his imposing visage and his shaved head, making him a perfect look for a security or operations grunt type officer.
In the first season, we see Billy helping carry boxes and hanging out in the mess hall, talking to other crewmates. He's one of the regular background characters we often see walking past main characters as they are in the corridors of the ship or hanging out in engineering. One of his few speaking lines first occurs when he calls Trip Tucker from engineering during the episode Civilization.
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Billy shows up in multiple episodes in all four seasons of the show, doing all the types of things background characters are known for from previous Star Trek shows. Although he was seen or heard a few times during his appearances, the actor Solomon Burke, Jr. was not credited for these appearances formally until the finale. In that finale, we see Billy tell Archer that it was time to give his speech at the Federation Founding Ceremony.
This character was unnamed until his third appearance, and following that his name is used in other episodes consistently when it comes up. His promotion to ensign occurs between the primary four seasons of the show and the finale, so perhaps Billy is on his way up the chain in Starfleet and the newly-formed Federation.
As mentioned, Solomon Burke, Jr. played Billy. He is the son of the Rock and Roll Hall of Famer Solomon Burke, who was a soul and blues musician. Burke is also a musician playing in a band called The Position. He also continues to act, with recent appearances in the films Sun Dogs and the musical Revival.
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