Deidre Hall will appear in a special soap opera-themed episode of Star Trek: Strange New Worlds on Thursday, September 3, playing a psychiatrist who bears obvious similarities to Days of Our Lives‘ longtime therapist, Marlena Evans.
When Hall heard the show was incorporating soaps into sci-fi, she was immediately on board. “I thought that was brilliant, absolutely brilliant,” she enthuses. “Maybe a little overdue. They use a lot of our devices of flashbacks and a number of things, but it’ll look familiar to you.”
Hall was familiar with the world of Star Trek — “I grew up watching Captain Kirk” — but saw some parallels to her daytime job, too. “It’s like a soap,” she observes. “It’s always true to itself, there are no weird surprises, you can count on what they say being what is, you know who the characters are, and will always be true to that. So, it’s a fun, adventurous, safe place to shop.”
Christos Kalohoridis/Paramount+
Because the character she plays on Days and the one she plays on Star Trek: Strange New Worlds have a lot in common, Hall says the shoot was fairly seamless. “I do have some familiarity with playing a good listener,” she muses. “So, it wasn’t difficult. I was going to say it wasn’t challenging but that isn’t true. I was navigating, ‘Oh, there’s a camera,’ ‘Oh, we’re walking down the hallway.’ ‘Oh, we’re over there,’ so that was new to me, but the actual performance was pretty close to Marlena.”
The official logline of the episode reads, “When a familiar space trickster traps the Enterprise crew in a classic soap opera, Pike finally mourns the loss of a life not lived,” and Hall shares several scenes with Anson Mount, who plays Captain Pike.
“Basically, I am helping our captain, Captain Pike, come to terms with an old wound,” she previews. “And the end has him reconciling a lot of deep emotion that has come up for him because he’s now freer as an emotional person. It’s what every therapist hopes for. It’s wonderful and he is brilliant doing it.”
Working opposite Mount gave Hall another reason to enjoy her trip into the Star Trek universe, and she says she was very impressed by her new costar. “He’s wildly professional,” Hall raves. “In fact, he has so much on his plate. Obviously, with starring in the show, and he was expecting a baby when we were shooting, so we all were sort of expecting him to answer the phone and go, ‘Oh, I’m done. Got to go now.’ And every time we did a scene, it was with great relief, ‘Okay, that’s in the can. We have that one now.’”
That professionalism was especially apparent when they filmed the episode’s emotional climax, and Mount took a beat before filming. “Nobody knew what to expect, and he stepped off the stage for a minute,” Hall recalls. “I thought, ‘Oh, okay, guess we’re taking a moment here.’ And then he came back in, sat down, and said, ‘I’m ready,’ and I thought, ‘I guess I’m ready too.’ And when you see the last scene, you’ll say, ‘Oh, wow, that was a happening.’ So that’s a style of working, staying immediate, staying right on the cusp of what you’re about to do, and it was fun to watch him do it.”
Christos Kalohoridis/Paramount+
Another highlight was getting to experience some of the elements that make the franchise distinct, including her character’s wardrobe. “Bernadette Croft is our costume designer, and she is such a huge talent,” Hall praises. “I didn’t know going in what I’d be wearing — obviously, that’s somebody else’s decision — and I met with her, and I said, ‘I like a long pant and a little bit of a high neck, and that’s fun for me.’ And then she sent me the sketch, and I went. ‘Oh, my gosh, it’s so great!’ And then we had fittings, and I would go in, and the shoulders weren’t pinned, the coat wasn’t ready, and they said, ‘Come back in an hour.’ Came back in an hour, and the bottom part is done. I thought, ‘They must have little worker bees in the back, just working their little fingers to the bone.’ And then with the coat, I said, ‘If it’s possible, it would be nice if the coat could kind of flow, so you see a lot of movement.’ And there it was, done like that. I just I can’t say enough good things. She really is incredibly gifted, and makes it fun to wear, because that’s very un-Marlena.”
Hall kept her Star Trek appearance under wraps, but the news didn’t stay hidden from one of her Days costars for long. “They didn’t know that I was doing it, and I was with [Eric] Martsolf [Brady Black] at some point, and somebody asked about Star Trek,” she recalls. “I said, ‘Oh yeah, we’ve shot it.’ And he went, ‘Ah, you were on Star Trek?! How did I not know that?’ So, it was a very well-kept secret for a long time.”
Christos Kalohoridis/Paramount+
Star Trek is celebrating its 60th anniversary this year, a milestone Hall also marked in Salem in 2025. Having now been part of both franchises, she recognizes the significance of their enduring legacies. “I think the longevity speaks to the excellence of it, that people keep coming back and wanting more and appreciate it and share it with generations of families,” she reflects. “I saw Star Trek as a kid, and here we are, and it goes on. A number of people said, ‘Oh, yeah, I’ve watched it with my parents,’ or, ‘I’ve seen that with my own kids.’ So, it’s a multi-generational show, just like Days.”
The Star Trek appearance also marks the second time Hall has appeared in a streaming series in recent years. In 2024 and 2026, she did episodes of Hacks, where she played a heightened version of herself. She feels the wider television landscape is becoming increasingly aware of the power of soap fans. “I think they’re suddenly aware of our vast audience and how devoted and loyal they are,” she notes. “And I think maybe they don’t mind getting a little piece of that for themselves.”
Jake Giles Netter/HBO Max
And Hall would happily do more streaming if the right opportunity came along. “Oh, I’m always open to something new,” she says. “I especially love comedy. That would be great fun to do some more comedy.”
For now, though, Hall is looking forward to audiences seeing her latest departure from Salem. As “Like Chronitons Through the Hourglass” heads toward its premiere, she says there’s plenty of reasons for Days fans — and Star Trek fans — to tune in.
“It’s an episode about deep feelings and accessing them,” she concludes. “It’s Dr. Marlena in space.”
Star Trek: Strange New Worlds, streaming on Paramount. New episodes air Thursdays.