Kate Mulgrew:  It’s my pleasure to be here. With another Irish Catholic women...fascinating.

ML: We were dishing the Irish Catholic dirt, right? A lot in common with that.

KM: That’s right. But we’re both still standing.  Something positive out of all that.

ML: It’s a good background.

KM: It’s a wonderful background, don’t you think?

ML: Yeah, I do.

KM: I think we’re a bit apart. We’re set a bit apart, Irish Catholic girls.  You were right, you hit the nail on the head. First of all you survive, if you’re a member of a large family. And you survive with laughter, don’t you?

ML: The humor is such a big part of an Irish Catholic family, I think.

KM: Absolutely, the Italians are second only  to us in our love and  appreciation of the absurd.  It’s just life.  It’s just a trip, right?

ML:Well  you’re the second oldest of eight children?

KM: Eight children, yes.

LM: And you came out to New York City... 17 years old.

KM: City of my soul.

LM: Left NYU?.....

KM:  yes

LM: ....to play Mary Ryan.

KM: I always try to lie about that, you know. But I did. I dropped out of school at the end of my junior year and became professional at 18..19 and did  “Ryan’s Hope”.

LM: “Ryan’s Hope”,  that’s where we first got a glimpse of you.

KM: That was the big moment.

LM: That was a big deal right?

KM:  It was a big deal then.  And I'm always amazed that regardless of what I've done since, and I have lived since, believe me, people always refer to it.  "Oh, you were Mary Ryan on Ryan's Hope.  I just loved her.
She was strong, but she was vulnerable.  She was noble, but she was human. She was fractured, but she was fabulous."  She was the ideal girl next door.

Maureen: But now you are Captain Janeway.  I do not pretend to be a trekkie.
<Kate corrects her.>  Trekker. The season finale is coming up on May 21.
<They show a clip from "Scorpion.">

KM: <laughing> Maureen, you envy the makeup!

Maureen:  Let me tell you what I've learned.  I know the Borgs are the bad guys.

KM: Very good!  It's actually not plural.  It's The Borg.  It's a collective.  It's a hive; a hive of bees as far as Regis Philbin is concerned.  A hive of the collective.  They have no conscience.  There is a greater power than even The Borg in the Delta Quadrant right now -- referred to as species 8476.  The Borg stand to be annihilated along with Voyager unless we can come to some sort of compromise.

Maureen: So you kind of have to sell a bit of your soul to connect with the Borg.

KM: Janeway is not a soul-seller.  That's not going to happen.  She is a major negotiator.  That's where we leave you at the end of "Scorpion, Part 1."  I am on the Borg Cube alone in the middle of my negotiations with the hive.  And Voyager is, you know, lost.

Maureen:  You're all on your own.

KM: Chakotay's in charge.

Maureen:  I was really impressed with your mastering of "space speak.:  I watched the final episode.  I was, like, "Whoa, Kate Mulgrew, go!"
<laughter>  Was that tough for you?

KM:  How much are you .. now Maureen .. this is no longer a quiz.  Are we friends or not?  How much did you buy - did you really absorb?

Maureen:  I was impressed because I read that you were not a trekker prior to this show.

KM: No, I wasn't.  But I'm always interested in people like you -- bright, marvelous, career women.  <laughter>

Maureen:  More! More!

KM: Are you listening to what I'm saying when I'm talking the techno-babble?

Maureen:  Yeah, you had the brain tissue thing going on.  I'm like, "Oh, heavy!"

KM:  So you sort of get it.

Maureen:  You make it realistic.

KM:  The first season was a trapeze act.  It was just like this.  <she puts her hands up as if she were a cat hanging on a screen door>  "Dear God, let me get through this day."

Maureen:  Well, you're doing a great job.  We're on the way out now, but you are going to be on hiatus for a couple of months, spending the summer with your two sons?

KM:  I am no longer on hiatus. I'm finishing my hiatus, which was this <snaps fingers> fast.  I go back to work on the 27th.  I took my boys to Costa Rica for two weeks.  Then I went to Bali to recover.  <laughs>

Maureen reminds everyone to watch the season ending episode of "Voyager" and thanks Kate for doing the interview.  Kate says it was her pleasure.