Anthony Montgomery is largely steering clear of the final frontier since Star Trek Enterprise.
Since his last trek aboard the Enterprise NX-01 as helmsman Travis Mayweather, Anthony Montgomery has had several high profile TV roles.
Notably, he played investment banker Darryl Jenkins in the first two seasons (2011-12) of Single Ladies on VH1. Darryl was a seemingly nice guy who turned nasty when his wife cheated on him, provoking strong reactions from the show’s fans!
And Montgomery enjoyed a long run—122 episodes between 2015 and 2019—as Dr. Andre Maddox on ABC’s venerable soap opera General Hospital. His work even earned him an Emmy® nod in 2018.
But Anthony Montgomery has largely charted his career’s course well clear of science fiction and the fantastic. Let’s take a look at the few genre ports of call he’s made since Star Trek Enterprise.
Anthony Montgomery wants to get the truth out there
The biggest genre credit in Montgomery’s post-Enterprise filmography is the ten-minute short film DDX: Department of Disclosure. Montgomery plays a U.S. Air Force intelligence officer desperate to bring what he’s learned about extraterrestrials on Earth to light.
Co-produced by writer Brandon Easton (an IDW Star Trek: Year Five scribe, among many other credits) and director Ramon Govea, DDX is, as you can see above, a visually arresting and skillfully edited kaleidoscope of real-life and dramatized footage. Its grim but gripping plot would be right at home in The Twilight Zone.
With what the government does and doesn’t know about UFOs again making headlines—and, more importantly, the fortunes of America’s fragile democracy still in considerable question—DDX may be even more timely now than it was in 2017.
Anthony Montgomery coming soon (?) to a dystopia near you
In 2012, Variety reported production had wrapped on Without Ward, a “sci-fi romancer” from writer and director Cory Cataldo.
Starring Mad Men’s Michael Gladis and Martin Landau (who was originally offered the part of Spock and whom Leonard Nimoy replaced on Mission: Impossible), the film will also feature Montgomery as a character named Billy.
Variety offered this short logline:
"Story takes place with the world under one form of government in which lawyers with guns police the world and enforce people’s personal contracts. Pic follows a dysfunctional family being forced into a never-ending life of house arrest."
“Never-ending house arrest” may sound uncomfortably close to life during the pandemic to some people, so perhaps Without Ward may also seem especially relevant whenever it’s released!
Anthony Montgomery helps viewers make the season bright
During the 2019 holiday season, Montgomery played Marcus Jordan in Carole’s Christmas, one of OWN’s first original Christmas movies.
As its title might lead you to expect, Carole’s Christmas is a Yuletide fantasy in the vein of A Christmas Carol by way of It’s a Wonderful Life, and even such alternate reality Star Trek stories as TNG’s “Tapestry” or Discovery’s “Terra Firma” (both of which owe a debt to Dickens’ Christmas classic themselves).
Carole Jordan (Kimberly Elise) wishes her life were different, a wish the magical Iris (Jackée Harry) readily grants in order to teach Carole about being grateful for her life and the people in it, including Montgomery’s Marcus.
Being careful what we wish for is all well and good. (Just ask “Mr. Adventure,” who learned that lesson the hard way from Commander Uhura in Star Trek III: The Search for Spock!)
But every fan of Anthony Montgomery is surely wishing for more fantasy and sci-fi performances from this handsome and talented performer!