Jonathan Frakes backs Brent Spiner on Hardy’s Nemesis treatment
jonathan frakes helped set the table for a blunt new read on Star Trek: Nemesis, as Brent Spiner and Ron Perlman said Tom Hardy was not treated very well on the 2002 film. On the Dropping Names… And Other Things podcast, the comments turned a long-closed production into fresh industry gossip.
Perlman on Hardy’s set behavior
Ron Perlman said Hardy was “He was so sweet, and so… talk about deferential” during the shoot, adding, “And he really appreciated our time together. We bonded big time.” That framing matters because it comes from a co-star describing Hardy as cooperative at a moment when the set was apparently not giving him much room.
Brent Spiner then sharpened the claim, saying Hardy “was not treated very well by the director, Stuart Baird.” Perlman went further on Baird’s path to the job: “He was a f***ing editor that the studio owed a favor to. He said, ‘You want to pay me back? Let me direct a movie.’ So they gave him Star Trek: Nemesis.”
Stuart Baird and the 2002 film
Hardy played Praetor Shinzon in Star Trek: Nemesis, the Romulan-created clone of Picard who became the leader of the Remans and planned to invade the Federation and destroy life on Earth. That role put him at the center of the film’s conflict, and the podcast comments shift attention back to how that production handled its lead antagonist more than two decades later.
Patrick Stewart had already described Hardy in his memoir Making It So as an “odd, solitary young man.” Put together, the memoir and the podcast sketch a consistent picture of a young actor working inside a difficult production environment, with the blame in Spiner and Perlman’s telling aimed squarely at Baird rather than Hardy.
Hardy’s MobLand spotlight
The timing also lands while Hardy is tied to MobLand, where he plays Harry Da Souza. In May, reports claimed he had been fired after alleged clashes with executive producers Jez Butterworth and David Glasser, along with reported feuds with Helen Mirren and Pierce Brosnan.
Those reports also said negotiations were underway to resolve the situation and secure Hardy’s return for a potential third season, while Colin Farrell and Idris Elba were cited as possible replacements. That makes the Nemesis comments more than nostalgia: they land while Hardy’s current TV future is already being negotiated in public.
