TREKCORE > DEEP SPACE NINE > CAST > Rom

PLAYED BY: Max Grodenchik
FULL NAME: Rom
SPECIES: Ferenginar
POSITION/OCCUPATION: Worked for Quark as "assistant manager of policy and clientele" until "Bar Association", when he joined the station engineering crew (see below)
RANK/TITLE: Diagnostic and Repair Technician, junior grade, night shift; was promoted to day shift in "The Assignment"; was promoted to maintenance engineer, first class in "It's Only a Paper Moon"; became Grand Nagus in "The Dogs of War"
BIRTHPLACE: Ferenginar
PARENTS: Keldar (father, deceased); Ishka (mother)
SIBLING: Quark (older brother)
CHILD: Nog (son by Prinadora)
OTHER FAMILY: Firn, Gorad (uncles); Barbo, Gaila, Kono, Stol (cousins)
SPOUSE(S): Prinadora (1st wife); Leeta (eventual 2nd wife)

As a child, Rom was teased for his smaller-than-average lobes; on his Naming Day, Quark replaced his presents with old vegetables, and sold the presents. His first wife, Nog's mother, was named Prinadora; Rom signed a standard five-year marriage contract with her in order to have a child, but then fell in love with her and wanted to extend the contract. Prinadora's father swindled him out of all his money, and Prinadora left Rom for a richer man.

Most people believed that Rom was stupid (Quark's favorite manner of address towards him was "you idiot"); but he was actually a mechanical genius. Nog said of him once that he could have been chief engineer of a starship if he had had the opportunity. But after being ruined by his father-in-law, Rom ended up working for Quark, and stayed with his brother when Starfleet took over the station.

Rom's one ambition in those days was to take over the bar, and it was to this end that he actually plotted with Krax to assassinate Quark when the latter was briefly made Grand Nagus (in "The Nagus"). Afterwards, Quark was so impressed by Rom's unusual show of initiative that he made him assistant manager of policy and clientele (which pretty much meant that Rom's job was exactly the same as before). Rom acted in a similarly sneaky manner when he sold Quark's runabout seat during an evacuation to a Dabo girl in "The Siege", and when he snooped out Pel's secret in "Rules of Acquisition". He once deserted Quark to work for Martus (in "Rivals") for a short period of time.

Rom increasingly showed signs of backbone in "Heart of Stone" (when he supported Nog's desire to join Starfleet, against Quark's wishes), in "Family Business" (when he schemed to get his feuding brother and mother talking again), and in "Facets" (when he told Quark off after the latter sabotaged Nog's pre-Starfleet Academy entrance exam). His engineering expertise was instrumental in "Little Green Men" and "Our Man Bashir".

In "Bar Association", finally fed up with Quark's heavy-handed management, Rom led a strike of the bar's workers. After Brunt had Quark beaten up as an example, Rom agreed to settle the matter secretly. He quit the bar and took a position in the station's crew, as Diagnostic and Repair Technician, junior grade, night shift (he later was promoted to the exalted day shift, and in the 7th season, he became a maintenance engineer, first class). But Rom continued to be Quark's main (albeit unappreciated) source of support.

During this period, Rom fell in love with Leeta, one of his brother's Dabo girls, but was too shy to tell her until she nearly left the station in "Doctor Bashir, I Presume". They became engaged, though they hit a snag (in "Ferengi Love Songs") when Rom wanted Leeta to sign a Waiver of Property and Profit, and she refused; Rom's solution was to give away all his money, so that he no longer had assets to "protect" from her. Rom and Leeta were married by Captain Sisko in "Call to Arms", after which he stayed on the station to be a spy for the Federation. (Whether the Federation was aware of this or not is debatable.)

Rom undeniably played the biggest role in saving the Alpha Quadrant during the occupation of DS9 by the Dominion and Cardassia. For one thing, it was he who came up with the idea for the self-replicating mines that were deployed across the wormhole's entrance and prevented more Dominion ships from coming through. In "Behind the Lines", to prevent the station's deflector array from being used to destroy the minefield, he tried to disable it, but was caught and arrested. Rom was to be executed for his act of "terrorism" in "Favor the Bold"/"Sacrifice of Angels"; but after he, Kira, Leeta, and Jake were freed by Quark and Ziyal, he tried to shut down the station's power. He failed to do so in time to stop the destruction of the minefield. However, he did take the station's weapons offline, preventing Damar from firing on the Defiant as it entered the wormhole.

Rom got to be a hero again when he helped rescue his mother from the Dominion in "The Magnificent Ferengi"; and on a smaller scale in "Take Me Out to the Holosuite", when he entered the baseball game as a substitute (after being kicked off the team by Sisko due to his ineptness), and enabled the Niners' only score due to a purely accidental bunt. In "The Emperor's New Cloak", he accompanied Quark and the mirror Ezri to the alternate universe, and saved the day there by sabotaging the power grid of Regent Worf's ship.

Finally, in "The Dogs of War", when Quark believed he was soon to become the next Grand Nagus, he sold the bar to Rom at last. However, when Zek arrived, it turned out that Rom himself was Zek's intended successor. Rom accepted the staff and the position. His comment: "Wow."

Other facts: Rom was credited only as the "Ferengi Pit Boss" in "Emissary", and was named for the first time in "A Man Alone", in which he was a very different character from what he later became: he was much more of a hardline Ferengi, and the actor used a different voice.

Max Grodenchik

Max Grodénchik played Rom, the former barkeep/technician/waste extraction engineer on station Deep Space 9 who has moved up to the position of Grand Nagus of the Ferengi Alliance. A highly unconventional Ferengi — he has very little business sense but he's a mechanical genius and has a keen social conscience — Rom is brother to Quark, father of Nog and husband of the sexy Bajoran dabo girl, Leeta.

Prior to his recurring role in Star Trek: Deep Space Nine, Grodénchik played two other Ferengi characters on Star Trek: The Next Generation: Sovak in "Captain's Holiday" and Par Lenor in "The Perfect Mate." He has a history in other science-fiction and similar genre films and TV shows. He played a NASA flight dynamics officer in Ron Howard's "Apollo 13" (Howard's children are big fans of DS9). He also played the title role in the 1996 horror film "Rumpelstiltskin," and was mangled to death by Timothy Dalton's henchman in "The Rocketeer." His other TV appearances include Sliders, Tales from the Crypt, and the 1995 TV movie "Here Come the Munsters."

It was Grodénchik's murder at the hands of Harvey Keitel that forced fellow Star Trek alum Whoopi Goldberg to don a habit in 1992's "Sister Act." His film credits date back to 1981 with the comedy "Chu Chu and the Philly Flash" starring Carol Burnett and Alan Arkin. His TV credits also include The Drew Carey Show, Night Court, Civil Wars, Doogie Howser and thirtysomething.

The Bronx, New York-born actor has played regional theatres across the United States, from Yale Rep to the Guthrie Theater to the Mark Taper Forum.

Grodénchik enjoys attending Star Trek conventions because most of what he's learned about the show comes from talking with fans. In fact, in addition to his acting talents, Grodénchik is an expert on the Ferengi Rules of Acquisition, and can quote them by memory.

Note: his appearance in "Captain's Holiday" was credited as "Michael Grodenchik".

Bio from StarTrek.com