Star Trek: 10 Things You Didn’t Know About Quark
7. His relationship with Odo was modelled after Casablanca
Michael Curtiz's 1942 wartime romance film is a masterpiece in its own right, but you would hardly call it science fiction, would you? Well, it might not be sci-fi, but it definitely had an influence on a very small, very niche aspect of a sci-fi franchise.
The relationship between Quark and Odo, the Security Constable on Deep Space Nine, is one of fans' favourite dynamics of the series and it often served as both comic relief and a means to advance the plot. However, what you might not have known is that that relationship was inspired by a similar one from Casablanca.
In the movie, Rick Blaine is the owner of Rick's Café Américain and Captain Louis Renault is an officer of the French police; and the relationship between the two of them is very complicated. Sounds familiar?
The dynamic between Quark and Odo is very much of the "one you love to hate" variety, and that is what was brought in from the film, but the resemblance more or less ends there. The Deep Space Nine characters went their own way and became much more complex.