They cast a woman as the captain.
Robert Beltran in response to the question “What did Voyager do best?” (via radarsteddybear)
He replaced the idea of wanting to be liked with the idea of becoming accomplished. Instead of being interested in being popular, he became interested in being intelligent. And instead of wanting to be powerful, he became interested in being useful.
He said to himself: ‘Not everyone will like me. But there will be those who will accept me just for what I am. I will develop myself to such a point of excellence, intelligence, and brilliance that I can see through any problem and deal with any crisis. I will become such a master of my own abilities and career that there will be a place for me. People of all races will need me and not be able to do without me.’ And that’s just what he did.
- Leonard Nimoy, explaining how Spock dealt with prejudice aimed at his Vulcan-human parentage in response to a letter from a mixed-race girl struggling with real-world racism. (via finallyfrontiered)
The hair, the bosom, the boots, the voice. I mean, it was a CONSTANT examination of my gender. Until I finally marched into the producer’s office and I said ‘You know, Rick, you’ve GOT to stop this. If those people are examining my bosoms with the same intensity as you all are, it gives Star Trek a very bad name indeed.’ Right? Why don’t you just let them learn to trust me, care about me, follow me. Let me become the captain I want to be. Let me endow Janeway with Mulgrew, Mulgrew with Janeway, and then we’ll make a marriage that will last. Otherwise you’re looking at a divorce here.
Kate Mulgrew (x)
Star Trek legend Nichelle Nichols was hired by NASA for a real-life space mission.
CNN story on Nichelle Nichols!
Though Marina Sirtis has voiced her concern that 20th century men are not particularly adept at writing for 24th century women, [Terry] Farrell sounds not the least bit worried. ‘I think it would be difficult for 20th century writers to write about the 24th century, period. How do we know what the problems are going to be? What I like, quite honestly, is that they’ve made Dax and Kira very strong female characters. Kira is a major,’ she notes, ‘and Dax is a second lieutenant. We’re in powerful positions. I’ve already been left in control of Ops several times. Maybe it’s different for Marina because she plays a counselor. She’s an empath, so it’s a whole other ball of wax, but I can understand what Marina’s talking about.’
From an interview with Terry Farrell in the March 1993 issue of Starlog. (via grrrltrek)
To think that we’ll be used to seeing aliens in the 24th century is amazing, but what are we going to go through when we really see aliens for the first time? Look at the riots in L.A. Human beings can’t even get along now. It’s hard to imagine being on a space station with all of these different life forms getting along OK. That’s what’s so great about Deep Space Nine. Just because somebody is a little different doesn’t mean we’re not made of the same stuff. I’m just hoping people will watch our show and relate to it, that they’ll realize, in reality, we’re all human beings. I’m excited about that
- Terry Farrell in Starlog, March 1993. (via grrrltrek)
I can track in my own lifetime the evolution of people of color in the media. It was a huge deal for me as a kid to see Nichelle Nichols on Star Trek. Mae Jemison, my friend and the first African-American woman in space became a scientist and an astronaut because she saw Nichelle as Lt. Uhura on Star Trek. Star Trek has always been about diversity, Infinite Diversity in Infinite Combinations. That’s very much the appeal of Star Trek to me, that and the hopeful nature of the vision. Blacks, women and minorities have always been a part of Star Trek and, over the 30 years Star Trek has been around, that has only grown and increased.
Star Trek is responsible for a lot of firsts. It had the first interracial kiss. I was the first African-American to direct an episode of Star Trek. We’re talking about the ideals that Star Trek embodies being reflected in the society in which it was created. It’s equally as important that young women see Kate Mulgrew as the captain of the Voyager as it is for young black children to see Avery Brooks as the captain of Deep Space Nine, as it was to see Nichelle on Star Trek or me on The Next Generation. I’m happy to be part of that, to be a part of something like Star Trek, that may make as big a difference in other people’s lives as it has made in mine.”
- LeVar Burton in Starlog, May 1997 (via grrrltrek)
When I think of having a son grow up and he can look at what I was involved in and what he remembers of visiting the set, that makes me very happy and proud. Some things on Deep Space Nine may look dated 30 years from now, but I don’t think they will ever look cheap or unimportant. And what we have to say in our stories, the messages they convey, will always be relevant. In that sense, Deep Space Nine will have tremendous staying power.
- Nana Visitor in the October, 1996 issue of Starlog, celebrating Trek’s 30th anniversary. (via grrrltrek)
Interview with Grace Lee Whitney (Janice Rand) in the March 1987 issue of Starlog. Here are some of the highlights for me.
On Rand’s role (as written in Star Trek: IV):
"Chapel and Rand were involved in the crisis situation, for which they gave us five pages of dialogue to read. We didn’t know how much of it they were going to do, so Majel Barrett and I memorized each one of the segements, and we got a chance to do little excerpts from those five pages in this one action scene."
On Rand’s rank (this write-up says she was promoted to Chief Petty Officer but IMDB lists her as Commander Rand):
"I feel that Rand should almost always be at the bottom of the totem pole. She should barely make it because she was a yeoman, although that isn’t really right for me to say."
On how women were portrayed on Star Trek:
"Women were given great roles on Star Trek. I mean, you couldn’t have gotten a more dramatic, more meaty role than the one Jeanne Bal had in ‘Man Trap.’ Kim Darby’s part in ‘Miri’ was about a real issue, about the fear women have about aging and how men look at them. And look at Joan Collins’ role in ‘City on the Edge of Forever,’ which is one of my favourite episodes. Some of the parts that women had were wonderful, highly dramatic, very colorful and interesting. I didn’t feel they were slighted at all.”
On how women are portrayed in media more generally:
"The role of women in every type of film has been an improvement, except in the horror genre, which I absolutely abhor. I’m very against women being portrayed as being mutilated, hurt and abused. Too much sex and violence in film is terribly detrimental to everyone…Why must it always be a woman who’s cut up or chained? That’s what really infuriates me."
You’ll react the same way to hearing the lyrics.
#5. The Unused Star Trek Lyrics Were Created to Screw the Composer
Composer Alexander Courage … agreed to work on this then-obscure show about space malarkey and what have you on the understanding that he would get royalties every time a Star Trek episode aired using the song. Obviously, thanks to the many spinoffs and feature films, Courage is now neck deep in cash and green-skinned strippers of the gender of his fancy.
Or he would be, if there wasn’t a small note in one of the contracts he signed stating that if Gene Roddenberry ever added lyrics to the song, they’d have to split the royalties. Good thing there are no lyrics, then! That would not only shaft a talented composer, but utterly ruin that classic instrumental theme. Ah, but here’s the rub: Nobody said the lyrics had to be used.
Source: cracked.com
[Doohan] was an artillery captain, leading his men to battle during the D-Day invasion of Normandy. Doohan survived, but took one for the team. Actually, he took six for the team, as he was shot that many times in the legs and hands, ultimately leading to the amputation of his right middle finger.
Now, chances are you didn’t ever see a nine-fingered Scotty while watching Star Trek. That’s because, instead of giving the character an origin tale where his fuck-you finger was shot off in a tragic Phaser accident back at the Academy, Doohan chose to hide the amputation. You rarely saw his hands close up and, when you did, they weren’t his, but rather a stunt double. Of course, sometimes a stunt double wasn’t an option, and we got this as a result. #CrackedClassic
The 94 Most Badass Soldiers Who Ever Lived
Source: cracked.com
I actually didn’t know until this year that the Talosians in “The Cage” were all played by women with dubbed male voices. So I was interested to read more about how this came about in Marc Cushman’s These are the Voyages: TOS: Season One.
"Meg Wyllie, 47 was made up to play ‘The Keeper,’ a hairless alien man. Director Butler had the idea that it might be interesting to create an ‘anti-sexuality’ for these aliens who had given up all physical sensation in favor of intellectual pursuits. Roddenberry loved the idea; it was an inventive and daring choice. It was also Butler’s idea to cast Wyllie. He had directed her before during her career in television, which included recent appearances on Perry Mason and Wagon Train.”
"The refined Meg Wyllie said, ‘I had never played such a role nor had such a makeup job applied to me. The base was an old-fashioned rubber bathing cap - the type with a chin strap…Upon the cap, a rubber substance was placed. When that was set, the special effects people finished the skull - placing the blood vessels and covering them. The makeup was not comfortable - my ears especially suffered being so confined under the cap.’
Wyllie’s instructions were to play the part with ‘dignity and control.’ She remembered, ‘A mental, rather than physical, approach was needed to concentrate on the words that I was saying. The pulsing in the veins in my skull and very little facial expression were to be the only visible effects of my thought transfers…I was most intrigued.’”
“This race of ‘Yankee traders’ evolved over the years from a hostile, opportunistic culture in their early depictions in TNG to a fully structured complex society as seen on Deep Space Nine. While in large measure the characterizations of the Ferengi grew because of Armin Shimerman, Max Grodénchik, Aron Eisenburg, and Wallace Shawn, to mention a few, the characters were also effective because of a collaborative makeup design process. […]
All through the appearances of the Ferengi on TNG, the makeup department had a one-head-fits-all policy. When Armin Shimerman was cast as Quark, that policy changed. The original heads were relegated to Max Grodénchik, Aron Eisenburg (Rom and Nog) and to the background Ferengi. A newer, larger head was constructed, something that would be more comfortable for Armin to wear. And to make the head appliance more comfortable for him, makeup sculpted holes in the sides of the appliance for Armin’s ears to go through so they wouldn’t have to be flattened. His ears fit inside the ear appliances. The ‘new head’ allowed Armin to stand out.
Eventually two customized heads were developed, one for another Ferengi, Jeffrey Combs, called Brunt, and the female Ferengi, whose ears were smaller than the males’. For the grand nagus, the makeup department started with the basic Quark head appliance and made larger ears and a more wrinkled forehead and neck. Thus the Zek head contains additional pieces that were glued on over the top of Quark’s head so that the grand nagus looks older and far more wizened than either Quark or his brother Rom.
Another Ferengi development concerened the way the makeup department enhanced their teeth. The original TNG Ferengi had sharp jutting upper teeth but straight lowers. In DS9 the makeup department added a set of lower teeth to fill in the gaps in the uppers and give them an even more piranhalike appearance. The designers made moulds for the lower teeth to fit into the spaces between the upper teeth so the characters could talk, even though it affected their speech. The Ferengi also had blue painted fingernails, and Zek was given longer false nails.”
Source: Star Trek Aliens & Artifacts [Michael Westmore et al.] 2000
For example, there’s a scene in “The Cage” where the young girl who’s living on Talos IV begins to appear differently to Pike. In one of these incarnations, she appears as an uninhibited green slave girl. Of course, no green woman had ever before appeared on television, and for that reason no one quite knew how to pull it of, not even Star Trek’s master makeup artist, Freddie Phillips. […] Majel Barret put up with Freddie’s emerald concoction and put her best face forward for some screen tests. Everything went well … until they watched the dailies. When the screen tests came back from the lab, they showed Freddie’s guinea pig/actress with perfectly normal skin tones. “This is fucking impossible!” screamed Freddie. Gene ordered a new batch of screen tests. […] A new actress was hauled in and plastered with Freddie’s new foul-looking, and now equally foul-smelling, concoction. But once again the test footage came back from the lab bearing the beautiful image of a lovely pink-skinned young actress. […] Finally, after adding some unusual ingredients into the mix, they once again came up with a bright green batch of new improvised paste, and proceeded to spackle it all over the lovely young mug of yet another horrified actress. Test footage was shot once more, and once again a fine pinkish Caucasian complexion appeared. […]
Finally, a dejected Roddenberry calls the film processing lab to see if they can suggest any filter or lighting tricks that might make an actress appear bright green on film.
“What?” stammers the quite obviously terrified lab technician. “I’ve been working overtime the last three nights trying to correct your actresses’ lousy green skin tones. … I had no idea you wanted them green, I just thought you had hired a shitty cinematographer.”
Technical problems whilst shooting “The Cage” Star Trek Memories by William Shatner with Chris Kreski (via fictionalred)
“Female Star Trek fans [are] among the most active in engaging their sci-fi hobby in creative ways, cosplaying, writing fan-fiction, and producing artwork generally more than their male counterparts,” sociologists Maria and John Jose-Tenuto wrote earlier this year, describing the findings of an international, 8,000-fan survey they conducted back in 2006 to study fandom subcultures. “The strong connection with Star Trek by female fans has its roots in the initial days of fandom when pioneers like Bjo Trimble, Eileen Becker, Elyse Pines, Shirley Maiewski, Devra and Deborah Langsam, and Jacqueline Lichtenberg helped pave the way for many of the same fan activities in existence today.”
“Boldly Going Where No Man (or Woman) Had Gone Before" by Devon Maloney
The first official Star Trek convention, held at the Hotel Pennsylvania in January, 1972, featuring appearances by the show’s creators and cast, quickly became the stuff of fandom legend. [Joan] Winston and crew had planned for 500 attendees. Instead, they got over 3,000.
“Boldly Going Where No Man (or Woman) Had Gone Before" by Devon Maloney