THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1996, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Thursday, August 8, 1996 TAG: 9608080047
SECTION: DAILY BREAK PAGE: E1 EDITION: FINAL
TYPE: Column
SOURCE: Larry Bonko
LENGTH: 109 lines
IT WAS 31 YEARS AGO on Stage 15 of the Desilu Studios in Southern California when William Shatner first played Capt. James T. Kirk, commander of the Starship Enterprise. It was in the pilot episode of ``Star Trek'' called ``Where No Man Has Gone Before.''
Actually, it was the second ``Star Trek'' pilot produced by Gene Roddenberry, because NBC had rejected the first (``The Cage''), in which Jeffrey Hunter starred, as being too cerebral and too literate for a Thursday night prime-time audience.
``The NBC executives praised the pilot as beautiful and fantastic but thought it would go over the heads of most viewers. They thought it was too good for TV. NBC wanted more action,'' Roddenberry said in his memoirs.
Enter the swashbuckling Canadian-born Shatner.
``His Captain Kirk is definitely a man of decisive action,'' wrote Roddenberry in the Starship Enterprise crew profiles. Roddenberry's second ``Star Trek'' pilot, made at a cost of $299,974, sold NBC on the series, and the network put it on the air Sept. 8, 1966.
A $1 billion industry was born.
Shatner will appear in Norfolk at Scope, his first appearance in this area in 26 years, during Saturday's ``Trek-o-Rama Star Trek Convention.'' He has been actively involved in the ``Star Trek'' franchise from the time that pilot episode was shot 31 years to the seventh ``Star Trek'' feature film of a few months ago.
But now it is over.
Oh, Shatner will be there to take his bows Oct. 6, when the United Paramount network does ``Star Trek: 30 Years and Beyond,'' a two-hour tribute to Roddenberry's concept of going boldly where no other TV producer had gone before.
And the producers of ``Star Trek: Deep Space Nine'' plan to revive 29-year-old images of Kirk, Spock and the Tribbles later this year. But nobody with ``Star Trek'' in 1996 is sending scripts to Shatner, 65, or asking his counsel.
They are making the eighth film, ``Star Trek: First Contact,'' without Shatner because Kirk is dead and will not be resurrected a la Spock.
How does Shatner feel about ending his ties with ``Star Trek'' after three decades?
``Positively geriatric,'' he said when reached by phone at his office near Los Angeles. ``I have no regrets that I'm being studiously ignored by the producers. It's over. I am basically finished with `Star Trek' except for a trilogy of books.
``I have a full and varied plate of projects before me that includes writing books, screenplays and producing computer software. I do not plan to retire. For me, there is no retirement age.''
Asked about the plans of ``Star Trek'' producers Rick Berman and Jeri Taylor to revive Kirk, Spock and the Tribbles for one episode of ``DS9,'' Shatner said he had not been consulted. ``I have no idea what they have in mind. Some movie magic, no doubt,'' he added.
The producers, when they met with TV writers in Los Angeles not long ago, didn't say how Kirk and Spock would fit in with the ``DS9'' characters.
``We came out with a story that has a nice connection to the original series,'' Berman said.
That will be the ``DS9'' salute to the 30th anniversary of ``Star Trek.'' A similar toast is planned for an episode of ``Star Trek: Voyager'' called ``Flashback,'' in which the Tuvok character (Tim Russ) connects with Sulu (George Takei) from Kirk's crew.
``Through the mind meld and other Vulcan-like specialties, viewers will go back in time to when Tuvok was quite young and crossed paths with Sulu when he was captain of the Excelsior,'' Taylor said. ``We'll probably arrange for Voyager captain Janeway to accompany Tuvok.''
But not before the Voyager crew extracts itself from the planet of the monkey men as the new season unfolds.
Shatner doesn't appear often before gatherings of ``Star Trek'' faithful, and after Norfolk, he isn't likely to do another until Paramount stages the ``Star Trek'' Woodstock in Huntsville, Ala., next month. He's really loosened up lately, spoofing ``Star Trek'' in TV sketches and lecturing Trekkers to come back to Earth, get a life and give up the ``Star Trek'' obsession.
``Some people have been shocked I've done these things,'' he said. ``Why should they be? One of the basic precepts of the original `Star Trek' was that it would be a fun thing. There would be laughs. The people who make the `Star Trek' shows and movies today take the whole thing too seriously.''
And why not? By conservative estimates, Roddenberry's ``Star Trek'' concept - a ``Wagon Train'' to the stars, he called it in 1964 while working on the first script - has evolved into a $1 billion-plus cultural phenomenon. And Shatner, first as Kirk and later as the star of ``T.J. Hooker'' and ``Rescue 911,'' has become an international television star.
Who could have imagined such a thing would happen when Shatner and the seven others in the 1965 cast gathered at Studio 15 on a July day 31 years ago to film the second ``Star Trek'' pilot? Only days before, Roddenberry had changed the captain's name from Robert T. April (first used and discarded by Hunter) to Christopher Pike to James T. Kirk - after rejecting North, Neville, Thorpe and Boone as last names.
``We had no idea what great value would come from what we began to do that day at Desilu 31 years ago,'' said Shatner, who is scheduled to appear at Scope at 3:30 p.m. Saturday.
WGNT and Star Knight Productions of Harrisburg, N.C., are sponsoring the convention, for which general admission tickets at the door are priced at $20 for adults and $12 for ages 6 to 11. VIP seating is $35.
Kirk's first line of dialogue as he sat in the Enterprise's briefing room: ``The bridge said they'd call. We should be intercepting this object. . . .''
It all began right then and there.
``The viewers' need for exploration and adventure still hasn't been satisfied,'' said producer Taylor. Until that happens, the ``Star Trek'' story proceeds at Warp Factor 6, even without James T. Kirk. ILLUSTRATION: Color photo by Paramount Pictures
William Shatner
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