Aug. 26, 1977 review: Gene Roddenberry at the Niagara Falls Convention Center


 

The man who gave us Star Trek comes down to earth. 

Aug. 26, 1977 Gusto 

Trekkies, Read On 

          Gene Roddenberry, the TV producer who created the pioneering Star Trek science fiction series in the ‘60s, showed his home movies in the Niagara Falls Convention Center Thursday night and virtually sold the place out.

          Long lines at the box office obliged the organizers to delay the start of the program for half an hour. Meanwhile, inbound cars jammed up for half a mile on the barricaded Robert Moses Parkway, their drivers no doubt wishing for a transporter unit that would beam them to their seats.

          Roddenberry’s own coordinates were fixed on good news for followers of the show, which has been rerun almost continually here since 1970. Star Trek II is in pre-production. Shooting of a two-hour movie-of-the-week version will begin late this year. It’ll be done by February.

          More than $2 million is being spent on that first episode. “Paramount is serious about this,” the bespectacled writer and producer said. “We assume they will like what they see. The Enterprise will be on its second five-year mission and this time I’d like to last out the whole mission – do it all.

          Roddenberry showed color slides of carpentry work on the new bridge of the United Starship Enterprise and recent pictures of returning stars from the original series.

          William Shatner, who played Captain Kirk, has just agreed to come back, Roddenberry announced. James Doohan will return as Engineer Scott. Dr. McCoy (DeForest Kelley) is aboard too, as is Nurse Chapel (Majel Barrett), who also is Roddenberry’s wife.

          Not so, however, for the most popular figure in the series, Leonard Nimoy’s pointy-eared alien Mr. Spock. Nimoy is doing “Equus” on Broadway and is no longer interested in series TV, though he may make guest appearances. In his place will be a new young science officer from Spock’s home planet of Vulcan.

          Special effects, instrumentation and the vision of outer space will benefit from the scientific and technological advances of the past 10 years. Roddenberry showed breathtaking slides of the planets and the Andromeda galaxy as examples of where future Star Trekkers will tread.

          The series also will benefit from the loosening of TV taboos over the past 10 years. The new Enterprise will have something the old one didn’t – toilets.

          “You know who you can thank for that?” Roddenberry asked with a wink. “Archie Bunker.”

          The producer announced that a new science fiction craze is in the works. Star Trek II, which Paramount hopes to start an independent TV network with, is only the beginning. Universal Studios, he said, has bought the rights to Buck Rogers.

          Roddenberry, an engaging, business-like figure in a gray suit, white shirt and red tie, amplified his show’s enthusiasm for the limitless reach of mankind and science. The successful test of America’s space shuttle, he noted, is our breakthrough into the age of interplanetary travel.

          “We humans belong wherever we can get,” he said.

          High points were the two expertly-edited blooper reels, featuring ruined takes of scenes long familiar to fans. Spock went blank. McCoy blew a diagnosis. Running crewmen collided and fell down. Female guest stars made undainty tugs at their costumes.

          More ludicrousness was seen in the costume contest, which was won by a pint-sized Mr. Spock named Peter Murphy. The deejay conducting the contest kept calling him Larry. Other finalists included two young women in spangled showgirl outfits.

          “We’re inhabitants from a distant planet,” they told the deejay.

          “How far?” he asked.

          “Pretty far,” was the answer.

* * * * *

IN THE PHOTO: Gene Roddenberry a year before this appearance, visiting the Space Shuttle Enterprise in Palmdale, Calif., with other Star Trek cast members. He's the one on the far right. 

* * * * *

FOOTNOTE: What spurred Paramount into backing the revival of Star Trek was the overwhelming success of the first “Star Wars” movie, which had come out in June. But plans for that new TV network fell through and Roddenberry’s project turned into a feature film, “Star Trek: The Motion Picture,” which was released in 1979. For that voyage, Leonard Nimoy was back on board.

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