A Brief Guide to Star Trek (9 page)

During this period it was Coon, not Roddenberry, who created several key concepts, including many that survived well beyond
The Original Series
to inform the movies and successor TV shows. Among them were the Klingons (in ‘Errand of Mercy’), genetic Übermensch Khan Noonien Singh (in ‘Space Seed’), warp speed developer Zefram Cochrane (in ‘Metamorphosis’) and the concept of the Prime Directive (which pro -posed non-interference in undeveloped indigenous planetary
cultures). Coon’s supervision also resulted in the naming of the United Federation of Planets, while Starfleet Command was established as the body that directed the voyages of the
Enterprise
.

Coon’s work, alongside that of Roddenberry, Fontana, Black and the individual episodic writers served to create a coherent, seemingly consistent universe within which the
Star Trek
TV adventures could take place. There is a sense of completeness and consistency to the environment in which the characters exist, even if individual early episodes feature glaring continuity errors or shifts in the naming of parts of the ship or peoples (is it deflector screens or deflector shields? Vulcanians or Vulcans?). These details would be more clearly defined over time, but the bigger picture made the future world of
Star Trek
feel like a real, coherent place.

These details accumulated, episode by episode, and were shaped by Roddenberry’s rewriting into a gradually more cohesive universe. As well as Coon’s major contributions, other elements that make up the recognisable
Star Trek
universe came from a variety of people. D. C. Fontana gave Spock his parents – a Vulcan father and human mother (he’d previously only admitted to ‘human ancestors’ in ‘Where No Man Has Gone Before’) – as well as the two-handed Vulcan ‘death grip’ (a bluff used by Spock to fake Kirk’s death in ‘The
Enterprise
Incident’). It was from her episodes that two alien races emerged, the blue antenna-sporting Andorians and the Tellarites, one of the founding races of the United Federation of Planets – both would survive right through to
Enterprise
. Leonard Nimoy came up with the more benign Vulcan nerve pinch for Spock, based on Richard Matheson’s script ‘The Enemy Within’, which contained the idea that Spock could disable enemies in a non-violent, non-fatal way. Nimoy also contributed the Vulcan salute, a peaceful, welcoming hand gesture (with the raised palm held outwards and fingers parted in the middle in a V-shape), apparently basing it on a half-remembered Jewish blessing and the Hebrew letter Shin (meaning ‘God)’. The Romulans, a
long-running
Star Trek
antagonist race based on the Romans, pre-dated the more well-known Klingons, first appearing in Paul Schneider’s script ‘Balance of Terror’ (which also introduced actor Mark Lenard, later to play Spock’s father, Sarek). Writer Schimon Wincelberg (under his pen name S. Bar-David) introduced the Vulcan mind-meld in ‘Dagger of the Mind’, allowing Spock to read the thoughts of other beings through physical contact. The background of Spock’s Vulcan race was further developed by Theodore Sturgeon in ‘Amok Time’, which, as well as introducing the Vulcan salute, also saw the debut of the phrase ‘Live long and prosper’ as a Vulcan greeting.

While Roddenberry came to be affectionately fêted by
Star Trek
fans as ‘the Great Bird of the Galaxy’ and sole creator of
Star Trek
, it is clear that (as with all television productions) many creative hands were involved, even if one person provided the initial guiding force for all the others to follow. In a later speech, Roddenberry noted: ‘When they say on a show “Created by” anyone, like “Created by Gene Roddenberry”, that is not true. I laid out a pathway, and then the only thing I will take credit for is [that] I surrounded myself by very bright people who came up with all those wonderful things.’

Writing about the creation of
Star Trek
, D. C. Fontana noted: ‘It was not one mind, but many – a creation by people who lived and loved the show. More than forty years later audiences still watch and enjoy
Star Trek
, quite an accomplishment for a show that almost didn’t make it.’

By early 1966 Gene Roddenberry had secured his long-held dream: an order for sixteen episodes of his own space show on network television.
Star Trek
’s production was in full swing by summer 1966, with the lessons learnt on the two pilots applied to the shooting of individual episodes in the space of six to eight days. The scripts were flowing in and Roddenberry’s rewrites were flowing out, via line producer Robert Justman, to the cre -ative departments who had to supply the costumes, the props and the planetary locations used to tell
Star Trek
stories.

Roddenberry had determined that by including ‘Where No
Man Has Gone Before’ and by using ‘The Cage’ footage as the basis for a later two-part episode, he could reduce the required number of new episodes by three. For those first thirteen new instalments, storyteller Gene Roddenberry owned
Star Trek
– others may have contributed to the series’ core concepts and ideals through their scripts (as noted), but every one of those initial thirteen episodic scripts went through the ruthless Roddenberry rewrite machine. He was the final arbiter as to what was or was not part of his
Star Trek
. Working late nights and weekends on others’ scripts, Roddenberry was determined that his universe would make sense and be attractive to viewers. That was one reason he insisted on his show depicting an optimistic future. ‘I believe in humanity’, noted Roddenberry during a speech marking his acceptance of a star on Hollywood Boulevard in 1985. ‘We are an incredible species. We’re still just a child-creature, we’re still being nasty to each other. And all children go through those phases. We’re growing up, we’re moving into adolescence now. When we grow up – man, we’re going to be something.’

Shooting on the first of the new episodes (‘The Corbomite Maneuver’) began on 24 May 1966, with script revisions continuing right up until the days that various scenes were shot, common practice in television. By now the
Star Trek
production unit was firmly established within Desilu. The budget per episode was set at around $193,000, at the top end of the scale for one-hour drama in the late 1960s, but this was due to
Star Trek
’s many unique production and post-production requirements in sets, props and costumes, as well as special visual and sound effects. One way to keep down costs was in establishing an effects library. Fly-by shots of the
Enterprise
were regularly reused as the ship came into orbit around another planet (usually the same stock planet, recoloured), while regular bits of tech like the medical tricorder, the phaser or the communicator were given their own signature sounds. The background noise for the bridge of the
Enterprise
similarly worked its way into the consciousness of a generation through constant repetition.
The pulsing sound effect itself was not created especially for
Star Trek
, but instead came from the Paramount sound library. It can even be disconcertingly heard in earlier episodes of
The Outer Limits
and
The Twilight Zone
, pre-dating
Star Trek
. The consistent use of these sounds establishes time and place in
Star Trek
: they’re different from the sounds surrounding the 1960s viewer at home or at work, yet through reuse and repetition they provide a consistent sense of place in a far out (in time and space, as well as in concept) drama.

Only William Shatner and Leonard Nimoy were contracted to appear in all thirteen of the first batch of episodes. DeForest Kelley – one of the original actors under consideration for the role of Dr Boyce on ‘Where No Man Has Gone Before’ – filled the role of the irascible Doctor McCoy, but was only signed up for seven of the first thirteen episodes. Canadian actor James Doohan was cast as Scottish engineer Scotty and guaranteed five shows. George Takei was cast as Sulu, fulfilling Roddenberry’s hopes for a multi-ethnic range of characters on the
Enterprise
, and signed up for seven shows. Nichelle Nichols won the role of Communications Officer Uhura, but no minimum number of episodes was guaranteed. Actress Grace Lee Whitney was guaranteed four days’ work across seven episodes, as her character of Yeoman Janice Rand was then considered part of the core group indicated by her inclusion in many of the pre-publicity photos. Rand was, however, quietly dropped while Uhura went on to become one of the characters instantly connected with
Star Trek
. These contractual arrangements go some way to explaining why across the early
Star Trek
episodes, characters appear to come and go and some don’t feature in certain episodes at all, even McCoy, who was nonetheless quickly established as one of the core trio. This flexibility, however, allowed the production team to respond to audience reaction to characters and make changes and substitutions in the hope of firming up that audience appeal. This was quite far-sighted and fortuitous, especially as one
Star Trek
character proved
to be more popular with 1960s viewers than any other: the ‘satanic-looking’ Mr Spock.

Prior to
Star Trek
’s September 1966 debut, a few pivotal details had to be locked down. The opening of the show would be important in highlighting the setting of
Star Trek
in the viewers’ minds every week. This had to be done in a succinct manner, quickly and easily over the show’s opening credits. Alexander Courage had been commissioned to produce the theme tune for the first pilot and that would be retained, but Gene Roddenberry wanted a voiceover explaining what the series was about (following Herb Solow’s early suggestion). As the episodes featured regular ‘Captain’s Log’ story updates, it seemed sensible to have the ‘saga sell’ (as the dramatic statement of the concept of a show is called today) narrated in character by William Shatner as Captain Kirk. The only debate was around the exact detail of what he would say.

In August 1966, just five weeks before the first episode aired, associate producer Robert Justman sent an urgent memo to Roddenberry pointing out: ‘It is important that you compose, without delay, our standard opening narration for Bill Shatner to record. It should run about fifteen seconds in length.’ That opened the floodgates for various
Star Trek
creatives to try their hands at crafting a suitable opening narration, something that encapsulated the story of this new show. Roddenberry’s first attempt was rather long-winded: ‘This is the story of the United Space Ship
Enterprise
. Assigned a five-year patrol of our galaxy, the giant starship visits Earth colonies, regulates commerce, and explores strange new worlds and civilizations. These are its voyages . . . and its adventures.’

Although that contained some of the now classic
Star Trek
opening narration, it wasn’t quite snappy enough. Justman’s turn at honing Roddenberry’s words got closer to what was needed: ‘This is the story of the starship
Enterprise
. Its mission: to advance knowledge, contact alien life and enforce intergalactic law . . . to explore strange new worlds, where no man has gone before.’

Although Justman developed the distinctive rhythm that would be used in the final narration, it still needed editing and revising. Producer John D. F. Black took a pass at crafting suitable opening words. ‘The USS
Enterprise
. . . starship . . . Its mission, a five-year patrol to seek out and contact alien life . . . to explore the infinite frontier of space . . . Where no man has gone before . . . A Star Trek!’

His second attempt introduced more pivotal elements that would influence the final, now classic, narration: ‘Space, the final frontier . . . Endless, silent, waiting . . . This is the story of the United Space Ship
Enterprise
. Its mission, a five-year patrol of the galaxy – to seek out and contact all alien life, to explore, to travel the vast galaxy where no man has gone before . . . A Star Trek!’

After over a week of this, Gene Roddenberry pulled together the various drafts on 10 August 1966 and crafted this final (and now famous) version for Shatner to record: ‘Space, the final frontier. These are the voyages of the starship
Enterprise
. . . Its five-year mission to explore strange new worlds, seek out new life and new civilizations, to boldly go where no man has gone before . . .’

Roddenberry had successfully fused the best elements of all the drafts by himself, Justman and Black to craft a new, snappier and more rhythmic narration, while also introducing, in ‘to boldly go’, the infamous split infinitive that would haunt him. The narration’s indication of a five-year mission for the
Enterprise
was also a statement of intent on behalf of the show’s producers, who hoped to secure a lengthy and profitable run for
Star Trek
, as after five years there’d be enough episodes to put the show into syndication.

Prior to the launch of
Star Trek
, Gene Roddenberry had the good sense to court the growing body of science fiction fans that gathered regularly at conventions. He felt they could act as ambassadors for his show, spreading awareness to their friends and family via word of mouth. Roddenberry felt that such fans
(often more wedded to literary science fiction than the ‘lighter’ film and TV variety) were so starved of decent television fantasy that they’d support
Star Trek
regardless of whether they personally liked the show or not.

Some television producers may have seen Roddenberry’s attendance at the 24th Annual World Science Fiction Convention in Cleveland – just five days before his new show premiered on NBC – as foolhardy. They’d no doubt be keener on him touring the TV talk shows and news studios to promote their new show. Roddenberry, however, felt it important to cultivate fan support – you never knew when it might come in useful . . .