Nichelle Nichols - Uhura and Beyond - Starlog January 1995

N is for Nichelle Nichols!

I really enjoy Uhura as a character - she is an intelligent and powerful woman, and broke racial barriers. Not only that, but she is absolutely beautiful. Some of my favorite interactions are between Spock and Uhura in the original series, and between Uhura and Scotty in Star Trek V - The Final Frontier.

There was a feature on Nichelle Nichols in the January 1995 issue of Starlog magazine (click images to enlarge):

In this article, she speaks about her autobiography, "Beyond Uhura" - a book which I hope to read in the near future. She writes about how racism has affected her career, and a near rape by a respected lawyer. She also writes about how important music is to her, and the projects she has been involved with throughout her life.

Interestingly, she also writes about her serious relationship with Gene Roddenberry (by the time Star Trek began, they were just close friends), and her intense dislike for William Shatner. I do not enjoy reading about her hostile feelings towards him, because I have heard him speak about the situations discussed from his point of view as well (when I saw him live). I actually found myself disliking Nichelle, and then wondering why - I knew then that I should disregard the seemingly petty argument and focus on the positive aspects of both actors. I still am not fond of Nichelle, but I quite enjoy Uhura.

Uhura seems very bitter about a lot of things when it comes to Star Trek. She also recalls how she felt when she was left out of the Generations movie - stating (jokingly?) that "they successfully left out the two minorities".

The article focuses for a while on her recent projects at the time ("Saturn's Child") and how she would like to end up on Broadway - and then goes back to the topic of Star Trek, where she leaves us with this:

"People still say to me from time to time, 'what does it feel like to know that you will always be known as Uhura?' and I always say, just a bit flippantly, 'It's better than being known as an ax murderer.'" Well, that's positive. (Sarcasm.) She follows that by stating that she loves Star Trek, and she hopes that comes through in her book.

Fun Facts About Star Trek

F is for Fun Facts!

I love reading books about Star Trek, as well as looking through manuals and blueprints. Through my studies, I have stumbled upon many a delightful fact. Here are only a few of them, in no particular order:

• Captain Christopher Pike was played by Jeffrey Hunter in the first Pilot, "The Cage". The crippled Pike in the Menagerie, however, was played instead by Sean Kenney as Jeffrey Hunter wanted to move on to doing movies. 
• The first interracial kiss shown on TV was between Captain Kirk and Uhura, in the episode "Plato's Stepchildren". This kiss was originally to be between Spock and Uhura.

• In order to do the Vulcan salute, Zachery Quinto had to glue his fingers together.
• Spock was originally going to have red skin, but because he would look almost black on black and white TVs, he was given a "chicken soup" coloring instead. He also originally was not going to eat or drink, but would have a special plate in his stomach - he would feed off of any energy that struck the plate. I used my "amazing" editing skills to see what he might look like with red skin:

• After filming "The Trouble With Tribbles", it took about two weeks to get all of the tribbles off the set - between takes, tribbles would be pulled out instead of communicators, and  DeForest Kelley recalls doing surgery on someone - he thinks it was Mark Lenard in Journey to Babel - and pulling out a tribble.
• George Takei had to take fencing lessons before filming The Naked Time, as he had never fenced before.
• Leonard Nimoy had a tootsie pop with him almost constantly, sometimes even with him on set while the camera was rolling, because the the makeup made his mouth so dry.

• Leonard Nimoy, during the second or third year of the Original Series, became an alcoholic - but did not drink while they were filming.
• When planning The Next Generation, they considered getting rid of the Enterprise, and starships altogether - transported technology would be so far advanced that they could simply beam from planet to planet.
• The character, Deanna Troi, was almost given three breasts.
• The original pilot, The Cage, was deemed to sexy for viewers, and this was part of the reason Star Trek did not go further at that time.
• In the original series, "outrageously" sexual content would be inserted into the episodes so that the censors would focus on that instead of themes such as political allegory.
• The network wanted Roddenberry to get rid of two characters: the female first officer, and the demonic looking alien. He begrudgingly removed Number One from the cast, but fought to keep Spock. 

• Majel Barrett, the woman best known for playing the role of Nurse Chapel in the original series, also played roles such as Number One in The Cage, and Lwaxana Troi in The Next Generation. She also did the voices for many characters in the Animated Series, a few being Amanda Grayson, M'Ress, Theela, Lora, the Queen of Hearts, and Randi Bryce. She is also the voice of the Federation computers, a narrator (TNG, DS9,VOY), and has written an episode (DS9). She also became wife to Gene Roddenberry.
• The TOS Enterprise had a six lane bowling ally. 
• Star Trek used many of the set pieces from the Andy Griffith Show, for financial reasons.

Designing the Enterprise Exterior - Matt Jefferies

We all know what the U.S.S. Enterprise NCC-1701 looks like - many fans see it every day, and there are numerous shots of the exterior in every single TOS episode. What many do not know, however, is how the exterior of the Enterprise was developed.

Walter Matt Jefferies, a skilled aviator and mechanical artist, designed both the interior and exterior of the original Enterprise. I have scanned some of the sketches he had made while designing the enterprise from the Star Trek Sketchbook (The Original Series), which can be enlarged by clicking on them.

"Outer space is probably the worst environment for a humanoid - even worse than being under the ocean. Without outside help, there's no way you can live. And since anything that man makes can break down, why put equipment outside the hull, where you'd have to go outside the ship to fix it? That - and my desire to play color off it - was the reason I kept the Enterprise exterior as plain as possible." - Matt Jefferies

According to Jefferies, the Enterprise was given a designation without a profound reason for it's sequence, seeing as a serial number had not been decided on:

"Since the 1920's, N has indicated the United States in Navy terms, and C means "commercial" vessel. I added on the extra C just for fun. Interestingly, Russia's designation is CCC. So the N and the C together made it kind of international.
After that, I had to pick some numbers. They had to be easily identifiable from a distance, so that eliminated 3, 8, 6, 9, and 4 - none of which is that clear from a distance. That didn't leave much! So 1701 was as good a choice as any. The reason we gave for the choice afterwards was that the Enterprise was the 17th major design of the federation, and the first in the series. 17-01!" - Matt Jefferies

When designing the ship, which would have warp drive, he wondered what that would even mean:
"What the hell is warp drive? But I gathered that this ship had to have powerful engines - extremely powerful. To me, that meant that they had to be designed away from the body"
"The other thing is what we called during war a Quick Change Unit. By having the engines out there, if anything is wrong, you can just quickly unhook it and put another in its place." - Matt Jefferies

He tried many ideas such as balls and spheres because he wanted to stay away from the typical saucer. Obviously, he ended up using the saucer after all.

"I decided that whatever we came up with had to be instantly recognizable, and to sell the speed it would probably have to start in the distance as a tiny speck of light, and enlarge and come right by your head or go the other way. In that couple of seconds you had to be able to recognize it.
The habitat part I felt ideally should be a ball, but it got too awkward to play with. It just didn’t look like it would get out of first gear, much less the speeds he was talking about. So it gradually got flattened. I was trying to stay away from a saucer because the UFOs or flying saucer were old hat but it did gradually turn it into a saucer." - Matt Jefferies

Because Jefferies was a member of the Aviation Space Writers' Association, he had material that had come out of any company that had to do with space such as NASA, Northrop and Douglas. He would pin them up on the wall as a reference - things that he would not do. He wanted the Enterprise to be entirely unique.

"Gene described the 100-150 man crew, outer space, fantastic, unheard-of speed, and that we didn't have to worry about gravity. He had emphasized that there were to be no fins, no wings, no smoke trails, no flames, no rocket." - Matt Jefferies

When he and Gene Roddenberry finally decided on a design, it was time to make a small model:

"We had a put a little hook in the top of it with a string, but I was holding it underneath. It was made out of balsa wood, except for the two engine pods which were stock birch dowels, which are much heavier than the other wood.I held it up and Gene took it by the string and it immediately flopped upside down. He liked that better. I didn’t. That was one of our biggest arguments which I won, and then when the show hit the air it was on the cover of TV Guide - printed upside down." - Matt Jefferies

Who knows what the Enterprise would have looked like if Walter Matt Jefferies had not been involved? Certainly it would not have been the success it was (and is), as he not only designed the enterprise, but many of the props, sets, and even the Klingon insignia.