STAR TREK "New Voyages" Lets Trekkers Play Again

For many of us, we grew up with STAR TREK, the Original with Kirk, Spock, and McCoy. It affected our lives in many different, often unseen, ways, but of course we were too young to work on the original series.

In a way, it was the beginning of my journey that has culminated in me working in the entertainment industry. I grew up telling myself stories to put myself to sleep, instead of counting boring sheep. I wrote poetry and short stories for my school magazine and studied to be a research biochemist. I was a rebel child who believed that I lived in a country of the greatest beliefs and ideas and tried to change my beloved country so that it could reflect those axioms on which it was created, and was falling so short of. Star Trek seemed to embody all that I believed in and seemed to speak to our struggles to make our country live up to in reality what it was in its ideals. In fact, it impacted every one of those areas I've mentioned above.

Star Trek fandom gave me a wider audience for my writing than I had with my school newspaper and magazine. In fact, it was a good place to hone my writing skills -- to see what touched people and what didn't, to see what worked and what didn't. From there I learned about conventions and from there I learned about the British science fiction shows. Meeting the actors, writers, producers, and makeup designers from the British shows clued me into how big the production machine is to make a series or a movie in a way that that long scroll of names at the end of a show or movie didn't. Like most Americans, I was off getting my snacks during those long scrolls of names -- after all, I didn't know any of the people, so I didn't think in terms of all those names representing various jobs in the industry -- and that somewhere in that list was a job for me and my love of story-telling.

But I did learn and here I am -- bashing my head against the wall -- trying to stay afloat and do good work here in the industry I love. I wasn't all that fond of the other incarnations of Star Trek so I let them slide out of my consciousness and pursued other avenues. The journey was over... or so I thought.

Imagine my surprise and delight when one of my friends, MARC SCOTT ZICREE, announced to us that he discovered a site online where a group of people were making new original episodes -- newly written, newly acted, 60 minute versions of STAR TREK, THE ORIGINAL, with young actors playing Kirk, Spock, and McCoy from sets constructed in their home town of Ticonderoga, NY. You can check out what they have done on www.newvoyages.com . They were marvellous endeavors and to the surprise of many, Paramount said they could do it as long as they don't make any money from it.

This seemed to be an opportunity for people who once worked the show and who were too young to work the show to come together, help out, and have fun creating something they also once loved. Marc then told us that he and another friend, MICHAEL REAVES were writing an episode for George Takei, "Sulu" and that George loved the script. You can read all about this on Marc's blog, www.zicree.blogspot.com.

Marc let me read his script and I could immediately see why so many people in the industry want to see it (which is not usually the case with science fiction oriented stuff). The script is marvellous. It is exciting and poignant. It has great heart and humor. And it has the characters right on target. Reading this script made me want to be part of the project even more. To my good fortune, Marc has allowed me to contribute something that I do best... I'm script coordinating the project, like I've done for many TV series over the course of my career here. I have just numbered and locked down the production version of the script a few days ago and emailed the script back to the writers so they can get started on their revisions. Now that the script has scene numbers and locked pages, everyone who has it can be on the same page, because they have the exact same copy. Scene numbers make it so much easier for them to be in the same place. So I am so excited to contribute my little bit to this project.

And it feels like I've come full circle -- because now I get to contribute my bit to the series that kick-started me on the journey to here. I'm excited because I'm part of a project that has good people on it and has a great script. Sometimes we truly do live in interesting times.