ALL SCI-FI

[Pow]

Article about Trek's debut in 1966 from a Hollywood newspaper and written by Joseph T. Sullivan.

Science fiction, with the exception of Lost In Space and a few episodes on The Twilight Zone, has failed miserably on television.

The overall fault, if one can risk generalization, is two-fold. Writers have concentrated on the gimmicks in the storyline rather than the characters and the viewing public, despite the dawn of the space age several years ago, doesn't seem ready to accept the reality of "way out there."

Even when writers have translated the proven works of science fiction into television terms, popular appeal has been severely limited. Science fiction plays on the Broadway stage have also met with the same general critical disaster.

"Star Trek," an hour-long NBC drama, which will debut Thursday, September 15, at 8:30 p.m., hopes to reverse the failure.

Produced by Norway Productions in association with Desilu and the network itself, the locale is billed as the "completely self-contained U.S.S. Enterprise," a space ship and crew entrusted with the mission of cruising around the galaxy investigating various forms of "alien life forms and social systems."

The premise is wide open, offering countless possibilities for dramatic situations provided, of course, viewers can accept, as previously stated, the basic reality of "way out there."

The strongest reason they may be a hit is Gene Roddenberry, creator and producer of the series. A tall, lumbering ex-cop from the southland, he has a strong background of achievement. In 1959 he was the winner of the Writer's Guild of America Award and his television writing and producing credits include Dragnet, The Dick Powell Show, The Lieutenant, and Have Gun Will Travel. Several episodes on these shows provided some of TV's best scripts.

"What we have is authentic drama," Roddenberry said, "that just happens to take place in outer space."

It also has two able young actors, William Shatner as the captain of the space ship and Leonard Nimoy as the chief science officer; also Grace Lee Whitney as the female executive officer, a honey-haired actress getting her first television series role after a sketchy career of bit parts in films and understudy status on the stage.

Roddenberry also said that a future script of the series will be written by Ray Bradbury, one of the giants of the science and fantasy fiction genre.

It was, in fact, Bradbury's "Martian Chronicles" that paved a significant road to the realization that the genre is merely a setting for a writer to tackle some of the most basic dramatic themes of all time.

A short story in that collection, for example, described what happened to a small southern town when its Negro residents suddenly upped and left for another planet, via a rocket ship. It was one of the best analysis of America's racial problem one could read.

If Star Trek will not back off social issues and commentary, if its characters are strong and believable and if one sees a minimum of light panels that always seem to keep blazing on TV space ships, the series will have a better than even chance of succeeding.

The devoted science fiction audience in the country alone could guarantee it. The science fiction market, as any Science Fiction publisher will tell you, is substantial. And that's an understatement.

Besides, if the series does settle for the banal it can never hope to defeat its competition in the ratings which includes no less, Tammy Grimes, My Three Sons, Bewitched, and the beginning of the Thursday Night Movie.

Blast-off, anyone?

[Bud Brewster]

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That is an impressive article! Mr. Sullivan did a remarkable job of predicting the success of Star Trek and analyzing the reasons why science fiction series have often failed.

Thanks for sharing that with us, Mike!
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Is there no man on Earth who has the wisdom and innocence of a child?
~ The Space Children (1958)

[Pow]

Mr. Sullivan did indeed a fine job with his article. Some journalists that write up such a profile can show a condescending attitude about science fiction. They like to take some sneering digs at it; make cheap jokes at its expense; and don't worry if they mess up any of the details.

Mr. Sullivan did none of that with his well crafted newspaper piece.

I'm not sure referring to Yeoman Janice Rand as an "executive officer" was correct regarding her official status on board the Enterprise. But it may be. At least he gave the lovely Grace Lee Whitney a decent plug.

I'd read somewhere where GR did plan to have Ray Bradbury script an episode of Star Trek. Unsure of exactly what happened because we know RB never did so for the show?

As we noted here on ALL SCI-FI before, sometimes fine SF authors do not make for fine film or television scriptwriters. It takes a certain talent that not all SF authors possess, no matter how great they are in the realm literature. Books and TV can be two entirely different specialties to work in.