Tue 21 Aug 2012
STAR TREK FOR THE MYSTERY FAN, by Michael Shonk.
Posted by Steve under Reviews , TV mysteries , TV Science Fiction & Fantasy[45] Comments
by Michael Shonk
STAR TREK. NBC / Paramount Studios, 1966-1969. Created by Gene Roddenberry. Cast: William Shatner as Captain James T. Kirk, Leonard Nimoy as Mr. Spock, and DeForrest Kelley as Dr. Leonard “Bones†McCoy
While Star Trek is TV’s most famous science fiction series, many of its episodes can be considered part of the mystery genre:
â— “Journey to Babel.” (11/17/67) Written by D.C. Fontana. Directed by Joseph Pevney. Guest Cast: Mark Lenard and Miss Jane Wyatt
While the episode focuses on the relationship between Spock and his parents, the story’s backdrop of political intrigue, spies, and murder will appeal to those seeking a good TV thriller. The Enterprise is escorting a group of diplomats on their way to an important conference when one of them is murdered and Spock’s Dad (Mark Lenard) is the chief suspect.
â— “Conscience of the King.” (12/8/66) Written by Barry Trivers. Directed by Gerd Oswald. Guest Cast: Arnold Moss, Barbara Anderson, and Bruce Hyde.
A friend tries to convince Kirk that an actor in a touring troupe of Shakespearean actors is the long sought after mass murderer, Kodos the Executioner. When the friend is murdered, Kirk investigates the troupe further. The acting and dialog are too much over the top for my taste, but the final confession scene is worthy of Perry Mason.
â— “Court Martial.” (2/2/67) Teleplay by Don M. Mankiewicz and Steven W. Carabatsos. Story by Don M. Mankiewicz. Directed by Marc Daniels. Guest Cast: Percy Rodriguez, Elisha Cook and Joan Marshall.
Speaking of lawyer Perry Mason, the courtroom was featured in more than one episode of the series. In this episode, Kirk is on trail for causing the death of a crew member. The lawyer (Elisha Cook) was right out of the Perry Mason’s school as he pulled one dramatic trick after another.
â— “The Menagerie, Part One.” (11/17/66) Written by Gene Roddenberry. Directed by Marc Daniels (*). “Part Two.” (11/24/66) Written by Gene Roddenberry. Directed by Robert Butler (*). Guest Cast: Malachi Throne and Sean Kenny; from the series pilot, “The Cage”: Jeffrey Hunter, Susan Oliver and M. Leigh Hudea.
Spock kidnaps invalid Christopher Pike, his former Captain and forces the Enterprise to travel to the off limits planet Talos IV. During the trip Spock is put on trail for mutiny. The courtroom is used as a framing device so the series can save some production time and money and show the series original pilot, “The Cage.”. Spock’s motives and what happened on the original mission supply the mystery for this Hugo award winning two-part episode.
(*) Robert Butler directed the pilot “The Cage” but was not interested in returning. Marc Daniels directed the new footage and the two split the credit with Daniels getting screen credit for Part One and Butler getting screen credit for Part Two.
â— “Wolf in the Fold.” (12/22/67) Written by Robert Bloch. Directed by Joseph Pevney. Guest Cast: John Fiedler, Charles Macauley and Pilar Seurat.
This is the series’ attempt at a police procedural. During a visit to a planet, Chief Engineer Scott (James Doohan) is accused of being a serial killer. The chief investigator uses the typical procedural methods of fingerprints (Scotty’s fingerprints were on the murder weapon), and questioning witnesses and other suspects, but the story does take a supernatural turn or two CSI might not have taken.
â— “The Enterprise Incident.” (9/27/68) Written by D.C. Fontana. Directed by John Meredyth Lucas. Guest Cast: Joanne Linville, Jack Donner and Richard Compton.
Inspired by the real spy drama of the Pueblo incident. Kirk takes the Enterprise into Romulan (the series other bad guys) Neutral Zone where the ship and crew are captured. Fans of Spock like this one as the female Romulan Captain seduces our hero of logic. The spy thriller plot of obtaining military secrets from the enemy is a strong one.
â— “The Trouble with Tribbles.” (12/29/67) Written by David Gerrold. Directed by Joseph Pevney. Guest Cast: William Schallert, Stanley Adams, and William Campbell.
Perhaps the series’ most beloved episode was also the cutest TV episode ever to be about a terrorist plot to kill millions. Who can forget those non-stop reproducing adorable balls of fur called Tribbles? Love by all, well almost all. And that was the key to foiling the evil scheme and uncovering the villain responsible.
â— “A Piece of the Action.” (1/12/68) Teleplay by David P. Harmon and Gene L. Coon. Story by David P. Harmon. Guest Cast: Anthony Caruso, Vic Tayback and Lee Delano.
The Enterprise’s visit to a planet “contaminated†a century earlier by visiting explorers from Earth leads to a fun comic caper. The planet had adopted an Earth history book on 1920’s Chicago mobs as the basis of their civilization. Someone took a Tommy gun and shot the story full of plot holes, so try not to think too hard and just enjoy this humorous nod to great gangsters movies (there is a scene that mimics Mervyn LeRoy’s Little Caesar).
Sadly, Gene Roddenberry’s original Star Trek world was too perfect for any true noir unless you wore a red uniform or was a beautiful woman one of the guys fell in love with, then you were as doomed as any noir character.
NOTE: For more information and endless spoilers I recommend a visit to Memory Alpha at http://en.memory-alpha.org/wiki/Star_Trek:_The_Original_Series.
August 21st, 2012 at 6:12 pm
About the picture of Shatner half buried in Tribbles, he is not totally acting annoyed there. It took eight takes to do the scene and by then he was getting tried of those balls of fur bouncing off his head.
August 21st, 2012 at 7:58 pm
The Star Trek novel THE CASE OF THE COLONIST’S CORPSE by Tony Isabella features the lawyer character from the episode “Court Martial” and is a deliberate Perry Mason homage, right down to the color of the page edges.
August 21st, 2012 at 8:38 pm
That book by Tony Isabella sounds like a must have to me, James. I’d never heard of it before, which maybe isn’t too surprising. I gave up on trying to keep up with all of the STAR TREK books a long time ago. I remember watching the very first episode when it was first telecast, and not being all that impressed. If you’d told me then how popular the series would become, and in so many ways, I’d have never believed you.
August 21st, 2012 at 8:16 pm
James, I have not read many of the books, but there seem several that enjoyed taking characters from the series and further exploring them. A.C. Crispin has enjoyed exploring Sarek, Spock’s Dad in SAREK, and even gave Spock a son in YESTERDAY’S CHILD using the episode ALL OUR YESTERDAYS as the starting point.
August 22nd, 2012 at 1:14 am
At the same time that STAR TREK was being filmed at Desilu Studios, MISSION IMPOSSIBLE was also being filmed on the same lot. With its confidence trick type story, ENTERPRISE INCIDENT has always been considered a parody/pastiche of M:I. I’ve always found THE CONSCIENCE OF THE KING unintentionally hilarious. Shatner and Barbara Anderson are good actors, but the romantic scenes between them are conducted with such awful dialogue that it has me laughing every time. A number of the episodes from the original show can be recognised as versions of well known stories. THE ENEMY WITHIN is Jekyll/Hyde, BALANCE OF TERROR is the war movie RUN SILENT, RUN DEEP and so on.
August 22nd, 2012 at 3:04 am
After so many others’ ripping off Bloch’s most famous early story, the one-two of his short story “A Toy for Juliette” and “Wolf in the Fold” at least brought a little attention and funds back to the progenitor in ’67…
August 22nd, 2012 at 10:27 am
I am not positive about this, but when I watched the series the first time, I am nearly 100% sure that we did not have a color TV. Judy and I were still in grad school, and we barely had enough to pay the rent. We had fish sticks so often for supper that I can no longer eat fish today.
Nor have I watched many of the episodes since then, and in fact, hardly any. All of my memories of the show are in black and white, which is why comments such as Michael’s about characters who wore red uniforms always coming to their doom have never meant a lot to me.
As I was looking for suitable photos to add to Michael’s article, it took me by surprise how striking the images I came across looked in color.
I have been meaning to obtain the series on DVD and watch them again in order, and this eye-opener on my part will be the clincher I have needed to actually do it — as if Michael’s review and the comments so far hadn’t already gone a long way to convince me.
August 22nd, 2012 at 10:38 am
#5. I agree about Shatner and Anderson’s scenes though I would never call Shatner a good actor. A good actor makes you believe the character. At one time he might have done that, but everything I have seen him do it has been Shatner on screen. It is fun to watch Anderson, who most remember from IRONSIDE, give the ham a run for his money.
As for THE ENTERPRISE INCIDENT being a parody of MISSION:IMPOSSIBLE, not according to the writer D.C. Fontana. She was not pleased with this episode (it is common for writers to find fault with changes to their work).
Memory Alpha has some great background and quotes from Fontana at
http://en.memory-alpha.org/wiki/The_Enterprise_Incident_(episode)
Fontana was right about the female Romulan Commander. Her character throwing herself at Spock does not make sense. But it makes for some great scenes for Spock (Nimoy). She is wrong about her complaint about the device. She wanted it small not the size of a lamp. But the TV screens were small in the 60’s, the director needed something large enough for the audience to see and remember why Kirk is running around like an idiot.
TV has a gluttonous need for content so it leads to many inspired aka rip off episodes.
August 22nd, 2012 at 10:55 am
#6. Todd, STAR TREK did more than just help Bloch, it helped the genre itself expand to many who would never have discovered science fiction. I can’t think of any other genre show that did more for its genre and its writers than STAR TREK.
August 22nd, 2012 at 11:00 am
#7. John Scalzi has written a sf novel called REDSHIRTS that deals with the fate of STAR TREK’s men and women in red uniforms. The red uniform by the way was worn by security, characters whose purpose was to die so to show the danger the stars were in.
August 22nd, 2012 at 12:12 pm
I was never really into Star Trek in its initial run.
This was likely in reaction to my older brother, who was a devotee from the get-go.
In a world of Trekkies and Trekkers, Sean was truly a Trekkeur. He was one of the first to get on the Lincoln Enterprises mailing list; one Saturday morning (we were both teenagers at the time), or parents were stunned when a huge package came in the mail, addressed to Sean, containing Trek scripts, photos, film frames, and various and sundry USS Enterprise tchotchkes.
I sometimes wonder if Sean ever found out that Lincoln Enterprises was set up so that Gene Roddenberry could shield the money he would make from Trek merchandise from his soon-to-be ex-wife (?).
1966 was the year that color TV took over in toto. Most home sets were still B&W; our family didn’t get a color set until early ’68, so Sean and I didn’t see many of the ’60s color explosion shows until they got into syndication.
Now that those series are forty-plus years in the past (sometimes more than that – Bonanza started colorcasting in ’59),
I can still feel a disconnect while watching TV of that vintage, when many theatrical films of the same period were still being made in B&W. It gets even more pronounced when I see Ziv shows from even farther back in the ’50s (like Cisco Kid or Science Fiction Theater) in restored color; my head shakes so much I can detect a rattle.
The other thing I take from this entry is that Star Trek was definitely Old Hollywood, for all its futurism. Trek, Mission:Impossible, and Mannix were the last three series from Desilu; After Lucy Ball sold out to Paramount, the three shows formed the foundation for that studio’s TV prominence in the late ’60s-’70s.
I’ve read many stories about the near-symbiotic relationship between Trek and Mission: prank “wars” between the two shows, actors dropping in on each other’s sets (often in outre costumes), etc.
Maybe not the Golden Age, but everybody seemed to be having a lot of fun along with the hard work.
Could this be what seems to be missing from much of what’s done today?
*or am I just showing my age here?*
**sigh**
August 22nd, 2012 at 12:23 pm
#11. Maybe that is how Spock got his role on MISSION IMPOSSIBLE.
August 22nd, 2012 at 3:01 pm
#12. Probably. Martin Landau was offered the role of Spock before Nimoy, but he turned it down.
I don’t think Shatner is as bad as all that. This reputation he’s gained as a bit of a ham is a little unfair. If you watch the first two season of TREK you will find that he’s pretty controlled and believable. It’s only during the disastrous third season that he begins to play to the back of the theatre, and even then his over-acting tends to be fun (watch,if you dare,the hilarious final episode TURNABOUT INTRUDER, which was known to the cast and crew as CAPTAIN KIRK- SPACE QUEEN) It’s probably true to say that he tends to play ‘himself’ or at least a version of the character that the audience like, but in that way he’s no different from, say, James Garner.
I was amazed to discover that Shatner played Archie Goodwin to Kurt Kaznar’s Nero Wolfe in a short lived 1959 TV series. Has anyone here seen it? Do any episodes still exist?
August 22nd, 2012 at 3:39 pm
I googled it and top of the list is this…
https://mysteryfile.com/blog/?p=13714
I had forgotten about that post.
August 22nd, 2012 at 5:06 pm
Thanks for that. ‘Fascinating’ as Mr Spock would say. Until someone comes up with a surviving bit of the Nero Wolfe series, we are left with speculation, but Shatner and Kaznar sound very promising in the roles.
August 22nd, 2012 at 5:34 pm
Just looked again at that earlier post about the CBS-“Nero Wolfe” pilot with Kasznar and the Shat.
It reads very vaguely as to who exactly is the producing entity – CBS produced many series “in house”, most notably Gunsmoke, Perry Mason, and Twilight Zone, while farming out the production grunt work to other companies and studios.
If the Wolfe series actually got past the pilot stage and more than one episode was produced, there has to be a written record and some film or kinescope to prove it.
On the other hand, Rex Stout’s distaste for film and TV is well-documented; it might be that after some shows were filmed, Stout had a clause in his deal that would let him stop the whole project cold if he had a mind to.
(Compare with Erle Stanley Gardner’s tight control over Perry Mason.)
It might well be that Stout had the right to not only kill the Wolfe show in its tracks, but to suppress any product if it didn’t suit him. We do know that all subsequent Wolfe TV projects only happened after Stout’s death (Supposedly at his direction).
Corrections to any or all of the above are welcomed.
Meanwhile – the possibility that somewhere in CBS’s vaults is an unseen trove just waiting to be restored and DVD’d …
“…the mind reels!”
August 22nd, 2012 at 6:15 pm
16. Mike, you are assuming CBS didn’t do what ABC did to the DuMont library or NBC did to the Tonight show library of that era and got rid of them.
August 23rd, 2012 at 10:42 am
17.
I’m not assuming anything.
First off, it’s unclear from what I’ve seen and read here whether Nero Wolfe was to be a filmed or a taped series.
If Wolfe was produced on videotape, the chances for its survival decrease, since tape could be erased and reused. Consequently, little thought was given to saving what was made.
Even at that, a surprising number of videotaped shows from this period still exist; Ive seen a number of them in the collection at the Museum of Broadcast Communications here in Chicago, and our friends at the Paley Center in New York can likely say the same.
If Wolfe was a filmed production, different rules apply.
Even back in ’59, and even in B&W, and even on a TV budget, motion picture film was simply more expensive than live or taped production.
Add to that the fact that Nero Wolfe was a “known commodity” from books, magazines, and radio, and its “disposabilty” factor decreases.
This is why we need to know the exact extent of Rex Stout’s involvement in the TV project; was he to take an active role in the production process (as Erle Stanley Gardner did with Perry Mason), or was he just going to “take the money and run” (which is what he did with the radio and comic strip versions of Wolfe)?
Or was it somewhere in between, as I posited in my earlier comment?
One thing is certain: this was obviously a major project for CBS. Perry Mason was a hit for the network, and the Hercule Poirot pilot with Martin Gabel was also around this time; a weekly Wolfe series would have given CBS the best-selling literary detectives, plus Alfred Hitchcock’s series to boot – something eminently worth publicizing.
It just doesn’t make sense that ant extant portions of a Wolfe TV show, whether on film or tape, would simply vanish –
– unless Rex Stout demanded that they vanish.
Something – scripts, films, kines – has to have survived.
And if nothing survived, there has to be a reason for that.
I assume nothing.
But you gotta admit, I sure can speculate …
Anyone else wanna join in?
August 23rd, 2012 at 2:54 pm
“Wolf in the Fold” is also discussed here:
http://stkarnick.com/?p=11899
Spin-off series in the STAR TREK franchise occasionally tried to do mysteries:
http://layonthecrime.wordpress.com/2012/07/25/star-trek-deep-space-nine-a-man-alone/
August 23rd, 2012 at 3:13 pm
18. You are right about the differences of tape vs film.
Let me get my assuming hat on and have a go…
From the well cited article on Wikipedia, in 1949 Fadiman Associates was pushing a Nero Wolfe TV series.
Note. Edwin Fadiman, executive producer of the NERO WOLFE show we are discussing here was also the person who handled Wolfe in radio and film. Thus it is likely Stout had no interest in the series or pilot.
It is eight years later (1957) CBS buys the rights and searches for a sponsor.
In 1959, Fadiman executive produces the pilot and three or four episodes. Networks have always tried different ways when it comes to pilots, it is possible CBS asked for the episodes to help convince an advertiser or Fadiman was so sure he was on the schedule went ahead and produced the episodes.
HENNESSY gets the time slot NERO WOLFE had been scheduled for. CBS had a stake in HENNESSY as it apparently did WOLFE.
Is it possible the sponsor chose HENNESSY over NERO WOLFE.
Where is the films? I doubt CBS kept the failed pilot. My guess it is where ever Fadiman Production library is.
It could also be in someone’s garage. There has been reports of old lost TV shows showing up in garage sales, so there is always hope.
But what condition is it in? Anyone who sees what neglected film turns into know surviving is at times not enough.
The wikipedia article (there is a link back at the original mysteryfile post) has a photo from the show. It was shot in New York so some stuff might float around there.
I wonder who owns the copyright or has it slipped into public domain?
August 23rd, 2012 at 3:31 pm
Back to mysteries and sf, I hope to examine more mystery TV episodes in other genre television series. According to the book INSIDE STAR TREK:THE REAL STORY, Gene Roddenberry came up with the idea for the ultimate in literary genre-bending, the holodeck to use in the third season of STAR TREK.
The holodeck is part recreation and part training room. It is an empty room where the computer could simulate any adventure or exercise the person in the room desires. This opened up all types of stories for the writers, including Data the android as Sherlock Holmes and Captain Picard doing a 1940’s hard-boiled PI named Dixon Hill.
August 23rd, 2012 at 3:34 pm
21. Left out the bit explaining the holodeck was not used in the original STAR TREK, but debuted in STAR TREK ANIMATED SERIES and was a popular part of STAR TREK: NEXT GENERATION featuring Data and Picard (among others)
August 23rd, 2012 at 5:11 pm
Back just now from a very frustrating bout with IMDb.
According to the Wikipedia article, the Nero Wolfe was “filmed” in New York, but the credited director, Tom Donovan, spent his whole career in live and taped TV.
Since most news reports of TV productions, then as now, use “filmed” and “taped” interchangeably (and are often as not wrong in assigning the terms), we have a stumper.
The credits of Shatner and Kasznar, as well of those of Donovan and Sidney Carroll (the credited screenwriter), do not mention Nero Wolfe at all.
If a pilot episode and more than one episode had been filmed/taped/transcribed/whatever, somebody must have a written record of the event somewhere.
And if episodes were made, other people had to be involved – actors, for example, to play the other roles. Who were they, and if any are still around, what was the work experience like?
Also, which Stout stories (if any) were used for adaptation, or did they just write originals? And if episodes were produced, how far ahead were they in scripts written?
Also also:
Bill Shatner has written at least two autobiographies (that I know of – correction welcomed). Has he ever mentioned the Wolfe projectin these, or in any interview he’s ever given?
According to Wiki, the Carroll script exists in his archive. So do recordings of the Alex North score. And there’s that one photo of Shatner and Kasznar.
Nothing else exists – at all?
Highly unlikely, from the CBS point of view.
Of all broadcast companies, CBS has always been the most diligent about saving stuff from the past. And 1959-60 is about the time that everybody else started to save theirs (or at least didn’t rush to wipe them out).
The copyright question is a good one.
Are we talkng about the character of Wolfe, or the shows?
Exactly what rights did Rex Stout surrender to CBS and Fadiman in his deal, and which ones did he keep for himself?
The loss of a potential sponsor or time slot would hardly be sufficient to stop a series production cold; at this point, advertisers and their agencies were always ready to step in, especially on a project already underway.
So why not Nero Wolfe?
And that brings me back to Rex Stout.
As I mentioned before, Stout disliked the movies that had been made of Wolfe, and had stayed away from the radio productions and the syndicated comic strip.
Would he have maintained a right to withdraw his approval from the Wolfe TV show if it did not meet his standards?
And would that withdrawal entailed suppressing any issue of the production?
These are the unanswered questions.
Somewhere, there must be answers.
Even missing TV shows, to paraphrase Myron Cohen, “gotta be somewhere!“
August 23rd, 2012 at 5:40 pm
IMDb rarely (ever?) include unaired pilots in actors credits.
CBS has no reason to save any program that has never aired nor will ever air. The production company might hope to resell to syndication would have a reason.
CBS was a major player in syndication. If they had kept the rights why not turn there (unless the cost were too high)?
CBS sold out their schedule early every year. If there was one spot and the sponsor was a major one such as Chevy, and that sponsor wanted CBS’s other show, there would be no room for WOLFE.
Heck, you think this one is crazy, how about the alleged pilot of SAM SPADE with Peter Falk as Sam? I have read the magazine Wikipedia sites as proof and can find nothing. With WOLFE I have read the items in BILLBOARD about the “series to premiere”.
August 24th, 2012 at 10:21 am
CBS has no reason to save any program that has never aired nor will ever air.
I’m snagging on that last one.
In 1960, CBS scheduled a sitcom starring the Wiere Brothers, titled Oh, Those Bells! Thirteen episodes were produced, and a premiere date was announced, with a definite time slot (Sunday evening at 6:30 Eastern time).
But at the last minute (literally – that week’s TV Guide carried an ad for the show), CBS yanked Oh, Those Bells! from the schedule, giving no reason for its action.
(It was reportedly a “troubled” production – that term can mean almost anything – but few details ever surfaced.)
The thirteen Bells eventually aired on CBS in the spring of 1962; again, no explanation was ever given.
The point I’m trying to make here is that if episodes were made of a Nero Wolfe series past the pilot, CBS would not simply drop the show outright – to say nothing of eliminating all traces of its existence – for mere reasons of “economy”. That just doesn’t make sense … unless somebody stopped the series for his own reasons – somebody like Rex Stout, who perhaps didn’t care to repeat the bad experience he’d had with Hollywood years before.
“Nero Wolfe”, the character, was very well-known during this period; the name sold books and magazines (the novellas were a regular feature in the Saturday Evening Post at this point), so TV would be a natural progression.
Compare that with the Wiere Brothers, who were not too well-known outside the sphere of vaudeville/variety and nightclubs (their best-known film work was the Hope-Crosby Road To Rio, in which the Brothers performed Hollywood’s first breakdance – in 1941).
If CBS was as rigid about these things as you posit, why was Nero Wolfe scuttled aborning, while Oh, Those Bells! got at least a sort of second chance (years too late to do any good, but still…)?
More questions, no more answers …
By the by, in the version I heard, the unseen Sam Spade pilot starred Richard Conte, not Peter Falk.
Just scrolled up, and shocked myself with the reminder that this thread was originally about Star Trek.
Well, whatever else you can say about us, we’ve got range to burn!
*Hotpoint?*
August 24th, 2012 at 11:16 am
25. Everyone else may have left but at least we are having fun.
“No one” knows what the networks do with failed pilots from last year let alone in 1959.
Again a series of 13 episodes may not get tossed, but one pilot and maybe 3 or 4 episodes (the producer may have done on his own) is different. Especially one from 53 years ago.
It would not surprise me if Stout hated the show. But so what? Think Hollywood cares how Stephen King feels about the second studio passing on THE DARK TOWER. Think Hollywood cares if a famous author hates the TV or movie adaptation?
WOLFE got pulled at last minute was not unusual. THE LONG HUNT OF APRIL SAVAGE got dumped for THE MAN WHO NEVER WAS. Whatever happened to the Sam Rolfe/Gene Roddenberry pilot? When STAR TREK fans who pay to watch his work (THE LIEUTENANT is coming out soon…from the studio not the network), why has that not surfaced?
Your turn.
August 24th, 2012 at 12:49 pm
I’m so out of it I didn’t even know Steve was up and at ’em again. Very glad everything went well.
Michael, I hope you are inclined to tackle Star Trek: The Next Generation and the holodeck at some point down the line. I’m one of the few boomers who prefers TNG to the original. In “The Big Goodbye,” Picard is accompanied to ’40s San Francisco by Data and Dr. Crusher. The episode is pretty hilarious but also conceptually interesting, in that the Enterprise team gets stuck within the holodeck, which raises all sorts of issues.
There are also of course several Holmes-themed episodes involving Data and the holodeck.
August 24th, 2012 at 3:27 pm
27. David, I always found TNG talked too much. Most space theme series feature at one point a plot where a parasite attacks and kills humans. In ST:TOS, they without thought shot and killed it. In BABYLON 5 (my favorite sf series) they killed it and it turned out to be the good guy. In ST:TNG they talked it to death (at least that is the way I remember it).
David, how many unsold, unaired pilots are kept at the Paley Center?
August 24th, 2012 at 4:35 pm
26. My turn, eh?
The point to remember is that the Wolfe tossing would have happened 53 years ago: all the participants were still around, most likely under contracts of varying terms – contracts that would have to settled if the series didn’t go on for whatever reason.
The fact that episodes were produced is significant, because film doesn’t grow on trees, and 50s era videotape was far more expensive to make and maintain than it is today.
We haven’t even mentioned the shows themselves:
We know about Kasznar and Shatner, but who played Fritz? Or Inspector Cramer? Or Saul, Fred, and Orrie? Or Lily Rowan, if they got that far?
In 1967, Bill Dozier made a Dick Tracy pilot for 20th-Fox andNBC. This pilot still exists; I’ve got a tape of it. A full cast of regulars is shown in the opening titles, but two key characters don’t appear in the episode. I’ve never been able to find out how far along Tracy had gotten in its production when NBC decided to pull the plug (I vaguely recall that a timeslot had been chosen, but nothing beyond that).
But as I said, the pilot is there, with its own set of attendant questions, to which I one day hope to learn the answers.
As I do with this Nero Wolfe phantom series.
If it was made, somebody besides Kasznar and Shatner had to be in it.
Even if the shows were erased (by CBS exec fiat or on Stout’s demand or whatever), that info has to be somewhere.
So back to watching and waiting …
August 24th, 2012 at 6:08 pm
Way back up at #19. Mike Tooney left some good links including one for ST: Deep Space 9. And the holodeck (21,22). And David mention in 27 of ST:NG (27). This should remind us how common the elements of mystery is to all genres. The theme of mystery may be returning order to chaos, but it does that answering the basic questions of all drama, who, what, where, why and how.
August 25th, 2012 at 10:53 am
Michael, we’ve never actually totaled the number of unaired, unsold pilots in our collection. That would take some work, perhaps something for an intern the next time I get one. Let me know on or offline what you are thinking if you want to pursue (though I am intern-less at the moment).
For me Star Trek in any iteration is about two things: characters and concepts. I’ve loved every Star Trek (though I had serious problems with the W-era politics of Enterprise), but I thought TNG was by far the most interesting on both counts.
August 25th, 2012 at 2:18 pm
I love the original series. I’ve seen every episode multiple times, so it’s rather hard to say whether it’s good or bad–it’s just one of those things that’s been around since I was a kid.
Of the ‘new’ series I probably like TNG the least. There are some good episodes, but in general it always came across as a little too self-important. That said, I enjoy all of the different versions (including the generally disliked VOYAGER and ENTERPRISE). My fave might be DS9, which attempted to be a little different from the general run of TREK by being a little less sure of itself and having slightly more morally ambivalent characters.
August 25th, 2012 at 3:57 pm
#31. David, I have always been curious about where do unsold pilots go to die. Does the networks keep them or return them to the production company? Where does the Paley Center get its copies?
August 25th, 2012 at 4:16 pm
The STAR TREK universe is a product of its times. ST:OS, filmed in an era of political turmoil, was a source of entertainment that gave us hope that humans would evolve into better beings. ST:TNG with its focus of emotions and feelings (Lt Troi) was where society was at the time. ST:TNG had the advantage of better production values, but the disadvantage of living up to the original.
Of the others, DS9 started out a favorite then got steadily worse as it got older (its theme by Dennis McCarthy is the best of all ST series). VOYAGER, with its premise of lost in another universe, seemed too disconnected from Roddenberry’s humans live happily ever after universe. ENTERPRISE was awful until the last season when it started to find its own identity beyond being the prequel to the original.
I hate the reboot of ST because it ignores my ST characters and past (I have never made it past Spock’s mom’s death). But its, like the others, is a product of the time. Let today’s audience discover ST of their own, I have my DVDs.
August 25th, 2012 at 7:04 pm
Referring way back to my Comment #7, I have been looking on Amazon for a set of the original series on DVD (not Blu-Ray). It seems that the OS has been remastered, with new CG effects and no labels on the disks, and there is a long and sometimes loud discussion about whether this new set is any improvement over the older set, now apparently no longer available.
I don’t know how I feel about this. Part of me wants to see everything as it was originally; another part says who cares about the cheesiness that was part and parcel of the original episodes.
August 25th, 2012 at 7:28 pm
Steve, you can always come to the Paley Center to see the original in all it’s cheesiness (although we too remaster with higher-quality copies when possible). And no matter how much you remaster, you still can’t do anything about that acting.
Michael, I WISH it worked like that. The networks and production companies aren’t calling us up to donate programming — we have to go out and get it.
By the way, I hope you will forgive this self-promotion, but for anyone in the NY area, the Paley Center is screening a “mixtape” comparing Star Trek TOS and TNG on Thursday evenings and Saturday and Sunday afternoons throughout September, with clips chosen by yours truly, to commemorate the 25th anniversary of the premiere of TNG. It’s a fun tape and I hope some of you will come out to see it. If you do let me know; I would love to meet you. There’s more information on our website: http://www.paleycenter.org/. I will say this: judging from the comments on this site, no one is going to like my conclusion.
August 25th, 2012 at 7:54 pm
Here’s a direct link to the ST mix-tape presentations: http://www.paleycenter.org/p-paley-tv-mixtapes
Wish I could go. It’s not so very far away. Maybe I can!
Steve
August 25th, 2012 at 8:29 pm
Steve, you can download ST:OS in original version or remastered, with HD or without at Amazon. I think iTunes does the same.
Oddly enough ST:TNG is available for download only to Amazon Prime members.
August 26th, 2012 at 7:45 pm
David Bushman: I clicked on the site and was amazed to discover that you do screenings of classic DOCTOR WHO, of which I am a very long term fan. It’s become hugely popular again over on this side of the Atlantic, but I’m still not certain just how popular it is over in the USA. Just recently the production team have been able to afford to film in America, and the most recent season had a story with the Doctor teaming up with President Richard Nixon in order to defeat an alien threat. Is the show edging towards mainstream popularity over there, or is it still niche?
August 27th, 2012 at 1:17 pm
Steve, thanks very much for the tout. That was extremely kind of you, and I am grateful.
Bradstreet, thanks for checking out the site. We are screening classic episodes of Who the last Saturday of every month through October, and they do very well in terms of audience draw. I don’t know if I would qualify Who as having “mainstream” popularity in the US, but it is a HUGE cult show here with a very, very passionate following.
As an example, this past Saturday the BBC premiered the seventh season of the reboot with key cast members in attendance at the Ziegfeld Theater in NY, which seats around 1600, and the tickets went so fast that the website selling them wound up crashing (within the hour, I believe).
My observation is that we are talking about an audience that is heavily into sci-fi (the so-called “nerd” crowd, which I mean in a totally positive way). What is really, really cool to me about the Paley Center screenings is that every month we get parents bringing their children along with them, and I’m talking about kids who are 10, 11, 12 years old, and so on.
Getting back to the subject at hand — Star Trek — all this talk of Doctor Who makes me think it is time for another Star Trek TV reboot. It amazes me that it has taken this long. Maybe if the next film is a huge success …
August 27th, 2012 at 5:11 pm
TV SF fans in America became aware of Dr Who during the Tom Baker days when it showed on PBS. When Baker left, so did most of America’s interest. David Tennant turn at the Doctor is when the internet in America went crazy for the series. In both cases the series was a cult favorite, something in America that usually gets more attention than the masses favorites (example, Sherlock vs NCIS, America’s #1 TV drama). This makes CBS the home of NCIS rich but attention deprived.
As for STAR TREK, there has been rumors of it returning to TV since ST:OS left the air. In fact, STAR TREK had planned to return to TV in the late 70s. Scripts were written. Sets designed (not made). But Paramount at the last minute decided to try it as a movie. When the movie was successful enough to breed successful sequels, Paramount ended all plans for the TV series. I suspect it will take the new STAR TREK movie to underperform before rumors of a new TV series will begin to surface.
August 27th, 2012 at 5:30 pm
Michael, I actually didn’t mean Star Trek “reboot” literally, as in the original series all over again, but rather a new spinoff. It has been years since Enterprise left the air.
It is said that your first Doctor (like your first Bond) will always be your favorite. Personally I’m a Christoper Eccleston man, though Tennant was plenty good too.
August 27th, 2012 at 6:29 pm
#42. David, if I remember right, Paramount worried about another TV series damaging the box office of the film series (TV was, and somewhat still is, considered a step down from movies).
It took four movies before NG hit TV. Then Paramount needed to cash in on the exploding syndication for cable market (as well as noticing the originals were getting old).
I don’t see Paramount’s motivation after the failures of VOYAGER, DS9, and (especially) ENTERPRISE.
But if Whedon does it with THE AVENGERS (make a TV series), maybe JJ will do the same with ST.
My favorite Captain is Picard (Spock is my favorite ST character), but you are right and we tend to favor the character/series we grew up with. This explains the recent blog over at Tor.com where the author praises Janeway.
http://www.tor.com/blogs/2012/08/janeway-doesnt-deserve-this-shit
August 28th, 2012 at 12:24 pm
41.:
Chicago’s PBS stations have lnog been a home-away-from-home for British TV of all genres: Comedy: (Monty Python, The Two Ronnies, The Goodies)
Sitcoms: (As Time Goes By, The Good Life, To The Manor Born, The Vicar Of Dibley, Keeping Up Appearances, Are You Being Served? and one that’s been popping up lately called The Old Guys.
Mysteries: The Masterpiece group, plus odds and ends like my current fave-rave New Tricks.
In the SF field (I learned from my late brother – the hard way – that ‘sci-fi’ is a put-down term), the first Doctor Who to turn up on Chicago PBS was Jon Pertwee, a good two years before the other stations started carrying Baker.
My aforementioned brother was a hardened Who fan, as he was for classic Star Trek, as noted above: he became expert (to a sometimes annoying degree) on Doctors whom he never actually saw until the home videos became available years later. He was among the first to help stage Dr.Who conventions in the Chicago area, as well as organizing fan participation for channel 11’s beg weeks.
As I said above, I can take Science Fiction or leave it; on a case-by-case basis, I’ve enjoyed some, but I’m well short of being a devotee.
For me, much of what’s been written above deserves at least footnote status, and so I’m grateful for it.
September 7th, 2012 at 5:14 pm
A quick follow-up on the Nero Wolfe series that never was:
Why I didn’t think of this in the first place, but The Wolfe Pack, the Wolfe appreciation society (of which I am a proud member), maintains an extentive website evote to the Wolfe stoeies and their creator, and all media manifestations thereto.
I checked in at the site for the first time in way to long, and lo and behold –
– now they’ve got a whole page devoted to the Phantom Wolfe!
That’s the good news.
The not-quite-as-good news is that as of now they don’t know much more than we do.
One new item though:
“A letter from Rex Stout to Edwin Fadiman directing him to cease production plans for a TV series was located in the Rex Stout Archives at Boston College. Alas, a copy was not made.
Next fan to stop by there, please search for that letter!
The site is simply called The Wolfe Pack.
Check it out at your leisure.