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Beam
Us Up - 1982
"Very dead!" Captain Spock's Earthbound form, actor Leonard Nimoy, sits down behind his desk in Hollywood without a trace of a smile. The greetings out of the way, it's time for business. Time to discuss the question thousands of anguished Trekkies - and a few million more of us less eccentric. but still loyal. fans—have wanted to know the answer to since the last Star Trek, film blockbuster... is Spock really gone for ever?
LN: To say Spock was left in the lurch at the end of the last film is—to put it mildly—a charming understatement". says Mr Nimoy. “He was left for dead, remember? I don't want to give any secrets away. so let's just say that for the time being I'm simply directing the search for Spock….
With scarcely a wiggle of the most famous pointed ears in show business. Mr Nimoy has slipped out of the limelight to become the true skipper of the Starship Enterprise. TV's top sci-fi show has run and run for what seems like light years—in fact it's about two decades— and, at 53, Nimoy's now behind the cameras, The £12 million film version, Star Trek III: The Search For Spock will be landing in London at warp factor 3 on Friday, July 27. It's already smashed through the performance records of the first two Star Treks in America, and is on course to do the same in Britain.
But is that all he's doing? Star Trek without Spock would be like Rice Krispies without their snap, crackle and pop. LN: Let me put it this way: the audience is going to expect something. My job is to surprise them. We build up the suspense to breaking-point. I want their imaginations to run riot.
At the end of Star Trek II: The Wrath Of Khan, poor old Spock sacrificed himself on a far-off planet for the sake of his paIs. Incinerated, vaporised or Vulcanised …. he did the decent thing—and left the studio bosses at Paramount here on Mother Earth with a king-sized headache: How to bring him back?
In Star Trek III the rest of the crew go looking for him "and they're going to have to find something or people will feel cheated." Mr Nimoy arches an eyebrow, Spock-like, challenging me to defy his logic: But what will it be? That's my secret. Will Spock be recognisable? Will he just be a mysterious, shadowy figure? An aura, perhaps? Will he be hostile after what happened? An animal, even—or pure energy?
Tantalising, isn't it? One thing's certain—if and when the cinema's favourite alien does materialise in recognisable form, the cheer that goes up will raise the roof. LN: And that's as it should be. Star Trek is all about friendship and family, and none of us in the cast ever forgets it.
Mr Nimoy not only looks like Spock away from the screen, he seems to have taken on the same awesome characteristics. In the lean, 6ft Earthling flesh, clad in a sober blue shirt and trousers, he proves every bit as cool and logical as Spock. And if the shadow of Spock has loomed larger than anything else in his life, Mr Nimoy has cause to be grateful for it.
That's why, when the first hint that Spock wouldn't survive Star Trek II leaked out the reaction stunned even him. Rumours that he was being Vulcanised brought 15 crates of letters to the studio doors. All of them pleading: Let Spock live !
He's immortalised by Star Trek fanatics all over America and Britain, in the annual Trekkies' conventions where their idea of a good time is to sit for hours in front of a TV screen watching their heroes battling with swarthy Klingons, pig-faced Telerites and blue-skinned Andorians.
Leonard Nimoy had heard all about the Trekkies' convention in Britain that was attended by James T. Kirk in person—otherwise the likeable William Shatner, who is now more intent on pursuing earthbound baddies as T. J. Hooker. Kirk had told him how scores of fans, including numerous Captain Spocks in full gear, rubber ears flapping in panic, had spilled out on to the unsuspecting streets of Birmingham when the hotel fire alarm went off by mistake.
LN: That must have been some sight. They must have thought they were being invaded. You see, it's not impossible. l've always believed in life on other planets. It's logical, isn't it?
Similarly I believe in UFOs. The mathematical possibilities of life on other planets are so great it would be illogical to think that we are the only planet that's populated.
He says he would dearly love to confront a creature from another planet. I see them as elongated, wispy figures. And I know what I'd say if I met one in the street: 'What took you so long?'
Spock himself is the ultimate alien imaginable. Unemotional. Detached. Keeping his cool while all about him are losing theirs. Leonard Nimoy first donned the Vulcan's famous ears in 1966, and admits: I guess I know Spock pretty well by now. I like him. I can't really say I ever get fed up with him, though now and then I wish people would talk about something else.
But they never do. Those ears, particularly. They're the first things people mention. The fact is there's more to Spock than his ears.
After the first Star Trek series ended, Mr Nimoy was presented with a handsome pair of Spock ears, elegantly framed. He hung them in the hallway of his home, just to remind himself of their importance in his life.
LN: They're very delicate, you know. The make-up people join them quite invisibly to my own skin. It has to be done very carefully or people wouldn't think of them as real.
The trouble is, the ear moulds will only last a certain time, then they start to shrink in the heat. And they have to start all over again, with a fresh pair. On the first two Star Trek films I went through more than 250 pairs. I need a new set every day.
In Star Trek III, not quite so many ears have been packed into boxes, ready to be used. Remember, Spock perished on the planet Genesis, while his friends high-tailed it for home …
Or did he?
LN: I can reveal that the crew are going back to Genesis, where his remains were left. But whether they find him or not, I'm not saying.
It's a film on an epic scale, with four different spaceships as part of the hardware, an enormous space station and numerous aliens — like Valkris the beautiful Klingon spy.
LN: The whole film is a remarkable physical event.
If I tell you that the good ship Enterprise falls through a time warp and Admiral Kirk and his stout-hearted band stumble on a young re-born Spock—don't worry. Spock Junior is only part of a cat-and-mouse game they're playing with us in the search for Spock Senior.
Far away from the flights of fantasy and the deck of the Enterprise, the earthly Leonard Nimoy is a Boston-born actor who went to a local school, then to Antioch College, before finding his way to California to be trained at the Pasadena Playhouse. He featured in supporting roles in a variety of films and TV plays, often as a heavy. Films with uplifting titles such as Rhubarb, Frances Goes To West Point and Satan's Satellites.
But he can afford to forget them now. Four years filming the original TV Star Treks, and their innumerable repeats (they're currently being reshown on BBC on Tuesdays). led to better things: Invasion Of The Body Snatchers, Catlow, a visit to China to star in a mini-series about Marco Polo, and a stage tour as Sherlock Holmes with the Royal Shakespeare Company.
LN: There's no knowing what shape my career might have taken if it hadn't been for Spock. I was making a living when he came along, but probably I'd have been directing rather sooner than now. I've waited 20 years for that title!
He avoids the Hollywood social whirl like a Black Hole, preferring the simple life with a house in a quiet suburb and a hideaway bolt-hole on the shores of Lake Tahoe. He has been happily married to Sandi for 30 years, which is like moving into another dimension by Hollywood standards. Their daughter Julie is 29, son Adam, 27 and Mr Nimoy has no desire to steer either of them into the film business.
Spock's own Trek record is a shaker: He made 78 episodes for TV... and they're still being shown today over 300 times a week in up to 134 cities and towns in America alone. Add to that the other 120 countries around the world where they pop up in 47 different languages and you'll see just how far the Starship Enterprise has boldly ventured where no TV series has gone before.
But what is the secret of Spock's enormous appeal?
Mr Nimoy thinks tor a moment: I'll tell you. The crew of the Starship Enterprise are more than a cult. We have an audience rather than merely a cult following, and it's an extremely wide one. There's a big difference. And Spock is so special. Recently, I received a 50-page report from doctors who've been studying the effect of Spock on their patients. It's no joke, I can tell you. They consider it an important piece of work. They've gone into the question of how their patients relate to Spock, and it matches up with some of the ideas we've explored in the episodes. For instance, all young people feel alienated at some point in their lives—it's part of growing up. Spock, as a half-alien himself, is someone they can identify with. They respect him. They admire him. Above all, they sympathise with him.
With such logic, who's arguing?
