Letters to Fact Trek

From: [name redacted]

Date: Sept. 9, 2021

Subject: Re: Fontana & Barrett Face the Fans, 1972

Message: Thanks so much for making a transcript of this available and for doing your usual diligent job of checking what was said against what we know of that facts. I found it especially interesting that Majel said that Spock "grew out of Leonard," rather than the character's being planned like that from the beginning. We were lucky that so lovely a person as Mr. Nimoy embodied Spock for us, or Spock might have been a very different person indeed. This also makes your other article -- about Mr. Nimoy's always being the first choice for Spock -- all the more important.

Thanks for the great job you always do!

Best wishes,

[name redacted]

Dear [name redacted],

Thanks! We’re blushing!

Given the poor quality of the source recording it was a tough transcription process; a painful burden that Michael Kmet bravely/foolishly shouldered.

To quote Spock from an episode we needn’t name; “Pain! Pain!”

—Fact Trek

From: Phil Nichols

Date: May 5, 2020

Subject: Good luck!

Message: Hey guys, good luck with this new venture. I shall be following avidly, as I have done with Star Trek Fact Check.

If, in your researches, you come across anything connecting the writer RAY BRADBURY to Star Trek, I would be very pleased to hear about it. (I know that Ray visited the sets of TOS at some early point in the shows run. And I have also read that he pitched for the first Star Trek movie, along with every other writer in town. But I have seen little hard evidence of any of this. My own research in the Bradbury papers at Indiana University has uncovered only a small amount of correspondence with Gene Roddenberry.)

- Phil Nichols

UPDATE MARCH 14, 2021

Hi Phil,

One thing we forgot to mention previously is that Star Trek got its costume designer in part because of a Bradbury connection: William Ware Theiss had costumes The 1964 play the World of Ray Bradbury, and Theiss’ friend Dorothy Fontana pointed her boss Gene Roddenberry to the play and the rest is history (detailed in an article by Fact Trekker Maurice on startrekc.com (link)).

Mr. Bradbury’s name comes up in an April 26, 1966 memo from John D.F. Black to Gene Roddenberry (subject: “Art Wallace Yarn”). In the memo, Black warns Roddenberry that the Wallace story (which would evolve into the second season episode, “Obsession”) is “right flat on top of Ray Bradbury’s ‘MOBY  DICK 1999’ (aka ‘LEVIATHAN 99’)…Beware.” 

When Dorothy Fontana was summarizing existing science fiction short stories for possible purchase by Star Trek, various stories by Bradbury were considered. These included “Night Meeting” (from The Martian Chronicles), “A Miracle of Rare Device,” “The Veldt,” and “The Shoreline At Sunset.”

Among the newspaper clippings in Roddenberry’s Star Trek files is a profile of Bradbury by Art Seidenbaum that ran in the Los Angeles Times on July 20, 1964 (“Outer Space Finds Inner Place”).

Bradbury also brought a spec script by Laurence N. Wolfe to Roddenberry’s attention that was bought and, after Wolfe was unable to incorporate notes from the staff, heavily revised by Dorothy Fontana — “The Ultimate Computer.” (Wolfe ended up with story credit; Fontana with credit for the teleplay.) 

Beyond that, we know Roddenberry sent Mr. Bradbury a signed copy of his novelization for Star Trek—The Motion Picture (Bradbury sent a thank you note for the gift dated November 18, 1979). There may be additional correspondence between Bradbury and Roddenberry in the private files currently held by the Roddenberry estate, but to date we have not been allowed access to those.

Also, you’ve probably seen this from the L.A. TIMES (link)…

For Ray Bradbury, Proud of a Case of Mistaken Identity

By RAY BRADBURY

OCT. 26, 1991 12 AM PT

Gene Roddenberry asked me to be part of the “Star Trek” family as a writer 25 years ago. He showed me the pilot, and I looked at it and liked it but said at that time that I’ve never been able to adapt other people’s characters--no matter how much I admire them. So, one of the sad things of my life is I was never able to participate in the love and joy that made “Star Trek” so special.

But, ironically, for many years people have thought I was Gene Roddenberry. It never bothered me because I loved him as a friend and admired him as a creator. I was always very proud every time a bunch of young people ran up to me and said, “Oh, Mr. Roddenberry, we all love you and we love ‘Star Trek’.” It happened all the time. I learned over the years to simply say, “Oh, I’m so glad that you like the show. I wrote it for you and I created it for you.” And I let them run off thinking I was Mr. Roddenberry....

I don’t know how much longer I can go on pretending that I’m Gene Roddenberry, now that he’s gone, but I will carry the sweet burden to the end of my life.

—Fact Trek

From: James Fanson (his Twitter feed)

Date: Dec. 16, 2020

Subject: NBC order for Star Trek production series.

Do you have a specific date from the record for when NBC ordered the production episodes for Star Trek?

Also, do you have a date when NBC ordered the second pilot episode?

Dear James,

As to when the series was picked for the the fall 1966 schedule, that’s not absolutely clear but Gene Roddenberry sent out the following telegram on Sunday, Feb. 27, 1966 indicating he’d had word—formally or informally—that the show was on the schedule:

HAVE PERSONAL ASSURANCE FROM NBC WE ARE FIRMLY SCHEDULED TUESDAY 730. CONGRATULATIONS AND THANKS.

GENE RODDENBERRY

As regards the 2nd pilot order, in a letter from Gene Roddenberry to Alexander Courage dated Monday, March 29, 1965, there’s this:

This is just a brief note to keep you up to date on the STAR TREK situation. On Friday, NBC agreed to order a second STAR TREK episode with options for more segments if this one meets their approval.

As this letter is dated on a Monday, "On Friday" in this context would mean NBC committed to a second pilot (or at least the first part of a step deal towards a second pilot) on March 26, 1965.

— Fact Trek

From: epaddon

Date: May 9, 2020

Subject: Madlyn Rhue and Wrath Of Khan

Hi, your website looks great and I'm looking forward to seeing more, especially because the whole matter of misinformation and questionable anecdotes told as facts has always been infuriating to me. I was wondering if its possible to find out the matter of how serious an effort was made to get Madlyn Rhue, who played Marla McGivers in "Space Seed" back for WOK? It's my understanding an early draft of the script had the character of McGivers but eventually she was dropped from the script and written out as having died at the hands of the Ceti Alphan eels (though amazingly she is never mentioned by name in the final version of the film, only indirectly as Khan's wife). I know that by this point in time, Madlyn Rhue was already battling MS which later confined her to a wheelchair for the rest of her life but at this point in time she wasn't completely immobile since she interestingly did appear in a "Fantasy Island" episode (no scenes with Ricardo Montalban) that aired in October 1982 and she was still able to move about (though her role is admittedly only a few minutes of screen time). Trying to piece together how much an effort was made and at what point did they abandon the idea of bringing her back has always been the one aspect of WOK's production I've wanted to know more about.

UPDATE SEPT 9, 2021

We'‘re in the process of doing a deep dive into this and will be posting a full blog post on the subject very soon!

Dear epaddon,

The McGivers character appears up to The Genesis Project version of the script, but she's gone when Nicholas Meyer turned it into The Undiscovered Country (which was the title up until post production when it got its release name). We've yet to encounter a smoking gun re her demise or any written documentation detailing why she was dropped, but we'll keep an eye out.

EDIT: Rhue appeared on the Diff'rent Strokes episode 3x23, “The Model” that originally aired on November 12, 1981—just 3 days before principal photography started on The Wrath of Khan (November 9, 1981). She first shows up around the 10 minute mark and is present for much of the rest of the episode.
https://www.dailymotion.com/video/x54za4u

She also appeared on the soap opera Days of Our Lives (44 episodes from 1982-84) and the TV version of Fame (8 episodes from 1982-85). In one episode of the latter she was seen hurrying from a cab to her daughter on the street. All of this seems to indicate she wasn’t as wheelchair bound as the stories would have us believe.

—Fact Trek