ENTERPRISE INCIDENTS: Is There in Truth No Beauty

First Aired: July 24, 2022

At the start of this podcast I warned Scott and Steve, “Fasten your seat belts, this is going to be a bumpy dive.” As it turned out, that may have been an underprediction. There’s not much I can add now to what we discussed, but that’s not to say that I don’t have more to relate. I’ll do that after you listen again (if you choose to do that) …

or if you didn’t hear the podcast, listen to it here now and then continue into …

A DEEPER DIVE

There was much discussion in our podcast about the IDIC (a pin that Spock wore) and the problems it caused. But there was more to that story – more I have refrained from telling for 54 years. It was what happened on our third day of filming when we filmed the dining sequence in which the IDIC appeared.

As I remember, that scene (scheduled as the first to be filmed on the first day but not filmed) was inserted into the schedule where the already filmed Miranda/Marvick scene had been. The Miranda/Marvick scene was less than 3 minutes in length and had 2 characters. The dining sequence, a scene early in the story establishing important character relationships, was over 6 minutes in length, involved 6 characters and the work for the 3^rd day increased from 10 pages to 13 pages with the dining scene the last to be filmed. We got to it late in the afternoon. We had the wide-angle shots completed as the clock was approaching 6:00. Next cama the first close-up of Bill Shatner. We completed that and Jerry Finnerman then prepared lighting Diana Muldauer’s close-up, which was going to be our last shot of the day. When he was ready, it was past 6:00. The actors took their positions. Leonard was seated left of the camera. David Frankham, “Scotty” Doohan, DeForest Kelley and Bill were seated right of the camera. I was surprised to see when Bill returned to the set that he had changed from his uniform to his civvies and had removed his make-up. I was more than surprised that as he sat down, he had a newspaper which he read while performing the off-camera for Diana. At the completion of the take (it was now 6:09) I said, “Cut. We’ll do it again and Bill put down the paper.” He turned to me to object and I continued, “We have to start. If camera is rolling at 6:12, the shot can be finished, so put down the paper and roll camera.” Camera rolled. The scene was acted again and at the end I said, “Cut. Print. That’s a wrap.” I turned and walked away. DeForest Kelley came rushing after me. He grabbed me by my upper arms and with a huge grin and blazing eyes he said, “I could kiss you.”

The Journey Continues