Specifically, Lew Grade's British commercial TV production house, ITC.
Let's say the POD is Gene Roddenberry moving his family to Europe in the late fifties to work as a script doctor on international co-productions. There were a lot of Hollywood studio movies and independent pictures being filmed in Great Britain and on the Continent at this time--just think of any American WWII movie from that era and there's a good chance it was shot at Pinewood or Shepperton Studios in England. A number of Hollywood stars like Errol Flyn and Jack Palance were making films in France and Italy. Not to mention that a certain actor from TV westerns was about to make his bigscreen break-through in movies shot in Spain*...
Anyway, by the middle of the sixties Roddenberry is living and working in London. He's introduced to Gerry and Sylvia Anderson, and gets to talking with them about producing a live action version of the sci-fi super marionette programs they've been making, Stingray and FireballXL5. The Andersons aren't yet ready to go into grownup drama, but their business partner Lew Grade is interested in Roddenberry's idea of a show that combines elements of Flash Gordon with Horatio Hornblower. So, in 1965, ATV on Britain's commercial network ITV commissions the first ten episodes of the new space adventure program, produced by Gene, executive produced by Lew.
The concept of the show is very much like OTL, this ain't no Limeyfied 'Trek'. In fact, Grade sees this show and the Andersons' Thunderbirds as the perfect twin set of colour productions he can sell to the American networks as they move away from black & white broadcasting, so much so that respectable British opinion will complain that he is manufacturing nothing but lowest common denominator pap full of American accents**. There are, however, some differences in Star Trek filmed at Pinewood from TOS we know and love. The ship is the FSS Enterprise (Federation Star Ship), and the 'unified Earth' themes of our timeline's show are even more advanced. Kirk in this series is not as specifically American as OT's Kirk, though he's still probably played by a Canadian actor (though not Shatner, unfortunately. A more restrained actor like Leslie Neilsen circa Forbidden Planet is likely to be cast as the hero). The characters of Spock and Scotty and Sulu are unchanged--however, Uhura is more ethnically African, a product of the legacy of 'benign' UK imperialism in Kenya. Bones is probably a Frenchmen or Briton (if he's French maybe he's Bones MacDonald, a descendant of Napolean's marshal, or somesuch Roddenberry nonsense in the same vein as the way Picard got his name).
Instead of SoCal backdrops when filming on location, the series has English woods and moors to 'beam down' onto. There are some quarries, of the type used in 'Doctor Who', that can substitute for more barren worlds.
This all seems quite doable, though unless it's as popular as Roger Moore's The Saint there won't be as many episodes produced as OTL's 'Trek' (the Andersons' Space: 1999 had a run of 48 programs). But then we get to the first of two problems with this ATL show. Judging by what was produced by British commercial TV for export to America in OTL, how good would a Roddenberry-Grade production be?
I've already mentioned the Thunderbirds, but in live action sci-fi the shows ITC is best remembered for are The Prisoner, UFO, The Champions and Space: 1999. I've only watched full episodes of the first show, and I see how it's a classic. But the other three? Well, what I've seen and heard of '1999' makes me think that there was a lot left to be desired in the quality of writing commissioned by ITC. Perhaps there just wasn't the talent in the UK to come up with dozens of storylines comparable to what was done in Hollywood with TOS. Or, alternately, because there won't be as many episodes as Roddenberry delivered to NBC, maybe the quality ITL is higher overall.
But TOS was big on a kind of scientific plausibility. That's not what Patrick McGoohan was aiming at with The Prisoner, while the adventures of Moonbase Alpha are really closer to what Irwin Allen's shows were about. Despite Gene's best efforts perhaps an ITC 'Trek' is closer to the '80 Battlestar Galactica in style.
But the biggest difference in this trans-Atlantic version of TOS is that it won't have the cultural impact of a truly American show. I don't see how it captures the imagination of fandom like the original did, at least not as broadly within the US. And it won't become a franchise, not unless the relentlessly confident Roddenberry gets to do a follow-up series filmed in Hollywood for one of the networks. Maybe this is the best way to guarantee a Phase Two goes on the air in the seventies? Also, the topical social liberalism (first interracial kiss, etc) will not be as immediate if the show isn't made within American culture. (Hmmm, the wiki article I link to says, "Although supportive of the produced shows, the consistent drive for success at home and abroad led to various artistic differences for Grade with McGoohan and Anderson, leading to the departure of both." If Gene works with Lew as these people did, eventually falling out with the tycoon, then this might put the kybosh on both ground breaking themes and sequels.)
*Clint Eastwood. But your knew that.
**I've read that most of the American accents in Thunderbirds are performed by Australian actors, Ray Barrett and Bary Humphries being two of them.
Let's say the POD is Gene Roddenberry moving his family to Europe in the late fifties to work as a script doctor on international co-productions. There were a lot of Hollywood studio movies and independent pictures being filmed in Great Britain and on the Continent at this time--just think of any American WWII movie from that era and there's a good chance it was shot at Pinewood or Shepperton Studios in England. A number of Hollywood stars like Errol Flyn and Jack Palance were making films in France and Italy. Not to mention that a certain actor from TV westerns was about to make his bigscreen break-through in movies shot in Spain*...
Anyway, by the middle of the sixties Roddenberry is living and working in London. He's introduced to Gerry and Sylvia Anderson, and gets to talking with them about producing a live action version of the sci-fi super marionette programs they've been making, Stingray and FireballXL5. The Andersons aren't yet ready to go into grownup drama, but their business partner Lew Grade is interested in Roddenberry's idea of a show that combines elements of Flash Gordon with Horatio Hornblower. So, in 1965, ATV on Britain's commercial network ITV commissions the first ten episodes of the new space adventure program, produced by Gene, executive produced by Lew.
The concept of the show is very much like OTL, this ain't no Limeyfied 'Trek'. In fact, Grade sees this show and the Andersons' Thunderbirds as the perfect twin set of colour productions he can sell to the American networks as they move away from black & white broadcasting, so much so that respectable British opinion will complain that he is manufacturing nothing but lowest common denominator pap full of American accents**. There are, however, some differences in Star Trek filmed at Pinewood from TOS we know and love. The ship is the FSS Enterprise (Federation Star Ship), and the 'unified Earth' themes of our timeline's show are even more advanced. Kirk in this series is not as specifically American as OT's Kirk, though he's still probably played by a Canadian actor (though not Shatner, unfortunately. A more restrained actor like Leslie Neilsen circa Forbidden Planet is likely to be cast as the hero). The characters of Spock and Scotty and Sulu are unchanged--however, Uhura is more ethnically African, a product of the legacy of 'benign' UK imperialism in Kenya. Bones is probably a Frenchmen or Briton (if he's French maybe he's Bones MacDonald, a descendant of Napolean's marshal, or somesuch Roddenberry nonsense in the same vein as the way Picard got his name).
Instead of SoCal backdrops when filming on location, the series has English woods and moors to 'beam down' onto. There are some quarries, of the type used in 'Doctor Who', that can substitute for more barren worlds.
This all seems quite doable, though unless it's as popular as Roger Moore's The Saint there won't be as many episodes produced as OTL's 'Trek' (the Andersons' Space: 1999 had a run of 48 programs). But then we get to the first of two problems with this ATL show. Judging by what was produced by British commercial TV for export to America in OTL, how good would a Roddenberry-Grade production be?
I've already mentioned the Thunderbirds, but in live action sci-fi the shows ITC is best remembered for are The Prisoner, UFO, The Champions and Space: 1999. I've only watched full episodes of the first show, and I see how it's a classic. But the other three? Well, what I've seen and heard of '1999' makes me think that there was a lot left to be desired in the quality of writing commissioned by ITC. Perhaps there just wasn't the talent in the UK to come up with dozens of storylines comparable to what was done in Hollywood with TOS. Or, alternately, because there won't be as many episodes as Roddenberry delivered to NBC, maybe the quality ITL is higher overall.
But TOS was big on a kind of scientific plausibility. That's not what Patrick McGoohan was aiming at with The Prisoner, while the adventures of Moonbase Alpha are really closer to what Irwin Allen's shows were about. Despite Gene's best efforts perhaps an ITC 'Trek' is closer to the '80 Battlestar Galactica in style.
But the biggest difference in this trans-Atlantic version of TOS is that it won't have the cultural impact of a truly American show. I don't see how it captures the imagination of fandom like the original did, at least not as broadly within the US. And it won't become a franchise, not unless the relentlessly confident Roddenberry gets to do a follow-up series filmed in Hollywood for one of the networks. Maybe this is the best way to guarantee a Phase Two goes on the air in the seventies? Also, the topical social liberalism (first interracial kiss, etc) will not be as immediate if the show isn't made within American culture. (Hmmm, the wiki article I link to says, "Although supportive of the produced shows, the consistent drive for success at home and abroad led to various artistic differences for Grade with McGoohan and Anderson, leading to the departure of both." If Gene works with Lew as these people did, eventually falling out with the tycoon, then this might put the kybosh on both ground breaking themes and sequels.)
*Clint Eastwood. But your knew that.
**I've read that most of the American accents in Thunderbirds are performed by Australian actors, Ray Barrett and Bary Humphries being two of them.
) for one. Not sure who that'd be though.