Updates for today include a Life Magazine interview with Cary Grant and a Nichelle Nichols interview with Ebony. Plus, a special on the moon landing, which occurs at the same time (July 20, 1969) as IRL.
CARY GRANT: MY DAUGHTER WANTED TO SEE ME WITH MR. SPOCK
July 7, 1969
Cary Grant surprised us all by announcing that he would leave retirement for a brief television excursion on the NBC hit
Star Trek. Why
Star Trek instead of a more conventional show, America wonders? Grant is one of Hollywood's leading men and can take any job he wants in the movies, but he chose to return to the small screen instead of where we are used to seeing him romance women, on the silver screen. So why did Grant make this decision? In this tell-all interview with
Life, Grant opens up on his personal life, his daughter Jennifer, his business interests, and his unexplained support for
Star Trek.
Life: First of all, thank you for granting us this rare interview.
Grant: It's a pleasure to talk with
Life Magazine.
Life: Why are you coming out of retirement to appear on
Star Trek, of all shows? Couldn't you choose a more popular television show like
Gunsmoke or return to the movies?
Grant: Well I haven't seen a script that I liked for the movies, so that is why I have not returned to the silver screen. Plus, I am 65 years old, with different interests, such as controlling a seat on the board of Faberge, and returning to the movies and keeping up my previous schedule would be impossible considering my age.
Star Trek is a fun show, and they gave me a role as a President where I can boss around Captain Kirk and be a lead, at least briefly.
Life: You're going to be President Nixon?
Grant: It's a little more complicated than that, but the character has some Nixon-like mannerisms.
Life: We know you are a
Gunsmoke fan and watch it most of the time on the television. So why not
Gunsmoke?
Grant: I am a serious fan of
Gunsmoke, but the producers always wanted me to play a Western villain, and I feel like that is out of my character. Plus, I am too old to play a convincing, dashing hero in a Western.
Life: We understand that you wanted to watch
Gunsmoke, but your daughter Jennifer had other ideas.
Grant: Yes, Jennifer got to the television first one Monday night and switched it to NBC instead of CBS, where I usually have the television tuned. Jennifer pointed to Leonard Nimoy (Mr. Spock) and said, "That's Mr. Ears Guy! I love Mr. Ears Guy!" I told my daughter, "Jenny, he's known as an alien. That's why he has the weird looking pointy, spiked ears."
Life: So your daughter fell in love with Mr. Spock.
Grant: "My daughter was insistent! I was going to switch the television back to
Gunsmoke, but my daughter kept on saying, "I want to see pointy ears guy, I want to see pointy ears guy, Daddy." And she put up such a fuss, and started crying when I switched my television to
Gunsmoke. My daughter threw a tantrum. "Where is pointy ears guy, Daddy!" So I turned the channel back. I'm not that big a
Star Trek fan, but Dyan [Cannon], my ex-wife, liked the show and often saw it with Jennifer.
Life: So Jennifer got her way. It seems that daughters always get their way with their fathers.
Grant: A daughter melts a man's heart like no other person in the world. This is for any father who has a daughter out there, it is a fact of life. Daughters always seem to win their fights with their fathers.
Life: Then something really funny happened.
Grant: My daughter said, "Can we meet pointy ears guy? Can we meet the alien?" I said to Jenny, "No, he's an alien from another planet, there is no way we can meet him, Jenny." But Jenny was never going to give this fight up. "Can we meet pointy ears guy, I want to meet pointy ears guy." So I told my daughter, "Down in Hollywood, I know the studio that makes this show. We can meet pointy ears guy there." My daughter loved it, and said, "I love you, Daddy."
Life: Then the phone rings.
Grant: The next day, I received an unusual call from Mort Werner at NBC. I knew Werner because he tried to get me on Johnny Carson's show, so I thought he was asking me to appear with Carson. But Werner shocked me with the idea that I could play a President on
Star Trek. He said, "We have a distinct role for you, with your own dressing room, your own makeup and everything. The cast on the show loves you, looks up to you and would love to learn from you."
Life: So Werner somehow pulls off the sale.
Grant: I told Mort, "Well of course the cast looks up to me, everyone looks up to me in Hollywood. I am fascinated by Bill Shatner though. His acting is a little bit unrefined, but he could become a Hollywood great with some work. He has some classic acting skills from the old silver screen. Maybe I could teach Bill some of my finer points." Mort then said, "I bet your daughter is a big
Star Trek fan, even though she's three. Little kids love our show." I then told Mort, "My daughter and I had this argument just last night. I wanted to watch
Gunsmoke, and she wanted to see Mr. Spock. She won out, of course." So Mort said, "Do you want to join our cast for two or three episodes?" I thought about it for a moment, and said, "Why not? I get to have some fun for once in my life. I take myself too seriously sometimes."
Life: What do you think about the silver screen and the small screen and their relationship?
Grant: I think the quality of full length movies on the silver screen has deteriorated significantly from when I was the leading man in Hollywood. I never thought the small screen television programs would become of equal or higher quality than the movies, both in production quality and in script writing. But it has amazingly turned out that way. I want the younger generation to see a little bit of Cary Grant, like the World War I generation did, like the World War II generation did, and lots of youth watch
Star Trek. So they'll get to see me for a brief time and make some judgments about my abilities.
Life: Thank you for talking to us. It seems like your daughter won this round.
Grant: Like I said, daughters always win their battles with their fathers. We have a soft spot for them like nobody else in this world.
NICHELLE NICHOLS OPENS UP ABOUT COMMANDING THE ENTERPRISE, THE BLACK COMMUNITY, HER CO-STARS AND LIFE ON STAR TREK
July 15, 1969
Ebony: Nichelle, it's great to have you back. You've become a huge star since we last interviewed you two years ago.
Nichols: I'm glad to share my thoughts with the magazine.
Ebony: So how was your experience commanding the Enterprise? I know it was a massive talking point in the black community that an African-American woman got to play Captain Kirk's role for one episode.
Nichols: Well I asked Dorothy Fontana, the woman in charge of creative control on the show, how about an episode where I have to command the Enterprise? Dorothy loved the idea as a woman herself, and even had me leading the Enterprise into battle! It was so fun sitting in the captain's chair. William Shatner told me he was afraid I would take his job, I did so well as acting Enterprise captain. In the episode (The Y Virus), I received a promotion to Lieutenant Commander, so I became the fifth-highest ranking member of the Enterprise crew.
Ebony: The show caused African-American viewership for Star Trek to skyrocket. We were represented as powerful and appreciated on that show. How do you feel about African-Americans embracing Star Trek?
Nichols: I know. Star Trek is a hit in our community now! Roy Wilkins, who runs the NAACP, asked me to appear as a major speaker at the annual NAACP convention. The ovation I got from the crowd was tremendous! I knew I made it as a person everyone looks up to in the community. I think to make my position as Lieutenant Commander Uhura a reality in the future, major changes need to occur in real life.
Ebony: Such as?
Nichols: Segregation is no longer the law of the land, but educational opportunity for African-Americans remains substandard compared to white Americans. We must improve our school system, especially in the major cities, such as Chicago, my hometown, and New York, for more black people to gain opportunity. I fear that a new form of segregation is occurring in our schools, where white families flee to the suburbs with all the resources, leaving poor, marginalized members of our community to fend for themselves with little funding. We must also improve our ability to attain high ranks in the professions, such as doctors, lawyers, engineers and scientists. We are not doing well enough in those aspects.
Ebony: I hear you, Nichelle, and completely agree. What do you propose?
Nichols: More funding for schools in urban areas which are being depopulated and have been depopulated by white Americans at an alarming rate.
Ebony: I see. You feel very strongly about that, and we do, too. So how are your fellow cast members treating you?
Nichols: They are a joy to work with! Even Bill Shatner, who gets on my nerves a little bit, is his jolly old self, cracking jokes, which are only sometimes funny. Leonard Nimoy is almost like an older brother on the set. When he laughs in the Spock costume, it's so funny because he leaves character and just becomes silly Leonard. DeForest Kelley got a little bit of getting used to because he's a white Southerner from Georgia and I'm a black lady from Chicago, but he's a sweet soul without a single racist molecule in his body. George Takei is so fun and also gets in on cracking jokes. Jimmy Doohan has about 100 different accents, and can talk in jive better than some of us! And Walter Koenig, he's like the young man on the set, so he never has to buy dinner for himself. We always take care of Walter because we feel like he has the worst role in the cast.
Ebony: Doohan is an Irish Canadian, and he can talk jive better than some of us?
Nichols: It's astonishing but true. Jimmy is ridiculously talented with his accents. In real life he doesn't talk like a Scotsman, like in the show. That's an accent he puts on, and it's totally convincing.
Ebony: So what about Cary Grant making his presence known on the show?
Nichols: Cary Grant walks on water. We couldn't believe it when we saw him on set. He came to the set with his young daughter, and asked where Leonard Nimoy was. So Leonard comes out, and Cary says to his daughter, "This is pointy ears guy, Mr. Spock." His daughter jumped in Leonard's arms and said, "I love you, Mr. Spock." Leonard loved that moment. We all look up to a man like that, of course. He's a god in Hollywood. We all tried to talk to him but he seemed to only be interested in Bill and Leonard.
Ebony: I wonder if old Cary wanted to kiss all the women on the set.
Nichols: That was the only other time Cary opened up to us! He was talking to Shatner about kissing a woman, and how Shatner was too crude with it. Cary wanted to demonstrate to Bill how it was properly done. So Cary walks up to Arlene Martel, who was guest-starring as a Vulcan character, and gives her this suave kiss.
Ebony: That's amazing. Did Cary kiss you?
Nichols: Yes he did! When Cary kissed Arlene, she broke her Vulcan character which she tried to keep, being cold and logical and all that jazz. Arlene screams, "Cary Grant kissed me, Cary Grant kissed me! I'm going to tell my grandchildren someday that he kissed me!" All in the Vulcan ears, no less. Everyone was in stitches. So I ask Cary, "Can you kiss me too?" So Cary said, "I heard you were a good kisser, so I'll show Bill how to kiss a woman the right way." So we have this amazing smooch, and I told Bill, "Cary's definitely a better kisser than you!" (chuckles)