First, the resolution to the Paramount imbroglio:
CRAMER, WERNER REACH DEAL FOR STAR TREK
March 4, 1970
Douglas Cramer and Mort Werner met in New York last week to hash out the future of Star Trek. Cramer wanted the cast of Star Trek blackballed from Hollywood after what he considered a "childish stunt" from William Shatner, who called a press conference to rail against Paramount's practices as a studio. Werner sympathized with Cramer to a point, but wants more Star Trek produced because the series has become a key part of the Peacock Network's primetime lineup. The stipulations of the deal are as follows:
*Cramer will produce one more year of Star Trek, and NBC will cancel the series after the 1970-1971 television season, because Cramer considers the Star Trek cast to be self-centered and problematic to work with.
*NBC will place Star Trek in a 9:00 PM time slot on Friday nights for its final season as punishment to the cast for Shatner's press conference, in a concession to Cramer.
*Cramer will give carte blanche to Star Trek for its final season in a concession to the Peacock Network, because NBC believes it is losing a great investment and would prefer for Trek to be made for at least five more seasons, as a show to anchor its lineup.
*The budget for Star Trek's final season will be doubled, with carte blanche given to any longer episodes, or "two-parters," that Gene Roddenberry wants to produce for the final season.
*Contract disputes will be resolved between Paramount and Shatner, who complained that the studio asked him, Leonard Nimoy, and DeForest Kelley to give money back for the end of season 4 for not making budget.
*The cast will receive a doubling of its wages from Paramount, plus extra parachute payments from NBC as a parting gift for providing the network with great ratings.
*NBC will attempt to look for another studio to make Star Trek in the future, if Cramer remains at Paramount after the 1970-1971 television season, because Star Trek is a flagship franchise for the network.
An interesting offshoot of the meeting was Cramer's surprising willingness to work with the cast if they ever wanted to make television movies in the future. Cramer sees a possibility for Star Trek as a TV movie franchise, and is willing to produce TV movies periodically so he does not have to be exposed constantly to the cast's demands. Paramount is shifting its view of Star Trek as a franchise that can potentially make it big on the silver screen as well as the small screen, and would like to transfer production of the franchise in the future to its movies division. Gene Roddenberry is very interested in making movies, but it is unknown whether the cast is in favor of making movies after the 1970-1971 television season. The cast, especially Leonard Nimoy, is reportedly fatigued with the high-stress environment of Trek and may see this final season as an opportunity to work on other projects.
Shatner:
I got a great deal for the cast. We were all starting to get sick of working on Star Trek at the end of season four, so I got all of us paid for another two years after the series ended. We also ensured with the fifth season that the series would enter syndication, which meant that it would remain as popular in reruns. My gambit worked, and it was that move which eventually brought the cast back together for the movies, because I convinced the rest of the cast that I had their back. Unfortunately, I had to agree to relinquish any roles as director of episodes in the fifth season and in the movies. I felt like I was a great director but my co-stars did not agree.
Nimoy:
Bill did me a huge favor. I was virtually done with Spock at that point and had to go into treatment for alcohol addiction. My marriage was suffering, my relationship with my children was suffering. I couldn't break my character and be the Leonard that my family loved. To get this deal where I basically got to double-dip with the Star Trek parachute payments while working on Mission Impossible worked out very well financially for me, and the lack of stress working on Mission Impossible helped save my marriage. I stopped drinking, cut the smoking habit significantly, and took up meditation, which my wife and kids appreciated.
Kelley:
From my perspective Shatner did us all a major favor. I was also tired of Star Trek by that point and he got us paid. We also won the arbitration case with Cramer. As for Cramer, I felt like he made a mistake with us, but learned from that mistake. Cramer treated us like gold in the final season, and towards the end, he told us that he regretted how he handled us in the past. He became a world-class director for Dynasty and other shows after his tumultuous Trek experience. If he did it again, he would have treated us better in seasons 3 and 4 and we would have had a run lasting seven or eight seasons instead of five.
Doohan:
The money got me through 1973, but after that I was barely making ends meet with my cartoon voice work, which Gene got me through his connections, and the conventions, where I was extremely popular. I got only one other live action screen role until we made the first movie in 1979. I believe it was the incident with Shatner that prevented me from getting future work. The movies saved me financially because nobody could replace me as Mr. Scott.
Takei:
It worked out for me. I used some of the money in my political campaign to win a seat on the Los Angeles City Council. There, I advanced the rights of LGBT citizens in the city, who were extremely marginalized at that point. Shatner was an ass but he was our ass. Sometimes he treated us like crap but deep down, he looked out for us in his own way.
Koenig:
I also benefitted from the extra money but I wanted to work on Star Trek more for another decade. I actually got to submit a script for season five called The Infinite Vulcan, which was produced. So I got a writer's credit for the original series. I couldn't get any work other than a couple of appearances on Columbo due to Dee Kelley putting in a word for me, so I spent most of the 1970s attending conventions and writing scripts for various shows, of which I only got two produced.
Nichols:
Cramer should have treated us better, but he made it up for us in season five. I still don't like the man. I got a role in SHAFT but after that I didn't want to do blaxploitation films, and I couldn't find any other work in LA because of the incident with Bill. So I went back to my first love, musical theatre, on Broadway, and I joined the Grease cast, plus earned a starring role on Chicago before my NASA work. The Chicago role ranks up there with Uhura as my fondest acting experience.
Roddenberry:
I was extremely disappointed that the studio decided to cancel us, and I desperately wanted to bring the cast back for another Star Trek series in the mid-1970s, but none of them wanted to work on Star Trek at that point. They would only return if the series was made into a movie, or series of movies on the big screen. So immediately after the show's cancellation, I looked for scriptwriters to help us with potential movie plots. I found a great young writer for season 5, Alan Dean Foster, who was only 24 at the time. He was an absolute genius like David Gerrold, and he wrote most of the plot for our first movie. He also wrote the script for the final episode of the original series, where Earth is threatened by a godlike ship which happened to be of human origin.