When the cast of J.J. Abrams’s upcoming Star Trek comeback movie donned their primary-coloured uniform tops and holstered their phasers, they weren’t just preparing for a voyage to seek out new life and new civilizations - they also opened up a strange new world of hotel concourses, air-conditioned convention centres and even cruises.
To be a Star Trek actor, even once, is to open oneself up to a potential lifetime of paid appearances at conventions and other fan events. And should Chris Pine, Zachary Quinto and the rest of the new crew of the USS Enterprise choose to boldly go where so many Trek actors have gone before - mingling with the fans - they could be beaming in just in time to save these fan events from the inescapable fact that the Star Trek franchise is now 43 years old and has been helmed by actors who now demand tens of thousands of dollars per appearance, some of whom are elderly and in other cases have travelled onward to the undiscovered country.
Just as Abrams’ Star Trek movie is being counted on to kick the Enterprise back into warp speed for the masses, the question for convention organizers will be whether the new cast will be able to similarly jump-start the meet-and-greet events that have characterized Trek fandom since the 1970s.
“We sure hope so,” says Gary Berman, one of the owners of Creation Entertainment, which runs the Official Star Trek Convention in Las Vegas between Aug. 6 and 9 this year. “We should know pretty soon.”
Attendees at the annual convention will witness a torch-passing of sorts when the orginal Capt. James T. Kirk, William Shatner, and the original Spock, Leonard Nimoy, both 78, appear at the same event as 31-year-old Zachary Quinto, the actor playing Spock in the new film.
Until Abrams’s reboot started generating interest in the franchise again, Star Trek had been through some lean years. Though the original 1960s Star Trek series and Star Trek: The Next Generation, which ran from 1987 to ‘94, have remained popular, later Star Trek spinoffs Deep Space 9, Voyager and Enterprise never developed the same cultural currency as the first two series.
“When Star Trek was at its peak of popularity, which was when Next Generation was on TV, we were doing 70 conventions a year solely for Star Trek,” Berman says. “Now we’re really doing two or three a year.”
Given the decline of the Star Trek franchise over the years, the time would seem ripe for a new, young cast able to excite fans - and conventions at which to meet them.
“We’re anxious to increase the number of events we’re doing,” says Berman, “and we’re already getting emails from fans all over the world asking us to do Star Trek conventions. We’re going to have to see what happens after the new movie opens. We know it’s going to help the franchise but we don’t know what will happen with the convention business.”
If the new cast is what the fans end up wanting, satisfying them could prove difficult. So far, Quinto appears to be the only member of the reboot cast to be booked for a fan event.
The first obstacle is money.
The organizer of a Star Trek cruise setting off from Los Angeles in October acknowledges that the actors from the later, lesser Trek shows generate less interest than stars from the original series and The Next Generation. But the less famous actors are what Jeff Lind, the Florida-based organizer of the Star Trek Cruise, can afford. The cruise will bring 100 to 150 fans (who will pay US$1,230 to $1,500 each) on board a ship to interact with past Trek actors, taking part in a murder mystery event during a seven-day cruise with stops in Cabo San Lucas and Puerto Vallarta. The cast will include a smattering of secondary actors from latter-day Trek spinoffs, plus Marina Sirtis, The Next Generation’s Deanna Troi.
Lind says he talked to representatives of new Trek cast members but “we have to be sure we can afford them, bottom line.”
According to Lind, “they’re a lot more expensive” than actors he has singed up for his company’s voyage. He remains confident his company’s cruise will work because fans will get to interact more meaningfully with the cast than at typical conventions.
Even if an event has the money to pay them, the new Trek cast is comprised of young, working actors -unlike some Starfleet stars of yesteryear, they’re busy. James Armstrong, event co-ordinator for Toronto’s FanExpo, says “nine times out of 10,” a young actor is otherwise occupied when a convention is taking place.
Organizers of Trek events are divided on whether new blood is even required to keep fans excited. Armstrong says the science fiction component of FanExpo, which takes place each year over the weekend before Labour Day, never experienced a lull in popularity even when Trek sputtered earlier this decade.
Whereas Star Trek and Star Wars have weathered ups and downs in terms of popularity with the general public, Armstrong says, support has been unwavering when it comes to the die-hard fans. “There’s never a bad year, it seems, for us.”
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