I watched my first episode of "Star Trek" sometime in the early part of 1968. As it turns out, the episode was "The Trouble With Tribbles," one of the show's most popular episodes, and certainly one of its funniest. I like to say that having that episode as my first full-scale exposure to the series probably meant that I was destined to be a fan, which I have been, ever since. But the truth is that I had been intending to watch the show for a long time, and probably for the same reason everybody knew about the show in the first place. During its first season, if you had gone outside of the show's admittedly small fan base, and talked to people at large, mentioning the title of the show would have, in almost every instance, produced a pause and then a comment along these lines: "Oh, yeah ... that's the show with the guy with the pointed ears."
In other words, Mr. Spock. Or the human that portrayed him, Leonard Nimoy.
But, while most people would have had a general knowledge of the character, not even everyone in the show's fan base knew how much of a struggle it was to get that character on the show in the first place. Keep in mind that this was back in the day when television content was exclusively the product of three national broadcasting networks, and their executives worried almost obsessively about the reactions of audiences (and, therefore, the consumer-driven sponsors whose commercials paid for the programs) to what was put on the air. And, while NBC liked "Star Trek" enough to order not one but two pilots before greenlighting its production, the network's executives absolutely, positively did not like Spock, on the grounds that his allegedly Satanic appearance would offend religious viewers. Gene Roddenberry, the show's creator, fought back, saying that a space-bound show needed at least one character whose very presence reminded viewers of where the show's characters were and what they were doing.
Roddenberry, of course, won. And all of us are grateful that he did. The original "Star Trek" series was never a ratings winner in its three years on the air. But even the people who didn't watch it knew about "the guy with the pointed ears." And, despite his presence, there was no mass revolt against NBC by religious viewers. If anything, there was a mass revolt against the network's plan, during its second season, to cancel the show--one that managed against the odds and ratings to buy it one more year on the air.
And none of this even touches on Leonard Nimoy's own reluctance to play the character. He saw himself at the time as a very serious actor, one whose seriousness would be jeopardized by playing someone with pointed ears. He came very close to walking away from the show for that reason during its early production. Years after the series went off the air, he felt (not without reason) that the show and the character had typecast him out of a career. At one point, his resentment ran so deep that he authored an autobiography called "I Am Not Spock."
But none of this explains why the show became a cultural fixture even in its original incarnation, and led despite the failure of that incarnation to later television shows and feature films. There are a lot of reasons that explain why "Star Trek" has earned that status. But there's no doubt that Nimoy's own performance was essential to that success. He found both the logic and the humanity in a half-human, half-alien character in a way that perhaps no one else could have done, and made it work to a degree that stamped him on our collective consciousness. He found the ability to see Spock as a way to reflect humanity, rather than to repress it. He underplayed a role that, in one sense, would have been easy to overplay, and made him more real as a result. In the creation of the Vulcan salute, he integrated his Jewish faith into the portrayal, an illustration of how actors can use different parts of their lives to transform themselves into the characters they portray. And, in conjunction with William Shatner and DeForest Kelley, he became part of a troika of characters that gave "Star Trek" a framework for mixing philosophical debates with action and adventure.
And, in the process, through the magic of television, he visited the homes of millions of us, and became a friend. I'm proud to have been one of those friends, Leonard, even though we never met. You and your fellow cast members helped get this pre-"Big Bang Theory" geek, and many others, past childhood ridicule and bullying, and into a future where, like Spock, we could be ourselves. Perhaps, when I join you in being beamed up to the flip side, I can tell you all of this in person. In the meantime, for all of us who watched you (and, to paraphrase you from the second "Star Trek" film), you have been, and ever shall be, our friend. Live forever and prosper. Baruch dayan emet.
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