Star Trek came long after the pioneering of television, in 1966, but it was a pioneer in its own way, Nichelle Nichols recalls.
Bonanza was already broadcasting in colour at the time. Colour had a galvanizing effect on the medium, in the same way that talkies changed the silent movies, but it was originally introduced to sell TV sets, not transform TV itself. Star Trek made it onto the air in the first place because its parent network, NBC, realized it would be colourful, with psychedelic, LSD-inspired '60s colours, and sell many TV sets.
For Nichols, Star Trek turned into a wild ride.
"Were we pioneers?" Nichols asked rhetorically, at the summer meeting of the TV Critics Association. "I think not. I knew, though, that something was very, very different in Gene (Roddenberry) casting me as the fourth in command, as Lt. Uhura.
"It was rather interesting for me to be cast on the show because I came up in musical theatre. I was about to break through and do all the things I really wanted to do on Broadway. I took Star Trek because I thought it would be a nice adjunct to my resume; I'd get to Broadway quicker, and be a star. And suddenly - I still think that way - I kind of got stuck there. Star Trek interrupted my career."
Kidding.
Nichols was serious on one point, though: She tried to leave Star Trek after the first season.
``I thought, `Oh, this is going nowhere for me.' I told Gene on a Friday evening that I was going to leave the show. And Saturday, that next day, he said, `Please don't leave. Don't you see what I'm trying to do here?' ''
That very next evening, at a charity fundraiser, a star-struck fan walked up to Nichols. It was Dr. Martin Luther King.
``One of the fund raisers came up to the dais and said, 'Ms. Nichols, there's fan here; there's a person who says he's a big, big fan of yours,'' Nichols recalled. ``I thought it was a Trekkie, and so I said, `Sure.' I stood up and I looked across the room, and there was Dr. Martin Luther King walking towards me with this big grin on his face. And he reached out to me and said, `Yes, Ms. Nichols, I am your greatest fan.'
``And he said that Star Trek was the only show that he and his wife Coretta would allow their three little children to stay up and watch, because while they were marching, every night you could see people who looked like me being hosed down with a fire hose and dogs jumping on them because they wanted to eat in a restaurant.
``The civil rights marches were going on, and here I was playing an astronaut in the 23rd century.
``And when I told Dr. King I was leaving the show, I never got to tell him why, because he said, `You can't.' He explained to me just what I've just said.
```Here you are on the command crew in the 23rd century, fourth in command, while we're marching in the streets for equality.'
``He told me a lot of other things that were so complimentary that I blush to think of it, but he was dead serious. He said, `You're part of history, and this is your responsibility, even though it might not be your career choice.'
``So I went back and told Gene Roddenberry on Monday, because he'd asked me to think about it over the weekend, and that if I still wanted to leave I would have his blessings. I went back, and I told him about Dr. Martin Luther King. Now, Gene Roddenberry was a six-foot-three guy with muscles. He was a big, hack- nosed guy. He had been a motorcycle cop and flying hero in the Second World War. And he sat there with tears in his eyes.
``He said, `Thank God that someone knows what I'm trying to do. Thank God for Dr. Martin Luther King.' And I told him if he still wanted me, I would stay. He took out my resignation, and it was all torn up where I had given it to him. And he put it in the drawer. I stayed, and I've never looked back. I'm glad I did.''
http://www.canada.com/Martin+Luther+King+changed+face+Star+Trek/3363268/story.html
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