On the Red Carpet for ‘The Sixty-Year Mission: How Star Trek Changed Television and the World’

Star Trek first aired proper in the United States on September 8, 1966. Since then, some 60 years on, the series has had a constant presence in entertainment, pop culture, and society not just as a brand or IP, but as a fundamental cornerstone of television and a prime example of science fiction narrative storytelling.

With phrases like “Make it so,” “Beam me up, Scotty,” and of course the most popular, “Live Long and Prosper” having transcended the fandom; phasers, tractor beams, Klingons, The Final Frontier, and others have entered the lexicon of modern English.

But it isn’t just culture that Trek has helped forge over the multiple decades, but community — and on a global scale. Enter Director Mark A. Altman and Executive Producer William Shatner’s “The Sixty-Year Mission: How Star Trek Changed Television and the World.” And as the title offers up, the documentary, featuring interviews with all three living stars from Star Trek: The Original Series (William Shatner, George Takei, and Walter Koenig), includes discussions with friends, fans, and family (aka talent) of The Next Generation, Deep Space Nine, Voyager, and Strange New Worlds series. It’s full of archival footage, nostalgia for Trekkies, and insights into the history and the legacy that Gene Roddenberry’s magnum opus continues to leave behind — and there’s enough in here for even casual viewers to appreciate alongside the die-hard fans.

Along the strip of the United Theaters in Downtown LA on a gorgeous Friday evening, the casts, crews, and creatives — and those they inspired — arrived for the 60-year celebration of the longest-running and most influential sci-fi show in television history ahead of the special premiere screening of The Sixty-Year Mission, and I had the opportunity to talk with many of them, including: William Shatner (Executive Producer; Captain James T. Kirk on Star Trek), Terry Farrell (Jadzia Dax on Star Trek: Deep Space Nine), Nana Visitor (Major Kira on Star Trek: Deep Space Nine), John de Lancie (Q on Star Trek: The Next Generation), Todd Stashwick (Captain Shaw on Star Trek: Picard), Mark A. Altman (Writer/Director, The Sixty-Year Mission), Emily Swallow (Star Wars: The Mandalorian), Vincent Martella and David Errigo Jr. (Phineas and Ferb), Christopher Hunter (son of Jeffrey Hunter, aka Captain Pike on Star Trek: The Original Series), and more.

“Who could have imagined this?” said The Original Series’ leading man, and EP of the respective documentary, William Shatner. “Star Trek at the 60-year anniversary… this show is unique. No show has lasted 60 years, and there’s no sign of it fading.”

Terry Farrell, who portrayed Jadzia Dax in one of the earlier entries of the franchise, reflected fondly: “To be in the third or the second version after The Original, It feels kind of surreal how many… Think about how many people have come after Deep Space Nine! They’re like ‘hi, so nice to meet you.’ We are like a family together!”

“I’ve seen fans come up to me and go, you made me — I felt like I had courage to do this, that, or the other thing. And it — they’re trying to — I don’t know that I even deserve all that praise, but it’s — it feels so terrifically honoring [sic] to be able to hold space for somebody.”

And hold space, Star Trek has — literally and metaphorically. The show once averaged 11 to 12 million avid viewers per episode at one point during its The Next Generation era, and moreover, the series still boasts millions of fans across the world. “Star Trek has always been woke,” The Sixty-Year Mission director, Mark A. Altman posited, “Star Trek has always been aware of the sociopolitical climate, and Star Trek holds up a beacon for change for all of us. That promises a world where we all belong. And I think get into Star Trek and then get into changing the world so it can become Star Trek.”

So how has the show maintained its longevity and, most importantly, its quality?

“We are shepherds, you know? We are ambassadors,” said Todd Stashwick (aka Captain Shaw of Star Trek: Picard fame), “So from the writing to the acting to the directing, we have to take care of it. It’s an important thing culturally, it’s an important thing, so we got to take care of it. So it’s not just a paycheck. It’s a commitment.”

But what does that level of dedication actually look like? For the writers and actors, just like the fans of the series, it could mean starting with binge-watching a singular season or deep diving into the history of the specifics of the series. For Nana Visitor (Major Kira on Star Trek: Deep Space Nine), that meant getting in touch directly with how the fans related to the world of Star Trek and its tenets.

“Four years ago… I started to write a book about the women of Star Trek, and when I started to, I said, ‘I can’t, I gotta watch all the shows.’ And I watched all the shows,” she revealed, “Not just mine, not just the first one. And I got a different understanding of what all these amazing people were doing. And then I got the, the concept from the audience.

“The audience taught me that we were virtual mentors, that we — it was a young chaplain. I always talk about her because she was remarkable. She told me that what she brought onto the battlefields that she would have to go on… three concepts learned from Star Trek, and that was hope, courage, and the fact that you’re never alone.”

Not bad for a little TV show that networks originally called ‘too cerebral’ to work some 60 years ago. And with a brand-new generation of viewers experiencing the classic series as well as ongoing fans engaging with the current incarnations of characters that we could safely call part of American Mythology — if there is such a thing — as the Ancient Greeks had, I think Gene Roddenberry’s slogan for the series has become more than just that. Star Trek has truly gone where no man has gone before. And that’s not bad at all.

Full interviews with the stars right here: