I love Star Trek. Expansive universes are enthralling to me, so Roddenberry's work is perfect. I do not engage in the Star Trek vs Star Wars debate because they are different and I love then both. That said...
Tonight I watched the documentary The Captains, which is narrated by William Shatner and is his conversations with each of the Star Trek captains: Sir Patrick Stewart, Avery Brooks, Kate Mulgrew, Scott Bakula, and Chris Pine. He talks about their backgrounds, how they came into Star Trek, what their experience was like, and what it's been like since. A couple of highlights:
The conversation with Stewart happens at his country home and the gardens are so beautiful I couldn't believe it. Should Sir Patrick ever decide he needs someone to house sit, that is a sword I will fall on.
It was interesting seeing Shatner walk around some of these conventions and his interactions with the fans. There is one fan "Captain Dave" who appears to have ALS and is chair bound. He struggles to communicate and his mother speaks for him. He meets Shatner and Captain Dave begins to cry he's so happy to see him. Shatner's interactions with him are so touching and genuine (not a word I often associate with Shatner) that it brought tears to my eyes.
Avery Brooks is, apparently, a mad genius. He's a jazz musician and seems to communicate primarily through the piano. His segments are like a brief glimpse into the mind of a mad man. A really, really talented one.
Stewart is my favorite of the Star Trek captains. When Shatner talks to him about his own embarrassment and his dismissiveness of fans who claim that Star Trek changed their lives, Shatner appears rather vulnerable. He talks about how he feels the captains who came after were so much better and his realization, when he was boarding the flight to meet with Stewart and met the owner of the company that provides the plane who says he decided to become a pilot because of Captain Kirk, that he might have actually changed some lives. Stewart reminds him that each of the Captains who followed were building on what he created and that, if he died tonight, he knows he would be remembered by most as Captain Picard rather than Macbeth or others...and he's proud of that. Shatner mentioned that he's finally proud of it too.
The documentary is great if you are a Star Trek fan, but even if you're not, the examination of this sort of unique place in television and film history that Star Trek (and it's captains) hold is really worth the 90 minutes or so it runs.
Knowing that Stewart is actually proud of being remembered as Picard really is a breath of fresh air after the bitterness of Alec Guinness as being remembered by most of the world as Obi-wan Kenobi. It's a wonderful thing that the generation of Shakespearean actors after him (notably Sirs Stewart and McKellan) are much more accepting of their pop culture legacy than Guinness was.
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