Normal television limits what you can do. With science fiction, you can exercise your imagination more. I fell in love with it.
Earth is the nest, the cradle, and we'll move out of it.
We tried to limit human versus human conflict only to those cases where it could be powerfully motivated and made completely believable.
We must question the story logic of having an all-knowing all-powerful God, who creates faulty Humans, and then blames them for his own mistakes.
These are the voyages of the starship Enterprise. Its five year mission... to boldly go where no man has gone before.
We stress humanity, and this is done at considerable cost. We can't have a lot of dramatics that other shows get away with - promiscuity, greed, jealousy. None of those have a place in 'Star Trek.'
If 'Trek' is a hit, we'd love to do a series of films - a regular event. Look at James Bond's films. They've been around since the early sixties.
I wanted to send a message to the television industry that excitement is not made of car chases.
When you get into an airplane by yourself and take off, you find yourself in this lovely, three-dimensional world where you can go in any direction. There is no feeling any more exciting than that.
'Star Trek' says that it has not all happened, it has not all been discovered, that tomorrow can be as challenging and adventurous as any time man has ever lived.
I have felt many times trapped by 'Star Trek.' It cost me dearly. It won't anymore, because I've come to grips with what it is and where it fits in my life.
I was tired of writing for shows where there was always a shoot-out in the last act and somebody was killed. 'Star Trek' was formulated to change that.
The ship's transporters - which let the crew 'beam' from place to place - really came out of a production need. I realized with this huge spaceship, I would blow the whole budget of the show just in landing the thing on a planet.
When they put out the sales brochure when we eventually went to series, they carefully rounded Spock's ears and made him look human so he wouldn't scare off potential advertisers.
The Russians were responsible for the Chekov character. They put in 'Pravda' that, 'Ah, the ugly Americans are at it again. They do a space show, and they forget to include the people who were in space first.' And I said, 'My God, they're right.'
Our effects were primitive. Our stars were a black cloth with holes in it and light behind.
It was 'ST' format to let space and alien worlds, rather than human weakness, provide the conflict and danger necessary to our adventure show.
