Nichelle Nichols - The Unseen Interview (2008)

and what is it on we spin on YouTube but we also air locally on Comcast fantasy TV and it's cold but real black hi I'm Nichelle Nichols and when I'm in the squadron I watch real black on Comcast you should too thank you that he was really taking care to take good care of the characters and to do honor to the to this to the show and and at that and he took me to lunch on the set at the commissary and afterwards he said you know I'm so excited he said I didn't know what you look like at about this time yes you could play I say he said I wish I had something for you in the film and I said well if I don't you let me play her grandmother he says mom is thinking about her mother so I said no 300 years from that this is what grandma's are gonna look like it's a matter of fact this is what and we have a wonderful time and he subsequently tough called and talked to everyone and met with them to give the that give the original stars the honor and and and the respect of not just doing it without yer not and he talked in depth about the character and what made the character tick what we had developed and that day that I was there the young woman Zoe Saldana was not scheduled to work and he called knowing that I was coming he called her in under pretext of working so she was all in you what she came up good and because he didn't tell me but she told me so friend she came walking in and and she walked past me she went and she just goes no way and if we had a wonder and I stayed much longer than I would had planned to and we had a wonderful time together and she is one most beautifully exquisite young women I've ever met and with the wonderful cheekbones and you know and a serious demeanor with a nice sense of humor and a classic lady and I thought to hers in good hands and I I think that everyone who talked with him had hoped that that he would do you know cameos but in the final analysis this writer strike went on and it was became too unwieldy to try to write for any number even one other person but he called which was so incredibly classy of Lee he called to explain to me that there was that the sets were now broken down each one as they left and there was absolutely no time that than nothing that could do about it but that he was excited about having met me and thanked me for my being gracious I thanked him for his being gracious and he said but I'm going to look forward to working with you I'm gonna find something for you I'm gonna find something yes okay so that was my meeting with so I feel in I feel the prequel to what we did it was in good hands and I'm looking forward to seeing and expected to be the only person that was in from the original cast was was Leonard Nimoy and the story centers around him and so and so the and there's a young man playing him and there's minute Nimoy I don't know whether he's playing 300 years from that off what what is cuz he's keeping that close to his vest so that's all I know but I'm looking forward to seeing yes yes I was making three independent films all within a few months of one another and I was going from the first one called the torturer which is an craite credible film to Los Angeles to stay for three days and go to my next one in Phoenix this one one was in Denver and an excellent Phoenix totally different this bit of Earth which totally different characters and I was looking forward to both of them and when I got to Los Angeles or before I got to Los Angeles my agent called said there was a third film that was a guest star role and starring in the other two and he says I think it's wonderful script he sent me the script and again a really totally different script totally different character I mean and it's a grandmother I played Jasmine guy's mom and the grandmother to this young son who is battling with his sexuality and he's the star of the football team and he's discovering his his something's wrong and he's fighting it like crazy and this is the role that I'm playing and I played the spicy old grandma who's sexy as all get-out and used to be a jazz I just I put that in and you know and and he loves her so much it's a big influence on her and so I came just came in to do the two days with that have another day I go and I get there my agent says oh by the way you've got an interview one Thursday I said I'm leaving for Phoenix on Thursday he said yes but this is for a TV sir I said I can't do it he said yes you're going to do it I have it at 10 o'clock you don't leave it until to the limo I can't take it bringing back a lot of dot about so hi Ana okay you know I probably won't get it anyway that's me picking up whatever and I - and he said he rose and I'm doing here roses TV series and I had seen something I was so fascinated with it I go man I read forward and I forget about it and there's this whole quartering of people there and I went oh oh this is bigger than a breadstick this is this is oh yeah this is this is Network you know and that's exactly what it was and Tim Kareem the creator what crane lifted creator was there and all the writers were there and producers and associate producers and la-dee-da and so I sat down and I said would you sit here and it actually is seen that you'd be standing up but I was glad to sit down and they laughed you know and so I put a little sense of humor in this role a gain of grandmother and I played an entirely different grandmother but still if I steal abroad you know and I left and I thank them all very much and and when I got to Phoenix I'm shooting one or two days later and somebody comes up to me and says oh I heard I heard you're going on o heroes and I said what are you talking about how do you know about it I just did that yesterday that's all those people yesterday and then I realized that people are talking to you know their Star Trek fans everywhere in the world in every walk of life and so the next thing I know and the TV guys that there and I said well it's common knowledge and I didn't know it was one of their things not to talk about it they hadn't told me that cuz they hadn't told me I had it yeah and so I can't agent and said and he said oh my agent called me and said hey guess what and he says Oh corpse you know crane called him he was livid he said you did and of course they had not told me because they hadn't even sent me the contract yet and so I think they did let me have it anyway and I got there for my first day of shooting and he was to put up and they said do you know what it means to hire a person from Star Trek one of the stars of Star Trek he said it is complete and immediate communication he says well yes but and he says everybody is sworn to secrecy around here do you have a secretary he said several I said the Star Trek fans do you have a wife no I said do you have a son yes do you have a daughter yes nice do you have a wife sister it's the first duty of a Star Trek is to call tenth Star Trek fans of their cult is Star Trek anywhere in the country and world and I said I found out about it before my agent called me and the next thing there was an affiliate and at the at my shooting schedule interrupting my movie and so I didn't know that I was committed to secrecy and so I told him yes and he said I'll be darned I said by the way who's your messenger service to get your scripts tight it's ink dries and so he went he said he was so non plus and he never really had that degree of exposure but he was they were very happy with what I was doing and and so I've just been called back I hope this is not supposed to be secret for the second season for the next season or the end of the second whatever it is I I'm going back for and I'm a recurring character and hopefully I don't join the whole cast but if not as being a wonderful wonderful experience cast is superb write them and tell them that because they don't believe me yeah yeah well they do know that they have a large contingency of Star Trek fans who have written them and Takei had done a role as you know earlier in the year but somehow it didn't get the all the pre excitement and I guess they were kind of kept in and he knew to keep it by so he was putting out the word and I hadn't talked to him so - a little different and I'll try to be short and get some it's a great honor thank you two-part question I want to hope hope you could talk a little bit about how your current work I know you've got I look at the writing and the script and you can never tell what's gonna happen and when it gets translated onto the screen but I thought it had a great potential because I play a Madame a game a totally different role and the the the greatest motivation of an actor is to get to stretch and not to you know you can play one role forever but to stretch into many roles and to bring a sense of who the character is and then still in that character whoever it is some sense of dignity and why where it's something involving the person that makes it more than a cardboard character right and there's more to man Lady Magdalene Maggie then be just a madam and so I want I thought that that was interesting enough to get involved with and and so that that's why I came on board and I liked the writers other works and but this was the first picture for him and he's still working on on distribution but it's gotten a lot of play on the internet Tyler from real black TV a pleasure and honor to meet you I have two questions one is could you talk to us a little bit about being the first person to be involved with the interracial kiss on national TV into did you make a conscious effort to avoid the blaxploitation era I made a conscious effort to jump in and feet first because we did not at that time refer to it or even think of it as black exploitation it was an opportunity for black riders for black directors for Black Stars for black actors behind the scenes to get experience to get known and Gordon Parks had done the learning tree and my son happened to play Gordon Party I'm new to started that Kyle Johnson and I saw what could happen from there and he was the one who really opened the door for black people to have an opportunity and in filmdom where it was going to be seen unfortunately what the studios were very interested in which became black exploitation was the CDR side and no one saw it coming what we were doing because as actors you're playing a role you know not being yourself you're playing a role and before you knew it that's all that was up there you know so I did one film I'm Adam and that was 40 some years ago you know and I didn't play another one a job and many other roles in between but no more black exploitation films because after that one all I saw was the opportunity to show to take off women to take off their clothes black men to leave their wives and and have bastard children running around to be a dope artist and and to demean the black horse and never seeing the while that exist never seeing the other side of us of who we are the diamond faceted persons that we are like anyone else any other culture and I resented it deeply and so I turn down opportunities and they wouldn't they wouldn't cast me in anything else and so I went back to theater my first love until things started moving around and then ten years later and well not not ten years later in 70 70 or 71 right after Star Trek the the conventions Star Trek conventions which were fans produced and organized came along and so that and there was one somewhere every weekend in the world it spread like wildfire and every like and so we we stayed in in the in the public eye and that took ten years later to these six major motion pictures of Star Trek and the other question you asked me was about the interracial kiss we were always looking to each the next script because one was better than the other but I was not looking to as great scenes being constantly cut in in rewrites there was a reason for that and that that reason I wasn't terribly thrilled and I and I was getting offers now in theater and and one was an interest in my one-woman show to go to Broadway and that's one of the the the major motion pictures kay of Star Trek and so it kept postponing that anyway back to the to the kiss I went in it was the end of the first season and I went into gene Roddenberry and told him that I was getting these offers since after the first this was after the first season and and that I wanted to get back to my first love which is musical theater in life life theater and he said you can't do that do you know what I'm trying to do don't you see and he said wait a minute just this is Friday take the weekend and think about it and the next set the next night on Saturday I was a guest of celebrity guest and I think was an N double ACP fundraiser and one of the I attended and and I'm at the dais and people are coming in and one of the producers our organizers of the event came to me and said mrs. Nichols there's someone who really wants to meet you is a big fan and I said oh certainly and I got up and turned around into the face of dr. Martin Luther King I could not breathe I mean you know that expression Waiting to Exhale I and he's and he smiled and what he laughed I think that's when I time to begin to exhale and he said I'm the fan and my whole family as a fan of yours and my little children and then he says and I want to congratulate you on the quality of your work and and the quality of the character and so forth and I said well thank you dr. King I'm going to miss my co-workers and and he said what you're talking about and I said I'm leaving the show after the first season and I told Gene Roddenberry he says you can't do that you cannot disease you cannot do that and I I wanted to say would you talk about that and he said don't you understand what that man is doing he's chained you he's put you and the command crew you're fourth in command you can't abdicate this you're you're out there on a five-year mission where no man or woman has gone before his he says you've changed the face of television forever you cannot do that for the first time the whole world is seeing us as we should be seen not just as beautiful entertainers and and domestics or domestics he said for the first time there's a whole human being there beyond the beauty beyond the talent the musical talent in science in it's not a mistake he made you chief communications officer and I thought right that I've used it since yeah I get to tell everybody were yes but I'm I listened fascinated to him and he said do you know that how important this still is this is the only television show that my wife Coretta and I allow our little children to stay up and watch and he said this is so important I said and this is right in the middle of the civil rights marches and programs and I said you know when and again I really wanted he says no we don't want you there we we have enough marchers we have enough famous people we need you on that bridge indicator we need you on that screen because this is 300 years from now that's telling the world it already is we are there what happened between now and then begins with our marches what happens there is you you can't go you cannot leave I could not leave and I went back to tell Gene Roddenberry and I told him what dr. King said Gene Roddenberry six-foot-three hatchet-face big ex-cop motorcycle cop world war ii fighter pilot and he sat there at this desk and he looked at me looked up at me and he said thank God for dr. Martin Luther King somebody knows what I'm trying to achieve here and the tear ran down this thing I almost lost that said thank you Jean and I got out of there and he was a dear friend and he saw to it from then on that less of my I never complained that my scenes were protected more and I'd like to say before we go there I did not leave and I never looked back I was very grateful for that opportunity and when dr. King's kids grew up I got to meet all but one and each one totally separately and equally you know we didn't need luck believe our daddy when he came home I said did you know who your father yeah it was getting beat up you know it's you a game in retrospect hearing them say that that dr. King was so far ahead of himself because he realized that images are so powerful and they're and the television is educational whether we like it or not you know and and there's a sad thing that's happening in television that with the technology of immediate communication with the network that a very powerful negative is being used and turned on us and it's very important that you what you people are doing and what you people are doing is so powerful and so necessary because we've got to get those young minds before because they have so glamorized the gangs it's all you hear the first thing you hear on the news every night is a shooting is the gangs and then seeing them you know what yeah and the last thing I saw was one walking around talking but this is in one of the schools where the fight broke out between Latinos and blacks and the cops came in and they and they laughed at him and they're looking at a Latino beautiful guy you know beautiful guy and he said don't matter to us young student you know about 17 I guess high school and he matter to us he said that there he said they turned their back were someplace else he said we don't fight we gonna kill each other and I'm quick they're putting this on television you know how many thousands of young people's minds are being affected and it looks glamorous it's vicious it's terrible and it's despicable yes the that I've seen oh I thought you meant that I'm doing well they the film torture has to do with our role in in torturing in and in Iraq and and it's a three character play that that is very very powerful and brings into focus just how do who are we and and how do we handle ourselves with the world scene and how how are we perceived now as before eight years ago just just diminished and that has an effect on society and the role that I play in this better earth she's a powerful teacher music teacher and film teach uh to young people and she stands tall until this young one woman who's seen her father murdered in a front of her has turned negative and they have a battle and and I won't give you any more but it's it's very inspiring because the end of it each one of these from hat has the end of it is uplifting as well as the second other little film that I'm that I'm doing I'll think of the name and I want to begin right here with okay this is uh from the shelf I was chatting with someone when a man approached and said in show there was someone who would like to meet you he's a big fan of Star Trek and of Alura I turned to greet this fan and found myself gazing upon the face of dr. Martin Luther King jr. I was stunned and I remember thinking whoever that's Fantas he just is going to have to wait the man introduced us and imagine my surprise when his first words uttered by dr. King were yes I am that fan and I wanted to tell you how important your role is you see Michelle was just debating the very night before about whether or not she should leave because she didn't feel her role on Star Trek was very section of the program and I want to say that this is the right here she paved the way for just like the ultimate just strong intelligent beautiful black woman who could hold her own against any man that's what I'm thinking the whole time against any man and I think about in the 70s and I made onion in myself I'm sorry I guess I was watching the reruns but I think about going into the seventies thinking about Patti LaBelle and the bluebells and then hold that whole style they were rocking hey we know where it comes from so we're gonna continue on miss Nichelle Nichols most famous for her role as lieutenant Uhura on the original Star Trek television series is an accomplished dancer and singer performing since the age of 14 she was hired by the great Duke to choreograph and perform a ballet for one of his musical Suites and finish the tour as his lead singer Nicole Nichols has performed throughout the US Canada and Europe including a stint as a guest artist with Lionel Hamptons band she has co-starred it's six blockbuster Star Trek films performed in her own one-woman show toured Broadway recorded a CD wrote it autobiography and sci-fi novel and has a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame [Applause] she stars on the hit television series heroes who watches hero [Applause] so please welcome me please join me welcoming the Pioneer Award hopefully those few words but we do want to acknowledge miss Nichols success continued success and we do truly honor you but with this award well when she comes and will continue you want to read what's on the award and it's very little because I'm going to put so much more on it but it says the Chipola university pan-african studies communication program Xbox Pioneer Award presented to Nichelle Nichols for our lifetime achievement and contributions to the television film sci-fi and comic-book industries presented at the seventh annual East Coast black Age of comics convention egg box and birth brother Joseph wheeler says egg box forever [Applause] this is so beautiful please take your seats in so I can see you all and I'm truly honored itself but throughout the years you sometimes received awards just for being there this will set high among the most important awards that I have received one for my work when I took a year off my career to change the place of the space program and and to have been told a few years later by a young woman who was just down the hall and Medical School when that happened that she was 9 years old when Star Trek came on and she said I'm going to fly someday the stars and because the core is there and of when I received the contract and unsuccessfully recruited the first african-american men and women and the first women for the astronaut corps she was in medical school and she said I'm going to fly now and four years later she became the first woman in color to be selected as an astronaut for the space shuttle program and became my very very close friend ever since this is deep to my heart and I thank you so very very much you

Channel: reelblack

Views: 28,191

Rating: 4.8766518 out of 5

Keywords: Nichelle Nichols, Star Trek, Interview, Unseen Interview

Id: pB4sjzvsNFY

Length: 39min 10sec (2350 seconds)

Published: Sat Feb 18 2017