Entry tags:
Woman in Motion
I got a ticket to Woman in Motion because my flatmate is a huge Star Trek fan, and Woman in Motion is a documentary about Nichelle Nichols, who played Uhura… and then my flatmate had to bail on the screening, so I went into the thing with a bit of a chip on my shoulder, but the film’s just so darn charming that I ended up loving it anyway.
How could I help it? Nichelle Nichols is a charismatic subject for a documentary in the first place, and the documentary focuses on one of the most interesting aspects of her life: her campaign to recruit more women and minorities to train as astronauts for NASA in the late 1970s. She criss-crossed the country doing talk show spots to put out the word that NASA really meant it when they said they wanted women and minorities to apply, and indeed, the next NASA astronaut class (expanded from 25 to 35 because Nichols’ recruitment drive brought in such a flood of extremely qualified applicants) included the first Asian-American astronaut, the first African-American astronauts, and the first female astronauts.
And not only did Nichols inspire these people to apply to NASA, but she remained involved in NASA outreach and became friends with many of these astronauts, including Judy Resnick who tragically died in the Challenger explosion. Nichols actually teared up in remembering her.
The documentary is also impressive because they interviewed such a broad range of people: NASA scientists, astronauts, Judy Resnick’s surviving brother, Martin Luther King III - Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. was integral in convincing Nichols to stay on Star Trek, which she was planning to leave because Uhura rarely got much of a storyline. He explained that her presence on the bridge was inspirational in itself, even though she had so few lines.
And of course the documentary includes interviews with some of Nichols’ surviving Star Trek co-stars, George Takei and Walter Koenig. No William Shatner, though. Someone asked the director about it in the Q&A afterward and the director was all, “Well, it is Nichols’ story…” I guess Shatner has a tendency to take over any project that he’s involved in, like a fungus.
Another charming story from the Q&A: the director mentioned that they had dinner with Nichols in a noisy restaurant once, and she sang the Star Trek theme song (she’s the one doing all those “ah-ah-AAAAAHs” at the beginning of TOS episodes), and the whole restaurant went quiet and then burst into applause when she finished.
***
Naturally I came home all afire to watch an Uhura episode, although as aforementioned there are no episodes that focus primarily on Uhura (hence Nichols’ frustration with the show), so we watched “Plato’s Stepchildren,” which is famous for showing US TV’s first interracial kiss.
My GOD does that episode go hard. The crew of the Enterprise end up on a planet of psychokinetic psychopaths who claim to have modeled their society off the philosophy of Plato, who use their psychokinetic abilities to move the crewmembers’ bodies around like puppets. They force Spock to laugh! Kirk to crawl around on the floor like a dog! And then, of course, it goes all “aliens made them do it” with Kirk & Uhura, because that’s how you get an interracial kiss on American TV in 1968.
How could I help it? Nichelle Nichols is a charismatic subject for a documentary in the first place, and the documentary focuses on one of the most interesting aspects of her life: her campaign to recruit more women and minorities to train as astronauts for NASA in the late 1970s. She criss-crossed the country doing talk show spots to put out the word that NASA really meant it when they said they wanted women and minorities to apply, and indeed, the next NASA astronaut class (expanded from 25 to 35 because Nichols’ recruitment drive brought in such a flood of extremely qualified applicants) included the first Asian-American astronaut, the first African-American astronauts, and the first female astronauts.
And not only did Nichols inspire these people to apply to NASA, but she remained involved in NASA outreach and became friends with many of these astronauts, including Judy Resnick who tragically died in the Challenger explosion. Nichols actually teared up in remembering her.
The documentary is also impressive because they interviewed such a broad range of people: NASA scientists, astronauts, Judy Resnick’s surviving brother, Martin Luther King III - Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. was integral in convincing Nichols to stay on Star Trek, which she was planning to leave because Uhura rarely got much of a storyline. He explained that her presence on the bridge was inspirational in itself, even though she had so few lines.
And of course the documentary includes interviews with some of Nichols’ surviving Star Trek co-stars, George Takei and Walter Koenig. No William Shatner, though. Someone asked the director about it in the Q&A afterward and the director was all, “Well, it is Nichols’ story…” I guess Shatner has a tendency to take over any project that he’s involved in, like a fungus.
Another charming story from the Q&A: the director mentioned that they had dinner with Nichols in a noisy restaurant once, and she sang the Star Trek theme song (she’s the one doing all those “ah-ah-AAAAAHs” at the beginning of TOS episodes), and the whole restaurant went quiet and then burst into applause when she finished.
***
Naturally I came home all afire to watch an Uhura episode, although as aforementioned there are no episodes that focus primarily on Uhura (hence Nichols’ frustration with the show), so we watched “Plato’s Stepchildren,” which is famous for showing US TV’s first interracial kiss.
My GOD does that episode go hard. The crew of the Enterprise end up on a planet of psychokinetic psychopaths who claim to have modeled their society off the philosophy of Plato, who use their psychokinetic abilities to move the crewmembers’ bodies around like puppets. They force Spock to laugh! Kirk to crawl around on the floor like a dog! And then, of course, it goes all “aliens made them do it” with Kirk & Uhura, because that’s how you get an interracial kiss on American TV in 1968.