My Star Trek Experience
Sept. 5 - 10, 2001
Written by Denise Felt 2001
When my family and I flew into Las Vegas, Nevada, Wednesday evening, September 5, 2001, for the 35th Anniversary of Star Trek Convention, we felt as though we had stepped out into another world. We were awed and amazed by everything our eyes saw, and that was before we got to the hotel! Las Vegas’ palm trees seemed extremely foreign to our Midwestern eyes, as did the imposing neon-lit green of the enormous MGM Grand Hotel. Thankfully, we were not staying there, but at a smaller hotel nearby that wasn’t quite so . . . flashy. We checked into our hotel and ventured to the Alexis Park Hotel a mile away, where we could preregister and save ourselves a long line the next day.
The Athena Ballroom was sparsely populated when we arrived, but then, it was just after 9pm, and the Preregistration closed in an hour. We received our vouchers for the shows, our necktags to wear to let the staff and security know that we had a right to be at the Convention, and free tickets to the Las Vegas Hilton’s “Star Trek: The Experience” program. This last was a nice bonus, since we had planned on taking a free moment over the weekend to go there anyway. We also chose our pre-signed autographed photos of those few stars who did not do in-person autographs for the masses. It was a leisurely evening, which gave us no hint of the coming insanity of the next few days.
As a sample day, I will endeavor to describe as accurately as possible what Saturday was like. By this time, we had two days of the Convention behind us, and we knew which lines to get in, which ones to avoid, and which ballroom we were supposed to report to. We were pros. We arrived at the Alexis Park Hotel to find the General Admission lines out the door, but that was nothing new, since they’d been out the door for the past two days. But this time, we didn’t make the mistake of getting in line. When we entered the hotel, we could see that one of the long lines was for the Athena Ballroom, the small ballroom where we had registered Wednesday night. We avoided that room as much as possible, only venturing in near closing time or lunchtime, when the lines cleared out. At all other times, the room was completely packed (far past any fire code allowances) with fans trying to get autographs from the visiting stars.
And there were definitely a lot of stars at the Convention! Over sixty invited guests, many of whom were doing autographs only for the fortunate ones who had access to the large Parthenon Ballroom. These lucky people had the pleasure of talking with William Shatner, Kate Mulgrew, and the crews of each of the four Star Trek series. Naturally, my family had bought these, more expensive tickets. We may be frugal, but we’re not stupid.
But there were many other stars there, as well. Recurring guest stars like Max Grodenchik (Rom) and Gwynyth Walsh (B’Tor) were in the Athena Ballroom alongside such actors as Robin Curtis (Saavik) and Gary Lockwood (Gary Mitchell.) Stars from both the TV series and the Star Trek movies came and talked, signed, and took pictures with the fans. No wonder the Athena Ballroom was always packed!
On Saturday, we arrived at the Alexis Park Hotel at 10am, hoping to get into the Athena Ballroom for more autographs before the crowd. But everyone else seemed to have the same idea, and we gave it up very quickly when we saw the line. We found out later that Alan Ruck (Capt. Harriman) had arrived and was signing. So that was why the room stayed overflowing all day! We decided to hit the Apollo Ballroom once more. This was our first stop on Thursday, and we had managed to squeeze in time there on Friday, as well. This ballroom contained the dealers. And did they have deals for all of us fans! We browsed the tables, oohing and aahing over the merchandise, even buying a few choice items, but our eyes kept straying to our watches. And at 10:30am, we headed out and went to the Zeus Ballroom.
This ballroom was across the hall from the large Parthenon Ballroom where, sure enough, many of our fellow fans were biding their time until they could get in line for autographs from the crew members. This day was September 8th, the official anniversary date of the original series, and in honor of that event, we got to see the original crew of the U.S.S. Enterprise. But we knew from experience that our row wouldn’t even be called for another two hours, so we slid into the General Admission room (the Zeus Ballroom) to hear the Klingons speak. All of the lovely Klingon women were there: Spice Williams (Vixis), Mary Kay Adams (Grilka), Barbara March (Lursa), and Gwynyth Walsh (B’Tor.) They spoke to us and answered our questions, allowing us to take photos of them onstage. We asked them about the make-up, the costumes, and whether it was true what Robert O’Reilly (Gowron) had told us on Friday, that Lursa had fallen out of her costume more than once? She hotly denied this and was supported by the others, who all avowed that Robert was a complete gossip and not to be trusted. After they spoke, we were enchanted to hear from the adorable (really!) Boba Fett of Star Wars fame, Jeremy Bulloch.
We headed back to the Parthenon Ballroom in time to get in the long line to get autographs from Nichelle Nichols (Uhura), Walter Koenig (Chekov), and John DeLancie (Q.) George Takei (Sulu) had signed some on Friday and would be signing again on Sunday. William Shatner, James Doohan, and Leonard Nimoy had done the pre-signed autographs. We’d heard from Shatner on Thursday, since he couldn’t be with us on Saturday, but Nimoy and Doohan would be talking to us that afternoon. After our trip through the line, we returned to the Zeus Ballroom to hear Max Grodenchik (Rom) and Aron Eisenberg (Nog) discuss the merits of all things Ferengi.
At 2pm, we were in our seats in the Parthenon Ballroom as Dave Scott, out host for the weekend, introduced science fiction’s most logical man, Leonard Nimoy. Many years older and still sexy even without the pointed ears, our favorite Vulcan charmed us for an hour answering questions, telling what he’s been up to, and reciting some of his poetry for us. I got to tell him that I owned one of his books of poetry and how much I enjoyed it. I didn’t add that I was a poetry editor, nor that I published a monthly international poetry magazine, but it still felt serendipitous to hear him thank me for the compliment.
At 3pm, he was joined onstage by the rest of the crew, including Grace Lee Whitney (Yeoman Rand), whose autograph I had been fortunate enough to get in the Athena Ballroom on Thursday. It was wonderful to see James Doohan, although it was sad to see him in such failing health. Nichelle was looking as beautiful and vivacious as ever, and George Takei barely looked a day older than when he had sat at the helm of the Enterprise. Walter had aged, but very gracefully. And if he no longer made a young girl’s heart flutter, well . . . this girl wasn’t so young any more either. And he was still a handsome man. They spoke about the show, but nostalgically, and I realized that it had truly been a long time since they’d worked together at Desilu Studios with good ol’ Gene. But later, they livened up as they told us what they were doing now, what their children were doing, and in a few cases, what their grandkids were doing. It was a blissful hour spent in the company of a very special band of actors.
But more fun was coming up! At 4pm, we adjourned to poolside for a pool party. James, Nichelle, Walter, and George were doing photo ops for the fans and the proceeds were going to charity. And the fans got a free drink too. I got my picture taken with Scotty. It was a very special moment. He reminded me up close of my beloved grandfather, and I suppose my hug was a little tighter than it should have been from a stranger because of that thought. But he didn’t mind at all, his eyes twinkling as he hugged me back. (I suppose that might have been because I was wearing a swimsuit at the time, but who would take offense?)
Later, I rushed into one of the hotel’s many restrooms and changed into my evening gown for the evening show. When I returned poolside, I was fortunate enough to run into the incredible lookalike Picard. He’d been enjoying himself greatly at the Convention, having actors and fans come up and mistake him for the sexy captain, asking him for his autograph. Some just asked to have their picture taken with him, which he very graciously allowed, his soft British voice never losing patience or tiring of our foolishness. I learned later that they’d cancelled the Lookalike Contest because of him, Dave Scott going so far as to say that he’d have won, even without a uniform! In fact, Dave said that it would be a great joke if it actually was Patrick Stewart, and he’d managed to make it to the Convention after all! I never learned the name of Picard’s lookalike unfortunately, but I did get a picture taken with him. My son told me that he said that he had met the real Picard a few weeks before our Convention, and that great actor had almost fallen over in shock!
We didn’t have time for a formal dinner, and had in fact eaten pizza by the pool during the party. Our theatre show was at 7pm, and we didn’t want to be late. We were seeing the Fab 4 of Voyager (Ethan Phillips, Roxann Dawson, Robert Duncan McNeill, and Robert Picardo) perform “The Midlife Crisis of Dionysus” by Garrison Keiller. We were in line early, but didn’t take our seats until 7:20, since they had run into trouble with the podiums. Apparently the hotel had been remiss concerning their needs for the show and had supplied them with podiums that did not have proper lighting or microphones. In addition, Robert Picardo (The Doctor) insisted that the podiums didn’t even match! It was a very comical few moments as they dealt with these setbacks, and I told Picardo while getting his autograph the next day that the show was made more enjoyable by their humorous handling of the adverse circumstances. My mother and I took a taxi back to our hotel after the theatre, leaving my father and my son to enjoy the late show, which was “Into the Matrix,” a play starring Alexander Siddig (Bashir) and Andrew Robinson (Garak.) When my son returned to our hotel room later to tell me about the show, I was organizing my many autographed pictures and deciding if Sunday’s lines were going to be too long to get the last remaining signatures that I’d been wanting from the Athena Ballroom.
Some of the many wonderful moments over the weekend that stay in my mind are when I heard Dick Gordon, the Apollo astronaut, tell us that NASA would “take our science fiction and make it science fact!” Or when we found out that several countries had people who had come to the Convention; including Japan, England, Germany, Australia, Sweden, Peru, and Switzerland. There was also one woman who had flown all the way from Israel to join us. There was the Karaoke Night on Friday, where the stars and the fans sang and danced the Time Warp together. Or the “Experience,” which was indeed an incredible attraction at the Las Vegas Hilton. Or when Michael Dorn (Worf) told the fans that Terry Farrell (Dax) was the best kisser, while Marina Sirtis (Troi) glared at him with her hands on her hips. Or Wil Wheaton’s (Wesley) hilarious improv group, who had us all falling off our seats laughing Thursday night with their skits. It was especially nice to be able to tell him on Friday how great the show had been. Or when Jimmy Doohan and Nichelle Nichols sang “St. James Infirmary” to the fans. Or when Garrett Wang (Ensign Kim) spoke to me about his plans to get an act together for a future Slanted Fedora Convention. Or when Robert Picardo came out during Neil Norman and his Cosmic Orchestra’s performance and sang “Viva Las Vegas” in Elvis’ voice. And especially when the orchestra did their rendition of the UFO theme music! Several of the stars spoke about the upcoming new series, “Enterprise,” as did Brannon Braga himself! And Scotty told us that he’d been given an honorary doctorate in Engineering from Milwaukee Wisconsin’s School of Engineering because, they said, more than 55% of their applicants put his name down as the reason why they wanted to be an engineer.
I originally thought I could somehow pack every wonderful thing that happened over that weekend into an essay for you all, so that you could feel like you were there too and witnessed it for yourselves. But the truth is, there’s far too much to write anything short of a book about! So I’ll leave my story here, making you want to hear and see more (as I still do), and tell you with sincerity not to miss the 40th Anniversary!
When my family and I flew into Las Vegas, Nevada, Wednesday evening, September 5, 2001, for the 35th Anniversary of Star Trek Convention, we felt as though we had stepped out into another world. We were awed and amazed by everything our eyes saw, and that was before we got to the hotel! Las Vegas’ palm trees seemed extremely foreign to our Midwestern eyes, as did the imposing neon-lit green of the enormous MGM Grand Hotel. Thankfully, we were not staying there, but at a smaller hotel nearby that wasn’t quite so . . . flashy. We checked into our hotel and ventured to the Alexis Park Hotel a mile away, where we could preregister and save ourselves a long line the next day.
The Athena Ballroom was sparsely populated when we arrived, but then, it was just after 9pm, and the Preregistration closed in an hour. We received our vouchers for the shows, our necktags to wear to let the staff and security know that we had a right to be at the Convention, and free tickets to the Las Vegas Hilton’s “Star Trek: The Experience” program. This last was a nice bonus, since we had planned on taking a free moment over the weekend to go there anyway. We also chose our pre-signed autographed photos of those few stars who did not do in-person autographs for the masses. It was a leisurely evening, which gave us no hint of the coming insanity of the next few days.
As a sample day, I will endeavor to describe as accurately as possible what Saturday was like. By this time, we had two days of the Convention behind us, and we knew which lines to get in, which ones to avoid, and which ballroom we were supposed to report to. We were pros. We arrived at the Alexis Park Hotel to find the General Admission lines out the door, but that was nothing new, since they’d been out the door for the past two days. But this time, we didn’t make the mistake of getting in line. When we entered the hotel, we could see that one of the long lines was for the Athena Ballroom, the small ballroom where we had registered Wednesday night. We avoided that room as much as possible, only venturing in near closing time or lunchtime, when the lines cleared out. At all other times, the room was completely packed (far past any fire code allowances) with fans trying to get autographs from the visiting stars.
And there were definitely a lot of stars at the Convention! Over sixty invited guests, many of whom were doing autographs only for the fortunate ones who had access to the large Parthenon Ballroom. These lucky people had the pleasure of talking with William Shatner, Kate Mulgrew, and the crews of each of the four Star Trek series. Naturally, my family had bought these, more expensive tickets. We may be frugal, but we’re not stupid.
But there were many other stars there, as well. Recurring guest stars like Max Grodenchik (Rom) and Gwynyth Walsh (B’Tor) were in the Athena Ballroom alongside such actors as Robin Curtis (Saavik) and Gary Lockwood (Gary Mitchell.) Stars from both the TV series and the Star Trek movies came and talked, signed, and took pictures with the fans. No wonder the Athena Ballroom was always packed!
On Saturday, we arrived at the Alexis Park Hotel at 10am, hoping to get into the Athena Ballroom for more autographs before the crowd. But everyone else seemed to have the same idea, and we gave it up very quickly when we saw the line. We found out later that Alan Ruck (Capt. Harriman) had arrived and was signing. So that was why the room stayed overflowing all day! We decided to hit the Apollo Ballroom once more. This was our first stop on Thursday, and we had managed to squeeze in time there on Friday, as well. This ballroom contained the dealers. And did they have deals for all of us fans! We browsed the tables, oohing and aahing over the merchandise, even buying a few choice items, but our eyes kept straying to our watches. And at 10:30am, we headed out and went to the Zeus Ballroom.
This ballroom was across the hall from the large Parthenon Ballroom where, sure enough, many of our fellow fans were biding their time until they could get in line for autographs from the crew members. This day was September 8th, the official anniversary date of the original series, and in honor of that event, we got to see the original crew of the U.S.S. Enterprise. But we knew from experience that our row wouldn’t even be called for another two hours, so we slid into the General Admission room (the Zeus Ballroom) to hear the Klingons speak. All of the lovely Klingon women were there: Spice Williams (Vixis), Mary Kay Adams (Grilka), Barbara March (Lursa), and Gwynyth Walsh (B’Tor.) They spoke to us and answered our questions, allowing us to take photos of them onstage. We asked them about the make-up, the costumes, and whether it was true what Robert O’Reilly (Gowron) had told us on Friday, that Lursa had fallen out of her costume more than once? She hotly denied this and was supported by the others, who all avowed that Robert was a complete gossip and not to be trusted. After they spoke, we were enchanted to hear from the adorable (really!) Boba Fett of Star Wars fame, Jeremy Bulloch.
We headed back to the Parthenon Ballroom in time to get in the long line to get autographs from Nichelle Nichols (Uhura), Walter Koenig (Chekov), and John DeLancie (Q.) George Takei (Sulu) had signed some on Friday and would be signing again on Sunday. William Shatner, James Doohan, and Leonard Nimoy had done the pre-signed autographs. We’d heard from Shatner on Thursday, since he couldn’t be with us on Saturday, but Nimoy and Doohan would be talking to us that afternoon. After our trip through the line, we returned to the Zeus Ballroom to hear Max Grodenchik (Rom) and Aron Eisenberg (Nog) discuss the merits of all things Ferengi.
At 2pm, we were in our seats in the Parthenon Ballroom as Dave Scott, out host for the weekend, introduced science fiction’s most logical man, Leonard Nimoy. Many years older and still sexy even without the pointed ears, our favorite Vulcan charmed us for an hour answering questions, telling what he’s been up to, and reciting some of his poetry for us. I got to tell him that I owned one of his books of poetry and how much I enjoyed it. I didn’t add that I was a poetry editor, nor that I published a monthly international poetry magazine, but it still felt serendipitous to hear him thank me for the compliment.
At 3pm, he was joined onstage by the rest of the crew, including Grace Lee Whitney (Yeoman Rand), whose autograph I had been fortunate enough to get in the Athena Ballroom on Thursday. It was wonderful to see James Doohan, although it was sad to see him in such failing health. Nichelle was looking as beautiful and vivacious as ever, and George Takei barely looked a day older than when he had sat at the helm of the Enterprise. Walter had aged, but very gracefully. And if he no longer made a young girl’s heart flutter, well . . . this girl wasn’t so young any more either. And he was still a handsome man. They spoke about the show, but nostalgically, and I realized that it had truly been a long time since they’d worked together at Desilu Studios with good ol’ Gene. But later, they livened up as they told us what they were doing now, what their children were doing, and in a few cases, what their grandkids were doing. It was a blissful hour spent in the company of a very special band of actors.
But more fun was coming up! At 4pm, we adjourned to poolside for a pool party. James, Nichelle, Walter, and George were doing photo ops for the fans and the proceeds were going to charity. And the fans got a free drink too. I got my picture taken with Scotty. It was a very special moment. He reminded me up close of my beloved grandfather, and I suppose my hug was a little tighter than it should have been from a stranger because of that thought. But he didn’t mind at all, his eyes twinkling as he hugged me back. (I suppose that might have been because I was wearing a swimsuit at the time, but who would take offense?)
Later, I rushed into one of the hotel’s many restrooms and changed into my evening gown for the evening show. When I returned poolside, I was fortunate enough to run into the incredible lookalike Picard. He’d been enjoying himself greatly at the Convention, having actors and fans come up and mistake him for the sexy captain, asking him for his autograph. Some just asked to have their picture taken with him, which he very graciously allowed, his soft British voice never losing patience or tiring of our foolishness. I learned later that they’d cancelled the Lookalike Contest because of him, Dave Scott going so far as to say that he’d have won, even without a uniform! In fact, Dave said that it would be a great joke if it actually was Patrick Stewart, and he’d managed to make it to the Convention after all! I never learned the name of Picard’s lookalike unfortunately, but I did get a picture taken with him. My son told me that he said that he had met the real Picard a few weeks before our Convention, and that great actor had almost fallen over in shock!
We didn’t have time for a formal dinner, and had in fact eaten pizza by the pool during the party. Our theatre show was at 7pm, and we didn’t want to be late. We were seeing the Fab 4 of Voyager (Ethan Phillips, Roxann Dawson, Robert Duncan McNeill, and Robert Picardo) perform “The Midlife Crisis of Dionysus” by Garrison Keiller. We were in line early, but didn’t take our seats until 7:20, since they had run into trouble with the podiums. Apparently the hotel had been remiss concerning their needs for the show and had supplied them with podiums that did not have proper lighting or microphones. In addition, Robert Picardo (The Doctor) insisted that the podiums didn’t even match! It was a very comical few moments as they dealt with these setbacks, and I told Picardo while getting his autograph the next day that the show was made more enjoyable by their humorous handling of the adverse circumstances. My mother and I took a taxi back to our hotel after the theatre, leaving my father and my son to enjoy the late show, which was “Into the Matrix,” a play starring Alexander Siddig (Bashir) and Andrew Robinson (Garak.) When my son returned to our hotel room later to tell me about the show, I was organizing my many autographed pictures and deciding if Sunday’s lines were going to be too long to get the last remaining signatures that I’d been wanting from the Athena Ballroom.
Some of the many wonderful moments over the weekend that stay in my mind are when I heard Dick Gordon, the Apollo astronaut, tell us that NASA would “take our science fiction and make it science fact!” Or when we found out that several countries had people who had come to the Convention; including Japan, England, Germany, Australia, Sweden, Peru, and Switzerland. There was also one woman who had flown all the way from Israel to join us. There was the Karaoke Night on Friday, where the stars and the fans sang and danced the Time Warp together. Or the “Experience,” which was indeed an incredible attraction at the Las Vegas Hilton. Or when Michael Dorn (Worf) told the fans that Terry Farrell (Dax) was the best kisser, while Marina Sirtis (Troi) glared at him with her hands on her hips. Or Wil Wheaton’s (Wesley) hilarious improv group, who had us all falling off our seats laughing Thursday night with their skits. It was especially nice to be able to tell him on Friday how great the show had been. Or when Jimmy Doohan and Nichelle Nichols sang “St. James Infirmary” to the fans. Or when Garrett Wang (Ensign Kim) spoke to me about his plans to get an act together for a future Slanted Fedora Convention. Or when Robert Picardo came out during Neil Norman and his Cosmic Orchestra’s performance and sang “Viva Las Vegas” in Elvis’ voice. And especially when the orchestra did their rendition of the UFO theme music! Several of the stars spoke about the upcoming new series, “Enterprise,” as did Brannon Braga himself! And Scotty told us that he’d been given an honorary doctorate in Engineering from Milwaukee Wisconsin’s School of Engineering because, they said, more than 55% of their applicants put his name down as the reason why they wanted to be an engineer.
I originally thought I could somehow pack every wonderful thing that happened over that weekend into an essay for you all, so that you could feel like you were there too and witnessed it for yourselves. But the truth is, there’s far too much to write anything short of a book about! So I’ll leave my story here, making you want to hear and see more (as I still do), and tell you with sincerity not to miss the 40th Anniversary!