Bridge to Captain Pike?
It could have been! In a very unusual twist, NBC ordered a second pilot of Star Trek. In the original, the captain’s name was Christopher Pike and was played by Jeff Hunter. In the second pilot, James T Kirk appeared as William Shatner was now free from obligations that prevented him from doing the first pilot. Creator Gene Roddenberry shows us some rare footage and tells the story. Below is the original Enterprise model being readied for the second pilot.
Friday, September 7th, 2022 was the 95th anniversary of the invention of electronic television. In 1927, 21 year old Philo T. Farnsworth and his 18 year old bride, Pem, demonstrated their invention to two Crocker Bank investors in the second floor lab of a rented garage at 202 Green Street in San Francisco. That day, […]
So Close, So Far Away…The ‘Today’ Show’s Original Home Circled in white is the ‘Today’ show’s original studio location. When the show debuted January 14th of 1952, this part of the building that is now occupied by Christie’s (auction house) was called The RCA Exhibition Hall. In the summer of 1958, television manufacturer Philco complained […]
The Final Guy Lombardo New Year With Ben Grauer Reporting Live By the next new year, both Guy and Ben would have passed away, but this was the night of December 31, 1976. Below is some history on the Lombardo broadcast years and some things about Ben Grauer that you may never have known. The […]
NBC’s “Matinee Theater”…October 31, 1955 – June 27, 1958 This morning, I sat down to write a story on the first ever use of a live chromakey effect on network television. That happened on this show, “Matinee Theater” in June of 1957, but…then I realized what the show was and was as surprised as you […]
Back when it was “blue screen” as opposed to today’s “green screen”.
I remember folks on camera where the background would “com through” their clothes because the color matched the blue._’
There was a lot of green screen too back in the 1960s and 1970s, both in film (traveling matte) and video (chroma key). The blue channel is usually the least significant one in rendering skin tones, and in 1960s camera design, it was usually the most optically compromised and noisy. Norelco cameras used the green channel for deriving the “contour” signal, which was used for image enhancement (improving contrast) BTW.
Very cool. Thank s for sharing that.
I have seen the original pilot as a stand alone feature, back at my one and only Star Trek convention in 1974 or 1975. I never knew about the second pilot. Majel Barrett’s character was referred to as Number One, in the Royal Navy manner.
Pike comes back in future episodes as a paralyzed admirial in a wheelchair
This shot was probably taken on the stage at Linwood Dunn’s Film Effects of Hollywood.
Everything on Star Trek exists today except teleportation and Klingons, I think.