VegasCon11: Thursday Report & Photos: Wang, Keating, Trinneer + TNG & TOS guest stars

Creation’s official Star Trek con in Las Vegas kicked off on Thursday with Voyager’s Garrett Want, Enterprise’s Dominic Keating and Connor Trinneer and a bunch of TOS and TNG guest stars. See below for full report and lots of photos from Thursday.

 

STAR TREK LAS VEGAS CONVENTION THURSDAY

Garrett Wang

Garrett Wang, Star Trek Voyager’s Ensign Kim kicked off Star Trek Las Vegas Con 2011. The actor began by showing off one of the T-shirts from his new venture Cosmic City Tees. The shirt is based on a story from a past convention when he coined the phrase "By The Power of DeLancie," about TNG’s Q John de Lancie. The actor quickly went to Q&A taking questions. On how he got the job on Voyager, Wang says being a fan of Star Trek helped land him the gig. As for what he can be seen in lately, the actor explained that he has "taken a break" from acting in the last few years, but he would love to return. Wang did reveal that he recently filmed a pilot where he plays a single father martial arts teacher who has acupuncture clinic.  He appeared especially interested in following Star Trek’s George Takei and to CBS’ Big Bang Theory.

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Garrett Wang shows off one of his company’s new T-shirts at Star Trek Las Vegas Con

Speaking of Takei, Wang delighted the crowd with doing a spot-on impersonation of the original Star Trek actor. Garrett also showed off his accurate impersonations of DS9’s Avery Brooks and Voyager’s Bob Picardo, explaining that he honed the skill during long breaks between takes on Voyager to keep the cast entertained. Wang even does an impresionation of Kate Mulgrew, explaining it was "a part Katherine Hepburn, a little bit helium and a little Smurf,"

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Wang delighted the crowd with impersonations of other Star Trek stars

Keating and Trinneer

The other main cast stars for Thursday was a joint panel with Star Trek: Enterprise’s Dominic Keating (Malcolm Reed) and Connor Trinneer ("Trip"), who seemed to be having a lot of fun and still appeared to have great chemistry. They mixed light-hearted jabs with their comments like Dominic explaining the success of the fan-favorite fourth season to Connor finally learning his lines.

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Keating and Trinneer kept themselves and the crowd laughing during their time at Vegas Con 11

Things even got a bit ribald, with the pair discussing co-stars Jolene Blalock’s assets, noting how one could still "bounce a mushy grape" off her butt. However, Connor couldn’t help but say that Blalock isn’t your typical glamorous actress, revealing how she once drove him home "farting the whole way."

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Connor Trinneer at Vegas Con 11 (photo: Steve Craig – Las Vegas Wire)

But it wasn’t all jokes, as the pair also praised Manny Coto who was made show runner for the fourth and final season. In discussing the cancellation of Enterprise Dominic defending the quality of the show and the writing, and put the blame on UPN who he says didn’t support the show. And regarding the death of Trip, Trinneer said he hasn’t read the Enterprise novel which explains he isn’t really dead, but for the actor he still considers Trip dead. As for what they wanted in season five, Dominic said he wanted to explore more of Malcolm’s connection to Section 31, whereas Connor wanted to explore more of the relationship between Trip and T’Pol.

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Dominic Keating at Vegas Con 11 (photo: Steve Craig – Las Vegas Wire)

Guest stars

Thursday at the Star Trek con also featured a number of Star Trek guest stars panel. The first of which was a "Return to the Sixties" collection of original Star Trek episode guests: Lee Meriwether (Losira – "That Which Survives"), Yvonne Craig (Marta "Whom Gods Destroy"), and Clint Howard (Balok "The Corbomite Maneuver").

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Meriwether, Howard and Craig at Vegas Con 11

Howard said that even though he was only six years old when he appeared on Star Trek, it was actually not his first job as an actor, which began on the Andy Griffith Show when he was only two. Howard also talked about the famous tranya, favorite drink of Balock. He said it was pink lemonade and that he really didn’t like pink lemonade, but his father told him "you are going to drink it and you are going to like it!" While not an avid fan of Star Trek, Howard did say that he made sure to have his family bring a camera to the set where he took pictures of himself including sitting in the captain’s chair.

By the way I had a chance to talk briefly with Howard before his panel and he recalled a story of an audition "around 1980 with George Lucas and Francis Ford Coppola. According to Howard, as soon as he entered the room George Lucas jumped up, pointed at him and yelled out "Commander Balok! "Corbomite Maneuver!"). However, unfortunately he didn’t get the job.

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Clint Howard got recognized for his Star Trek work by George Lucas over a decade later

Yvonne Craig spoke about how doing her makeup as the green-skinned Orion was very tedious and that the Star Trek makeup team struggled to get her to match with the first Orion, Susan Oliver (apparently no one who worked on the Cage was working when she did her episode). Craig also got some questions about her time as Batgirl on the 1960’s Batman, revealing she didn’t need a stuntwoman to ride her Batcycle. She also denied the rumor that there was every talk of a Batgirl spin-off show.

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Yvonne Craig at Vegas Con 11

Another panel pairing were TNG guest stars Eric Menyuk (The Traveler) and Olivia d’Abo (Amanda Rogers "True Q"). Eric revealed that he has given up acting and is now a lawyer, but he was excited to be at the con saying he was a "nerd" just like the rest of us. This was Olivia’s first con, although she said that her "True Q" co-star
John deLancie told Olivia told her years ago she would eventually appear at a con.

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Olivia d’Abo at Trek Vegas Con 11 (photo: Steve Craig – Las Vegas Wire)

Regarding favorite moments working on Trek: Olivia recalled doing the blue screen shots on the roof of the Enterprise with de Lancie, noting how impressed she was with the amazing sets. Eric remembered how excited he was to do Star Trek and his first scene in the transporter room. Eric also revealed that after 8 aditions, he did not get the role of Data, which went to Brent Spiner.

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 Eric Menyuk at Trek Vegas Con 11 (photo: Steve Craig – Las Vegas Wire)

The last main room celebrity panel was with another collection of original series stars: Beverly Washburn (Arlene "The Deadly Years"), Jack Donner (Romulan Subcommander "The Enterprise Incident") and Michael Forest (Apollo "Who Mourns for Adonais").

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Michael Forest, Beverly Washburn and Jack Donner at Trek Vegas Con 11

More photos

Here is a slideshow with more photos from STLV panels on Thursday:

 

More from Vegas con to come

TrekMovie will also have more daily wrap-ups, news, photos, videos and live reporting to stay tuned.

Erica Anderson contributed to this report. All photos by Anthony Pascale/TrekMovie.com unless otherwise noted

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So angry i’m not there. But the coverage has been fantastic! #stlv

I live in Vegas. I’m going Saturday AND Sunday!

Photo with Shatner on Sunday. I’m so excited!

Woop! woop!

I don’ t see how Yvonne Craig can deny that there was ever talk of a Batgirl spinoff… there is a pilot… that i have a copy of and is probably on youtube… with her as Batgirl…for a Batgirl series.

I always liked Yvonne Craig’s story about seeing Shatner in the makeup room with his toupee off (it was in his hand).

This coverage is super great for those of us not able to go this year – thanks Trekmovie!!

Daniel:

The “pilot” was actually made to sell ABC execs on the idea of adding Batgirl to the third season of “Batman.”

Wish I was there… :-(

“Connor couldn’t help but say that Blalock isn’t your typical glamorous actress, revealing how she once drove him home “farting the whole way.”

wow what a turn off. way to go Trip helping a girls career like dat

Is “Garrett Want” a Freudian typo? (:

#9 Giant Wang LOL

hey i think the next movie they should forget Kirk, Spock, the Enterprise etc and give us fans what we REALLY want…..a $200m Adventures of Captain Harry Kim movie. complete with cameos from the Voyager cast (maybe some of the Enterprise and DS9 cast too as we never got to see them in a movie)

heres my pitch – Captain Harry Kim of the Starship Voyager is on his final voyage of cataloguing gaseous anomolies when suddenly the Voyager is rocked by a huge blast. they find out its come from a nearby wormhole so they go over and see the NX-01 emerging from it..suddenly everything changes the crew of the Voyager find themselves in an all out war with the DS9 villains (forget their names) and then…

Cool coverage Anthony! Would love to see some video if possible.

10. Add dancing tachyons and I’m in.

#6 – Will – Ah… well, I see that I assumed too much and researched too little. Thanks for the clarification!

I wonder if they sell audio tapes of these conventions. Every single one I’ve been to has been great and last year’s was just the best. I’m missing this year’s, but the vibe from last year’s has remained with me!

Good to see that Wang behaved himself and was classy and fun this time around. Everybody deserves a second chance.

You know I was just thinking, it’d be funny if Clint would do a ST spoof as Balok now, 45 years later. He still has some resemblance of his child self. Maybe do something like:

Take 869, and . . . action!

“We must drink! This is Tranya, I hope you relish it as much as I.”

Director: “No, no cut. You’re still not in sync with the audio track. The lip movement is way off. Why don’t we call it a day? Damn these primitive machines!”

Or something clever and witty.

#16: Clint Howard did a parody of Balok for Comedy Central’s Roast of William Shatner a few years ago.

Re: Headline picture

I’ve got a feeling Garrett’s microphone hadn’t been earthed correctly!

MJ, how did Wang misbehave the first time around?

Wow, so cool seeing Apollo again. I didn’t know he was even doing conventions.

Did anyone record the panels, audio or otherwise? Sounds like a great listen

MJ, ok thanks. Wang ran the Trek portion of DragonCon last year, and will do the same this year. He did a great job last year and look forward to him this year. See Dragoncon.org.

Would like to have gone, but unfortunately, I had already planned to attend Starfleet International Conference, which was being held the same weekend (plus the fact I didn’t even have the money to go the Vegas, lol).

@24. Wow, nice con — you guys are going to have a great time!

Great stuff. Love seeing TOS stars. I did not know that George Lucas was a Trek fan. And what was the project that Clint Howard audtioned for? I’ve seen Lucas say he’s worked with Coppola but am curious what movie and part that Howard went for.

#27

I seem to remember years ago reading a quote from George Lucas where he said without Star Trek there never would’ve been Star Wars…

But don’t quote me on that. ;)

Yes–if my memory is right i think that lucas quote was from the trailer of rod rodden.s trek nation doc.coming soon to the science channel—i luv that quote–reminds me of pixar head john lassiter saying without tron there could not have been a toy story

Olivia looked absolutely stunning. She seemed like a fan herself: taking video with her phone’s camera of the people entering the hall for the costume record attempt.

It’s great seeing those six “TOS” guest stars as they are today; those two panels must have been a blast. And, I’ve heard otherwise about the “Batgirl” pilot; it was supposed to be a series, but since it didn’t sell, Batgirl was worked into “Batman”. Making the show pretty crowded. Also, NBC was interested in picking up “Batman” for a fourth season, but bailed because of the cost of rebuilding the Batcave set (which was struck when ABC cancelled the series.)

Nice.

I agree with Dominic Keating that UPN hurt Enterprise more than a Klingon disruptor. I wasn’t readily available in many parts of the U.S. (Link) Here in Cincinnati it was on a low powered TV station. And the cable provider picked it up way too late in its run. I miss the crew. You can get the old show on Netflix.

Availability of UPN
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Upn#Availability

Looks like Dominic Keating is on the same diet as Michael Dorn.

As folks like to say in the Zoe Saldana threads: “Eat a cheeseburger!”

j/k.

Thank you Anthony as usual you did a superb job covering this wonderful con

This was my first convention. Hands down–best weekend of my life.

We will miss you, Mr. Nimoy!

“This was Olivia’s (d’Abo) first con…”

Sorry, but that’s incorect. Ms. d’Abo appeared at a Chiller Theatre convention (www.chillertheatre.com), in Parsippany, NJ in the past year.

“This was Olivia’s (d’Abo) first con…”

Sorry, but that’s incorect. Ms. d’Abo appeared at a Chiller Theatre convention (www.chillertheatre.com), in Parsippany, NJ in the past year.