Happy Birthday, Anton Yelchin

Today is the birthday for the youngest member of Star Trek’s new crew. Anton Viktorovich Yelchin, Star Trek’s new Pavel Chekov, turns 22 Friday. We here at TrekMovie want to wish Anton a happy birthday and we catch up with the Russian-born actor to see what he is up to these days.  

Happy Birthday, Anton

When the Star Trek movie was first announced, many wondered if there was even a role for a new Pavel Chekov in an origin story (where the original character wasn’t introduced until season 2). But with the magic of the alternate timeline Yelchin helped create a new version of the character that paid homage to the original, but added elements of boy genius and even some real ad-libbed Russian dialog.

Yelchin as Chekov in "Star Trek"

While Anton Yelchin did his best to pay homage to Walter Koenig’s original Chekov accent, the St. Petersburg-born actor also showed he could go native when he traveled to Moscow to promote Star Trek in 2009, as you can see in this clip.

Yelchin wery busy since Star Trek

Anton’s career was already heating up before joining the Star Trek franchise, but since 2009 he has been very busy. The actor has a total of five film projects for 2011 release: the indie drama You and I, the indie romance Like Crazy, the Mel Gibson family comedy/drama The Beaver, the horror remake Fright Night, and even providing the voice of Clumsy Smurf in The Smurfs.

Here are some trailers and clips…

Brand new theatrical trailer for The Smurfs.

Clip from Like Crazy:

Trailer for The Beaver: