From the Montreal Gazette, July 16
‘FOR THE LOVE’ OF HIS FATHER
For Adam Nimoy, making Spock doc was ‘nice way to share the mourning’
Adam Nimoy has been a busy man since his father died. For most people, the passing of a parent might put life on hold for a while; but for the son of Spock, it simply increased the pressure to complete a project begun just a couple of months before Leonard Nimoy’s death Feb. 27, 2015, at the age of 83.
For the Love of Spock is a revealing documentary about the elder Nimoy and the character he made famous. Just in time for Star Trek’s 50th anniversary, director Adam Nimoy stops at the Fantasia International Film Festival on Saturday to present his insider’s take on one of the most affectionately revered characters of 20th-century pop culture.
“I’ve been travelling all over the country,” Nimoy said, on the phone from his L.A. home, Thursday morning. “Soon I’ll be going all over the world to screen the film at festivals like Fantasia; at conventions in Las Vegas, where there’s a Star Trek weekend for the 50th anniversary of the (TV) series. I’ll be going to New York City; to (Spain’s) Sitges Film Festival in October; to a convention in Birmingham, in the U.K.
Representing his famous father ’s legacy is a way of bringing things full circle for the 59-year-old, who watched Spock’s meteoric — some might say interstellar — ascent, from an utterly unique perspective. To step up and stand in for his dad helps connect the dots, according to Nimoy.
“It’s nice to be able to have something to contribute to the franchise,” he said. “It makes it much more meaningful to me to be going to all these events, meeting fans, not just as his son but as a filmmaker, having a pretty good doc to look at.
“It’s a great experience and a great
way to work through my life now without my dad — the postLeonard years. It’s a nice way to share the mourning and the grief of losing Leonard with the whole fan base. This film is my gift to them, to celebrate the life of my dad, Mr. Spock.”
To say Nimoy’s film offers a privileged take on all things Spock is an understatement. Therein we learn not just about the creation and evolution of Captain Kirk’s deadpan Vulcan sidekick but about the Boston actor behind him.
The son of Russian Jewish immigrants, Leonard Nimoy moved to L.A. when he was 18, hoping to strike it big. It took nearly two decades, during which time he landed roles in episodes of Dragnet, Bonanza, Gunsmoke and The Twilight Zone, while taking odd jobs working at a pet store, as an ice cream salesman and as an apartment building superintendent.
Through mostly archival interviews,
we hear Leonard Nimoy tell of how he landed the role of Mr. Spock, and helped come up with some of the persona’s key attributes, from those pointy ears to the Vulcan death grip. The only actor retained from the original Star Trek pilot, he rivalled Kirk as the show’s most popular character.
For the younger Nimoy, it was a dream come true.
“As a young kid, I was a big fan of the show, and a big fan of Spock,” he said. “I was very proud of my dad. I don’t think I’ve talked about this before but I used to carry pictures of him to school in my notebook — pictures of Spock, promo pictures of my dad, to show what he had accomplished.”
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But the son soon learned the per
ils of fame.
“One time when I was really young, I told one of my classmates, ‘I’m the son of Spock.’ He blurted it to the whole class and they went crazy, seriously. So I stopped doing that, because I didn’t want to cause a stir.”
As one might imagine, it wasn’t all fun and games being the child of a workhorse actor whose claim to fame is a character who keeps his emotions tightly in check at all times.
“It was a fine line for a while,” Nimoy said. “It was hard to tell one from the other. My dad could be very much like Spock. He was hard to reach at times, not very talkative. He brought a lot of his own personality to the Spock character, as I talk about in the film. He was an outsider, raised in Boston in an immigrant neighbourhood, a first-generation American who wanted to find a way to integrate himself into American society, much like Spock had to integrate with humans.”
Nimoy follows his father’s professional ups and downs: from the cancelling of the original TV series after just three seasons; to the cultlike appeal of the show in syndication, leading to the manic phenomenon of Star Trek conventions; the Star Trek movies, two of which he directed; and the recent, J.J. Abrams-led revival, which allowed the cycle to begin anew.
Leonard Nimoy’s long struggle w
ith alcoholism is also broached, as are the rifts between father and son, which Adam Nimoy is happy to have had the opportunity to resolve before it was too late.
“I’m lucky he was around long enough for us to reconcile,” he said. “We had a phenomenal last five years together.”
Some actors
might resent being pegged to a single character for — and well beyond — their lifetime. Asked whether he sensed any such apprehension in his father, Nimoy assured that this was not the case.
“I think he was enthralled,” he said. “He was very grateful for what Spock brought to him. It was a great challenge for him, and showed a lot of his craft as an actor. I said to him one time, a few years ago — on TV was a show called Menagerie, a two-part episode, from the first season, when it was still a new part for him — I told my dad how good he was.