Thursday, September 28, 2017

"Paint 'er greener!" The Famous Orion Makeup Test!

William McCullar's IDIC Page, sadly defunct now, made available this very rare image of Majel Barrett (M. Leigh Hudec at the time) when she was screen-testing the makeup for the Green Orion Slave Girl.

The “green girl” was the creation of Fred Phillips who also made Spock’s Vulcan look for the original Star Trek television series. Stephen E. Whitfield and Gene Roddenberry recalled in The Making of Star Trek (1968) how Phillips grew increasingly frustrated as three consecutive makeup screen tests, in which Roddenberry’s future wife Majel Barrett had been painted green, came back negative. "Now, Fred Phillips is an exceptionally fine makeup artist and recognized as a top pro in the business. He did a thorough job with the makeup and was quite satisfied with the results. Imagine everyone’s surprise, upon viewing the developed film the next day, to find the actress’ face just as normally pink skinned as ever! There was no trace of green." Gene’s orders to Fred Phillips: “Paint her greener!” The following day the test film again showed her as pink skinned as ever. Even Fred was dumbfounded. Recalling the incident, he says, “We did this three days in a row. We had her so green you couldn’t believe it and she kept coming back pink! Finally we figured out what was happening. The technician over at the film lab would receive the film every day and run it through the development solution. As the image formed on the film, he kept saying to himself, ‘My God, this woman is green!’ And so he kept correcting the film developing process in order to turn her back to normal skin color again!”



Bonus: Below, a rare photo of Shatner and Whitney, made after the second pilot, but before the first filmed episode. The uniform worn by Shatner was only ever seen in these promo photos and never in an episode. 
"See, you adjust this satellite dish and you can get hundreds of channels for only dollars a day!"

Bonus: A cartoon from the fanzine "Enterprise Incidents" that echoes the MAD Magazine depiction on a similar occurrence, referenced below it.


Wednesday, September 27, 2017

Some Rare Photos To Enjoy!

Here are a few rare photos that have turned up online, that you may enjoy!

(Click on images to enlarge. Once open, you may have to click again to view full-size.)
De and Leslie Parrish behind the scenes between takes while filming "Who Mourns For Adonis?"


An unusual promotional photo of Walter in front of a wall thingie that looks like it was made with an oven rack!

Nichelle shows her lovely kittycat some attention and love!

Between scenes in "The Final Frontier," the Big Three do their version of the monkeys who refuse to speak, hear or see bad things.

FM #64 Issue "Stark Trek" 1970 Article

From April 1970 Issue 64 of the venerable Famous Monsters magazine comes this early story on the show, and the bonus is some rare photos that have never really been seen since, like the one of the small copper-skinned ambassadors from "Journey To Babel" posing by the Jeffries Tube, and the closeup of the makeup of the doomed and diseased Only from "Miri."


(Click on images to enlarge. Once open, you may have to click on again to see full-size.)

FM artist Basil Gogos passed away this past week at 88. What a talent!








Bonus: Below, a clipping from a TV movie magazine from the first run of the show.






Nichelle On Cover of 1968 Sepia Magazine

Found this image of the cover of Sepia featuring Nichelle from 1968. Is it any wonder that she shaped my perception as to standards of beauty as a young man? Also, I now want a hotdog for lunch.... a $10 hotdog with all the trimmings.

(Click on images to enlarge. Once open, you may have to click again to view full-size.)

Bonus: Nichelle "hangs out" with Leonard at the premiere of The Motion Picture in 1979!

Bonus #2: A lovely rare promotional photo of Nichelle from "The Search For Spock."