Mark Lenard & Trek Fandom

I met him on a couple of occassions at cons in the early 80s. In fact, I think that he was the first Trek actor I ever met. I remember him leaving the convenion on Monday morning. As he left the hotel foyer, he turned and gave the Vulcan salute to the fans still hanging around reception. It was a really great moment that I shared with a friend, and really endeared Mark Lenard to me.

 

Thanks for the clarification. I always thought it was some kind of stole that was draped over his shoulders, and it wasn't actually worn in the movie. It would have been uncomfortable to wear, wouldn't it? "Lemme get that fly on my back....oww!"

Doug

 

I've had a huge crush on him ever since I saw him in Journey to Babel and read the book Sarek. He was handsome, dignified and had power, what's not to love?

I have to be one of Sarek's youngest fans...I'm only 24 and people are talking about going to see him "back in the 80's" lol!

 

To my experience, Mark Lenard did a whole bunch of conventions. Several with Actress Jane Wyman. I've personally attended at least 4 where he was a featured guest, including "Starbase Indy" in Indianapolis in 1988.

In the mid 80s he and Walter Koenig did a major tour of Trek convention dates, in part to promote a series of theatre projects they were working on together. Perhaps the best known of these stage projects was Bernard Sabath's "The Boys in Autumn", about a chance meeting in the 1920s between an elderly Tom Sawyer and Huck Finn.

 

I was at a convention where he was there, and he wound up talking about a humorous story on the set of Buck Rogers.

i enjoyed meeting him. This is when I was in college, back in the early nineties. Piersis Kambata was at the same convention

 

Go on, go on!

 

Being a long time trek fan, I can tell you as far back as the 70s Mr. Leonard had a great reputation with the fans. Say his name to any old time TOS fan and you can hear the sense of owe in their voice when they talk about him.

He brought about a sense of class and dignity that the writers built the entire Vulcan culture upon.

To my knowledge he was well respected by cast and crew of both TOS and TNG. I never heard a bad word about the guy.

 

my memory is vague. either he played a robot with a removable head or someone else did, and well it was just something funny that happened. I don'
t remember much. it was ten years ago. I'll see if I can find it.

He was a great guy to meet though

 

In 1976, my older sister took me to one of the conventions at NBC plaza in NYC for my 9th birthday. (We lived nearby in Long Island.) I was pretty overwhelmed and too young to fully appreciate the whole event, but one thing I remember clearly is that the first actor to speak was Mark Lenard. He was as classy, sophisticated and enthusiastic a participant as you would hope for, and I appreciated Sarek and General Urko much more for having seen him. I was glad he was able to reprise the role and give it finality in TNG.

I still have the program from that event, and Mark Lenard is clearly featured in the photographs.

 

Mark Lenard always brought gravitas to any Trek episode or movie he appeared in. Great actor.

My one pseudo Mark Lenard story: When I was in high school, my local radio station in NYC, WNEW-FM, had this daily call-in contest called the "Morning Mind Exercise". Basically they would ask a trivia question, and the first correct caller won a prize. Well, one morning before school, celebrating the release of ST:IV, the question was:
"What actor played a Romulan, a Klingon, and Spock's father?"

I called in, and, amazingly won! I was on the air, saying, "Mark Lenard, of course!"

So with that, I won year's supply of crappy Krauser's ice cream (they sent me 52 coupons for half gallon tubs). I recall having a party and getting about 10 of them

 

Go check out the second episode of the (short-lived 1980's) TV series Otherworld. Mark plays the Commandant of the Zone Troopers. He's fairly badass in that ep.

You can watch the episode online, in fact. It's on otherworldonline.org.

(plus it's loaded with other Trek actors as well, like Brian Thompson and Robert O'Reilly)

 

Thanks for that link! I thought I was only one of two people who actually remembered that show! And the only thing I distinctly recall is "oh, you're a ZIT!" "What's that?" "A Zone Trooper in Training!"

I wonder why the show didn't last?

 

As a teenager back in the 60s, I fell in love with Sarek, and from then on watched everything that Mark did, little knowing that in the 9 last years of his life we would actually become friends. He was one of the brightest, funniest, and, most importantly, kindest persons I have ever known, and even now, after more than 10 years I miss him greatly. He treated every fan with respect and dignity, and it always saddens me to know that many of his fans never got the chance to experience seeing him in person and the treat that was. Nothing was more amusing than when he appeared in front of an new audience which expected a solemn diginified "Sarek", and instead were shocked to an lively and animated man who loved to tell his stories, --- and some of the corniest of jokes.....

 

One of his other Trek contributions was occasional voice work. He performed the readings for Sarek and Federation, as well as the "historical documentary" vids included with the CD-ROM Star Trek Omnipedia. He may have done some other stuff, too, but those are what I recall offhand.

His reading of Federation makes it one of my favorite audiobooks.

 

I didn't know he lived long enough to know about the SAREK novel, so that's great that he not only knew a novel was centered on his character, but that Mr. Lenard actually participated in it in a major way. I'm happy to learn of this.

 

During the last years of his life he did a lot of voice work, not only Trek, but commercials and documentary narration, along with teaching acting classes in NYC.

 

I love the Federation audiobook, too. I don't think I ever heard the one for Sarek - might have to track that one down.

 

He was certainly a solid actor, and when I saw him at a con in the mid 80's he was very gracious, funny and personable. I was certainly more "star struck" at seeing him in person than I was the other celebs there.

 

A third here for my love of the Federation audio book. Sarak is a great book as well but the ending is just plain sad and heart wrenching... I have a hard time listening to it because of that.