Recently, I was able to land an exclusive interview with JJ Abrams through the judicious application of tranquilizer darts and mercenaries.
During one of the interviews, (none of which violated the Geneva Conventions, I might add) Abrams talked about the original casting ideas for Star Trek, at the time known as Star Trex: XTreme.
Dave Chapelle as Rick James T. Kirk
"Initially, we had the concept of Captain Kirk as a more comedic character. At this point, the reimagining of Star Trek was more extreme and significantly more tongue-in-cheek. He would have been an overblown combination of Zapp Brannigan and Chapelle's comedic take on Rick James."
Zach Braff as Spock
"I really like him in Scrubs. I think he's a great actor, and would bring layers of depth and likeabiltiy to Spock.
In the end, I think Quinto was a much better choice, though I still wonder what possibilities we could have unlocked with Braff."
Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson as Doctor Leonard "Bonecrusher" McCoy
"I really wanted to show the genesis of McCoy's nickname. The idea was that he was a total badass, and that in one fight scene, he'd rip out this Romulan's guy's bones and fashion a suit of armor from them, which he would wear for the rest of the film. This led to his nickname "Bonecrusher", which Kirk would shorten to "Bones" at the end of the film."
David Tennant as Scotty
"I kidnapped him to work on the movie. I figured he'd make a perfect Scotty, what with the high-pitched voice and the fact that he himself is scottish and doesn't have to worry about getting the accent right.
(Laughter) He is a squirmer, but I managed to fit him through the airport baggage claim."
Harrison Ford as Han Sulu
"I've always enjoyed his work, and felt he could bring a rough and tumble quality to Sulu. Of course, considering his age, and ethnicity, significant digital work would have been required, and ILM was already preparing an innovative new "morphing" technique. We changed his first name to Han because of the Chinese Han Dynasty, and Sulu's from that general area, so-"
Kate Capshaw as Pavela Chekov
"I chose her cause she's really good at screaming for no particular reason in the middle of a scene.
Yeah, Pavela would have been a pretty extreme change, but since this Chekov would have no penis, the only way she'd be capable of raping anyone's childhoods would be metaporically."
Nathan Fillion as Uhura
"Now, this wasn't an intentional choice. He was one of the first people to sign onto the project, but we kinda forgot what role we were gonna give him, until pretty much everything except Uhura was taken.
We planned to use groovy new ILM tech to put a CGI Uhura over his performance and modify the pitch of his voice."
During one of the interviews, (none of which violated the Geneva Conventions, I might add) Abrams talked about the original casting ideas for Star Trek, at the time known as Star Trex: XTreme.
Dave Chapelle as Rick James T. Kirk
"Initially, we had the concept of Captain Kirk as a more comedic character. At this point, the reimagining of Star Trek was more extreme and significantly more tongue-in-cheek. He would have been an overblown combination of Zapp Brannigan and Chapelle's comedic take on Rick James."
Zach Braff as Spock
"I really like him in Scrubs. I think he's a great actor, and would bring layers of depth and likeabiltiy to Spock.
In the end, I think Quinto was a much better choice, though I still wonder what possibilities we could have unlocked with Braff."
Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson as Doctor Leonard "Bonecrusher" McCoy
"I really wanted to show the genesis of McCoy's nickname. The idea was that he was a total badass, and that in one fight scene, he'd rip out this Romulan's guy's bones and fashion a suit of armor from them, which he would wear for the rest of the film. This led to his nickname "Bonecrusher", which Kirk would shorten to "Bones" at the end of the film."
David Tennant as Scotty
"I kidnapped him to work on the movie. I figured he'd make a perfect Scotty, what with the high-pitched voice and the fact that he himself is scottish and doesn't have to worry about getting the accent right.
(Laughter) He is a squirmer, but I managed to fit him through the airport baggage claim."
Harrison Ford as Han Sulu
"I've always enjoyed his work, and felt he could bring a rough and tumble quality to Sulu. Of course, considering his age, and ethnicity, significant digital work would have been required, and ILM was already preparing an innovative new "morphing" technique. We changed his first name to Han because of the Chinese Han Dynasty, and Sulu's from that general area, so-"
Kate Capshaw as Pavela Chekov
"I chose her cause she's really good at screaming for no particular reason in the middle of a scene.
Yeah, Pavela would have been a pretty extreme change, but since this Chekov would have no penis, the only way she'd be capable of raping anyone's childhoods would be metaporically."
Nathan Fillion as Uhura
"Now, this wasn't an intentional choice. He was one of the first people to sign onto the project, but we kinda forgot what role we were gonna give him, until pretty much everything except Uhura was taken.
We planned to use groovy new ILM tech to put a CGI Uhura over his performance and modify the pitch of his voice."
