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Star Trek passings

One of the true talents of Trek, Greg Jein has passed away.
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Back when @Harvey and I had lunch with Dorothy Fontana three years ago, just six months before she passed, she mentioned that Greg had been ill. So this is unsurprising, but nevertheless sad.

I never got to meet Greg in person, but back around 1995, when I was working on video game pitches for Playmates Toys/Playmates Interactive, I got Greg's number and called him to inquire if he had any photos of the model Earth-Romulan War Romulan ship model he'd built for The Star Trek Chronology, because one of the game pitches related to it. He didn't, saying he handed the model over to Mike Okuda without photographing it.

During the course of our conversation we chatted about a number of films and shows he'd worked on, and he mentioned that at the end of The Motion Picture they had all these leftover miniatures built for VFX shots, notably the Spock Walk, and Paramount didn't want to pay to store it, so he said, "People would visit and we'd say 'here, take a planet!'"

The funniest part of the conversation happened when I asked him about models for Flesh Gordon. The exchange went something like this:

GREG: I recently bought back one of the small flying phallus rocket miniatures. I'll try to sneak in the next time they do a spaceship graveyard scene on Star Trek.

ME: So, it'd be the U.S.S. John Thomas?

He cracked up.

RIP Greg.
 
Hollywood Reporter:
Gregory Jein, ‘Star Trek’ Model Maker and Two-Time Oscar Nominee, Dies at 76
He worked with effects pioneer Douglas Trumbull, and his credits included 'Close Encounters of the Third Kind,' 'The Dark Knight Rises,' 'Avatar' and 'Mulan.'


The modest Jein shared visual effects Oscar noms with Trumbull, Roy Arbogast and brothers Matthew and Richard Yuricich on Close Encounters of the Third Kind (1977) and with William A. Fraker and A.D. Flowers on 1941 (1979). He spent about two years on the latter, which he called one of his most rewarding jobs.

His résumé also included Christopher Nolan’s The Dark Knight Rises (2012) and Interstellar (2014), plus One From the Heart (1981), The Adventures of Buckaroo Banzai Across the 8th Dimension (1984), The Hunt for Red October (1990), Judge Dredd (1995), The Scorpion King (2002), Fantastic Four (2005), Avatar (2009), Reel Steel (2011), John Carter (2012) and Alice Through the Looking Glass (2016).​
 
I just learned about Greg Jein's passing today. He was a phenomenal model maker who helped make Star Trek one of the most visually distinct franchises in science fiction. Rest in Peace Mr. Jein.
 
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Dorothy Duder, Doug Drexler’s wife and food stylist for all four seasons Enterprise has passed.
https://memory-alpha.fandom.com/wiki/Dorothy_Duder
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That's going to hurt. Terribly. Those two were a team, from all I've read and heard.
 
This is a bummer to read right before bed, but Gregory Itzin has apparently passed. Sharon Lawrence posted about it on her Instagram page. Itzin played five characters across three series (2 on DS9, 1 on Voyager, 2 on Enterprise), but even most Trek fans probably know him as the disgraced President Logan on "24".

It's also sobering to realize he's the same age as both of my parents.
 
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