Gene Roddenberry’s Toxic Relationship With Star Trek’s Best Director
Two of the biggest names in Star Trek are Gene Roddenberry (the man who created this awesome franchise) and Nicholas Meyer (the man who, by directing The Wrath of Khan, preserved the franchise’s future). Most fans have always assumed that these two got along or, at the bare minimum, had a good working relationship. But in a recent interview, Meyer admitted that he and the Star Trek creator had a very bitter relationship that included writing nasty letters back and forth as they argued about The Wrath of Khan.
A Problematic Professional Relationship
Sadly, Gene Roddenberry died decades ago, so we only have Nicholas Meyer’s side of this particular story. Recently, the director admitted that his own memory sometimes plays tricks on him and that he would have once agreed with the fans who thought that he and Roddenberry had a decent relationship. At least, whenever fans asked about said relationship, Meyer would claim that he met the other man and “had to shake his hand … but he wasn’t part of making the movie.”
This describes a cool but professional and rather impersonal relationship between Gene Roddenberry and Nicholas Meyer. According to The Wrath of Khan director, he believed that relationship to be mostly pleasant until he visited the University of Iowa; this was his alma mater, and the school’s library had many of his old papers and correspondence. This included an “exchange of memoranda between me and Gene Roddenberry” that revealed something surprising: their relationship was very personal and in all the wrong ways.
Meyer Recalls The Correspondence
You see, Gene Roddenberry notoriously hated The Wrath of Khan, and he transferred some of that negativity into his correspondence with Nicholas Meyer. The Star Trek creator sent what Meyer later described as a “very toxic, very venomous” letter about how much “he hated the script.” Meyer was a young director who admits “I guess I didn’t know any better” and so “responded intemperately” to the rude letter he received, later blocking the entire exchange from his memory until he saw the actual letters for himself.
Roddenberry’s Rancorous Wrath
Considering everything that Gene Roddenberry did to sabotage The Wrath of Khan before it came out, we can’t really blame Nicholas Meyer for matching the energy of that first mean letter and then mentally blocking their exchange. Before the movie’s release, Roddenberry actually leaked major story details like the death of Spock, hoping to ruin the film’s biggest surprise. Later, the entire script was leaked, and a bit of investigation found that the script that had been copied was (to nobody’s real surprise) the one that had been given to the franchise creator.
May The Bridges You Burn Light Your Way
In case you’re wondering, after Gene Roddenberry actually saw The Wrath of Khan, he somewhat liked it, but he never sought to repair his relationship with Nicholas Meyer. In fact, he continued to hate the younger director’s more militaristic take on Star Trek and fought against it for the rest of his life. That’s quite literal: Roddenberry died only two days after trying to sue both Meyer and Leonard Nimoy in an effort to make The Undiscovered Country a less military-heavy film.
Can’t We All Just Get Along?
In a perfect world, Gene Roddenberry and Nicholas Meyer might have gotten along … after all, each was a visionary creator with a flair for great sci-fi stories. Unfortunately, from toxic letters back and forth to nasty legal fights about storytelling, these two were always destined to clash. And despite his best efforts, Roddenberry’s own fictional world would never be the same after The Wrath of Khan.
Source: TrekMovie
