In the 1967 episode of Star Trek, “Space Seed,” the Enterprise comes across a derelict "sleeper ship" named the Botony Bay, which contains a crew of approximately 70 men and women in suspended animation. Led by Khan Noonien Singh, these people turn out to be the result of genetic experimentation on Earth in the 1990s. Basically a race of supermen, with strength and intelligence nearly ten times that of an average person, they had attempted to take over the Earth and triggered World War III, the Eugenics War. They managed to flee in the Botony Bay, and are now revived in the 23rd Century.
Khan seizes the moment and, using historian Marla McGivers, nearly takes over the Enterprise. Kirk and company manage to gain the upper hand (barely) and sentence Khan and his people to the somewhat savage Ceti Alpha V. At least it will give Khan, McGivers and the others a chance to tame a world, rather than waste their lives in a Federation penal colony.
Behind-the-Scenes
Surprisingly, Khan Noonien Singh may never have come into existence at all if it hadn't been for Captain Video. "Hell," laughs writer Carey Wilbur, "the plot for 'Space Seed' came from an old Captain Video I did. Of course we did some very far out things on that show, including the popular idea of people being transported in space while in suspended animation." Allan Asherman's The Star Trek Compendium states that "Carey Wilbur began his outline for 'Space Seed' by explaining how out of place in today's world a man from Renaissance times would be."
"That sounds a little grand to me," Wilbur smiles. "I was just thinking of an adventure story, although there was some of that element there. I had this idea, which I revived from Captain Video because I thought it was time to do it again. It was a crazy story where we did the legend of men being turned into beasts, and our villainess had been transported from the days of Greek mythology to the future. So in doing 'Space Seed,' we took away the mythological powers and replaced them with a genetically altered human being. To be honest, I don't remember a heck of a lot about Khan. He was a criminal who had been deported in a seed ship who tried to take over the Enterprise after he was more or less accidentally revived."
Stated director Marc Daniels, "There's not much I remember about the episode except that we used those capsules which carried people in suspended animation. Ricardo Montalban was a very capable and good actor, and the episode, of course, led to Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan. Part of the problem in 'Space Seed' was trying to visualize Khan's tremendous power--where he could turn out a finger and turn somebody upside down. That was difficult, but we got away with it thanks to stunt people and judicious editing."
Recalled Ricardo Montalban, who brought Khan to life, "In those days, there wasn’t the dearth of material that we have today on television. Some shows were quite special, and certainly Star Trek was one of them. I was quite familiar with it. As an actor, I thought it would be great fun to do it. Khan was not the run of the mill sort of portrayal. It had to have a different dimension. That attracted me very much. And when they sent me the script, I thought it was a fascinating character and I loved doing it.
“Khan was a character that was bigger than life,” he added. “He had to be played that way. He was extremely powerful both mentally and physically, with an enormous amount of pride. But he was not totally villainous. He had some good qualities. I saw a nobility in the man that, unfortunately, was overridden by ambition and a thirst for power. I saw that in the character and played it accordingly. It was very well received at the time, and I was delighted. Then I forgot about it and went on to the next thing.”
Besides pride in his performance and the final episode, there was no reason for Montalban not to move on and continue with his career. Just as there was no reason to think that a role he had portrayed in a 1967 television series would enter his life again some 15 years later. But it did.
There is an interesting moment at the end of “Space Seed” where Spock says to Kirk, “It would be interesting, Captain, to return to that world in a hundred years and learn what crop has sprung from the seed you planted today,” to which Kirk responded, “Yes, Mr. Spock, it would indeed.” Even more interesting was an earlier draft of the script in which Kirk’s response was, “Let’s just hope that seed does come after us.” Prophetic indeed.
Following the release of Star Trek: The Motion Picture, Gene Roddenberry was “boosted” to the position of executive consultant, and TV veteran Harve Bennett (The Six Million Dollar Man, Time Trax, Invasion: America) was brought in to produce the second (and ultimately third through fifth) film in the series, eventually called Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan. As he began researching the story for the film, he studied old episodes of Star Trek along with writer Jack Sowards.
“I thought ‘Space Seed’ was wonderful,” said Sowards. “Ricardo Montalban is a classically trained actor. Anybody who can deliver those lines has got to be. Most actors in town would mumble them, but the man knows just how far to go. If you’ve watched Fantasy Island or his movies, there’s a smoothness. In this, he was something totally different and he knew just where to go with it without going over the edge. He is Khan. He brings that sort of macho arrogance to it and you believe this is a genetically engineered man who is stronger, smarter and brighter. A hero is nothing without a villain. If you overcome a slug and a snail, you haven’t done anything. If you overcome something like Khan, a hero is defined.”
No one was more surprised than Montalban himself to be asked to reprise the role of Khan, particularly since he had become so identified as Mr. Roarke from Fantasy Island. “When I started to articulate the words of Khan for myself,” he explained, “I sounded like Mr. Roarke, and I was very concerned about it. Then I asked Harve Bennett to send me a tape of the old show that I did. I ran it two or three times. When I first saw it, I didn’t even remember what I did. On the third viewing, a strange thing happened to me and I started reliving the moment and the mental process that I had arrived at at that time began to work in me and I associated myself with that character more and more. Finally, I took the script, found one of the scenes and did to myself, and I did feel than that Roarke had disappeared and that indeed I was into this character.
“Now this character presented a different problem,” he added. “The original character was in total control of the situation. Guided simply by his overriding ambition. The new character, however, was now obsessed. He was a man obsessed with vengeance for the death of his wife, for which he blamed Kirk. If he was bigger than life before, I felt he really had to become bigger than life almost to the point of becoming ludicrous to be effective. If I didn’t play it fully and totally obsessed with this, then I think the character would be little and insignificant and uninteresting. The danger was in going overboard. Very often, an actor will play things safely and it works. You can play safe, you can underact, put the lid on and it works beautifully. In this case, I thought if I did that it would be very dull. I had to be, if not deranged, then very close to it. I had to find a tone of really going right to the razor’s edge before the character becomes a caricature.”
One bit of criticism Wrath of Khan received was the fact that Kirk and Khan never come face to face, only dealing with each other over view screens and communicators. “I don’t think this was a drawback,” opined Montalban. “Actually, that was an element that was interesting. It was difficult as an actor, but that separate of the two ships gave it a really poignant touch to the scenes. The fact that being so strong, there was such pressure knowing that he can’t get his hands on Kirk. I didn’t mind that. I minded as an actor. I wish William Shatner and I had somehow been able to respond to each other at the time. The actual situation, though, I thought was a plus. I think we left the audiences wanting them to get together and we don’t.”
Illustrations above were all drawn by Tom Holtkamp.
Coming soon in Part II of this three-part series is an interview with author Greg Cox about a trilogy of Star Trek novels chronicling the rise and fall of Khan.