Doohan Memories and Tributes Continue

Reactions and tributes continue to pour in following the death of James Doohan (Scotty) last week.

The Letters to the Editor page at StarTrek.com contains tributes by numerous people connected with Star Trek, beginning with executive producer Rick Berman, who worked with Doohan on the Next Generation episode "Relics" and on Star Trek: Generations and wrote, "He was a gentle and lovely man, as well as an extremely talented actor. We are all very saddened by this news."

"Jimmy Doohan was a class act," added Michael and Denise Okuda. "Jimmy accepted his role as a cultural icon with grace and humor. He was thrilled that he had helped to inspire engineers, scientists, pilots, and even astronauts. To them (and to everyone else), he was a symbol of the triumph of human technical ingenuity (and grim determination) in the face of overwhelming odds."

"My father and Jimmy, as I often heard him called, were the closest of the Star Trek cast," stated Eugene Roddenberry Jr., son of Star Trek creator Gene Roddenberry, who is now working on a documentary about the Star Trek phenomenon. "I had met Jimmy only a few times throughout the years and it was always my impression that he was a genuinely good person."

"You never heard a bad word about Jimmy Doohan the whole time I was at Star Trek," declared Ron Moore, the former Star Trek producer now working on the revival of Battlestar Galactica. "He didn't have any ego clashes with anybody, didn't have an axe to grind — and I think, in a large way, that's also the heart of his character as well. Montgomery Scott was a character without guile — what you saw was what you got with Scotty."

The official site also contains tributes by Oofficial Star Trek Fan Club founder Dan Madsen, series saviour and convention organiser Bjo Trimble, writers Judith & Garfield Reeves-Stevens, actor Tim Russ, NASA astronaut Mario Runco and many others.

Data actor Brent Spiner and executive producer Brannon Braga have been busy promoting their new series Threshold but took a moment to pay tribute to Doohan at a television critics' tour session. "He was a lovely guy and of course I'm very sad to hear of his passing," CANOE Jam! quoted Spiner as saying. "He actually worked a lot with LeVar [Burton], because they both [played] engineers."

Braga called Doohan a "very charming man and a wonderful actor."

Creation Entertainment paid tribute to Doohan with two articles recalling his convention appearances and how he related to fans:

As you perennially regaled your loving audiences, certain themes and stories became treasured riffs that we hoped you would repeat. Everyone knows now what a great character actor you were and how many voices you could create. Still, it was always fresh when you posed Kirk's immortal plea, 'Scotty, I need Warp power in 20 seconds or we're all dead!' and answered in a variety of characters. My favorite was Reggie, the British Colonial soldier, whose perpetual response was, 'Well, I'm terribly sorry, Captain, but I can't seem to get the bugger to move!'

StarTrek.com reports that Doohan's ashes will likely be launched into space in September, on the same flight that will carry the ashes of his colleague John Meredyth Lucas, the original Star Trek writer and director who died in 2002. Space Services, Inc. also sent Gene Roddenberry's ashes into orbit.

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