Nimoy: Trek And Tweets

Not many octogenarians are on Facebook and Twitter, but Leonard Nimoy is, courtesy of his granddaughter Dani.

Like her grandfather, Dani is artistic and Nimoy’s Secret Selves photographs gave her an idea. “She was quite convinced that they’d look good on tee-shirts,” said Nimoy.

Nimoy gave her permission to put the images on t-shirts, but Dani said something else was needed first. “She said, ‘What you have to do is open a Twitter account and build up some followers, and then we’ll tell them where they can go to buy these shirts.’ I said, ‘OK,’ and I did that. Suddenly, I’m tweeting on Twitter. … the whole thing would have totally passed me by if it weren’t for her, this whole tweeting and Facebook thing.”

Although he started with them for merchandizing purposes, Nimoy found that he genuinely enjoys today’s social media. “It snuck up on me,” he said. “I had no idea. I love it. It’s a great world out there and it’s a great way of communicating with a lot of people in a very quick way. I enjoy it. I’m on Twitter fairly regularly. I don’t do an awful lot of tweeting. There are some people I see that tweet all day, every day. They start in the morning and say, ‘Good morning,’ then are on it all day. I don’t do that. I pop up. I try to tweet when I’ve got something really interesting to say or some idea that I think is meaningful. I don’t tweet when I go to the drug store.”

According to Nimoy, today’s technology mirrors what was seen on Star Trek back in the 1960s. “…the technology has really, astoundingly, followed some of the Star Trek items that we used,” he said. “(Early) cell phones were like communicators. There are the tablets, iPads and all of that, and they have so much of the information that we used to get on the tricorder. And we’re awfully close to a lot of those items that were so wonderfully imaginative forty, forty-five years ago. They’re in the culture now.”

Nimoy still cares about his Star Trek co-stars and plans on being a guest speaker at Walter Koenig‘s Star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame ceremony in September. “Oh, yeah,” he said. “Oh, yeah. I’m planning on being there. He certainly deserves it. Let me tell you something, if people were to ask me, ‘What are you thinking now about the original Star Trek series?,’ one of the things that comes to mind immediately is the people who have not had enough recognition, and I include Walter and Nichelle (Nichols) and George (Takei) in that, as well as DeForest Kelley, Jimmy Doohan and Gene Coon, who gave us some wonderful writing and worked very hard as a producer.”

And what about the new Star Trek? Nimoy’s comments would appear to refute the rumor of his possible appearance in Star Trek 2. “I visited the set one day and that started some speculation about whether I was doing the film,” said Nimoy. “It’s all speculation. I talk to these people regularly. Zachary Quinto and I have dinner whenever we can. We just had dinner three or four weeks ago. I talk to J.J. about family. His parents and I go back a number of years as friends. I knew them long before I ever met J.J. So we talk regularly.”

Nimoy also addressed his retirement. “I am [retired],” he said. “Look, I liken myself to a steamship that’s been going full-blast and the captain pulls that handle back and then says, ‘Full stop,’ but the ship doesn’t stop. It keeps moving from inertia. It keeps moving. It keeps moving. It’ll start slowing down, but it doesn’t stop. It doesn’t come to a dead stop. That’s the way I am. I still have a few odds and ends things that I enjoy doing. I don’t want to get up in the morning and have nothing to do that day. That would be boring.”

One of those “odds and ends” includes Fringe. “Next season is an open question,” said Nimoy. “I love the show. I admire the people who make it. We’ve become friends. I think they’re wildly imaginative. If they contact me, I answer the phone. I don’t avoid them. I try to be helpful. I try to make a contribution.”

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