Even if you’re not a hardcore Trekkie, you’re likely familiar with that unscrupulous galactic trader Cyrano Jones and his furry multiplying marvels known as the tribbles from “Star Trek: The Original Series.” That comedic fan-favorite chapter from “The Original Series” Season 2 first aired Dec. 29, 1967 and was written by David Gerrold.
Now Titan Books will honor those bountiful balls with a standout section inside its upcoming retrospective hardback, “Star Trek: The Illustrated Oral History: The Original Cast,” and we’ve got an exclusive interview excerpt featuring Gerrold and episode actor William Campbell who played the Klingon Commander Koloth.
Created by Gene Roddenberry, NBC’s seminal sci-fi series ran from Sep. 6, 1966 to June 3, 1969 for a total of 79 episodes over three seasons. This foundational show starring the legacy cast lived on beyond those pivotal years to spawn 1973’s “Star Trek: The Animated Series” and the entertaining collection of “Star Trek” theatrical movies released between 1979 and 1991.
“Star Trek: The Illustrated Oral History: The Original Cast” is a 96-page special edition being published on July 30, 2024 that’s packed with behind-the-scenes features, and chats with the “Star Trek” luminaries that injected this franchise with bold creativity.
Related: The 10 Best ‘Star Trek’ Episodes Ever
Check out the official description:
“The story of ‘Star Trek’ as told by the people who know it best: William Shatner, Leonard Nimoy, DeForest Kelley and the cast and crew! This lavishly illustrated oral history of the ‘Star Trek’ phenomenon covers the exploits of the original crew across three seasons of live action television, two seasons of animated adventures and the six movies.
“Featuring interview material with all seven regular cast members — William Shatner, Leonard Nimoy, DeForest Kelley, James Doohan, George Takei, Walter Koenig and Nichelle Nichols — this volume also includes contributions from guest stars, writers and directors.”
Here’s our extract with David Gerrold and William Campbell courtesy of Titan:
When David Gerrold submitted a light and whimsical story called “The Fuzzies” to the “Star Trek” production office in 1967, the last thing he expected was a flurry of complaints about cruelty to animals. But after the story, filmed as “The Trouble with Tribbles,” aired on Dec. 29, 1967, the complaints came in. Gerrold’s episode – inspired by rabbit plagues in Australia – famously sees the U.S.S. Enterprise overrun by furry aliens called tribbles whilst guarding a space station full of grain from Klingons.
David Gerrold: We couldn’t use real creatures, not gerbils or hamsters. Holly Sherman, a young lady I went to school with, had a fluff ball on her key chain, and I said, “Oh, we could do that. That’ll be my fuzzy creatures. We could just buy a bunch of key chains!”
I thought William Shatner would say, “I won’t do anything that makes Captain Kirk look funny.” I was prepared to have him step to the side when the tribbles fell, but instead he said, “Yes, I can do this.” He loved doing the comedy.
Once Shatner had acquiesced to Gerrold’s script, others joined in the fun, including DeForest Kelley.
David Gerrold: We just kept adding funny things. The next thing we knew, we had a comedy. All I had at the beginning was that the tribbles were going to breed like crazy, and Kirk was having trouble with the Klingons so that there was a perceived menace. But as it developed, we realized everything had to be tied together.
Bless [producer] Gene L. Coon’s heart, he gave me room to play with and develop it, and eventually we realized that the tribbles had to be the way we found out that the grain, destined for Sherman’s Planet, had been poisoned by a Klingon agent. So, the tribbles had to dislike the Klingons. That’s how we find out there’s a Klingon spy. That saved me a lot of trouble plot-wise, and it’s a good punchline. If we had had maybe two minutes more in time we could have done something more with that, but we just ran out of time.
The tribbles turned out to be a pretty good McGuffin – especially a device triggering the plot. They were a sight gag that actually became a plot-point. But the idea there was to do an episode where Kirk’s problem is a little one, and by ignoring it, it gets out of hand.
The episode also saw the return of a popular guest star, in a very different role!
William Campbell (Koloth): Gene L. Coon said to me, “There’s only one bad thing about your performance as Trelane in “The Squire of Gothos,” and that’s that I will not be able to use you for at least a year because everyone is going to associate you with Trelane!” It was almost a year to a month that he called me about playing Koloth. If Gene had asked me to do one line, I’d have said yes instantly.
What was great about Koloth, was that I was the only one who could possibly be a counterpoint to Bill Shatner. John Colicos couldn’t have been in the episode he did as the first Klingon and the same thing applied to Michael Ansara, but my character, age wise, and personality wise was the Klingon equivalent to Captain Kirk. Gene L. Coon asked me if I would be interested in doing 13 episodes, and I said I’d love to. They were thinking of having a character who would be a main adversary much in the same way as Ming was to Flash Gordon.
Writer David Gerrold was mentored by Gene L. Coon, who the young writer held in exceptionally high regard.
David Gerrold: I felt like Dorothy being ushered into the presence of the Wizard of Oz. That Gene Coon was on a 20-foot throne surrounded by pillars of lightning and thunder didn’t help much either. I can’t remember what he said, I was too busy watching his words materialize in big puffs of smoke.
