Friday, December 19, 2008

Goodbye Nurse Chapel



Majel "Nurse Chapel"-Barrett-Roddenberry passed away yesterday.

The widow of Gene Roddenberry, the creator of the influential science fiction series (Gene passed away in 1991), played Nurse Christine Chapel in 33 episodes of the original series, as well as in two of the spin-off Star Trek movies throughout the late 1970s and 1980s -- Star Trek: The Motion Picture and Star Trek IV: The Voyage Home.



Some fun facts about her:



In the original unaired pilot for Star Trek, titled "The Cage" (which later was repurposed for the award-winning two part original Star Trek episode "The Menagerie"), she was cast as the First Officer of the Enterprise (Spock reported to her) and Jeffrey Hunter played Captain Pike (no Kirk then).



She also played Lwaxana Troi, the mother of Counselor Troi on Star Trek: The Next Generation (seen here with her husband and "Star Trek" creator, Gene Roddenberry).



She appeared as Nurse Chapel in the short-lived Star Trek: The Animated Series too.

She also provided the voice of the ship's computer on "Star Trek: The Next Generation" (and all of their movies), "Deep Space Nine" and "Voyager".



So it's very cool that J.J. Abrams also brought that bit of nostalgia and detail into his upcoming "Star Trek" movie, where she also provides the voice of the computer on the new iMac Enterprise.



Which, if all of the Star Trek worlds collided (hmmm...there's a movie idea), she would be on board the USS Enterprise as the First Officer, Nurse Chapel and the voice of the ship's computer.

She'd be a triple threat!

But for now...she will just be missed dearly.

2 comments:

harrisonite said...

I was unaware that she had passed on.

I often wish that she would be the voice of my computer.

Vampire Hours said...

I totally wish the same thing. I have a feeling that someone, somewhere, has figured out how to do that.

We need to find them. =)