The Man Who Produced Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan – Then Walked Away

[TMC]

https://www.denofgeek.com/movies/the...n-walked-away/

To borrow a phrase, when it came to Star Trek circa 1980-1981, “it was the best of times, it was the worst of times.”

On the one hand, the arrival of Star Trek: The Motion Picture in 1979 had proven that audiences would show up for the big screen adaptation of a cult TV series that had gone off the air a decade earlier. The millions of fans who had never even seen the show in its original 1966-1969 run on NBC, but had caught it in syndication, were clearly hungry for more adventures with the crew of the U.S.S. Enterprise.

On the other hand, the negative critical response to that film and the incredible expense incurred in bringing it to the screen — its $44 million budget was the highest for a film made in the U.S. up to that time — had franchise owner Paramount Pictures rethinking its approach. With ST: TMP eking out a profit but on a somewhat tight margin, could additional movies be made on a more reasonable budget?

The answer to that question, Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan, is still considered the gold standard of the Trek movie series some 38 years after it premiered in June 1982. A sequel to the 1967 original series episode “Space Seed,” it dealt with the return of Khan (Ricardo Montalban), a genetically enhanced superman from the 20th century who has a score to settle with Captain Kirk (William Shatner). The movie had Kirk and the crew grappling with issues of aging, memory, and grief, all while fighting to stay alive and keep a deadly new weapon out of Khan’s hands.

To develop the sequel, Paramount effectively sidelined Star Trek creator Gene Roddenberry, who had produced the first film and who had battled with the studio since the days of the TV show, and brought in veteran TV producer Harve Bennett. His mission was simple: to turn out a Star Trek sequel that was exciting and perhaps featured a bit more of the flavor of the series — instead of the cerebral, more esoteric exercise that ST: TMP turned out to be — all at a fraction of the first film’s cost.

Bennett and writer Jack Sowards worked on the story and initial drafts of the script, but since Bennett was also overseeing other projects at the same time, he needed someone on Star Trek II to act as the line producer — the person who would oversee all the myriad details of the production from prepping to post, and would also be the producer on the floor during the shoot.

He selected Robert Sallin, an old friend whom he had attended UCLA with. Sallin had successfully started his own company in which he produced and directed scores of commercials — but he had not worked on a major motion picture prior to this.