Fun Day in Vancouver

[itsjustgwen]

I headed north to see George Takei and Nichelle Nicholls at the Stargate Con and had one of those perfect days, where everything just falls into place.  I parked in Richmond and took the SkyTrain downtown, which was so stress-free and inexpensive that I know I'll be going downtown more often.  It was a beautiful day and a very pleasant walk from the SkyTrain station to the Sheraton Wall Centre.  I registered for the con (with much mental swearing at Creation, but that's another story) and made it into the programming room just as Nichelle came on stage.

She's a sweetheart and everyone loves her for good reason.  She talked about how much she loves the fans and the history of the Star Trek cons.  I'd say her age is showing a bit in the way she tends to lose her train of thought .  She told a long rambling story about her work with NASA and support for girls and minorities in the sciences.   

Next on the schedule were Gwynyth Walsh and Barbara Marsh ( B'Etor and Lursa, the Klingon sisters).  I had no interest in them beforehand,  but they were surprisingly entertaining.  The crowd was interested to learn that they are both Canadian - one from Vancouver and the other from Ontario   Barbara is married to Alan Scarfe, who was up in the dealers room.

I had a nice lunch with Kristin and then we headed back to see George Takei.  He is a dynamo!  He was a great speaker, witty, sharp and interesting.  He said that he wishes they would develop a transporter because, even though McCoy hates having his molecules scrambled, "it's better than having your mind scrambled at airports, these days."  He talked a lot about "The Wrath of Khan" and how it was a great movie.  He said they used the same set for the Enterprise and Khan's ship.  He did a PSA in Japan, after the nuclear meltdown and reviewed footage of the cleanup workers going into the reactor everyday.  He said that line from the movie - "the needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few" - kept going through his head.  He said he recently went to a showing of "Khan" and was saddened to realize how many of the cast are no longer with us.

He talked a lot about his current show, Supah Ninjas, on Nickelodeon, and mentioned his upcoming movie with Tom Hanks and Julia Roberts.  He said he wished Heroes hadn't been cancelled before he found out what his super power would be.  He is in the process of working on a musical called "Allegiance" based on his family's experience in the internment camps during WW2.  He said it's scheduled to open in San Diego next summer and, hopefully, move to Broadway later.

After someone came up to the mike and thanked him for his bravery in coming out, George introduced his partner, Brad. He was an unassuming guy in a plaid shirt, with graying hair.  He seemed to be a little shy, but he did speak to the fans that spoke to him.  In the autograph line, he was poking George, trying to get him to talk less and sign faster so that they could go to dinner.  George asked him, "Where are we going?" and he replied with some exasperation, "That depends on how fast you sign these autographs."  I asked him if he was a Trekkie before he met George and he said he was just a little bit of one.

I was hoping someone would ask George about his famous feud with Shatner, but no one did.  When he was talking about recording dialog for animated series, he mentioned that the cast recorded their lines separately, which wasn't fun, because "actors like to bounce ideas off of each other" and then said with a wicked grin "except for one.  No names mentioned!"  Later, in the autograph line, I heard him tell a fan that Shatner could never remember how to pronounce his last name, no matter how many times he told him.  He finally told him Takei, it rhymes with toupee, and pointed to Shatner's head.  I'm sure that went over well.

He ended his talk with a nice story about introducing Jimmy Doohan to sushi and how he became a sushi missionary.

So, at this point it was all photo ops until around 6:00, when the autographs started, so I decided to head down the street to the Fairmont Hotel, where the Leo Awards (BC's film industry awards) were going on.  I thought it unlikely that I would actually see anything, but  thought it was worth a shot.  alsogater  joined me and, boy, did we hit the motherload.  We saw loads of celebrities.  All the Sanctuary cast were there - Chris Heyerdahl, Ryan Robbins, Robin Dunne, Amanda Tapping and Martin Wood.  We also saw Jodelle Ferlund and Alex Zahara and lots and lots of faces that we recognized, but weren't sure where we knew them from.  Lots of Vancouver's most beautiful people on the red carpet.  It was a lot of fun.  We stayed for about two hours and then headed back for autographs.
 

Comments

[ad_maggies]

Nice summary. I hadn't heard the 'toupee' remark. LOL We had fun, eh!? Still excited over the weekend.