Let’s celebrate making it through the week with a little ‘repressed Roddenberry’ – this obscure scifi project by Gene “Star Trek” Roddenberry called The Questor Tapes. TQT is a made-for-TV movie written by Gene Roddenberry and Gene L. Coon as a pilot for a 13-episode series on NBC in 1974. Take a look at the movie and then learn more below:
Oh man, the soundtrack is such 70s electro-funk cheese and includes other ‘that guy’ players as Mike Farrell and John Vernon. The Questor Tapes aren’t that fun to watch on its own but it’s significant when you consider its scifi pedigree. Roddenberry played around with Big Ideas like extraterrestial abiogenesis and post-human social issues.
More fun facts about The Questor Tapes:
- When Jerry enters “Vaslovic’s information center”, 4 TV screens are visible on the right. The upper right screen is running the loop used in Universal’s Colossus: The Forbin Project when Colossus and Guardian are creating a common language.
- Gene Roddenberry’s son, Rod, has confirmed that the Questor android was an inspiration for the character of Data, from Roddenberry’s later Star Trek: The Next Generation.
- The Questor Tapes connects to other major scifi projects like The Andromeda Strain, Battlestar Galactica, and Star Trek: the Motion Picture. Richard A. Colla directed many television projects along with TQT, including BSG. The music for The Questor Tapes was scored by Gil Mellé. His most well-known film score was The Andromeda Strain, whose director, Robert Wise, later directed Star Trek: The Motion Picture.
- Originally Leonard Nimoy was asked to play Questor. He posed in makeup for production photos and agreed to do the weekly series if picked up. However, Roddenberry hired Robert Foxworth.
All in all – The Questor Tapes remain a fond, if undersung, piece of ‘repressed Roddenberry’ and I’m glad we could revisit it for Sci-Friday! Please feel welcomed to dive down the rabbit hole of every other Sci-Friday I’ve published in the past couple years. Have a great weekend!
