Outsider Appeal of Spock
BURBANK, California — Spock, the half- human, half-Vulcan from “Star Trek,” is superstrong and a whiz at science. A master at tamping down his base needs and human emotions. He can literally look into your mind.
Leonard Nimoy originated the role in 1966, and when his son, Adam, began asking people what they most loved about the character while filming his new documentary, “For the Love of Spock,” all that stuff — his big brain, his ability to peek into yours — was secondary. His most attractive trait? “Ninety percent of them were talking about the fact that he’s an outsider,” he said.
Outsider indeed. Spock is that rarest of 23rd- century beings, the only son of a Vulcan dad and a human mom. For years, he was about the closest viewers could get to a multiracial role model on American TV. “I had Spock,” the actress Jennifer Beals said in 2011. “And that was kind of it.” (Ms. Beals is of Irish- and African-American descent.)
The character has inspired multiracial artists, writers and scholars. Teresa Will iams- León, a professor of Asian- American studies at California State University, Northridge, includes the stories of Spock and President Barack Obama (a self-avowed Spock fan) in her class, “Biracial and Multiracial Identity.” For Ms. Williams-León, there’s something telling about Spock’s need to choose one of his selves (logical) over the other (emotional), rather than integrating the two. “It’s an interesting way of looking at how biracial people have had to suppress aspects of themselves, or one part of themselves.”
At 60, Adam Nimoy has the strong jawline and ethnically ambiguous good looks he got from his father, who died last year. Mr. Nimoy’s documentary, part of a 50th-anniversary celebration of the original series, includes a scene from the episode “Day of the Dove” in which Scotty, the Enterprise’s irascible engineer, calls Spock a “freak” and screams at him, “Keep your Vulcan hands off me!” The dig had to sting, Spock’s emotionless Vulcan side notwithstanding.
But the pain had purpose. “That was the civil rights era, when socalled law enforcement officers were using fire hoses and attack dogs,” said George Takei, who played Sulu on the show. “Gene Roddenberry was trying to use science fiction as a metaphor for the issues of the day.”
In 1968, a biracial girl wrote to “Mr. Spock,” in care of a teen magazine, explaining her trouble making friends because “my mother is Negro and my father is white.” She wrote, “I know that you are half-Vulcan and half-human and you have suffered because of this.” Mr. Nimoy wrote her back, telling her to believe in herself and not to let the bigots get her down.
“Hands down, the most popular reason that people connect to Spock is that he makes them feel like it’s O.K. to be an Other,” Adam Nimoy said. “It’s O.K. to be outside the mainstream. And Spock is cool! Spock is awesome. So that makes you feel a little better about yourself, too.”