GEORGE TAKEI
The Star Trek fave and LGBT+ activist beams down for our Icon Award — we Vulcan-hand salute you, sir
For years, Star Trek actor George Takei had to hide his true self, but now he’s
a leading light in gay activism and the winner
of our Icon Award
George wears blazer, by Corneliani at Harvey Nichols, trousers, by Marks & Spencer, shirt, by Ted Baker, bow tie, by River Island, trainers,
George’s own
NOVEMBER 2018
To say that George Takei has lived an extraordinary life is to do him an injustice. His story begins with one of the most distressing experiences any young person should have to go through when, following the bombing of Pearl Harbor in 1941, George and his family were sent to an internment camp along with other US citizens of Japanese ancestry. He was only five years old and would spend the best part of the next four years living in the enclosed community, which he regards more like a prison.
Those early experiences in the camp were the inspiration behind the Broadway musical Allegiance, which opened in September 2012 and starred George. But his most famous role came almost 50 years earlier, in 1966, when he was cast as Hikaru Sulu, helmsman of the USS Enterprise in the original Star Trek TV series, created by Gene Roddenberry.
Now 81, George recalls the major events of the Sixties — a decade that transformed America: the Vietnam War and the assassinations of President John Kennedy, his brother and presidential candidate Bobby, and civil rights leader Martin Luther King Jr.
“Gene gathered us together and explained the idea of the series,” George says about his first day on set of the classic sci- fi show. “He told us: ‘ This is the future. We live in turbulent times’.
“Gene wanted to make a statement about our times, but you couldn’t make it directly otherwise you wouldn’t be on the air. So he came up with this idea of a science- fiction show and to use sci- fi metaphorically to make that commentary. The Starship Enterprise was a metaphor for Starship Earth, and the ship’s strength lay in its diversity, coming together and working in concert; that’s why he cast the way he did.
“Each character was to represent a part of Starship Earth — I was to represent Asia while Nichelle Nichols [ playing communications officer Uhura] was to represent Africa.”
Although the show struggled to hit particularly high ratings in its first run, it earned itself cult status with the cast returning in 1979 for a hit movie, which spawned five sequels.
However, all the while during his time playing Sulu, George lived a secret gay life, visiting bars and staying silent about his sexuality for fear of jeopardising his career.
It was a starkly different time to today’s open attitudes. It wasn’t until October 2005, inspired by the political activism of the fight for marriage equality when then California governor Arnold Schwarzenegger vetoed same- sex marriage, that George came out publicly, revealing that he had been in a relationship with Brad Altman since 1989.
Since then, George has been a vocal champion for LGBT+ equality, and has seen his popularity continue to rise — not just as an activist but also as one of social media’s wittiest commentators. As we meet George for his Awards shoot and interview in a South LA studio location that is worthy of a scene in Trek, his warmth radiates from the moment he arrives. He’s joyful and engaging, and everything we imagined our Icon Award winner to be.
Who was the first person you came out to on
Star Trek?
I didn’t come out to anyone; actors have antennas. We’d have Friday night wrap parties, the beer would be rolled out and the pizza would be brought in, and people brought their wives or girlfriends, or their husbands or boyfriends, and I usually had a buddy there.
So you didn’t have to say anything, but people were aware?
They knew. But they also knew that it would be destructive if they gave voice to it, so they were cool. There was one guy who clearly didn’t get it — it went right over his head.
William Shatner?
[ Laughs]. You could guess.
Your earliest memories are of being in internment camps during World War II. How long were you there for?
From age five to when I was 8 ½ .
You were a US citizen then suddenly as a child you were put into these camps, which wasn’t quite what the Nazis were doing, but to some people there were similarities in that they were grouping people by race and putting them in “jail”.
But we were Americans.
But Jewish people were also German. And they might not have been murdering you in the camps, but they were grouping you together…
Well, people were killed, but not systematically. There were people in camps who went crazy. They were despondent, some attempted suicide.
What was the treatment like of people in there? Did the guards look after you, or did they see you just as prisoners?
Oh, we were prisoners. We were all concentrated together. There were barbed- wire fences, sentry towers, machine guns pointed at us — without question it was a concentration camp. We were concentrated. I mean, that’s the definition of a concentration camp. What the Nazis had were not concentration camps, they were death camps, extermination camps. Right after Pearl Harbor, young Japanese Americans, like all young Americans, rushed to the recruitment centres to volunteer to serve in the military. This act of patriotism was answered with a slap in the face; they were denied military service and categorised as enemy aliens, which was crazy.
I guess there are similarities with LGBT+ people who weren’t allowed to serve their country in the military.
Exactly. The parallels are all there. What they subjected us to and what society subjected LGBT+ people to is the same mentality — to see with a broad brush, to paint a whole group of people as evil, sinful, a disease on society, and because of our face alone. My mother was born in Sacramento, California, my father was a San Franciscan, they met and married in Los Angeles. My siblings and I were born in LA, but we looked like the people who bombed Pearl Harbor. The racism was incredible.
When you left the camps, obviously you then had to go back into society. What was that like?
We went back to a fiercely racist Los Angeles. At school there was this old, tiny, grey- haired woman with a bun on top of her head, who continually referred to me as a “Jap boy.” That stung. My brother was four when we went into the camp and eight when we were let out. He was at a very impressionable, malleable age, and I’m sure he was called “the Jap boy” by the teacher, too, as well as by other kids who bullied us. He
“A T E ACHER AT S CHOOL CONTINUALLY R E F E R R E D T O M E AS JAP BOY. T H AT S T U NG”
George wears shirt, by Calvin Klein 205w39NYC
at Harvey Nichols
NOVEMBER 2018
was very stressed all the time. He began stuttering and he wet the bed and my mother had the worst kind of solution to it. She hung his bedsheet up in the backyard so that neighbours could see — she tried to shame him. He had this insecurity that he grew up with, but he was smart, he was very bright, good inside. My parents were determined to get all three children educated. My brother became a dentist and my parents were very proud of that, my sister became a school teacher. However, when my brother became quite successful, he loved being called Dr Takei, everything had to be the best. When he found out his brother was gay, that was something that stained his reputation. We’re estranged.
Since when?
Since I came out to him, back in the late Seventies. He lives only five blocks from me. At first, he came to me and said, “You’ve got to stop this. I’m breaking out in sweats at night, I’ve got a rash, I can’t sleep.” And the biggest insult, “I will support you in your old age” — as if I couldn’t support myself. Then, finally, he said, “You’re dead to me. I don’t want you in my life. I don’t want you to have anything to do with my children.” In response, I said: “They are independent human beings. They’re my niece and nephew and I love them and they’re gonna be who they are. I’m their Uncle George and you’re not gonna take that away from them.” But we’ve never spoken since that day. Later, when my mother got Alzheimer’s and somebody had to take care of her, I was with Brad, so I asked him if we could move her in with us and take care of her. Brad said yes, and that deepened my love for him that much more. He actually became a son to her. Every couple of weeks, my brother would come over for a very abbreviated, nervous, rushed, visit.
Have you tried to make peace with your brother?
It’s always been my hope that we can get together but as time passes it gets to be more awkward. Relatives would have family gatherings and I might walk into a room but my brother would immediately walk away and go into another room. Or if Brad comes in, he’ll move. It’s difficult, [ my brother] is a very insecure guy, that’s why he needs the accoutrements of wealth.
I guess family is family, whether you’re a celebrity or not.
We did Allegiance on Broadway, then we had a Los Angeles run, and all the relatives came and they crowded in backstage to tell us how much they enjoyed it, but not my brother, never. My nephew brings his whole family. My brother’s kids are like our grandchildren.
Even though you were in the closet during you went to gay bars and clubs and engaged with the gay scene. Was there ever a situation where you were afraid of being outed?
At that time, Star Trek was a very lowrated show and there weren’t too many people who recognised me, and I’d ask the few who did to keep it quiet and they honoured that.
There were some who I went out with, and you’d trust them but at the same time… One of the things you live with as an actor is that constant contained anxiety that you’re gonna be outed. I passionately love my acting career and I knew that I would not have it if I was outed; you could not be a working actor.
Did it make you fearful of relationships and getting to know other people?
It makes you very careful.
I guess you have to trust your instincts to be a good judge of other people’s character before you reveal yourself.
That was also another kind of constraint on my life. You meet people, you know they’re gay, but at the time, can you trust them? It’s your life that you’re entrusting. I did have many who became good friends, but there’s always that anxiety.
How did your parents react when they met Brad?
My father was gone, but my mother knew Brad to be a good buddy of mine and I told her: “Brad is my friend… but he’s also a person who I love very much.” We’re Buddhists and we accept the givens of life, it’s a very accepting faith; it’s not a religion — there’s no god, there’s a universal force. So, she understood, but she was still disappointed that she wasn’t going to have grandchildren from me. My brother was married and she already had a grandson from him, but she wanted me to provide her with a grandson, so I had to explain to her that I wanted to spend my life with Brad. It was a little diff icult for her initially, but because she already knew him, he wasn’t a total stranger.
You’ve been with Brad for 30 years now. What do you see as being the secret to your relationship?
It’s a combination of love, common interest, shared lust [ laughs]. It’s lust that brings you together first then that turns into love. Both of us were runners, we met at running club, and Brad was an outstanding runner, the best in the club. Then I heard that he’d run a couple of marathons so I got him to train me for my first marathon, and that training process brought us together.
When did you start to engage your activist side?
As a teenager I became curious about my childhood imprisonment and engaged my father in conversations about the internment. He told me that in spite of the other types of government in the world, American democracy is still the best, because it’s a people’s democracy. He said, “The ideals of this country are good, but the people sometimes fail it.” For our democracy to exist, it’s dependent on people who cherish those ideals and actively engage in the process of democracy.
From the perspective of being in the closet, what did you think of the early gay liberation movement?
Stonewall happened in 1969. It was exhilarating and galvanising, but at the same time there I felt guilty because I wasn’t out. There were these guys who were sacrifi cing everything. There I was protecting my career, my passion, while these guys were actively participating in that process of democracy.
The battle for same- sex marriage was instrumental in you coming out publicly.
Arnold Schwarzenegger was the governor of California at that time. When he vetoed it, I was raging. Brad and I were watching the late- night news and this story came on, and young people were pouring out on to Santa Monica Boulevard demonstrating against him. We felt the same way, so, in many ways, it was Schwarzenegger and his homophobic action that brought me out.
Speaking of politicians, do you see the USA recovering from Donald Trump?
He’s been devastating but the country has been going for about 240 years — Donald Trump is just a brief moment in time; I’m looking at the larger picture. We will get past Trump, but he has left an indelible scar.
Looking back at your life, what is your greatest regret?
One thing that has always pained me is, in those discussions I had with my father, I got kind of passionate talking to him and said: “You led us like sheep to the slaughter by taking us into the internment camp.” I knew immediately that I had gone too far; I hit a nerve and I felt terrible. I saw it in his face and heard it in that silence, and he said: “Well, maybe you’re right.” After that, he got up and went into his bedroom and closed the door. I felt like knocking on the door and apologising but it just felt awkward, so I thought I would apologise the next day. At breakfast, it was even more awkward. I never apologised and now he’s gone. I guess I regret that.
And what is your proudest moment?
It’s what Brad and I made of our relationship. We’ve gone through so much together and he’s been absolutely incredibly supportive throughout. During all my political activities, he’s been a stalwart supporter. And with my mother. That was something that my siblings wouldn’t do, but he did.
Can we talk about the challenge that you faced when you had the accusations of sexual assault made at you last year, which have since been discredited?
We happened to be in Tokyo when the story broke. We filmed the Broadway production of Allegiance and we’d had one- night- only screenings throughout the States in 600 theatres, and we took it to Tokyo for a screening there. The foreign minister, Taro Kono, was nice enough to greet us and be the speaker at the premiere. It was then that we got word of this allegation. So many women who had been silenced were coming out and that’s when the # MeToo phrase was coined and that became a movement, and here, in this case, was a guy accusing me of something that I don’t remember happening at all. I can’t even remember what he was like.
How did you feel not being able to properly respond? On the one hand victims absolutely have a right to be heard, but at the same time when you know it’s an unjust accusation it’s very hard to defend yourself.
What I said on Facebook was, “This is untrue. I racked my brains but I could not remember this ever happening.” First of all, he says I took him to dinner and to the theatre — I don’t take anybody who I meet at a bar to the theatre. I would certainly remember someone who I took out for an evening like that, so it was totally incredible to me. I said at that same time, “As far as I’m concerned, this didn’t happen; I don’t remember him at all.” But, I did not engage in a “he said/ he said” because of my respect for the # MeToo movement. Women had been silenced for so long and they were finally being listened to,
and here I would be challenging someone who is coming up with an accusation. The press all took that allegation to be fact and my name was being listed together with Harvey Weinstein and Bill O’Reilly.
How did that make you feel?
It was hellish! I had nightmares, I couldn’t sleep. It was torturous, and yet, because of what I said about the # MeToo movement, I’m respecting it and I’m not going to say anything more other than the statement I put out. To myself and with Brad I said, “I will speak out but in a timely fashion,” and I think that time has passed which is why I’m discussing it with you. But I was so disappointed in the press for not vetting it. Just like when we were incarcerated, there were no charges, no trial, no due process, and here, it took one unknown person to accuse me and the press just took that as fact and did nothing about it. However, subsequently, an investigative journalist named Shane Snow did look into it and my faith in the press and in journalism was refreshed, but it was a situation where only he did that. Snow did it in a very professional way, he talked to the accuser many times, he took that information and checked with the toxicologists. The other thing that really outraged me was [ the man] accused me of drugging him — I would never do something like that. I had never done anything like that, and I knew that’s what made it false, he was making up all these things. Shane Snow said he had checked with toxicologists and they said: “In those days, if he had been drugged, he would not have remembered a thing about it. He would have been out cold and he certainly would not have been able to drive home,” as he claimed. Also, he kept changing his story. There were many stories that he changed, so he’s quite discredited now.
Did you consider taking legal action against him?
That brings more attention, if I sue him. He was obviously taking it lightly, as when he accused me he said he regaled friends in gay bars with the story of George Takei groping him. It wasn’t like the women who have been assaulted and were left scarred, he was more or less making it a gay- bar joke.
Does it frustrate you that the media didn’t report the outcome of the story as widely as they did the accusations?
Well, that’s how it always is. I think there was a great overreaction, and I can say that now, but at the time if I had said something like that, the backlash would have been incredible.
What do you want to be your most enduring legacy?
That I made some contribution to society as a whole, that we mattered for a brief moment, but I keep thinking of the larger picture. I think my tombstone’s gonna read: “Here Lies Hikaru Sulu” in great big, bold letters, and in smaller letters underneath “AKA George Takei.”