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| Kirstie Alley as Lieutenant Saavik with William Shatner as Captain James T. Kirk in Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan. Source: https://treknews.net/ 2015/01/14/ kirstie-alley-forever-grateful-for-star-trek/ (May be subject to copyright) |
The 1980s were a busy time for Kirstie Alley.
I was thinking about her recently, after I heard she had passed away at age 72.
Another know-it-all Vulcan
In 1982, the Star Trek franchise was at a crossroads. "Star Trek: The Motion Picture" had made a lot of money, but the story was not that great. It was pretty much a recycled version of an original series episode. But fans were only so forgiving.
In 1982, the Star Trek franchise was at a crossroads. "Star Trek: The Motion Picture" had made a lot of money, but the story was not that great. It was pretty much a recycled version of an original series episode. But fans were only so forgiving.
The producers had to come up with a better movie, and they produced what many consider the best movie of the franchise.
That movie featured a new actor making her motion picture debut in a memorable role. Kirstie Alley played Lieutenant Saavik, a helmsman who, initially, looked as if she would be a female version of Spock. She was that and more.
“The Wrath of Khan” opens with Saavik in the captain’s chair. Her ship answers a distress call in the Neutral Zone only to be met by three Kling Birds-of-Prey. They begin to attack. Saavik tries to retreat but can’t. Crew members are dying around her. Sparks are flying. Then, suddenly, Admiral James T. Kirk appears. It was all a test – the Kobiashi Maru, the no-win scenario.
Saavik is stunned, and wonders what she could have done differently. She would almost obsess on the no-win scenario throughout the movie.
She also continued to quote Starfleet regulations, much to Kirk’s chagrin. After Khan attacks the Enterprise, and Kirk is forced to take a crew of recruits and inexperienced personnel into battle, he tells Saavik to keep on quoting regulations
He would also meet her in the Turbolift with her hair let down, something not typical of Vulcans. When he asked if she did something different with her hair, she points out it is still regulation. When the Turbolift stops, she gets off just as Dr. McCoy gets on. “Did she do something different with her hair?” he asks. “I hadn’t noticed,” Kirk replies.
Eventually, Khan not only captures Kirk, but he maroons him inside an asteroid. At that point, Saavik asks him what his response to the Kobiashi Maru was.
“You’re looking at the only one who beat the no-win scenario,” McCoy said.
Kirk explained he broke into the Kobiashi Maru and re-programmed it so there was a solution. He was even given a citation for original thinking.
Saavik is taken back by that, and says that he never faced the no-win situation.
“I don’t like to lose,” Kirk said.
Before the movie ends, he is faced with death, mortality and the possibility of losing, and expresses some regret for always finding a way to cheat death.
Saavik, through it all, was the one who held him accountable.
It was an amazing performance, especially for her first ever motion picture role.
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| Kirstie Alley with Rod Taylor, at left, and Greg Evigan, at right, in the 1983-1984 show "Masquerade". Source: http://www.criticallyacclaimed.net/2020/02/ canceled-too-soon-178-masquerade-1983.html (May be subject to copyright) |
The next time I saw Kirstie Alley was in the 1983-1984 season starring opposite Rod Taylor and Greg Evigan in a short-lived TV series called, “Masquerade”. I really liked that show.
The premise was really interesting. Spies were being compromised so Lavender, the spymaster, constructs an elaborate ruse. He utilizes two young agents – played by Alley and Evigan – to supervise a group of civilians, who have been recruited for just one mission, for very specific purposes. Their cover is a tour bus with the two young agents acting as tour guides. It was an ensemble show, no different from “The Love Boat”, “Fantasy Island” or “Hotel”, where there was a new guest cast every week.
Alley was good in that role too. The show only lasted 13 episodes, so we never really got to see what she could do with the character.
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| Kirstie Alley with Mark Harmon in the 1986 TV movie "The Prince of Bel-Air". They would also star together in "Summer School" in 1987. Source: https://www.mcleanamy.co.uk/ post/ prince-of-bel-air-1986-film-kirstie-alley-mark-harmon (May be subject to copyright) |
It was Grade 11, a Saturday night the spring of 1985, and my parents went out for the night to the annual Sugar Beet Growers banquet. I got a VCR that Christmas, and was busy taping pretty much everything.
Channel 13 was playing a double header of TV movies. The first one was “The Return of Perry Mason”, which I was really looking forward to. The second one was “The Prince of Bel-Air”, which I knew nothing about. I taped them both, but actually ended up watching them live.
Perry Mason was pretty much what I expected.
“The Prince of Bel-Air” was not. It was really good and, of the two I taped, the one that I watched over again. It starred Mark Harmon as Robin, a womanizing pool cleaner who meets his match in an artist played by Kirstie Alley.
The two would team up again in 1987 for the theatrical release, “Summer School”. This time Harmon plays a school teacher ready for summer vacation who is summoned back to teach summer school. He soon encounters another teacher, played by Kirstie Alley whose character, ironically, is named Robin. Eventually they too fall in love.
Alley and Harmon have obvious chemistry, and both movies hold up to the test of time.
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| Kirstie Alley in the mini-series"North and South". Source: https://lmoore66.livejournal.com/158576.html (May be subject to copyright) |
One of the television events of 1985 was the mini-series “North and South”, based on the best-selling book of the same name by John Jakes. It is the story of two men who meet at West Point military school and become best friends. Orry Main, played by Patrick Swayze, is a southern gentleman, and George Hazard, played by James Read, is a northern industrialist. The friendship is severely put to the test as they take opposite sides when the United States descends into civil war.
“North and South” was an epic with a massive cast.
Kirstie Alley played Virgilia Hazard, one of George’s sisters, and an ardent abolitionist. She was good in the role as the fiery anti-slavery advocate, and would reprise the role in the 1986 sequel “North and South, Book II”.
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| Kirstie Alley with Ted Danson in "Cheers". Source: ©NBC/EVERETT COLLECTION https://www.rollingstone.com/tv-movies/tv-movie-features/ kirstie-alley-cheers-tribute-1234641983/ (May be subject to copyright) |
Kirstie Alley, who was assembling a decent body of work, would become a household name in the fall of 1987 when she joined the cast of the venerable comedy, “Cheers”.
When the fifth season of “Cheers” ended, Diane Chambers had gone. We were left wondering what her on again, off again boyfriend Sam Malone, was going to do.
By then, I had moved to Edmonton to go to university and I really did not watch much TV anymore. I was just having so much fun in university. However, I did make time to see the season premiere of “Cheers”. I was stunned at what had transpired at the bar “Where everybody knows your name”.
As the show opened, Sam, played by Ted Danson, and Woody, played by a very young Woody Harrelson, were serving drinks, wearing vests that looked like uniforms. Something just did not look right.
It turned out Sam had sold his bar to a corporation, and now was just an employee. The representative of that corporation was a British businessman named Robin Colcourt. Sam's immediate supervisor, who was on site every day, was Rebecca Howe, played by Kirstie Alley.
The question was obvious – how long would it take before Sam and Rebecca would get together, just like Sam and Diane had. This was different though. It turned out, Rebecca only had eyes for Robin. She would go on to have a string of doomed relationships with rich men, and become more neurotic as the series went on.
Rebecca would remain on the show until it ended in 1993, and her relationship with Sam was – complicated – to say the least.
Kirstie Alley did a masterful job playing Rebecca. She was nominated five times for an Emmy for Outstanding Lead Actress in a Comedy Series, and won the Emmy in 1991. She also won a Golden Globe that same year for the role.
Baby talk
The last thing I remember Kirstie Alley doing in the '80s was “Look Who’s Talking?”. It was a theatrical film released in 1989, where she plays the mother of a baby opposite John Travolta. There is a catch. The audience, and only the audience, can hear the baby talk. To add to the comedy, the baby is voiced by Bruce Willis.
The last thing I remember Kirstie Alley doing in the '80s was “Look Who’s Talking?”. It was a theatrical film released in 1989, where she plays the mother of a baby opposite John Travolta. There is a catch. The audience, and only the audience, can hear the baby talk. To add to the comedy, the baby is voiced by Bruce Willis.
Once again Alley gets to stretch her comedic muscles, and had good chemistry with Travolta. They would go on to do “Look Who’s Talking Too” in 1990, and “Look Who’s Talking Now” in 1993.
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| Kirstie Alley with former husband Parker Stevenson. They were married from 1983 to 1997. Source: parkerstevenson/Instagram; Getty https://pagesix.com/2022/12/06/ kirstie-alleys-ex- husband-parker-stevenson-posts-tribute-after-death/ (May be subject to copyright) |
Hollywood marriages are always interesting. A lot of times, actors marry non-actors because they want a break from the business. Others marry fellow actors because they are the only ones who can empathize with the life they live.
I am always fascinated by actors who marry each other. Kirstie Alley was married to Parker Stevenson, best known in my world for playing Frank Hardy in “The Hardy Boys-Nancy Drew Mysteries”. He also had guest starring roles in the night-time soap opera “Falcon Crest”, the quirky science fiction show “Probe”, and played a lifeguard in “Baywatch”.
They married in 1983 and were divorced in 1997.
Parting thoughts
From the moment I first saw Kirstie Alley in “Wrath of Khan”, she made her mark on screen. For the most part, in her first decade of acting, Alley played characters who were often intense, such as Saavik, serious as in “Masquerade”, or playing it straight as in “Summer School” and “The Prince of Bel-Air”.
From the moment I first saw Kirstie Alley in “Wrath of Khan”, she made her mark on screen. For the most part, in her first decade of acting, Alley played characters who were often intense, such as Saavik, serious as in “Masquerade”, or playing it straight as in “Summer School” and “The Prince of Bel-Air”.
As she matured as an actor, she was able to turn that intensity on its ear, make fun of it, and create the unexpected. The best example was her portrayal of Rebecca Howe on “Cheers”.
Through it all, she continued to develop and evolve as an actor, but she never stopped being entertaining.
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