A clunker. The writing sucks. Everything is pinned to nothing—the story is all gimme. The idea is that every human everywhere is bound to go mad at the sight of the alien because that’s how ugly the alien is, and the dope who comes along with Diana Muldaur is bound to flip out and go homicidal with jealousy because that’s how much he loves her. And then he sees the alien and flips out extra and sends the Enterprise into someplace beyond the universe (what?) because he designed the Enterprise so this means he knows how to find the coordinates for, uh, for that place there

“He’s dead, Jim.” So far this is the only episode where I’m sure I heard the line spoken as precisely those three words, the classic formulation. McCoy says them right after the dope falls frothing to the ground. Maybe there’s a correlation between moments of extreme stupidity and the appearance of belovedly dopey lines of dialogue in their best-known forms. Maybe not.

Nimoy gets written up in a big way. He has a scene where he gets to grin and act hail-fellow-well-met, to laugh with a rich appreciation of life’s variety, because Spock has mindmelded with the alien (the alien has a great personality). Then Nimoy gets a mad scene because Spock de-mindmelds with the alien and forgets to bring along his protective visors that hold back the alien’s full ugliness. He left them on Sulu’s desk, the helm. Sulu sees them, gasps, snatches them up—“Mr. Spock …!” Too late. 

Dumb lights. The alien’s ugliness is represented by a light show: light pours out of the metal box where the alien is held, and then the screen gets trippy with the strobodelic light sequences old Trek falls into. Well, of course you’re not going to see the alien itself. But why a light show?

My theory: The light shows is like the big sparks that superhero artists draw around a guy’s fist when he’s knocking down a wall or punching the Hulk—impact balloons, or whatever they’re called. The strobodelics and the light pouring from the box aren’t themselves ugly, but they represent the impact of the alien’s ugliness. Which is a hamhanded device, sort of like going for all caps and rows of asterisks to indicate how awful the monster is. Then the show takes the mistake further, starts to live inside the mistake. The show treats the ugliness as if it were composed of light, so that putting on visors can protect against the ugliness. The visors reduce the amount of ugliness that gets thru, the way sunglasses hold back a percentage of UV rays. I guess if an alien was overwhelmingly generous or winsome, that would be a light show too and people would be wearing visors so they didn’t get dazzled.

The trippy light shows of old Star Trek … do those ever show up in the movies or Next Gen or the other successor series? Fan love has preserved so much from old Trek, but I get the feeling the strobodelics have been left buried back in the ’60s.

Plug for IDIC.  Roddenberry insisted on writing in the IDIC, an alien Vulcan brooch, because he was selling them thru his mail-order company. In order to justify the fuss made over the IDIC the script has to give Diana Muldaur an especially acute attack of nervous bitchiness.

About the mindmeld … Spock has to tell Kirk what it is. “Explain,” Kirk says, like it was a new idea.

Diana Muldaur. I like her, I think she does a better job than most of the show’s guest actresses. Her other episode was “Return to Tomorrow,” and she was a reg for Next Gen’s second season.

She was b. 1938, NYC, started her career in 1964 with an ep of Du Pont Show of Week, in 1965 became a reg on The Secret Storm, a soap opera, then five eps of Dr. Kildare, which was primetime and big. A reg on a new series in 1969, but it got canceled after 15 episodes. After that she was a reg on McCloud, the Dennis Weaver vehicle where he was a big-city cowboy who solved crimes. A lot of other roles, including ’70s movies and tv guest shots. In her fifties she really hit it big on L.A. Law, and after that she said the hell with it.

A neat quote: “I find so much tv depressing, even the sitcoms.” But I think she meant acting on the shows, not watching them, and had in mind co-worker relations on set.

Brown sash.  Okay, here’s the dope, b. 1926 in Kent, England. I like the costume Theiss did for him, the way it fronts a jumpsuit with a stylized sash and pocket, and the way light brown predominates, so the thing is businesslike but somehow festive.

Wiki says, “He appeared in guest roles on American television from the late 1950s through the 1970s. His career peaked in the 1960s with frequent roles on such popular series as The F.B.I., Gomer Pyle, U.S.M.C., Star Trek and The Outer Limits. He played Sergent Tibbs the cat in One Hundred and One Dalmatians.” He was not good in his Trek episode. In fact he shows that Shatner’s hamminess was not so unusual by tv standards of the day, except for the energy and commitment that Shatner gave his hamminess. IMDB lists 45 screen acting jobs, first is “Leftenant” in show Navy Log (1957), last is “Man” in film Ant (2002). Around time of “No Beauty” he was doing eps of Beverly Hilbillies, 12 O’Clock High (3 eps, different roles), The F.B.I. (eventually 5 eps, different characters).

Paskey’s last show.  Eddie Paskey’s last appearance (56 eps as redshirt Mr. Leslie). His back got injured in the fight with Spock, which is hard to believe. As shot, the fight involved a minimum of physical contact, just a lot of camera spinning and fisheye lens. The immediate prelude to the fight is a fisheye-lensed Shatner with hands held out, telling the crazy Spock that he’s safe—it’s quite a vision. Anyway, Paskey said the hell with it and found better things to do.

Talked about him here, and his IMDB list is here. He did some Mission: Impossible in 1966. Wiki says he was born in a Delaware farm town in 1939, moved to Santa Monica at age 12 or 13, worked in his dad’s garage.

It really is dreadful. “Brain and brain! What is ‘brain’?” After the brain goes missing, there’s a scene where Kirk, McCoy, and Scotty discuss the problem at hand. The exchange becomes a surrealist exercise just because the term “Spock’s brain” keeps popping up.

A woman is the chief menace, and she can’t strong-arm the men, so she uses a pain device that zaps them. Shatner does some extroverted waltzing with the air and the floorboards to demonstrate his suffering. There’s one scene where the other guys have settled to the ground and Shatner, having also settled, then arches his pelvis to give the moment that last little bit.

For some reason, Spock has to wear overalls. Why? If he’s brainless, would have been simpler to leave him in his old clothes. It’s not like they were going to slide off because he couldn’t keep pulling at them.   

Gene L. Coon wrote the script under duress, to play out his contract with the show after he had moved on to It Takes a Thief. He knocked out “Brain” and “Spectre of the Gun” and some outlines for other eps as fast as he could. “Spectre” wasn’t so bad, but “Brain” … Jesus.

Coon had become fed up with Nimoy’s demands for line rewrites and bigger roles, so maybe “Brain” is his revenge: Spock has to walk around like Frankenstein’s monster for most of the show and gets no lines until the end. He does the automaton walk quite well, which I guess is the sign of a professional. (Counter to my grudge theory, there’s an anecdote about Shatner deliberately turning his back on Coon toward the end of Coon’s time with the show, and yet Shatner does okay in the episode.)

Spock’s brainkeeper. Marj Dusay (b. 1936 in Hays, Kansas as Marjorie Ellen Pivonka Mahoney),was just starting out but went on to work for decades, wound up in the 90s as  a regular on Guiding Light and All My Children. 

“Spock’s Brain” catches her early on, and she’s game and overeager. She does a lot of reactions, none of them lifelike. But at least she’s in there, tracking all the events with her eyes, doing something with her mouth and nose. You can see how she might hang on and get a soap career later.

IMDB lists 90 acting jobs, starting in 1967 with “Susan” in the episode “Instant Fatherhood” of Occasional Wife, then “Kaos Girl” in a Get Smart ep, then “Waitress” in a Presley film, Clambake (1967), then eps of Cimarron Strip, The Second Hundred Years, someone in Sweet November (1967), the Star Trek, 2 eps of Wild Wild West (different characters), a Felony Squad two-parter, a Bonanza, eps of Hogan’s Heroes and Hawaii Five-O. She kept working thru the ’80s, on primetime soaps, 

Other girls.  This is the other girl with a speaking part, not much of one. IMDB lists seven acting jobs, first is “Salesgirl” in “The Dippy Blonde Affair” (Man from UNCLE, 1966), last is “Secretary #4” in the Beverly Hillbillies ep “Hotel for Women” (1970).

The two other babes, Mem Alpha doesn’t know who played them. Wig on the first, don’t know about the second:

Wig and beard. Actor’s name was James Daris. IMDB lists 19 credits, earliest being “Burly Man” on I, Spy in 1966.

Fair amount of tv work thru 1975, then a long, long gap, then a tv horror movie called Larva in 2005. Around Trek he was doing “Realtor” in I Dream of Jeannie, “Shorty” in a Bonanza, “Matt” in Daniel Boone, “Super Giant Robot” in Land of the Giants, some guy in a Hawaii Five-O. 

Big guy.  Stunt man and extra Pete Kellett. IMDB lists six stunt credits, 33 acting. Earliest is in 1949, movie Canadian Pacific, stunts and a part (“Saboteur”). Last is “Security Guard” in The Magic of Lassie (1978). Mem Alpha says, “He performed stunts and made numerous appearances on the Western television series Gunsmoke. Other TV shows on which he appeared include Branded … The Man from U.N.C.L.E. … Mission: Impossible, Mannix … The Big Valley … and Land of the Giants”

The unidentified.  No names or lines for the people below. The first has a uniform like Pete Kellett’s because their two characters have been enslaved as guards.

I think these guys are kind of pets of the babes:

And three savage surface dwellers:

I like this episode okay. Melvin Belli, the celebrity lawyer, plays a space demon who takes over a bunch of kids. The kids use telepathy to take over the Enterprise, but then Kirk shows them a tape of the old days when they had parents, so the kids come back to normal and reject the demon. The story works okay and the children playing the possessed kids are nice.

Belli’s shower curtain.  Mem Alpha says Walter Koenig was pissed because casting Belli meant that a working actor wouldn’t get the job. If I recall right, co-producer Robert Justman also objected. Belli seems okay in the role, but he comes to us thru a lot of studio tricks that make him blurry and fuck with his voice. His costume is a real crime, but I don’t think anyone got cheesed off about that.

Here is the translucent Belli (b. 1907 in Sonora, Calif.) wearing his Mother Hubbard/shower curtain:

Shatner’s musical director.  The skinny redheaded kid who’s ringleader of the messed-up children. This guy (b. 1953, Minneapolis) has had the most extraordinary high-level schlock music career you can imagine. Mem Alpha doesn’t do it credit; you have to check Wiki.

He did a lot of tv acting and jazz combo-leading in his teens, took a couple of years to study “progressive, multi-dimensional philosophy with a number of important futurists,” then started the high-level Hollywood schlock music career.

How to say this? He became “the Music Director for William Shatner, appearing in many shows and concerts, and helping to create songs such as Rocket Man, and Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds.” Of course Shatner did his “Lucy in the Sky” in 1968, so the kid would have been just the age he in this episode. Maybe Shatner figured the kid had what it took.

Also, in the early ’80s the kid “began performing most of the synthesizers on a variety of Stevie Wonder albums, and later with Earth, Wind & Fire. This prolific era culminated with a half year project in which Huxley performed most of the keyboard work on Michael Jackson’s Thriller.”  This career section largely is not schlock. But he also contributed bits to the scores of the first four Star Trek films, he produced the soundtrack of 2010, and he wrote and produced (or helped to) the music for Captain Eo.

Started the Enterprise Group (I guess the Star Trek connection was a good calling card with clients), which Billboard “named the #2 mixing studio in the US” in 2001.

All in all, that’s a lot.

Cute kids.  Above, Felix’s little girl in the tv Odd Couple. What a cute little blond girl (b. 1959 in LA), now an animal rights activist who likes to go to Trek cons and sign autographs. She was quite good in “Children,” notably better than the skinny redheaded boy.

She did a lot of movie and tv work in the ’60s/’70s (“the original voice of Lucy Van Pelt in the Peanuts series of television films,” the lead girl’s voice in Charlotte’s Web, etc.), became a nurse, married a surgeon, and the two of them got into animal rights. IMDB lists 72 roles, starting with an ep of The Littlest Hobo in the early ’60s, ending with Christmas the Horse in Elf Sparkle Meets Christmas the Horse (2007). Around the time of her Trek episode she was doing Monkees, Green Acres, Custer, Gunsmoke, Mad Mad Scientist, Blondie (5 eps), an ep of The Flying Nun called “The Reconversion of Sister Shapiro” in which she played “Linda Shapiro.”

One and only.  Above is a one-and-only appearance, and Mem Alpha doesn’t give his age. There’s a moment when Belli as space demon is giving the kids their instructions and this boy breaks into a grin. Not in line with the scene, but it was charming.

Career start. The guy below (b. 1959, LA) has done a ton of voice work and tv guest spots, including a Next Gen episode.”Children” was his first role. 

Takashi from Revenge of the Nerds 1, 3 and 4. (James Cromwell was also in the listed films, which blows my mind). Also Police Academy 3 and 4. He was also a St. Elsewhere reg for one season, and the voice of Leonardo in Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles 1, 2 and 3.  Wiki says, “Of Asian ancestry, Tochi frequently plays characters who are Japanese, Chinese, or of other Asiatic origin, adopting the appropriate accent as needed.” IMDB lists 74 acting jobs, of which “Children” was the first, then a Brady Bunch, a Partridge Family, a Nanny and the Professor, 14 eps voicing a kid in The Amazing Chan and the Chan Clan, and so on to “Preacher” in I Do (2007). 

Doesn’t like it.  Melvin Belli’s kid, b. 1957. Made a face over some ice cream, if I recall. Role was also a one-time thing.

In the grip.  Above is the hypnotized tech guy who mouths off to Scotty. Name was Lou Elias, did two other Trek episodes, both as guards. Mem Alpha: “Additional TV credits include Batman, Gunsmoke, M*A*S*H, Hill Street Blues, The Fall Guy, Knight Rider, and L.A. Law … performed stunts for films like Spartacus, True Grit, The Wild Bunch, The Longest Yard, Flashdance, and Dick Tracy.”

Jewish redshirt.  The redshirt who was going to arrest Kirk. Dick Dial, b. 1931. In “The Apple,” left, he was the only Jewish redshirt I’ve heard about, Lieut. Kaplan.

Enigma.  The episode’s mysteriously beautiful but wordless tech guy. He was Jay Jones and also worked as Doohan’s stunt double.

“To Serve Man.”  The man below, no birth year, is listed as “Second Man in Line” for the Twilight Zone episode “To Serve Man,” the one about aliens who are really doing a cookbook. In “Children” he’s the lost colony’s leader who delivers a warning on tape. He looks a bit like Randy Quaid. IMDB lists 13 acting jobs, starting in 1950 as “Welsh Captain/Gardener” in a (I think) British tv version of Shakespeare’s Richard II, then over to the U.S. with Zone, then a few others. Did a Lucy Show (as “Airport Passenger”) and in 1968 a Mission: Impossible (as “Hotel Manager”), right after his Trek. The Trek part may have been his biggest on screen. Last credit is 1972. 

Kirk loses his memory and marries an Indian princess. Spock does his second mindmeld on Kirk in 3 episodes, by Mem Alpha’s count. The site also says:

• The obelisk was built especially for this episode.
• The lake featured in this episode is the Franklin Reservoir above Los Angeles. It has been featured in hundreds of westerns and police shows, but is most famous as the fishin’ hole in the opening credits for The Andy Griffith Show.
• Other than the street sword fight in “All Our Yesterdays“, this was the only episode with outdoor shooting in the entire third season.
• Uhura is not on the bridge in this episode, but stock footage from “And the Children Shall Lead” places her there for a moment.
• During the first attempt to deflect the asteroid a rare top shot of the Enterprise is shown.

A lousy episode unless you enjoy seeing Shatner making an ass of himself. It’s a ham display, and not the familiar, herky-jerky hamminess Shatner fell into when trying to goose a line. Here we see Shatner’s special mode, in which he would physically try to overwhelm whatever emotion he had to put across, bring his whole body into it. In this episode he has to convey Kirk’s deep happiness at being an Indian god and marrying the Indian princess in a beautiful forest, so he squeezes his eyes shut and swings his arms wide while swiveling. He puts a lot of force into the squeezing and beaming; I think his face goes red. The moment isn’t so much fake as unreal. A fine distinction, of course, but watching him you don’t feel like Shatner is trying to shortcut his way to his goal. He’s just deeply misguided. Very few people could make such a mistake and then pursue it at such white heat.

The Indian princess is played by Sabrina Scharf. “Born Sandra Mae Trentman in Delphos, Ohio,” per Mem Alpha, and IMDB says she was a bunny at the Playboy Club in NYC. No birth year.

She was a late ’60s/early ’70s type exemplified by Ali MacGraw: long straight black hair, wholesome features. Barbara Hershey was another. Don’t think Angelina Jolie today would qualify, too facially exotic. The earlier type was more like a lush, wholesome blonde but with the hair somehow gone black.

Scharf’s credits start in 1965 with a role on Gidget (“Penelope Peterson”). Her Star Trek role was her 10^th in 3 years, including a couple of movie parts. The movies have really dreadful period titles: The Virgin President (“President’s Girlfriend”) and the very hard-bitten Dead Heat on a Merry-Go-Round. The credit line for the second film, per IMDB, is “Girl in bed with James Coburn.” In 1969 she was in Easy Rider as Sarah, possibly not a large role. (update,  In Comments, Joe S. Walker says this: “Sabrina Scharf was the female lead in “Hell’s Angels On Wheels”, a 1967 American International effort starring Jack Nicholson. It’s been a long time since I saw “Easy Rider” but as I recall Peter Fonda and Dennis Hopper spend some time in a commune where she’s one of the leading spirits, and she questions why they want to go back out into the bad wide world.“)

Also in 1969  she married Bob Schiller, who had been doing fine as a comedy writer since the 1950s and would do even better in the 1970s, thanks to Norman Lear. Scharf had a dozen more roles, mainly tv, after the marriage, then her credits stop in 1975. Mem Alpha says that at some point she entered politics and even became a state senator, but that’s all it says. Googling turns up a bunch of little show-biz items that also mention her being a state senator but say nothing about party, period served, etc. Damn.

The episode shows off her legs a bit, and they’re not just long but toned. Nowadays being toned is standard for actors/actresses. Back then it wasn’t, even for cheesecake.

The jealous lug, b. 1934, Stanislaus County, Calif., had 50 parts by IMDB’s count, started in 1957, ended in 1983 with a Quincy. Mem Alpha: “Solari died of cancer in 1991 at the age of 56. A popular acting coach and theater director, Solari once had a theater named after him. It has since been renamed.” Jesus.

The old chief. His name was Richard Hale, b. 1892 in Rogersville, Tenn. IMDB lists 130 credits, earliest None Shall Escape (1944, his role was “Rabbi David Levin”), latest a Police Woman ep (1978, ep was titled “Sons”). The site dug up some photos from very, very early in his career; at least I assume they’re for/from theater work.

“Blind Man,” “Soothsayer,” “King Chandra,” “Chief Xolic,” “Gaunt Man.” He was in the Night Gallery pilot. Mem Alpha says, “He was often cast in the role of a Native American, and as such, made guest appearances on seveal television Westerns, including Bonanza, Cheyenne, Gunsmoke, Rawhide, and Wagon Train. He has also appeared in several episodes of Perry Mason.”

… There’s a movie called The Explosive Generation, from 1961, William Shatner as a sex ed teacher with a turbulent classroom. Tag: “They look like kids — but they want love like adults!” Trailer here, though Shatner just sticks his hands in his jacket pockets and registers concern.