Nimoy Talks Star Trek Future and Past

In an interview with Starland.com, Leonard Nimoy talks working on Star Trek 2.0, about his future with his character Spock "Prime", progression of Spock through the years and more. Below is snippets of the interview but its worth reading the whole thing here.

DM: Do you feel a sense of completion with the Spock character after this film or is this the beginning of a new era for you and Spock?
LN: Both! I don’t know about me and Spock. It certainly is the beginning of a new era for Spock! It is impossible to predict about me and Spock. I have no idea where they want to go next and I feel very comfortable either way. I feel very gratified that I have been able to have some kind of closure. If this is the closure, then I am very comfortable with it. I was not happy at all with the closure that was imposed on the Spock character some years ago when Spock was just simply abandoned and Kirk was killed all in one fell swoop! I felt both were great losses to Star Trek. There was no reason to kill Kirk and there was a neglect of the Spock character. It seemed intentional. It seemed as if someone was saying, “Well, we have to put a stop to that and start with a whole new era here.” Having had this movie and this experience as Spock and seeing Zachary Quinto in the role now, I feel the character has a potentially wonderful, new life and certainly the success of the movie is just so terrific! It is so wonderful to see this happen and to see Star Trek have a chance of a reinvention and a revival. It was certainly in need of a revival.

DM: Was this movie a “make or break” for the franchise? In other words, Star Trek was beginning to lose some of its popularity over the last several years – was this film, and the way it was done, absolutely essential to the future health of the Star Trek franchise and its ability to continue as an ongoing entertainment franchise?
LN: Yes, I believe that is true. It is very clear now that the movie is a gigantic success and there is a whole new generation of fans coming onboard. I think we are going to find a very interesting surge in sales of the original series because a lot of fans who are seeing this movie will say, “Gee, I’d like to go back and see what this was all about to begin with.” So the original series, which is now out on Blue-ray, will get a wider audience. I just got the discs a couple of days ago and haven’t had a chance to look but I understand that they are beautiful! I believe there will be a tremendous interest in the original series again and I think that is wonderful.

DM: Do you think Gene Roddenberry would be happy with the state of Star Trek these days?
LN: Oh, I am sure he would enjoy what is happening today. I believe he would enjoy it a lot. It is just too bad that he and Majel are gone and can’t see this amazing revival of their original idea.

DM: I assume as well that you are very open minded to appearing as Spock again should they ask you?
LN: I have no illusions on whether or not they need me. They decided that they wanted to make this film using Spock as kind of an anchor for the story, which I think worked very, very well. They don’t have to do that again. If they decide they have a role for me to play I would be very interested in talking to them about it. But I have every reason to believe that they have established a whole new set of characters and they can sail very well without me and that’s fine. Either way is good with me. I am very gratified that this has happened.