ABOVE: George Takei. Photo by Luke Fontana.
“I’m a passionate lover of my career, my acting,” George Takei says, “but also I’m equally mindful of the important responsibility I have as an American citizen in advocating for justice.”
It’s why the 81-year-old actor is as well-known for originating Mr. Sulu on 1966’s “Star Trek” as he is for his social media dominance today. Takei takes neither for granted, noting that “an actor’s career is dependent on fans,” and uses his platform to foster a connection with audiences worldwide. In part, he’s done so because he spent years of his life behind barbed wire fences—both figuratively and literally.
“I grew up imprisoned behind American barbed wire fences when I was a child simply because we happened to look like the people that bombed Pearl Harbor,” Takei recalls. “Because we looked like those people of Japan. With no charges, with no trial, with no due process, we were summarily rounded up and imprisoned. Right here in the United States.”
The California native, his family and 120,000 other Japanese Americans were unjustly imprisoned during the outbreak of World War II, first in a prison camp in the swamps of Arkansas and later in Northern California. Takei calls it “a defining, formative experience,” one that led him to treasure his American citizenship.
It was during Takei’s early years that he realized it was more than his “Asian face that made him different” from other boys. “They would get excited about Monica who was prematurely buxom,” he recalls. “I thought Monica was nice, but it was Bobby that was really exciting to me. I was different again.”
As the years passed and Takei decided to pursue an acting career, he says he realized there would be challenges, in part because of his then-heartthrob Tab Hunter. Hunter, who passed away in June, was a leading man whose career suffered following rumors of his homosexuality in the 1950s. “Every movie coming out of Warner Bros. starred Tab Hunter,” he says, “and when one of the gossip sheets exposed him as being gay, suddenly he disappeared. He lost his contract.”
If he wanted to be an actor, Takei thought, he had to remain closeted. As he ventured into Hollywood, he created what he now calls “another kind of invisible barbed wire fence.”
“I had real barbed wire fences that imprisoned me because of my ancestral background,” Takei says. “Then I had another kind of barbed wire fence that I couldn’t see but was just as confining. I pursued my career behind those invisible barbed wire fences.”
It was during his closeted years that Takei, who has now appeared in more than 40 feature films and hundreds of television guest-starring roles, happened upon “Star Trek.” In its more than 50 year history, the series has launched a myriad of films, in which Takei has starred in six, along with a host of television spin-offs.
He still heralds creator Gene Roddenberry’s series as groundbreaking. “It was his vision, his talent, his idealism, his imagination of putting the story out three centuries ahead into the future and finding the strength of the starship Enterprise in its diversity, in people coming from all over this planet,” he says.
“Not only of different races, but different histories, heritages, cultures, languages and ideas, working together in concert,” Takei adds. “It was an idealistic, utopian image that he had created.”
Decades after its creation, Takei was advised that 2016’s reboot “Star Trek: Beyond” would feature the franchise’s first openly LGBTQ character in actor John Cho’s version of Mr. Sulu. “He called me to say that they wanted to pay tribute to me for my LGBT activism,” Takei says, “and I said that the movie would be coming out on the 50th anniversary of ‘Star Trek.’ The person to truly pay tribute to was Gene Roddenberry.”
It was well-publicized at the time that Takei wasn’t ecstatic about the news. “I’m all for representation of the LGBTQ community and all its diverse forms,” he says, “but I also believe in being forthright and bold. That’s the motto of the starship Enterprise: to boldly go where no one has gone before.”
He still calls the new film’s representation of Sulu’s sexuality “meek, timid” and an “overly-cautious toe in the water of LGBT recognition,” noting that Roddenberry had intended Sulu to be straight. “‘Star Trek’ was created back in the early 60s and all the characters had to be,” he says. “Otherwise it would never have gotten on the air. If we’re going to pay tribute to Gene Roddenberry, we should respect his creations.”
“It’s wonderful that now ‘Star Trek’ is bold enough to deal with the LGBT issue,” Takei notes. “So deal with it boldly; use your imagination, just like Gene Roddenberry did, and create a new character with his own history.”
The first season of the franchise’s latest installment, CBS’ “Star Trek: Discovery,” did exactly that. Takei applauds the spin-off’s two original gay characters. “They finally went back to what I recommended,” he says. “‘Star Trek: Discovery’ is doing it right; not only do they have a gay character but he’s there with his beloved, working as a team. That’s the way it should’ve been done.”
As rightfully-opinionated as he is on all matters “Trek,” Takei is even more vocal about today’s political climate. It’s something that began with his coming out in 2005, after California became the first legislature in the nation to approve a same-sex marriage bill without court pressure.
The bill went to film star and then-Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger’s desk to be signed, something Takei expected him to do. “When he ran for office, he campaigned by saying ‘some of my best friends are gay,’ that whole rhetoric… but he was a Republican from the right-wing of the party, and when the bill landed on his desk he vetoed it. I was raging.”
It was that night that he told his now-husband Brad, who at the time he’d been with for nearly 20 years, that it was time to come out. “We decided it was time,” Takei says. “I’d had an alright career and it was time for me to take that big risk. I was prepared for my career to fade away, just like Tab Hunter’s.”
It didn’t. Instead, “my career blossomed,” he laughs. “I was being cast in roles that were gay people and a number of them were characters named ‘George Takei’ … ‘gay George Takei.’”
The roles were often comedies, prompting Takei to discover that “a good way to fight narrow-mindedness or zero tolerance is to put it in a larger context.” He believes it’s essential “to laugh at it, to mock it and to lampoon it.”
A vocal opponent of Donald Trump’s presidency and his administration’s stance on immigration and equality, it’s that mentality that led to Takei’s new augmented reality app “House of Cats.” The app combines what the internet loves best, he says: cats and politics.
“‘House of Cats’ is the first political app that puts users in the center of the action,” its official description reads. “Using a cast of animated political characters and ‘Pokémon GO’-style augmented reality features, users can participate in the political news of the day by creating their own photos and videos—in and out of the Oval Office.”
The app, available now, launched with its inaugural cast of characters: Trumpy Cat, Meowlania, Vladdy Putin and Lil’ Rocket Pug. It will continue to grow and evolve with the politics of the day, adding new characters and satirical content in sync with world events.
A recent world event and point of contention for Takei was Trump’s joint press conference with Russian president Vladimir Putin in Helsinki. “My blood was raging,” Takei says. “We have proof that Russia attacked us [during the 2016 presidential election] and attacked the core of our democratic system… and we have this man that’s acting like the so-called president of the United States standing side-by-side with our attacker. He took his side and criticized our FBI and the Democrats.”
The press conference was criticized by Republicans and Democrats alike, Takei chiefly among them. “He’s an ignorant person, an ill-informed person, an incompetent person, and I don’t call him the president,” Takei says. “He’s a fake president. He’s a counterfeit…. to call him the president is fake news.”
To combat Trump’s ineptitude both abroad and domestic, Takei advises, a portion of the net profits from his new app will benefit Refugees International. The group exists to advocate for lifesaving assistance and protection for displaced men and women and promotes solutions to displacement crises.
“It’s an organization that brings aide, housing, food and legal support to those fleeing for their lives from authoritarian governments or governments in chaos,” Takei describes, specifically citing Central America, Guatemala, El Salvador and the Chiapas area of Southern Mexico. In a recent report, the nonprofit Doctors Without Borders found that these areas are experiencing “unprecedented levels of violence outside of a war zone,” prompting daily occurrences of kidnappings, extortion and murder.
As women and children flee the areas and seek asylum in the United States, Takei says, “this so-called president has a zero tolerance policy in the same way that a broad brush characterized Japanese Americans as traitors.”
“They’re seeking relief and fleeing for their lives,” he says. “Refugees International is bringing aide and support to them, showing the humanitarianism of the U.S. government as represented by the people of America; not that guy that’s inhabiting the White House.”
While Takei notes the situation in America is grave, he believes laughter is essential. “House of Cats is fun,” Takei says. “It’s engaging, it’s interactive, and it’s fresh… Laughter is powerful medicine, and it’s impossible not to laugh at the bright orange animal who lucked into a job running the United States. I’m talking about Trumpy Cat, of course.”
Above all, Takei says that America’s democracy is a people’s democracy and that there’s work to be done. “The people can do amazing things as the history of this country attests,” he says. “I subscribe to the ideals of this country, with liberty and justice for all; all men are created equal. We as citizens who cherish those ideals have to be actively engaged.”
If we are, Takei adds, “we will live long and prosper.”
“House of Cats,” created by George Takei in partnership with the Montreal-based app development company BMAD, is available to download from the Apple App and Google Play Stores for $0.99. A premium content subscription version will be available soon and a percentage of the net profits will be donated to Refugees International.
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