Star Trek: 5 Actors Who Almost Played Spock Instead Of Leonard Nimoy
Even to the uninitiated, Leonard Nimoy's Spock has long served as the face of the "Star Trek" franchise. Reflecting on the iconic character while speaking with Variety about "Strange New Worlds," the most recent Spock actor, Ethan Peck, recalled his own experience flashing the Vulcan's signature hand sign on his grade school playground as a kid. "When I thought of 'Star Trek,' I thought of Spock. And now I'm him," the actor mused. "It's crazy."
Like Zachary Quinto before him, Peck landed the gig in part because of his passable resemblance to Nimoy's O.G. Vulcan. Despite creator Gene Roddenberry's conviction that the actor would be perfect for the role, he was one of a handful of aspiring Vulcans in the running. According to William Shatner's account in the memoir "Star Trek Memories," NBC required Roddenberry to consider a handful of other actors for the role before landing on Nimoy. And judging by the lineup, Captain Kirk's favorite bromance could have looked a lot different.
Actors who were seriously considered for — or even offered — the role include character actor Rex Holman ("Escape to Witch Mountain"), Victor Lundin (Gene from "The Theory of Everything"), Michael Dunn ("The Wild, Wild West" TV series), Martin Landau, whose many well-known roles include Bela Lugosi in "Ed Wood," and even DeForest Kelley, who ended up playing the ship's doctor, Leonard "Bones" McCoy.
Roddenberry wanted Nimoy, but NBC wanted someone else
As recounted in Marc Cushman's book, "These Are the Voyages: TOS, Season One," Spock had been on Gene Roddenberry's mind early in the "Star Trek" pilot creation process. For suggestions on casting the ship's first officer, he had turned to Gary Lockwood, who played the lead in Roddenberry's 1963 TV military drama series "The Lieutenant." When the actor recommended Roddenberry cast someone "who was really good, but ... had kind of a strange face," Majel Barrett — Roddenberry's wife and then-future Trek legend — immediately reminded him of Nimoy.
But NBC had their own guy in mind to play the Vulcan — namely, Martin Landau. By the time he was offered the role of Spock, Landau had racked up a number of TV and film roles, including appearances on "The Twilight Zone," "Wagon Train," "Gunsmoke," and "The Alfred Hitchcock Hour." Around the same time the actor was offered the role of Spock, he had been up for a role in the spy series "Mission Impossible" as master of disguise Rollin Hand.
For Landau, turning down the space series was a no-brainer. In 1986, the actor told Starlog, "I can't play wooden. It's the antithesis of why I became an actor," adding that "newscasters are more emotional than Spock." Instead, he went for the spy gig — a role that earned him a Golden Globe in 1968.
DeForest Kelley turned down the role
Dishing in Allan Asherman's "The Star Trek Interview Book," Roddenberry said Michael Dunn, a 3' 10" actor whose best-known role was as Dr. Miguelito Loveless on "The Wild, Wild West," was also considered for the part. "I wanted Spock to look different and be different, and yes, to make a statement about being an outsider looking in," Roddenberry explained. Ultimately, the franchise creator felt the role needed someone more conventionally attractive to a weekly TV audience, concluding, "It was the right choice for the time." Dunn did, however, end up making an appearance on "Star Trek" in one of the series' most notorious episodes, "Plato's Stepchildren."
Victor Lundin, who played one of the first Klingons in "Star Trek" in "Errand of Mercy," also auditioned for Spock. In 2001, he told the Chicago Reader, "If you look at my ears you can see why. I would've saved them millions in makeup." According to Lundin, he was just too much of a beefcake to play the Vulcan at the time, noting, "I was very buff in those days." Also considered for the role was Rex Holman, who would finally get his turn with the franchise in "Star Trek V: The Final Frontier."
But for many Trekkies, the most surprising Spock revelation is that DeForest Kelley read for the role as the Enterprise's Vulcan science officer. Kelley detailed his near-Spock experience in "From Sawdust to Stardust: The Biography of DeForest Kelley, Star Trek's Dr. McCoy." Recalling a lunch meeting with Roddenberry, Kelley recounted, "He described this character, this alien with the ears, and he asked me how I felt about playing it." However, the idea of playing a Vulcan didn't sit well with him. "No, Gene, really, I don't want to do it," he recalled, answering in a tone similar to that of his sarcastic Enterprise doctor, Bones.