Russell Bates

Russell "Russ" Bates was a writer who co-wrote the  episode entitled  with David Wise. This episode is responsible for winning the only Emmy Award ever won by either of the two original Star Trek series, the 1974-1975 Daytime Emmy in the area of "Outstanding Entertainment Children's Series." He was a Native American, and came from the Kiowa tribe.

According to The New Voyages 2, Bates first wrote a Star Trek story while he was hospitalized in the US Air Force, in which he served during the 1960s. While he was unsuccessful in selling the story, it got the interest of D.C. Fontana, who helped him into a Writer's Guild program for minorities and asked him to write for the animated series. His first attempt, "The Patient Parasites", was rejected, but appeared in the book The New Voyages 2. He retained a character he had created for that script, the American Indian crew member Walking Bear, when he wrote his second script in collaboration with Wise, "How Sharper Than a Serpent's Tooth".

Bates was befriended with, and last student/protegé of, Gene L. Coon, and was suggested by the latter to Fontana to write for The Animated Series, when Coon himself declined to, which, as it turned out to be, was an inspired suggestion. In a short vidcast interview, given for Larry Nemecek's TrekLand blog, Bates related that his Emmy-winning episode had been a subtle homage to his mentor for what Russel believed to be his episode. Bates was only partially wrong in his beliefs, as that episode, while not conceived by Coon, was heavily revised by him for it to become the episode as ultimately featured. 

Bates only sporadically worked for the motion picture industry, having penned a 1974 episode for the television series Isis, and having acted in two movies, Gorilas a todo ritmo (1981) and  Porky's II: The Next Day (1983). Nevertheless he was shortly reacquainted with the franchise when he showed up as an extra in the Star Trek special, The Star Trek Logs: An MTV Big Picture Special Edition (1991) playing a warp drive consultant.

Star Trek interviews

 * "Russell Bates, In Service of Kukulkan", Bradley H. Sinor, , issue 159, October 1990, pp. 25-27, 87
 * 2008 Russell Bates vidcast interview at TrekLand

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Russell Bates Russell Bates