Bob Justman Is Dead
Saturday June 7, 2008
Although I didn't have a chance to post on it right away, I have to mention the death of Robert H. Justman, one of the people most responsible for shaping the original Star Trek and keeping it flying despite the shrinking budgets doled out by Desilu Studios and its successor, Paramount. He died on May 28 at the age of 81 from complications from Parkinson's disease.
His death follows hard on the heels the deaths of his friends and colleagues, Alexander Courage (who wrote the theme for the original series) and key original series director Joe Pevney (noted here). "There seems to be a big Star Trek convention and everyone is going," son Jonathan Justman said. "Everyone is getting beamed up."
Bob Justman was the associate producer on Star Trek (later promoted to co-producer): it was his job to make the show happen at the nuts-and-bolts level, making the best of a lack of resources. One of his most useful offstage contributions to Trek was the behind-the-scenes book he co-wrote with production executive Herb Solow, Inside Star Trek: The Real Story (compare prices on it here), in which they recounted in detail just what kinds of miracles it took to get Star Trek on the air week after week.
Justman's early career combined assistant directing and associate producing, both of which require keen management and organizational skills; he served in both roles on The Outer Limits and The Adventures of Superman. He was assistant director on both Star Trek pilots, "The Cage" and "Where No Man Has Gone Before," and associate produced the pilot for Star Trek's sister production at Desilu, Mission: Impossible.
Justman was also instrumental in helping Star Trek: The Next Generation get off the ground twenty years later, and was a supervising producer for the first season. "I can't tell you how nurturing this guy was to me," NextGen executive producer Rick Berman told the Los Angeles Times. "He was like a mentor and a father. He was extraordinary."
Bob Justman is one of the people without whom we would not have Star Trek, partly because he understood why it was important. "It wasn't just a science fiction show; it was a morality play," Justman told the Christian Science Monitor in 2001. "It was, 'Do the right thing and do right by your fellow man, and all will be well ... hopefully.' "
His death follows hard on the heels the deaths of his friends and colleagues, Alexander Courage (who wrote the theme for the original series) and key original series director Joe Pevney (noted here). "There seems to be a big Star Trek convention and everyone is going," son Jonathan Justman said. "Everyone is getting beamed up."
Bob Justman was the associate producer on Star Trek (later promoted to co-producer): it was his job to make the show happen at the nuts-and-bolts level, making the best of a lack of resources. One of his most useful offstage contributions to Trek was the behind-the-scenes book he co-wrote with production executive Herb Solow, Inside Star Trek: The Real Story (compare prices on it here), in which they recounted in detail just what kinds of miracles it took to get Star Trek on the air week after week.
Justman's early career combined assistant directing and associate producing, both of which require keen management and organizational skills; he served in both roles on The Outer Limits and The Adventures of Superman. He was assistant director on both Star Trek pilots, "The Cage" and "Where No Man Has Gone Before," and associate produced the pilot for Star Trek's sister production at Desilu, Mission: Impossible.
Justman was also instrumental in helping Star Trek: The Next Generation get off the ground twenty years later, and was a supervising producer for the first season. "I can't tell you how nurturing this guy was to me," NextGen executive producer Rick Berman told the Los Angeles Times. "He was like a mentor and a father. He was extraordinary."
Bob Justman is one of the people without whom we would not have Star Trek, partly because he understood why it was important. "It wasn't just a science fiction show; it was a morality play," Justman told the Christian Science Monitor in 2001. "It was, 'Do the right thing and do right by your fellow man, and all will be well ... hopefully.' "
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