Man...
... I never knew how close James Doohan came to not being part of the show! Even more odd is that there seems to be no clear or logical reason why he was cut in the first place.
I'm also not clear on how his agent managed to get Doohan so easily back on the show.
Also interesting how pathetically low the wages were, even by 1966 standards. $850 per show for up to 6 days of filming? And pro-rated for less days than that for shows beyond his contracted amount? But then, they did get royalties beyond that, on a show that has been phenomenally successful.
I once read that the cast of
Gilligan's Island made no royalties, just the wages for their original acting in the produced episodes.
Likewise, I spoke to Erin Grey of
Buck Rogers In The 25th Century and she was really bitter about the lack of royalties on that show. She hit it big with the comedy series
Silver Spoon after that, which ran for many seasons.
I read somewhere that William Shatner had some really lean years throughout the 1970's, where he actually lived in the closed cab of his pickup truck at a campground for several years. Rough!
I was also sad to hear about Andrea Dromm, who was in the "Where No Man Has Gone Before" pilot,
but like Doohan was not kept on when the series was picked up. It's confusing though, I'd previously read that she declined to stay with the show because Roddenberry was trying to get in her pants (even though he was married and already shacking Majel Barret in his office!) But this article with a lack of clarity seems to say she left to do a movie, and that Justman and Roddenberry had told her she could do the "Russians Are Coming" movie, or do the series, not both, but then after apparently sent her a letter saying they had chosen not to use her character in the regular series.
Regardless, she's one of the best looking women on the show, if only for one episode.
