While the year-long celebrations for “Star Trek’s” 60th anniversary continue to roll on, arriving in the Eternal City this week for Rome’s MIA Market, the iconic science-fiction franchise is at an inflection point, according to Trevor Roth, COO and president of development at Roddenberry Entertainment.
“Right now, ‘Star Trek’ is at a bit of a crossroads, with the end of the current series that are going on, with the fact that it’s been a while since a movie has been out and with decisions needing to be made with what the franchise will be,” said Roth, who appeared in conversation on Wednesday with MIA’s head of doc content — and self-avowed Trekkie — Marco Spagnoli.
“In addition to that, we’ve dealt with a lot of changes on the studio front. Skydance bought Paramount and has now bought Warner Bros., so that too has [raised] questions as to what the future of ‘Star Trek’ will look like.”
It’s been a banner year for Trekkies worldwide, with a whole suite of fan events, screenings and partnerships taking place around the globe as part of the landmark anniversary. They included a limited theatrical release across the U.S. of 4K restorations of classic “Star Trek” films paired with original series episodes and a tribute to the show’s creator, Gene Roddenberry, on Hollywood’s Walk of Fame.
The celebrations reached a fever pitch on Sept. 8 — the date in 1966 when “Star Trek” first premiered on television — when 934 Trekkies gathered at an event in London to set the Guinness World Record for the largest simultaneous Vulcan salute.
Yet the festivities have taken place against the backdrop of the Paramount-Warner Bros. merger, and lingering questions over what that will mean for “Star Trek” and other properties in the studios’ respective vaults. Even before the merger, the franchise appeared to be in a transitional phase. Earlier this year, Paramount Skydance announced that it was pulling the plug on “Star Trek: Starfleet Academy,” a series that was originally picked up at Paramount+ in 2023, after its upcoming second season. The fifth and final season of “Star Trek: Strange New Worlds,” meanwhile, will arrive on the streamer next year.
Roddenberry execs are now trying to ensure that a company built on the back of one of the world’s most beloved and recognizable IPs can continue to live long and prosper.
“We have very specific designs in our minds as to what ‘Star Trek’ will be in its next incarnations,” said Roth. “I think that ‘Star Trek’s’ ability to move forward the way it has through television, where it went from the original series to ‘The Next Generation’ to ‘Deep Space Nine’ and ‘Voyager’ and ‘Enterprise,’ really shows its ability to evolve.”
That evolution extends to Roddenberry, which was founded by Gene Roddenberry and is now helmed by his son, CEO Rod Roddenberry. The company is currently developing both additional “Star Trek” projects — including a forthcoming feature film, which Paramount Skydance execs confirmed at CinemaCon this year — as well as a range of “new science-fiction, fantasy and genre entertainment…that are outside the world of ‘Star Trek,’” according to Roth.
He added, “One of the reasons we are here at MIA is to introduce ourselves to people around the world who we might want to work with.”
Though Roth declined to comment on whether future installments of the franchise might include an Italian captain at the helm of the Starship Enterprise — dashing the hopes of Spagnoli — he insisted Roddenberry’s leadership “feel confident that there will be a wonderful future” for the beloved property.
“I think that it is a franchise that has been around for 60 years and will be around for 60 more,” he said. “But I think that the next steps of what it looks like, and how it addresses all the things that ‘Star Trek’ needs to be, but in a new universe of economy, of consumers, of viewing habits and such — it will need to evolve, as it always has over the years.”
The 12th edition of Rome’s MIA Market runs Oct. 19 – 23.