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Talk:Austarcon
Historical memories: My goodness, I saw the title "Austarcon" pop up in my Fanlore feed and vaguely recalled the name. Reading what others have dug up from the past helps me to recall a variety of memories. Are any of these worth citing in the fanlore article? (If so, please feel free).
The name "Austarcon" was a working title that I came up with in a hurry in order to complete the news article for the 1977 fanzine - the convention itself never became developed enough to have a name officially adopted. The whole idea of the convention appears to have come from Gene Roddenberry, who was apparently thinking aloud during his handwritten letters to Diane Marchant, who was then relaying these thoughts to the rest of us, and we tended to take his word as gospel (after all, he was the Great Hollywood producer).
Gene's visit to the UK was due to his filming of the "Spectre" film as a TV pilot.
The convention was probably cancelled because Gene's thinking aloud did not practically translate into reality, especially given the protracted nature of "Star Trek: The Motion Picture" - its length of production, it overinflated budget, and the exhaustion of everyone concerned (only Persis Khambatta and De Forest Kelley ever made it to Australia for movie publicity, and De's jet lag became so bad that his timetabled meetings with media and fans were largely cancelled).
I seem to recall that Diane Marchant and Bob Johnston (from the Star Trek Marathons) had discussions with Gene or some cast members about possible options for this convention. I do recall them both discussing with me a proposal from Bill Shatner that his conditions for coming to Australia reportedly included first class travel for himself and his wife and two bodyguards, all expenses paid accommodation etc, plus a ten-thousand-dollar appearance fee (this last cost alone equalling over $68,000 in 2024 dollars) - a cost that was prohibitive for a country whose fan base at the time was much smaller than that of the USA, and much less organised/affluent.
Melbourne's first Star Trek convention ("Trekcon") took place in 1978, comprising a low-key event without any Star Trek Guests of Honour. Sydney later had "Aussietrek" which was the first Australian Star Trek convention to feature a Star Trek celebrity (George Takei).Cheers GeoffA (talk) 09:09, 13 April 2025 (UTC)
- I'd recommend adding some of this that isn't included on the page and putting in references something along the lines of "personal recollection of User:GeoffA" or a reference to the talk page. Sobqjmv sphinx (talk) 16:30, 14 April 2025 (UTC)