C383

Convention
Name:	C383 (Triple C Convention)
Dates:	August 26-29, 1983
Frequency:
Location:	Birmingham, England
Type:	fan-run
Focus:	Star Trek
Organization:
Founder:	Chris Chivers
Founding Date:
URL:
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C383 was a Star Trek con held in Birmingham, England. It was the 16th British Star Trek Convention.

a 1983 flyer

It was also called the "Triple C Convention" as the con committee consisted of Chrissie Chrzan, Chris Chivers, and Carol Collins.

Guest of Honor

George Takei was to be the guest of honor, but he could not attend. Instead, the guest was Bjo Trimble.

Fanworks in Honor

The story "From a Professional Point of Vice" in IDIC #4 is a Professionals meta, RPF that takes place at this convention.

Con Reports

Just before going to print, I'll add in a quick report on Triple C Con,to give all of you who were not able to attend the latest news on Star Trek III. Unfortunately George was unable to come, because he has to work on the movie, so at the last moment Bjo Trimble came over to fill in the Star Trek guest spot. She is a very nice person and gave us a very interesting talk. She was not able to talk about Spock in this new movie but the latest news so far (liable to be changed by Paramount at any time, however) is that the movie is to be titled 'Genesis: The Search for Spock.' We will see Vulcan and Spock's father (played by Mark Lenard) who is to have a disagreement with Kirk. There will be Klingons (hopefully more like the series Klingons, not those from ST:TMP) and new aliens. Some changes inside the Enterprise will take place but costumes remain the same. Uhura and Sulu have better parts in this movie, away from their consoles, and McCoy has a major part. Bjo said that there are a lot of clues in 'Wrath of Khan' (if you look carefully great, I love detective work!) to what will happen in 'Genesis'. We also learn something about Vulcans which we do not know - it's something Vulcans do not talk about normally. There are plans for Star Trek 4 and 5 too!

Bjo said that it would be nice if more fans wrote 'thank you's to Paramount and not just criticism. The address to write to is: Harve Bennett, 5555 Melrose Ave., Hollywood, California 90038 USA, so write and give some encouragement.

There was a fire at Paramount Studios recently, however we were assured that the ST sets were not damaged seriously - in fact the only ST set to suffer was the alien set which was in the first stages of being built, so no real hold-ups have occurred.

All in all, the Con was great fun. There were 3 video rooms (Trek, general SF and one showing general movies which starred ST and SF actors and actresses) plus the main room where we were able to see both Trek movies, guests, etc etc. Thorn Christopher was his usual delightful self and we were all very happy to see him and Judy again. The other guest was Matt Irvine, He too seemed very nice, unfortunately I missed his talk due to Stewards duties.

On the Friday and Saturday of Triple ”C” Con I was very fortunate to meet Bjo and talk with her. She was brim full of energy and eager to get up in front of the fans and talk Star Trek. Until her scheduled spot on the programme she did her best to have a word with everyone attending the convention, telling them of George’s concern that we should not be unduly worried and upset about the fires at Paramount Studio and the damage to a set to be used in Star Trek 3 for things were not as bad as the media made out. The fire had occurred just before she flew overfrom Los Angeles, and George had confirmed with her by phone on the morning she left that the damage was not devastating, the set could be repaired or rebuilt, and filming would go ahead. It seemed that the main worry was whether or not the fire would reach, some explosive materials, used by the effects men, safely dug in though they were. But they remained untouched.

One of the anecdotes that Bjo told us was about some Japanese friends who were staying at her house while they were in Los Angeles. They were fans of Star Trek, and were amazed to learn that George lived close by, that in fact he could be seen jogging past most days. Understanding lady that she is, Bjo arranged a meeting between them, and George came round. He talked with them in Japanese, and Bjo gradually became aware that something, somewhere, was not exactly as it should have been. The girls were exchanging glances. It turned out that they were delighted to meet George, overwhelmed that he had come especially to talk to them, but ... he spoke Japanese with an atrocious Southern Californian accent, and they were vastly amused. George wasn't though. He looked surprised and said "I do?”

Bjo described George as "full of vitality”, "considerate”, and "eager to help”. He lives in the same district of LA that he represents on the LTD. Complaints about transport go to George, and at the time she spoke to us there was trouble with buses that had been re-routed. Complaints were coming in thick and fast.

I felt that Bjo could have talked to us for hours and we would never become tired. She just couldn’t wait to get up there with the microphone and tell everyone about Star Trek. And who is better qualified to tell us?

Carol asked for a Con report and this is what she got! It's a very sketchy report, probably due to the memory-destroying effects of booze!

I can't say much about Friday evening, as a number of mishaps caused my travelling companions and I to arrive rather late. However, Fran's little car struggled bravely on and got us safely to Birmingham for about 10.30pm. Unfortunately, we had missed Miss Galaxy and the hilarious Mr. Universe, but we knew there were plenty of good things to come.

On arrival, the first thing to do was, of course, to get to the bar! This was full. of old friends in convivial mood. Highlights of this evening were being tapped on the shoulder by Thom Christopher as he went up the stairs to retire for the night, sharing a Correllian Sideslip with Janet Carroll, and finding out that I'd missed my first tour of stewarding duty by being late! 2am found me sitting on the floor in the Grosvenor foyer with members of TAS and TASAS who were currently enjoying a truce. By then, I was really exhausted, and dragged my weary self off to bed.

Next morning after breakfasting carefully, so as not to get marmalade on my TWOK uniform, I made a bee-line for the sales-rooms, and found myself in Alladin's treasure cave. What a great selection or goodies to buy. All I remember about the next hour or so was a recurring vision of me handing money to people sitting behind tables. Does anyone else have the same dream?

The next item on the agenda was Mr. Thom Christopher. What a super guest! So friendly, so interesting, such a gentleman, and what a dish! His talk was superb, really fascinating and full of humour. In spite of having heard him at EmpathicCon, it was all fresh and new. Wandering from the main hall in a happy daze after Thom, I ran into my friends, Cathy and Trisha, and we decided to do a daring raid into the centre of Birminghan dressed in uniform. We caused quite a few raised eyebrows in B.H.S., Boots, and various other shops!

After lunch I spent some time just chatting with friends, and mooching about finding people I had arranged to meet. I also bullied a number of them to go an look at some of my pictures which were on display in the art room. People were very kind and their praise boosted my ego no end!

At 4. 40pm I attended the Hawk Alliance meeting and was able to get some good close-up photos of Thom. He also very kindly signed for me a drawing I had done of him.

A little while later I reported to my Starfleet Captain Lesley Wood, & spent the time up until tea by getting to know her and Janet Wheatman, our Chief Medical Officer.

After feeding and getting changed, it was time for the evening's festivities to begin. After a quick drink to calm my nerves, I proceeded to my first tour of steward duty, two hours minding the Star Trek video room. I was a bit worried because video machines tend to go haywire in my presence, however all was well and I got to watch two good episodes into the bargain, The only snag with pulling this stint of duty was that it coincided with the Fancy Dress show which, I'm told was excellent! Never mind, stewards do get nice perks to make up for things like this.

By the time I got back to the main hall the disco was in full swing, and I was ready to get down and boogie. I just love to dance at Con discos! It really burns off the calories too!

Come 2am and I'd really danced my feet off with Cathy, Janet, 'Trisha, Leslie and the rest of the merry throng. If only they'd played Hapti Nek.

I was ready for bed then, but Jackie, my roommate, had gotten me an invite to a room party. I managed to reawaken myself for another hour of talk & music and the odd drink or two. Some of them were quite odd! Bedtime ended up being 3am!

Sunday, starting slightly later, began with a further raid on the Sales Rooms. Ouch! My bank balance! Next, a further hour or so in Heaven - Thom Christopher again of course. Entirely different material to his previous day's talk and just as good. Thom's talk ran over time, naturally (he's certainly got plenty to say!), so lunch recess was next for me, and I'm ashamed to say I didn't attend the Business Meeting.

Refreshed after some fodder and a bit of a rest (all these late nights were really telling on me) we returned for the Fashion Show. Sadly, there were very few entries, but they were good ones; particularly the ML's "Warlike" collection.

Anne Page, Mistress of Ceremonies, forced all the people in fancy dress in the audience to stand up, just to show the wealth of talent that hadn't entered the show.

Next, we were treated to a talk by Bjo Trimble. What a nice lady! In spite of having the flu, she entertained us with a real inside view of Star Trek and Fandom, plus tantalising tidbits about the new Movie. She also allayed our fears about the Paramount fire.

Following on from Bjo was the auction - at which I was stewarding again. I was glad to be on duty for this because a friend of mine had a pastel drawing in it which went for the princely sum of £55. Remember Dianne Smith's "Deckard"? We were also treated to the spectacle of Rog Peyton persuading people to buy pieces of string, sweets and penny pieces! He is persuasive. After the auction we had The Wrath Of Khan, and what can I say about this except that it is my favourite movie (this is until STAR TREK III is released).

The evening got off to a fine start, with the Stewards/Hawk Alliance party. Thom bought all his fan club members a drink, which was greatly appreciated and Gin and Tonic never tasted so good! He was also very obliging about having his photo taken with just about everybody in the room.

The cocktail competition, now a regular feature, was a scream, with very brave people drinking revolting concoctions in ludicrous positions. Rather them than me! Another big hit of the Sunday night party were the Samurai Wookies, Butch Toranaga and the Seppuku Kid. What superb costumes, and what time, trouble & expense these fellas had gone to in their creation. Magnificent! Butch and the Kid invited my friends and I to a room party later, and 4am found us still discussing Blade Runner in a most intellectual manner!

Monday morning dawned and boy, was I tired. I was poor company at breakfast, for my roommate, Jackie, as I was a zombie with sheer exhaustion. I managed to wake up for the awards presentation and closing ceremony and suddenly found myself wondering how I was going to manage until the next Con? Over a final drink at the bar, I bade regretful farewells to all of my old and new friends. Blessedly, the return journey was fairly smooth sailing, no breakdowns, and it passed with my mind teeming with plans for costumes for the next Con.

I really enjoyed Triple C and only wished that some of the time I could have been in 2 places at once! It had been a very full programme of events, in addition to 3 video rooms, a games room, art &craft displays and the tempting sales rooms. One thing I regret missing was Matt Irvine's talk, because my room-mate said he was really interesting, and f1att is yet another gorgeous man! The atmosphere at Triple C was really friendly; guests and fans all getting together to have a great time. What a wonderful way to a weekend! I can hardly wait for the next one!