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Richard Keith Berman (born December 25, 1945) is an American television producer and screenwriter. He is best known for his work as the executive producer of several of the Star Trek television series: Star Trek: The Next Generation, Star Trek: Deep Space Nine, Star Trek: Voyager and Star Trek: Enterprise, as well as several of the Star Trek ...
Rick Berman is a New York-born producer and writer who worked on Star Trek franchise from 1987 to 2006. He created and wrote for Star Trek: The Next Generation, Star Trek: Deep Space Nine, Star Trek: Voyager and Star Trek: Enterprise.
- January 1, 1
- Producer, Writer, Additional Crew
- New York City, New York, USA
- Rick Berman
Aug 26, 2009 · Rick Berman, who produced Star Trek shows and movies for 18 years, shares his behind-the-scenes stories and insights in a 2006 interview. Learn about the origins, challenges, and legacy of TNG, DS9, VOY, ENT, and the TNG films.
- Overview
- Biography
- Writing credits
- Producing credits
- Star Trek interviews
- Star Trek awards
- External links
Richard Keith Berman (born 25 December 1945; age 78) is a veteran writer and producer of American television. He was the executive producer of Star Trek: The Next Generation (1991-1994) and co-creator of Star Trek: Deep Space Nine, Star Trek: Voyager and Star Trek: Enterprise. He also produced and co-wrote four Star Trek films.
Throughout his long tenure at Star Trek, Berman had his name on several occasions referenced:
•R. Berman, a 22nd century member of Earth Starfleet
•Rick Berman, a Starfleet officer in the 23rd and 24th centuries
•Berman, a shuttlecraft aboard the USS Enterprise-D
•Berman's Dilithium Supply, a store on Deep Space 9
Early life and career
Born in New York, New York on December 25, 1945, Rick Berman earned a bachelor's degree in speech from the University of Wisconsin-Madison in 1967. In 1970, Berman worked as production assistant on John Lennon and Yoko Ono's experimental short film, Fly, which was one of his earliest jobs in filmmaking. A prolific documentary filmmaker in the 1970s, Berman traveled extensively throughout the world, visiting over ninety countries. As an independent producer in the 1980s, Berman produced several informational series for HBO and PBS, including The Big Blue Marble (with Paul Baillargeon) for which he won an Emmy Award in 1982. Coming to Paramount Pictures in 1984, Berman served as director of current programming and executive director of dramatic programming during which time he supervised television series including MacGyver, Family Ties, and Cheers – appearing in the final episode of the latter as a bar patron.
Star Trek
In November 1986, recently promoted to vice president of long form and special projects for Paramount Network Television, Berman was called to a meeting with Gene Roddenberry, early in the development of his television spin-off of Star Trek. Berman recalled the meeting in his foreword for Star Trek: The Next Generation - The Continuing Mission: "When I arrived at the meeting, Gene's office was filled with a number of high-ranking studio executives. Gene didn't want to do whatever they were proposing. Gene pounded the desk and the executives pounded back. Gene raised his voice and the executives raised theirs even louder. In the midst of all this pounding and shouting, I sat with my mouth shut. It wasn't that I had chosen this as a tactic, it was simply that I had no idea what they were talking about. But I clearly remember that on at least two occasions during that meeting, Gene's eyes locked on to mine for an instant and I responded with a slightly mischievous smile. Later, Gene Roddenberry would tell me how that smile was filled with subtext… I actually believe it was nothing more than a slightly mischievous smile." Upon their second meeting, the two men discussed their travels – Roddenberry with the army and Berman as a documentary filmmaker – Berman described the meeting as a bonding experience, "love at second sight". Within days, Berman was offered a position as a producer on the fledgling Star Trek sequel, a move which would require him to resign his post as an executive and return to production. However, Berman was not acquainted with Star Trek, or with science-fiction in general for that matter, only vaguely recalling one or two episodes he had seen as a kid, and needed a crash course, being "personally mentored by Gene Roddenberry on the "rules of Star Trek" and vowed never to break them", as author Sue Short would have it. ((X) ; Star Trek and American Television, p. 40) Berman described his new working relationship with Roddenberry as a blending of the Star Trek creator's fantastical imagination with his more "Earthbound" sensibility. David Gerrold recalled the events differently, pointing out that Roddenberry disliked Berman, who was hired as a "watchdog" by the studio who still blamed Roddenberry for the perceived failure of Star Trek: The Motion Picture. "Gene didn't like Rick, at all. But Rick was installed on the show by the studio as a way to keep a control on the show… to keep the budgets in line, make sure that the scripts were done. Ultimately, Berman ended up in control rather than Maizlish [remark: Roddenberry's attorney] because Berman played the politics of the studio more effectively." The later, 2014 documentary William Shatner Presents: Chaos on the Bridge, amply demonstrated that Roddenberry actually fought tooth and nail to the bitter end to retain creative control over, what would become, Star Trek: The Next Generation. Officially credited as "Supervising Producer" (somewhat affirming Gerrold's assessment), Berman worked closely with fellow supervising producer Robert H. Justman, casting the new crew of the USS Enterprise-D and campaigning heavily to secure Patrick Stewart in the lead role in The Next Generation. (Star Trek: The Next Generation - The Continuing Mission) Actually, accepting his new position, formally constituted a demotion, as Berman moved down from the executive ranks (usually enjoying tenure) to production ranks (usually contracted on a per production basis as Justman was, though in this case Berman was an exception). Berman has stated that Roddenberry's lawyer, Leonard Maizlish, persuaded him to make the transition. (Stardate Revisited: The Origin of Star Trek - The Next Generation)
The Next Generation and Deep Space Nine
With the departure of Bob Justman following TNG's first year and Roddenberry's declining involvement in the day-to-day production of the series, Berman quickly ascended to the role of executive producer, a title he held alone following Roddenberry's death in 1991. Overseeing all aspects of the production of The Next Generation, Berman described his position as monitoring both the aspects of the series that changed and those that remained the same, in order to retain a balance. "My job also includes monitoring the 'degree of bend'… letting the shows and the films evolve, but keeping Gene's vision true to course. I'm not quite fluent yet, but I'm getting there." Berman would later recall, "I learned Gene's vision directly from Gene. It wasn't my vision of the future, but it was at the foundation of Star Trek. It was like learning a foreign language. I studied it." (A Vision of the Future - Star Trek: Voyager, p. 3) Keeping a small bust of Roddenberry on his desk, Berman often referred to what Roddenberry would have done had he survived to continue running TNG. When any one of the writers would propose an idea that Berman felt was explicitly contrary to that edict, Berman would "blindfold" the bust. (Star Trek: The Next Generation Companion (2nd ed., p. 265)) With the success of TNG and mounting production costs, Paramount, in the guise of newly appointed studio head Brandon Tartikoff (former head of NBC and for whom Berman had actually provided the hit series Cheers), soon approached Berman and his associates to ready yet another spin-off, one to run concurrently with TNG before supplanting it on the airwaves. In Star Trek: The Next Generation - The Continuing Mission (pp. 154-157), Berman had recounted that he had a series of meetings with Tartikoff, starting in the summer of 1991. As a former television network executive, Tartikoff was acutely aware that even the most successful series had a limited, economical life-span for a variety of reasons, ranging from psychological cast fatigue, through naturally increasing production costs – if only for the annually inflation adjusted production staff wages as ordained by the Hollywood Unions, and not in the least for star cast salaries habitually inflating exponentially with each sequel – to increased competition with itself for scarce syndication time slots the longer a series runs. Together with Berman, Tartikoff decided upon an optimum Star Trek series run of seven seasons, meaning that The Next Generation had at that time only three seasons left to go. Though enamored with the Original Crew movies (he had overseen the production tail-end of Star Trek VI: The Undiscovered Country), Tartikoff was well aware that they too had run their course, if only for the age of the cast, but figured this was the perfect time to pass the baton to "the next generation", thereby starting a new Star Trek movie franchise. He instructed Berman to start looking into that, and have a movie ready at the end of The Next Generation television series (by which time the new Star Trek series had to be up and running for two seasons), preferably one in which, one way or another, featured the transition of the Original Crew to The Next Generation Crew. Given his marching orders, Berman was sent on his way to his most daunting year in his entire career, 1994. For all intents and purposes, it was Tartikoff who had come up with the leap-frogging seven-season format of the modern Star Trek television franchise, and the start of The Next Generation movie franchise. What was to become Star Trek: Deep Space Nine would be Rick Berman's first "created by" credit. Despite criticism that the second Star Trek spin-off, co-created by Berman and Michael Piller, was darker and grittier than previous Trek outings, Berman consistently and steadfastly disagreed. In the Star Trek: Deep Space Nine Companion (p. 3), Berman recalls: "I was asked to create and develop a series that would serve as a companion piece to The Next Generation for about a year and a half, and then TNG would go off the air and this new show would continue. So I asked Michael Piller to get involved, and we put our heads together. I really never had the opportunity to discuss any ideas with Gene. This was very close to the end of Gene's life, and he was quite ill at the time. But he knew that we were working on something, and I definitely had his blessing to develop it." Nevertheless, in a January 1993 Los Angeles Times interview, Berman also admitted that Roddenberry had never known what the new series exactly entailed, "He was not well at the time. He was quite ill, and I never got a chance to tell him what the ideas were, what they were about. But I definitely discussed things with him enough to know that he trusted me and had given me his blessings," hastening to add that, "Our Starfleet officers are still Starfleet officers in the true Roddenberry spirit. There is no conflict between them," but by, "(…) twisting the location of the show a little bit to this strange uncomfortable place, by adding a back story where we have alien characters who are not at all that crazy about having our people there, it allows us numerous new vehicles of conflict that make the stories a lot more compelling."
Episodes
•TNG: •"Brothers" •"Ensign Ro" (story with Michael Piller) •"Unification II" (story with Michael Piller) •"Unification I" (story with Michael Piller) •"A Matter Of Time" •DS9: •"Emissary" (story with Michael Piller) •"The Maquis, Part I" (story with Michael Piller, Jeri Taylor, and James Crocker) •"The Maquis, Part II" (story with Michael Piller, Jeri Taylor, and Ira Steven Behr) •VOY: •"Caretaker" (story with Michael Piller and Jeri Taylor) •"Hope and Fear" (story with Brannon Braga and Joe Menosky) •"Timeless" (story with Brannon Braga and Joe Menosky) •"Think Tank" (story with Brannon Braga) •"Equinox" (story with Brannon Braga and Joe Menosky) •"Equinox, Part II" (story with Brannon Braga and Joe Menosky) •"Fury" (story with Brannon Braga) •"Endgame" (story with Kenneth Biller, and Brannon Braga) •ENT: •"Broken Bow" (with Brannon Braga) •"Fight or Flight" (with Brannon Braga) •"Strange New World" (story with Brannon Braga) •"Unexpected" (with Brannon Braga) •"Terra Nova" (story with Brannon Braga) •"The Andorian Incident" (story with Brannon Braga and Fred Dekker) •"Shadows of P'Jem" (story with Brannon Braga) •"Shuttlepod One" (with Brannon Braga) •"Fusion" (story with Brannon Braga) •"Rogue Planet" (story with Brannon Braga and Chris Black) •"Acquisition" (story with Brannon Braga) •"Oasis" (story with Brannon Braga and Stephen Beck) •"Detained" (story with Brannon Braga) •"Vox Sola" (story with Brannon Braga and Fred Dekker) •"Fallen Hero" (story with Brannon Braga and Chris Black) •"Desert Crossing" (story with Brannon Braga and André Bormanis) •"Two Days and Two Nights" (story with Brannon Braga) •"Shockwave" (with Brannon Braga) •"Shockwave, Part II" (with Brannon Braga) •"Carbon Creek" (story with Brannon Braga and Dan O'Shannon) •"A Night in Sickbay" (with Brannon Braga) •"Marauders" (story with Brannon Braga) •"The Seventh" (with Brannon Braga) •"The Communicator" (story with Brannon Braga) •"Vanishing Point" (with Brannon Braga) •"Precious Cargo" (story with Brannon Braga) •"Stigma" (with Brannon Braga) •"The Crossing" (teleplay with Brannon Braga, story with Brannon Braga and André Bormanis) •"Cogenitor" (with Brannon Braga) •"Bounty" (story with Brannon Braga) •"The Expanse" (with Brannon Braga) •"The Xindi" (with Brannon Braga) •"Carpenter Street" (with Brannon Braga) •"Harbinger" (story with Brannon Braga) •"Azati Prime" (story with Brannon Braga and Manny Coto) •"Zero Hour" (with Brannon Braga) •"These Are the Voyages..." (with Brannon Braga)
Feature films
•Star Trek Generations (story, with Ronald D. Moore and Brannon Braga) •Star Trek: First Contact (story, with Ronald D. Moore and Brannon Braga) •Star Trek: Insurrection (story, with Michael Piller) •Star Trek Nemesis (story, with John Logan and Brent Spiner)
•Star Trek: The Next Generation ("Encounter at Farpoint" – "When The Bough Breaks") – Supervising Producer
•Star Trek: The Next Generation ("Coming of Age" – "Shades of Gray") – Co-Executive Producer
•Star Trek: The Next Generation ("The Ensigns of Command" – "All Good Things...") – Executive Producer
•Star Trek: Deep Space Nine – Executive Producer
•Star Trek: Voyager – Executive Producer
•Star Trek: Enterprise – Executive Producer
•E! Inside Star Trek: Voyager (1995)
•Star Trek: Voyager - Inside the New Adventure (1995)
•TNG Season 1 DVD special feature "The Beginning"
•TNG Season 1 DVD special feature "Selected Crew Analysis" ("Character Notes")
•TNG Season 1 DVD special feature "The Making of a Legend" ("Make-Up")
•TNG Season 1 DVD special feature "Memorable Missions"
Emmy Award
Berman received the following Emmy Award nomination in the category Outstanding Drama Series •1994 for Star Trek: The Next Generation, shared with Brannon Braga, Michael Piller, Jeri Taylor, David Livingston, Peter Lauritson, Merri D. Howard, Wendy Neuss, and Ron D. Moore
Hugo Awards
Berman received the following Hugo Award nominations in the category Best Dramatic Presentation •1995 Hugo Award nomination for Star Trek Generations, shared with David Carson, Brannon Braga, and Ron D. Moore •1997 Hugo Award nomination for Star Trek: First Contact, shared with Jonathan Frakes, Brannon Braga, and Ron D. Moore •1999 Hugo Award nomination for Star Trek: Insurrection, shared with Jonathan Frakes, and Michael Piller •2003 Hugo Award nomination for the episode ENT: "A Night in Sickbay", shared with David Straiton, and Brannon Braga •2003 Hugo Award nomination for the episode ENT: "Carbon Creek", shared with James Contner, Chris Black, Brannon Braga, and Dan O'Shannon
Feb 10, 2011 · Former Star Trek producer Rick Berman shares his memories and insights on the four TNG movies, from Generations to Nemesis. He also discusses his memoir, Star Trek (2009) and his views on the franchise.
Watch Rick Berman, the producer and co-creator of Star Trek franchise, talk about his career and vision in this three-hour-plus interview. Learn about his early years, his work with Gene Roddenberry, and his involvement in Star Trek: The Next Generation, Deep Space Nine, Voyager, and Enterprise.
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Mar 1, 2011 · Former Star Trek executive producer Rick Berman answers fan questions about his 18 years of captaining the Trek ship, from TNG to Enterprise. He discusses music, canon, cancellation, rivalry and more in this two-part interview.
