Sad news about the legendary Leonard Nimoy who died on Friday February 27 from chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) at his Bel Air home in Los Angeles. He was 83 years old.

I remember seeing Leonard Nimoy in his final (frontier) turn as Spock Prime in the last Star Trek movie ‘Into Darkness’ (2013). My reaction was “God he’s looking old” but even then it was still a huge shock when I heard the news that he had passed away.

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Like many people who used to watch the TV series Star Trek (which originally ran from 1966 to 1969) Spock was probably my favourite character.

 I really became a fan seeing the re-runs in the 70’s when I was a teenager and although Captain Kirk could do the two-footed karate kick (which meant that he was always falling down on his backside) but Spock was much cooler and could immobilise anybody big or small with the famous Vulcan death grip, just there on the shoulder.

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Me and my brothers would count how many times his right eyebrow was raised and then the left eyebrow and sometimes (cue drum roll!) both eyebrows together! Classic eye acting.

It’s strange how often a complete stranger can become a familiar friendly figure during your lifetime. Nimoy played the role of Spock with an assured calmness and his performance made you have an affection for the half human, half Vulcan character.

Despite our love of the character Spock, Nimoy wrote his autobiography in 1975 titled ‘I Am not Spock’ which dealt with an identity crisis between his own life and the character of Spock.

The book hit a nerve with some of his fans who felt that Nimoy was trying to distance himself from the character that made him famous. It wasn’t until 1995 when he wrote a follow up Autobiography titled ‘I Am Spock’ after coming to terms with the fact that he owed so much to Spock and his friend and creator of Star Trek Gene Roddenberry.

Leonard Nimoy had certainly paid his dues as an actor, appearing in a number of ‘B’ Movies in the 1950’s and then had appearances in most of the popular American TV series of the 1960’s such as Rawhide, Bonanza, The Man from U.N.C.L.E.,  The Outer Limits, The Twilight Zone, Gunsmoke and Perry Mason. He also became a regular cast member of the original Mission Impossible series (69-71).

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Mission Impossible

His big break through was being offered the part of an Alien working alongside the crew of a spaceship called The USS Enterprise in a 1965 pilot episode of Star Trek titled The Cage.

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Leonard Nimoy and Jerrery Hunter in 'The Cage' 1965

Nimoy played the Vulcan Spock but the Enterprise Captain wasn’t called Kirk but Captain Pike, played by an up and coming young movie actor Jeffery Hunter, who in 1958 had appeared in in one of the best westerns ever made ‘The Searchers’ starring John Wayne. Probably one of Wayne’s finest performances.

Trivia: In the 2009 ‘Star Trek’ reboot the actor Bruce Greenwood plays a character called Captain Pike when Kirk (Chris Pine) is just a young officer on board the USS Enterprise.

 The pilot was originally rejected by NBC but when it was eventually taken on as a series in 1966 Hunter was offered the role of Captain but declined in favour of continuing his movie career. Sadly he died in 1969 age 42.

Leonard Nimoy really did make a career out of Star Trek.

The original TV series ran until 1969. Due to popular demand by fans wanting more it was a ten year gap before the programme came to the big screen in 1979 with ‘Star Trek: The Motion Picture’ which featured all our favourite TV characters and was a massive hit.

This was soon followed by ‘Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan’ (1982) my personal favourite, Star Trek III: The Search for Spock (1984), Star Trek IV: The Voyage Home (1986), Star Trek V: The Final Frontier (1989) and Star Trek Vi: The Undiscovered Country (1991).

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In the meantime Spock had also featured in TV episodes of Star Trek: The Next Generation (1991), and The Big Bang Theory (2012). Leonard Nimoy also had the rare privilege of playing the same character in a reboot of an old movie. This was J.J. Abrams version of Star Trek (2009) and then Star Trek: Into Darkness (2013) with Nimoy playing the older Spock Prime.

So a fond farewell to actor / director Leonard Nimoy whose last ever tweet was “Live long and proper”.