To Boldly Go with George Takei: Talking About It Podcast Transcript
Talking About It is HRC’s Podcast series of interviews with gay, lesbian, bisexual, transgender and straight supportive people on their live and experiences.
"To Boldly Go" Transcript: George Takei
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Actor and political activist George Takei made international headlines when he announced that he is gay, and that he and his partner, Brad Altman, have been living together for 18 years in Los Angeles.
Best known for his role on “Star Trek” as Capt. Hikaru Sulu, first on TV and then on film, Takei has long been politically active. Takei has been acting for decades. He has also been a tireless advocate for social justice. As a child, during World War II, Takei and his family were held in U.S. internment camps for Japanese Americans in Arkansas.
Takei, an HRC member since 1990, spoke with HRC Coming Out Project Director Mark Shields about coming out publicly, how his experiences as a Japanese American have shaped his views on equality and being gay on the Starship Enterprise.
HRC: It’s so good to talk to you. We were so excited to discover that you’re an HRC member. This has just been a great month or two. How are you feeling?
Takei: Well, just fantastic. The computer just exploded with e-mails after the publication of that interview with Frontiers, and I would say 95 percent have been very positive. And, you know, you get that fringe element there that makes up the other 5 percent. But it’s been very, very positive.
HRC: And does that include — you know, “Star Trek” fans are really like no fans in the world, with their devotion and knowledge of all things “Star Trek.” What has the reaction been within the Trekkie community?
Takei: Well, you know, the “Star Trek” philosophy, too, is to find our strength in our diversity. There’s that phrase: “infinite diversity in infinite combinations. "I remember Gene Rodenberry frequently telling us that the strength of the Starship Enterprise — which is a metaphor for starship Earth — lay in its diversity. And so “Star Trek” fans recognize the richness that we gain from diversity. And so, extending that to sexual orientation — they’ve all been. And, in fact, many of them are gay, and some closeted, and they’ve thanked me for speaking out.
HRC: You really began your career — I read that your first TV appearance was on CBS in 1959, and that after that —
Takei: “Playhouse Ninety,” I think.
HRC: And then you were on “The Twilight Zone,” and then, obviously, “Star Trek” was in the late 1960s. Were you out?
Takei: It was actually the mid-60s. We filmed the pilot in 1965 and went on the air in 1966.
HRC: Were you identifying privately then as a gay man? Had you come out to yourself at that point?
Takei: Oh yes, I had. But not to anybody else.
HRC: So, none of the people that you were working with during those years really had any idea.
Takei: No, they did not know.
HRC: What made you decide to come out now?
Takei: Well, actually we’d been out — Brad and I — with our friends and family for a long, long time. But what really inspired us was the fact that the California Legislature passed the same-sex marriage act — Bill 849 — and the only thing it required to become the law of the state was the signature of the governor, Arnold Schwarzenegger.
During the recall campaign in which he was elected governor, he made very positive sounds. He said he works with gays and lesbians in the motion picture business, that he knows many of them and some are very good friends, and he is very comfortable with them. And so I thought, surely, California will be the next state to legalize same-sex marriage, and that what happens in California usually sweeps across the rest of the country. And so we were really ecstatic about that.
But that all came crashing down when Arnold Schwarzenegger vetoed that, and played into the narrowest, most reactionary sector of his base. I felt that I needed to speak out, and in order to do that, my voice had to be authentic. So I decided to speak to the press for the first time.
So, although people say it’s “coming out,” it really is not that. It’s the first time I spoke to the press. The press, I always knew, is an ungovernable creature. And it certainly is.
HRC: When did you actually come out privately to the people in your life?
Takei: To my family first, and some of my friends knew.
HRC: And when did you do that?
Takei: That was in the early 1980s.
HRC: When all of us picked up the paper in October of this year, was that when, for instance, many of your “Star Trek” cast mates found out? Or had they known?
Takei: Oh, no, they knew long before. As a matter of fact, Brad and I are active in various sectors of the community — the Asian-American community, the theater community, in the motion picture community. And we go to events together, and we are also philanthropic. We’ve sponsored tables at fundraising dinners and contributed to, for example, the Japanese American National Museum, and the East West Players, where I am doing “Equus” currently. And our names are on donor walls and on programs together, and dinner recognitions, so in that sense, we’ve been out publicly. The October conversation with Frontiers was the first press discussion.
I think my friends and colleagues all recognized. And we’ve been over to Walter’s home — Walter Koenig, the actor who plays Chekov. And Nichelle Nichols, and Jimmy and his wife Wendy have been over here, and we’ve been socializing as a couple, so in that respect have been — to use that term — “out.”
But when you talk to the press, that’s when — I told the interviewer with Frontiers that the word “out” seems to suggest opening a door and walking through a portal and suddenly the world changes. It’s really not like that. I use the metaphor of a long, narrow corridor which is dark at first, then there are little glimmers of light coming in, then it starts to widen, and then there’s a window opening. And you peek out, and you see some possibilities. And then there are doors that are ajar, and you might step out briefly and then come back in. So it’s a long process. It’s not as the word “out” suggests — a sudden decision and you step into another world.
HRC: Do you feel that that long corridor has gotten more broad since you made your announcement in October? Or do you not feel a big change in your life?
Takei: Oh no, no it certainly has changed. It is still a corridor, albeit wide, in that we don’t have equality with other Americans. And I am particularly aware of that, because I grew up in a barbed-wire U.S. internment camp, under the most unjust circumstances. And there are what I call these “invisible barbed wires of legality” that deny us our full justice and freedom.
And so I started recognizing in my early teens that my sense of shame about being Japanese-American was not properly placed. But by that time, I’m starting to recognize that my sexual orientation is different. But you know, as a teenager, you don’t like to be different, so you try to not only hide that, but make every effort to be like the others — to be “normal.” And you date girls, and all that. Nevertheless, I know where my interests — what excited me really were. And there’s that element of denial, but this unquenchable urge is there. And then, by the late teens, you recognize that that is your orientation — that is what excites you, that thing that get those animal juices going in you. But still, you don’t share it with people, and it becomes a kind of covert search for gratification. And particularly because I began a career as an actor.
HRC: What advice — having just been through this experience you had in announcing to the world about your relationship with Brad and your life as a gay Japanese American — what advice would you give to other people in the public eye like yourself who are not open or out publicly?
Takei: It’s a very personal decision. Each person has his or her own specific givens, whether it’s family or your loved one’s family, or whatever the circumstances might be. So I don’t believe in that self-righteous giving advice to others. Each person has to make his or her own decisions based on their specific and personal circumstances.
HRC: You mentioned before that you and Brad have been together for nearly 20 years now, and that you’ve supported a number of charities. One of them is the Human Rights Campaign. You’ve both been members of HRC since 1990. What does HRC mean to you and Brad?
Takei: Well, we have a personal, vested interest in justice and equality for gays and lesbians. So in that sense, it’s self-serving. But at the same time, in our democracy, what’s accomplished is by educating the majority of the decent, fair Americans who believe in the fundamental values — ideals of this country. And that’s what the Human Rights Campaign is doing.
It’s because, just as Japanese Americans were stereotyped as potential traitors and saboteurs during the second World War, the gay and lesbian community is stereotyped, particularly by those who are adversaries. And that is the same mentality as the segregationists of the South, or those that tried to keep women from having full participation in American society. They stereotype the “other,” and try to characterize them as one kind. We gays and lesbians are as diverse as the straight community, save for the one difference being our sexual orientation. And this country — we started out with glowing, shiny ideals, but those ideals weren’t reflected by the reality of the times. Because those who articulated those ideas and put those ideas down on parchment also kept other human beings as slaves. But throughout American history, because courageous African Americans struggled for freedom and justice through slavery, through the Jim Crow years and through the civil rights movement, that today we have an African-American woman as the secretary of state. So we’ve been changing with much struggle — with much, sometimes, tragedy.
We’ve been getting closer to the fundamental ideals of this system. I think it’s time now to recognize that gay and lesbian Americans are like all Americans, with this unique difference, as Japanese Americans are like all Americans with the unique difference of ancestry.
And the Human Rights Campaign is important, because we are now in the process of educating the largely decent American public to that fact that gays and lesbians are corporate CEOs, are legislators, are schoolteachers, as well as plumbers and lumberjacks and truck drivers. There are criminals as well as priests that are gay and lesbian. We’re everything — just like the straight community.
HRC: And some of them serve on the Enterprise.
Takei: Yes. [Chuckles.] Some of them served on the Starship Enterprise. And I’m sure there were more than just me on that starship.
So, I think the importance of the Human Rights Campaign is that you are the NAACP, or the NOW, or the Japanese American Citizens League for the Japanese American community, in fighting discrimination. As you succeed — as we succeed — we increase our numbers. And the name of the game in politics is numbers. And I am absolutely confident that we have the numbers in terms of decent, fair Americans.
HRC: If I could ask one last question. It’s been such a pleasure to talk to you.
Takei: Thank you.
HRC: You’re such an articulate and thoughtful spokesperson for our community. But I’m going to switch gears completely now and be a little cheeky. Have there been fun jokes the last several weeks about boldly going were many men have gone before in coming out? Or is there a particularly funny or droll line you can share?
Takei: Well, I didn’t hear this but someone told me that I made Jay Leno’s opening patter when my conversation with Frontiers first came out. He said, “George Takei came out as gay, so he hasn’t any relationships with women. But most ’Star Trek’ fans don’t have relationships with women either — so what’s new?”
HRC: George, again, this has been such a pleasure and I’m so glad you and Brad are HRC members. I hope that we will continue to grow our relationship and work together.
Takei: Thank you for doing what you guys are doing. It’s important work. It’s important American work.