Star Trek: Discovery's "For April, with love" explained: producer April Nocifora passed away last December after cancer battle
“For April, with love” dedication at the end of Star Trek: Discovery’s season 4 finale “Coming Home”
MARCH 20, 2022 - You’ve seen her name, among other places, during the opening credits of Star Trek: Discovery, including last week’s season finale, “Coming Home.” You also saw (or will see) her name at the end of the episode: “For April, with love.” We must sadly report that April Nocifora died last December after a battle with cancer.
Discovery editor, Chad Rubel, shared the news via Twitter on Saturday. Nocifora was most recently a supervising producer on Discovery, and, according to Rubel, “ran the Post Production Department and was my direct boss.”
Often credited as April Rossi, Nocifora’s Star Trek work stretches back to Star Trek: The Next Generation, where she was a production associate and assistant to Ronald D. Moore, according to Memory Alpha. She also supervised post production on Star Trek: Deep Space Nine and Star Trek: Voyager, and she was an assistant to Peter Lauritson on Star Trek: First Contact. Her work outside of Star Trek included production on such shows as The Dead Zone, Fringe, Terra Nova, and Sleepy Hollow.
Rubel went on to say that he and Nocifora had worked together on Fringe and Sleepy Hollow and said, “April forever changed my life. She was the person who reached out to me for a resume for an Editor position with Star Trek. She sat in the interview I had with Alex [Kurtzman] for the job. It was great to have her in my corner rooting for me.”
I saw people ask what “For April, with Love” was about. April Nocifora ran the Post Production department and was my direct boss. She passed away in December.
— Chad Rubel (@ChadRubel) March 19, 2022
IMO, she made season 3 of #StarTrekDiscovery air during the start of the Pandemic.
1/5
In reply to Rubel’s tweet, Star Trek publicist and author Terry J. Erdmann said, “I am heartbroken. April helped me many times while I worked on writing The Deep Space Nine Companion, … [a]nd she helped us all these years later as Paula [Block] and I wrote the Art of Discovery book. This is so sad. Miss her.”
Rubel’s tweet about Nocifora also includes a link to an article that features some of Nocifora’s photography.
Please join all of us in offering our condolences to the friends and family of April Dawn Nocifora.
David is a contributing writer for Daily Star Trek News on the Roddenberry Podcast Network. He is a librarian, baseball fan, and book and movie buff. He has also written for American Libraries and Skeptical Inquirer. David also enjoys diverse music, but leans toward classical and jazz. He plays a mean radio.
