APRIL 20, 2022 - For three years, he sat at the helm of the USS Enterprise. He was eventually promoted to captain of the Excelsior. But George Takei’s life began in much humbler surroundings. Today we celebrate the birthday of a man who’s life has run the gamut, from concentration camps to politics to Broadway.

Hosato Takei was born in Los Angeles, California on April 20, 1937. Shortly after he was born, King George VI of the United Kingdom was crowned, and Hosato’s father added the first name George to his son’s moniker in honor of the monarch.

When World War II broke out, so did a panic in America. The Japanese were suddenly the enemy and people began to see threats around every corner. The War Relocation Authority was formed, ultimately incarcerating 120,000 Japanese Americans, often using the excuse that it was “for their own good.” It was a dark time in world history, made darker by the mistreatment of these Americans of Japanese ancestry, but who, in many cases, had never even seen the country. George Takei and his family experienced this firsthand in 1942, when they were incarcerated in the Rohwer War Relocation Center in the swamps of Arkansas. They were later transferred to the Tule Lake War Relocation Center, where they waited out the remainder of the war.

The experience has been with Takei for his entire life. He has taken up the mission of raising awareness about this terrible time. In 2019, he published They Called Us Enemy, a graphic novel illustrating his memories of the internment camps. Before that, a musical was written about his experiences opening on Broadway in 2015 with Takei in the cast. The production can be streamed from various places around the internet, including Broadway On Demand.

Once he graduated from high school, Takei went to study architecture at the University of California at Berkeley, later transferring to the University of California, Los Angeles to earn his Bachelor of the Arts and Master of the Arts, both in theater. He also studied theater at the Shakespeare Institute at Stratford-upon-Avon, Sophia University in Tokyo, and Desilu Workshop in Hollywood.

His true acting career was begun when he began dubbing English over Japanese films such as Rodan and Godzilla Raids Again, moving on to appear in anthology series, such as Playhouse 90 and The Twilight Zone. But we all know what his big break was. In 1965, he was cast as astrosciences physicist Sulu (like Takei, only gaining his first name, Hikaru, later.) By the time the show was picked up and the first regular episode was filmed, Gene Roddenberry had realized that an astrophycist would not be as necessary to the weekly running of the ship as a pilot would, so Sulu was transferred to the helm. Sulu’s role was meant to be expanded in season two, but a movie he was filming during the summer hiatus, The Green Berets, starring John Wayne, was delayed due to foul weather. At the time, a new character, Ensign Pavel Chekov (Walter Koenig) was being developed, so he wound up taking on episodes that were meant for Sulu.

Since October, 2005, Takei has been and “out and proud” member of the LGBTQ+ community and he and his partner, Brad Altman, were the first same-sex couple to apply for marriage in West Hollywood. Takei also has had political aspirations, having been an alternate delegate from California to the 1972 Democratic National Convention, run for a seat on the Los Angeles City Council, and been an appointee to the board of directors of the Southern California Rapid Transit District.

Takei has received Japan’s Order of the Rising Sun, Gold Rays with Rosette, acknowledging his contributions to US-Japanese relations, and NASA has named an asteroid after him, Asteroid 7307 Takei. He has also garnered a Lifetime Achievement Award from the San Diego Asian Film Festival and an honorary Doctorate for Humane Letters from California State University, among other honors. And, at the 2021 Tokyo Summer Games, he was the final torchbearer.

Please join us here at Daily Star Trek News in wishing George Takei the happiest and healthiest of 84th birthdays.

Further Reading

Wikipedia: George Takei, Rohwer War Relocation Center

George Takei on a mission