Star Trek II: Wrath of Khan featured a stunning debut performance from Kirstie Alley as Saavik.
Way back in 1998, when I decided I wanted my entry to Pocket Books’ Strange New Worlds short story contest to feature Lieutenant Saavik, I knew I’d have to write the character so readers could picture and hear either of the two actors who played Saavik. But as I wrote “The First Law of Metaphysics,” I pictured and heard only Kirstie Alley as Saavik in my mind.
Robin Curtis played Saavik expertly and exactly as Leonard Nimoy—no small authority on Vulcans—directed her to in Star Trek III: The Search for Spock and (all too briefly) Star Trek IV: The Voyage Home. But when Kirstie Alley originated the role of Saavik in Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan, Kirstie Alley brought to it an elegance, an emotional complexity, a wit, and a captivating presence that instantly earned Saavik a place in Star Trek lore all out of proportion to her time on screen.
How unfortunate Kirstie Alley as Saavik didn’t become a regular cast member in the later films. How fortunate, ultimately, she wasn’t turned into a traitor to Starfleet in Star Trek VI: The Undiscovered Country, as Nicholas Meyer originally planned.
Yes, I was 12 years old when I first saw The Wrath of Khan. Yes, I had a celebrity crush on Kirstie Alley for a few years. I watched North and South to see more of her, and briefly watched Cheers just because she joined the cast as Rebecca Howe. But even as the crush naturally faded, my respect for her performance as Saavik stayed and deepened. So the fact that Saavik, in my story, has an “emerald gaze”—even though Robin Curtis’ eyes are dark brown—is no accident.
I wish we’d gotten more Star Trek performances from Kirstie Alley. But she did so much in her only appearance in the franchise to appreciate and remember.
Here—at the end of her life and career, and at the end of Star Trek II’s 40th anniversary year—are my choices for Kirstie Alley’s top three moments as Saavik in The Wrath of Khan.
Kirstie Alley as Saavik in the center seat during the Kobayashi Maru
Kirstie Alley as Saavik is the first voice we hear in Star Trek II. I often wonder how long-time Star Trek fans in the 1982 audience reacted hearing an unknown woman narrate the captain’s log on what appears to be the bridge of the Enterprise as the film begins.
But I don’t have to wonder about the effect Alley has when she swivels around to face the camera for the first time. It’s electric.
Of course, Saavik’s control over the situation doesn’t last long. But her soft swearing after hearing the data about the imperiled freighter is one of the few ways we see the circumstances rattle her. She almost completely maintains command composure throughout the disastrous “rescue mission.”
I say “almost” because her reaction to Captain Spock’s “death,” just before the simulation ends, is a subtle and masterful choice. Remember: Saavik knows these events are not real. She knows Spock is not dead. Yet when she sees her mentor cry out in pain as his console explodes, then slump to the deck in feigned lifelessness, Saavik appears stricken.
The expression on Alley’s face only becomes clear in retrospect, as we realize Saavik must have been upset at the thought that she had failed her mentor. But even as we watch it, it’s a subtle and masterful moment alerting us to this character’s hidden depths.
Saavik asks Kirk for suggestions after “stay[ing] with the sinking ship”
To her credit, Lieutenant Saavik maintains remarkable composure when Admiral Kirk, one of Starfleet’s most famous figures—and making a dramatic entrance to end all dramatic entrances—answer her request for constructive criticism by telling her to pray, because “the Klingons don’t take prisoners.”
Saavik starts to leave the bridge simulator with the other trainees, but then stops by the side of the command chair and spins around on her heel, giving no ground. Note the look of steely determination with which Kirstie Alley composes Saavik’s face. You can all but hear Saavik thinking, “I am not going to let this damn test beat me. And I am not going to let Admiral Kirk dismiss me that easily.”
I don’t know whether Alley, here in her first major motion picture role, felt any trepidation sharing the screen in an extended two-shot with so veteran and iconic an actor as William Shatner. I would! But if she did, she did not show it. Saavik is not going to be cowed by Kirk, no matter how much he goads her.
When Saavik insists the simulation did not test her command abilities fairly, Alley infuses Saavk’s eyes with righteous anger no one can deny. She bites off Saavik’s last line in the scene so precisely, it reminds me of Zachary Quinto’s thinly veiled disgust when he says “Live long and prosper” to the Vulcan Science Academy members in Star Trek (2009). Like Quinto’s Spock, Alley’s Saavik is young and angry and has something to prove.
Saavik’s interaction with Kirk is a marvelous moment, and shows just how deftly Alley could create a compelling character.
Saavik and Kirk take a trip in the turbolift
As Saavik, Kirstie Alley was nothing if not tenacious.
When she finds herself sharing a turbolift with Admiral Kirk, she makes a point of asking him how he dealt with the Kobayashi Maru scenario—a question to which Kirk will not give her a direct answer until much later in the film, in the Genesis Cave.
Kirstie Alley and William Shatner make this scene a beautiful bit of give-and-take. Shatner plays Kirk as clearly uncomfortable in the presence of this talented, ambitious, and, yes, beautiful young officer asking him for advice. Her questions about his experience as a young man are making him feel his age even more keenly. His attempts at joviality fall flat, and he knows it.
For her part, Alley plays Saavik as respectful of Kirk, but not to the point of considering him any kind of living legend. As she told Spock soon after Kirk boarded, Kirk is never what she expects—he is “so human.” And she is not reluctant to let that puzzlement show. Her confusion about not only the concept of humor (presaging Data’s wrestling with the same subject in Star Trek: The Next Generation) but also Kirk himself are clear.
The video above is an alternate version of the scene, first included in ABC’s television broadcasts of Star Trek II. Some viewers suggest Kirstie Alley plays this scene more flirtatiously here than in the theatrical version.
I remember some writer in one of the old Best of Trek books describing Saavik’s looks at Kirk here as “come hither.” I don’t agree with that interpretation. I think the writer was perhaps wishing Kirstie Alley was casting “come hither” looks at them!
Kirstie Alley gives no indication Saavik is romantically attracted to Kirk. But she is attracted to him as an enigmatic representative of humanity—and Alley communicates something of Saavik’s own enigmatic qualities in both versions of the turbolift scene.
Kirstie Alley had a long and remarkable career. As Star Trek fans we are fortunate that it began, in earnest, with her sole but shining appearance in our favorite franchise.
What about Kirstie Alley as Saavik in Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan do you remember most? Let us know in the comments!