Just a Geek (14 page)

When the day was over, I felt like I was part of the
Star Trek
family again . . . even if I was the Black Sheep. The timing was perfect, too, because an off-handed remark I'd made while taping
Weakest Link
was about to put me back into a Starfleet uniform for the first time in over 10 years.

13 NOVEMBER 2001

Tonight At Last I Am Coming Home

When I played
Weakest Link
, I was placed right next to LeVar. We were talking during the commercials and I said to him that I really missed them. He said to me that I should be in the movie, especially since it's going to be the last
TNG
movie. I told him that I would love to be in it, but I thought that Berman and company really didn't like me. He seemed surprised and he told me that he was going to call Rick the next morning and suggest to him that I be in the movie, at least as a cameo. I thought that would be really cool and told him so.

Last week, on Friday, my agent called me to let me know that there was an offer from Paramount to reprise the role of Wesley Crusher in
Star Trek X
. We just needed to work out the details.

So we spent some time negotiating it and—get this—Rick Berman told my agent that he was "very pleased" that I was going to be in the movie!

I am really excited about this for three reasons:

I am going to get to work with my friends again.

Wesley Crusher will have some real closure, finally.

For the last five years, at least, everywhere I go, fans ask me if I'm going to be in a movie, and what happened to Wesley. I can honestly say that I'm doing this for the fans, because it will be so damn cool to see all of us together again.

WHEEE!

I wasn't under any illusions that this small role would have a significant impact on my career, but I didn't care. The wish I'd made in September, on the bridge of the
Enterprise
in Vegas, had come true. I would get to go back to
Star Trek
and appreciate everything that I should have appreciated back when I was a teenager. I got my second chance.

I didn't work on the movie until the beginning of December, but I counted down the days until production like a kid waiting for Christmas. On December 2, the script finally arrived by messenger. I signed for it with trembling hands and tore the envelope open before the front door was closed. I ran into my office, shut the door, and began to read.

Page 1.

Holy shit. That's awesome
.

Page 4.

Holy, Holy, Holy shit
.

Page 28.

Oh wow. That's cool!

Page 38a.

That's funny
.

Page 73.

Okay, that was sort of stupid, but I'm sure they'll fix that
.

Page 82.

This is far and away the best
Next Generation
movie
.

Page 97.

Okay, this is the best Trek movie since
Wrath of Khan!

Page 99.

Gasp
.

Page 105.

What the—?

Page 114.

Oh god. This really is the last
Next Generation
movie
.

I closed the script, and gently set it down on my desk.
The Next Generation
was really over. Sure, they left a tiny window open, but
TNG
as I knew it, with the cast that I loved, was done. If this realization had come to me . . . well, any time before Vegas, really, I wouldn't have given it a second thought, but as I sat there in my office, the sounds and smells of the holiday season creeping in under the door, it hit me
hard
. I vowed to take nothing for granted when I worked on the movie.

I had my final costume fitting the next day, and the day after that, I found myself at the Melrose Avenue guard shack, half-an-hour early for my 8:30 a.m. call time.

"ID, please," the guard said.

I pulled my driver's license out of my wallet, and gave it to him.

"And where are you going today . . ." he looked at my license. "Wil?"

"I'm working on
Star Trek
," I said.

"
Enterprise
or
Nemesis
?"

The Next Generation
.

"Nemesis," I said. "I play Wesley Crusher."

He looked up at me. "Oh my god. You
are
Wesley Crusher. You look so . . ."

Washed up?

". . . grown up."

"Yeah," I said "It's been a long time."

"Do you know where to park?"

"Yeah. But I don't know where our dressing rooms are."

But I do! I do know where our dressing rooms are! They're trailers on the street in front of Stages 8 and 9. Mine is filled with Warhammer 40K figures and GURPS books. It's right next to Brent's trailer. It's 1989, and I'm back. I'm back home
.

"Okay," he said, and gave me directions to an area on the lot where I'd never been before.

I parked my car and picked up my backpack. Inside was my script, a note pad, and a few tapes:
Only A Lad, Music For The Masses
, and
Squeeze: Singles 45 and Under . . .
all of them music I listened to when I was working on the series. I remember, when I put them in my backpack, that I thought to myself,
"Maybe I can sit in my trailer, listen to 'Never Let Me Down,' and imagine that I'm back."

I locked up my car, and walked toward the dressing rooms. Other than the addition of a back lot, Paramount hadn't changed in any substantial way since I was on the show, and my thoughts drifted as I walked down those familiar streets on autopilot.

That's where I met Eddie Murphy when I was 16 . . . Hey! I crashed a golf cart there when I was 15 . . . There's the mail room . . . There's Stage 6, where the bridge set started out . . . I almost got up the courage to kiss that girl at the Christmas party on that stage in . . . there's the stage where Shatner told me, "I'd never let a
kid
come onto
my
bridge" . . . this street feels exactly the way it did when I worked here . . . here's where my trailer used to be . . .

I stopped, and tears filled my eyes—tears of joy:
It's so good to be here
, mingled with tears of sadness and regret:
why didn't this happen years ago?

Because I wasn't ready for it to happen
. I walked a few more steps and looked into the foyer that led into Stages 8 and 9. Enterprise
lives there now. At least they kept the stage in the family
.

A few minutes later, my cell phone rang.

"Hello?"

It was my wife. "Are you at Paramount?"

"Yeah! Anne . . . it's so cool—"

"Wait. I just checked our messages, and they pushed your call to later."

"Uh-oh. How much later?"

"11:30."

I looked at my watch: it was only 8.
What the hell am I going to do for three hours?

"D'oh!" I said. "Well, I guess I need to find something to do."

"How are you feeling?" she said.

"Excited," I said. "And sad."

"That makes sense. Have a good day, and call me when you can. I have to get the kids to school."

"Okay. I love you."

"I love you too. Don't forget to relax and enjoy yourself !"

I laughed. "I'm pretty sure I have that covered. Bye."

It was so familiar to stand there in front of the stage . . . I closed my eyes, and tried to put myself back in 1989.

No dice. Turns out I'm only a Time Traveller on
Star Trek.
Maybe I'll go eat breakfast
.

I walked to the commissary and ordered a bowl of Irish oatmeal, two pieces of dry wheat toast with marmalade, and a large orange juice. It goes without saying that this was my usual, right?

I took my time and read my script while I ate. I had only three lines, and I'd learned them long ago . . . but it seemed like the right thing to do.

"Thank you, Captain. It's good to be back."

"Oh, the Titan is going to be a great ship! The warp core matrix is—" Goddamn technobabble. What the hell is it?

I laughed. Ten years ago, I would have hated the technobabble, but now . . . it was cool.

Time passed quickly, and around 11, I walked across the lot again, eager to report to duty. I mean, eager to report to work. Yeah, work.

A woman I didn't recognize spoke into a walkie talkie when I approached. "Wil Wheaton is here," she said. "Copy that."

She introduced herself to me as one of the assistant directors and walked me to my dressing room.

"I'll come back and get you when there's an available chair in the makeup trailer."

"Okay," I said. "I'll be here."

She left me, and I changed into my spacesuit. I put on a black undershirt, my pants, then my boots. I was wearing a formal Starfleet uniform, and the jacket portion stayed on the set until we were actually ready to shoot, so I put on a fleece jacket—similar to the one I had when I was on the series—and was very happy when I realized that I wouldn't have to wear an embarrassing fake muscle suit like the one I wore when I was a teenager.

I sat down and looked around. The trailer was bigger than the ones we had when we worked on the series. I guess it was a fringe benefit of the bigger budget. Thankfully, there was a tape player. I put on side one of
Music For The Masses
and remembered playing it in the makeup trailer when I was a kid. I remembered Jonathan laughing about the name "Depeche Mode," and Gates, who was fluent in French, telling me that it meant "Fast Fashion." I remembered how much Gates liked Oingo Boingo, and how great it felt to make that connection when I was 14.

There was a knock on the door, and the assistant director was back. "There's a chair available for you, Wil," she said.

"I'm on my way."

I took a deep breath.
I will not take a single thing for granted today
. Dave Gahan sang, "Never want to come down, never want to put my feet back down on the ground . . ." as I walked out.

All makeup trailers are essentially the same: as many as five, but usually three chairs face a wall of mirrors. It's always painfully bright, and though it's painted white and could feel like an operating room, it's usually the warmest, most welcoming spot on the entire production. Actors often congregate in the makeup trailer, and there is usually music and coffee, and sometimes, on a Friday afternoon, cocktails.

It wasn't the same trailer from the series, but the
feeling
was the same: the smell of freshly brewed coffee hung in the air, and jazz music played on the radio. There was Michael Westmore, gluing Worf's forehead onto Michael Dorn. There was Brent, getting his hands painted gold, and there's an empty chair waiting for me.

It was everything I could to do not burst into tears. I was
home
.

As I stood in the doorway, Brent said, "Milt! Milt Wheaton!"

"Is that the Teen Idol?" Michael Dorn said.

"Yeah, but he's not a teenager anymore," said Michael Westmore. "He's got two kids."

"Two kids?!"
Michael Dorn said.

"Stepkids," I said, as I stepped into the trailer and sat down in the chair.

That was cool. The Kid has kids. I mean, stepkids
.

June Westmore (yeah, pretty much everyone who does makeup on
Star Trek
—well, in the whole industry, really—is a Westmore in some capacity) who did my makeup for years on
Next Generation
, began to turn me back into Wesley Crusher. While she created his flawless skin, I talked with Michael and Brent. Marina briefly came into the trailer, kissed my cheek, and went back out.

"So how are you doing?" June said.

Are you kidding me? This is a dream come true. I'm so happy to be back!

"Are you kidding me? This is a dream come true. I'm so happy to be back!" I said.

"Everyone's happy to be back together," she said.

Everyone . . . that includes me
.

"Yeah. This rules."

She finished my makeup, and I moved down one chair to get my hair done.

"Do I have to wear Wesley's helmet hairdo?" I said.

"I don't think so," the hair designer said. "I really like this sort of messy thing you've got going on." She turned to Michael Westmore. "What do you think, Michael?"

"I think he looks great like that. Just make sure you put sideburns on him."

Sideburns?!

"Oh my god! That's right! I'm a Starfleet officer now, so I get sideburns!" I said, in spite of myself.

"Didn't you wear them before?" he said.

I shook my head. "I was a teenager, remember? No sideburns."

"You sure you've never had them?"

"Yeah. Believe me, that's something I'd remember."

"Well, then I want to put them on you."

COOL!

"Okay." I waited while he finished turning Michael Dorn into Worf, then sat in his chair.

We talked about family, kids, and
Trek
while he put my sideburns on. When they were trimmed into neat little points, he stood back and admired them.

"Those are some good looking sideburns," he said.

I smiled. "Yeah, they really are."

There was a knock at the trailer door, and a production assistant poked his head in. "They're ready for rehearsal," he said. "There's a van to take you all across the lot to the stage."

When I walked out of the trailer, I saw the entire cast, waiting to go to the set.

My family
.

I slowly walked over to them. Except for Marina, who would be wearing a wedding gown, everyone was dressed, like me, in half a spacesuit.

"Hi guys," I said, when I arrived.

There were hugs and kisses and more hugs, proclamations about how great I looked, and how good it was to see me.

This choking back tears thing is getting pretty old
.

"Hey, I'm going to walk to the stage," Jonathan said. "Anyone want to join me?"