“A Touch of Grace” (Lee Whitney)

Interview with Grace Lee Whitney (Janice Rand) in the March 1987 issue of Starlog. Here are some of the highlights for me.

On Rand’s role (as written in Star Trek: IV):

“Chapel and Rand were involved in the crisis situation, for which they gave us five pages of dialogue to read. We didn’t know how much of it they were going to do, so Majel Barrett and I memorized each one of the segements, and we got a chance to do little excerpts from those five pages in this one action scene.”

On Rand’s rank (this write-up says she was promoted to Chief Petty Officer but IMDB lists her as Commander Rand):

I feel that Rand should almost always be at the bottom of the totem pole. She should barely make it because she was a yeoman, although that isn’t really right for me to say.

On how women were portrayed on Star Trek:

Women were given great roles on Star Trek. I mean, you couldn’t have gotten a more dramatic, more meaty role than the one Jeanne Bal had in ‘Man Trap.’ Kim Darby’s part in ‘Miri’ was about a real issue, about the fear women have about aging and how men look at them. And look at Joan Collins’ role in ‘City on the Edge of Forever,’ which is one of my favourite episodes. Some of the parts that women had were wonderful, highly dramatic, very colorful and interesting. I didn’t feel they were slighted at all.

On how women are portrayed in media more generally:

The role of women in every type of film has been an improvement, except in the horror genre, which I absolutely abhor. I’m very against women being portrayed as being mutilated, hurt and abused. Too much sex and violence in film is terribly detrimental to everyone…Why must it always be a woman who’s cut up or chained? That’s what really infuriates me.

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