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Biography
Life and career
Doohan (pronounced DOO-en) was born in Vancouver, British Columbia, youngest of four children of William and Sarah Doohan, recent Catholic refugees from mainly Protestant Belfast during the Anglo-Irish War. His family later moved to Sarnia, Ontario where he attended high school at the Sarnia Collegiate Institute and Technical School (SCITS) where he excelled in mathematics and science. Doohan's father, who worked at times as a dentist, pharmacist, and veterinarian, is said to have invented a high-octane gasoline in 1923, but according to Doohan's autobiography, was an alcoholic who tormented his family.
At the outbreak of World War II, aged 19, Jimmy Doohan joined the Royal Canadian Artillery, and was eventually commissioned as a lieutenant in the 13th Field Regiment, part of the divisional artillery of the 3rd Canadian Infantry Division. Doohan went to the United Kingdom in 1940 for what became years of training. His first combat assignment was the invasion of Normandy at Juno Beach on D-Day. Shooting two snipers along the way, Doohan led his unit to higher ground through a field of tank mines and took defensive positions for the night. Crossing between command posts at 11:30 that night, Doohan took six hits from a German machine gun: four in his leg, one in the chest, and one through his middle right finger. The chest bullet was stopped by his silver cigarette case; the shot finger was amputated, and on screen he would generally conceal this. Despite his wounds, Doohan remained in the military, trained as a pilot for the Royal Canadian Air Force, and flew an artillery observation plane, though he was once labeled the "craziest pilot in the Canadian Air Forces".
After the war, Doohan started his acting career after being disheartened by the laughable quality of a radio drama, leading him to bone up on Shakespeare, and with his first work a CBC radio show appearance on January 12, 1946. He took a drama class in Toronto, and later won a two-year scholarship to the Neighborhood Playhouse in New York City, where classmates included Leslie Nielsen, Tony Randall and Richard Boone. For several years he would shuttle between Toronto and New York as work demanded. During this period Doohan appeared on some 4000 radio programs and 400 television programs, and earned a reputation for his versatility. In the mid-1950s he appeared as forest ranger "Timber Tom" (the northern counterpart of Buffalo Bob) in the Canadian version of Howdy Doody. He also played the lead role in the CBC TV drama production "Flight into Danger", based on Arthur Hailey's novel Runway Zero-Eight, later adapted as Terror in the Sky and spoofed in Airplane!. His credits also included The Twilight Zone, Outer Limits, Bewitched (episode 12, season 2) and Fantasy Island.
Star Trek
Doohan in a 1980s Star Trek publicity shot
Doohan always had a gift for using foreign accents. Auditioning for the role of Montgomery Scott, Chief Engineer of the USS Enterprise, before Gene Roddenberry (the creator of Star Trek), Doohan did several different accents. Roddenberry asked which he preferred, and Doohan reportedly replied "If you're going to have an engineer, you'd better make him Scottish" (or "All the world's best engineers have been Scottish"). In later years he would revisit this casting process at Star Trek conventions, demonstrating a variety of possible voices and characters. When Roddenberry produced Star Trek: The Animated Series in the early 1970s, Doohan's ability to perform different voices was utilized by having him perform most "guest star" male roles in the series, including Robert April, conjectured first captain of the Enterprise.
The Scott character, as conceived, would have been a semi-regular, but just as fellow cast members Leonard Nimoy, as the alien science officer Spock, and DeForest Kelley, as the irascible medical officer Dr. McCoy, were elevated in importance to leads alongside William Shatner's Capt. James T. Kirk, it was made clear that Lt. Cmdr. Scott was the third-in-command of the Enterprise and at times the ship was left in his care. Scott was frequently used in subplots regarding disabled ship components (such as the dilithium crystals which powered the warp drive, the transporter teleportation device, or just fiddling in the Jefferies tubes) and as a foil for Kirk's ambitious tactical approaches, which were said to strain the propulsion and defenses of the starship. In the end, many fans saw the Enterprise itself as the show's star, leaving Scott in an enviable position as her defender. He was often quoted as saying, "Scotty is 99% James Doohan and 1% accent."
Using his considerable vocal skills, Doohan devised the Vulcan and Klingon language dialogue heard in Star Trek: The Motion Picture. Later, professional linguists, particularly Marc Okrand, expanded Klingon into a fully constructed language with a working grammar.
After the series ended, Doohan found himself typecast and had a hard time getting other acting roles. After a conversation with his dentist, he realized that he would "always be Scotty", and he was able to support himself with income from personal appearances. Otherwise, he had minor, fleeting parts, often trading on his Trek fame, such as the Captain in the short-lived Saturday morning live-action kids' show, Jason of Star Command, or a cameo in the made-for-TV movie Knight Rider 2000 as "Jimmy Doohan, the guy who played Scotty on Star Trek". When the Star Trek franchise was revived, Doohan reprised his role of Scotty in seven Star Trek films and made a guest appearance on Star Trek: The Next Generation, all of which left him financially comfortable. Even so, he would never return to the busy, versatile career he once had.
Doohan had a well known distaste for William Shatner. Doohan was once quoted as saying "I like Captain Kirk, but I can't say that I'm very fond of Bill (Shatner)." He openly despised Shatner, making public statements on radio shows, especially the Howard Stern Show. He based his contempt on Shatner's alleged on-set behavior during the filming of the Star Trek TV series and movies. Doohan accused Shatner of showboating, stealing lines, and trying to keep other actors (including Doohan) in the background (although the Star Trek bloopers sometimes showed Doohan and Shatner sharing a laugh). Some of these criticisms were also voiced by his Star Trek colleague, George Takei. Although Shatner made overtures at reconciliation in the late 1990s while writing his autobiography Star Trek Memories, this was not successful at that time; however, an Associated Press article published at the time of Doohan's final convention appearance in late August 2004 stated that Doohan had forgiven Shatner and they had mended their relationship.
Later life and death
Scotty's exploits as the redoubtable Chief Engineer aboard the Enterprise inspired many students to pursue a career in engineering. Because of this the Milwaukee School of Engineering granted Doohan an honorary degree in engineering. He was immortalised with a star in Hollywood's Walk of Fame on August 31, 2004.
James Doohan's Walk of Fame star on Hollywood shortly after his death.
Doohan was married three times. He had four children, Larkin, Deirdre, and twins Christopher and Montgomery, with first wife Janet Young before a 1964 divorce. A marriage to Anita Yagel from 1967 to 1972 produced no children. In 1974, he was introduced to 19-year-old fan Wende Braunberger at a party, and they married the next year; their children were Eric, Thomas, and Sarah, who was born in 2000, when Doohan was 80.
He suffered from Parkinson's disease, diabetes, and lung fibrosis in later life. In 2004, he was diagnosed with Alzheimer's disease. On July 20, 2005, at 5:30 in the morning, he died at his home in Redmond, Washington with his wife Wende and long-time friend (and agent) Steve Stevens at his side. His agent identified the cause as pneumonia and Alzheimer's disease. He was the second member of the original Star Trek cast to pass away, after DeForest Kelley, who died in 1999. Some consider it ironic that he died on the anniversary of the Apollo 11 lunar landing, arguably the greatest engineering achievement in human history.
Doohan's ashes are to be sent into space at his request. Space burial firm Space Services, Inc. confirmed that he had arranged for his cremated ashes to be released into Earth orbit, and are scheduled to be on the Explorers Flight, a Falcon 1 rocket launched from California's Vandenberg Air Force Base in March 2006. The remains of more than 120 others will also be on the flight, including astronaut Gordon Cooper, Mareta West (the astrogeologist who determined the site of the first spaceflight landing on the moon), and Star Trek writer John Meredyth Lucas, who died in 2002.
Wikinews has news related to:
James Doohan, Star Trek's 'Scotty', dies at 85
Star Trek Lore
In Star Trek lore, Scotty was born in the town of Linlithgow, Scotland in the year 2222. In memory of James Doohan, the West Lothian Council plans to place a commemorative plaque in the town. Other towns have groups claiming to be Scotty's birthplace and wishing memorials are Aberdeen, Elgin, and Edinburgh.
Coincidentally, while Doohan starred in the Canadian version of the Howdy Doody TV show, fellow Canadian Shatner appeared simultaneously in the American show.
In an episode of Star Trek, Scotty (Doohan) allowed Klingons to insult Kirk (Shatner) repeatedly, but was only provoked to violence when the Klingons insulted the starship Enterprise.
As a writer
Doohan, with the assistance of longtime Star Trek author Peter David, wrote an autobiography entitled Beam Me Up, Scotty: Star Trek's "Scotty" in his own words (1996, ISBN 0671520563)
He collaborated on a series of three science fiction novels with S.M. Stirling:
The Rising (1996, ISBN 0671877585)
The Privateer (1999, ISBN 0671578324)
The Independent Command (2000, ISBN 0671319515)
