Production History:
Star Trek: The Next Generation ran from 1987 to 1994. In 1986, Star Trek was
celebrating its 20th Anniversary. Paramount approached Roddenberry in the spring
with the idea of a new series, but he initially rejected the idea, not wanting
to repeat the clashing with the network as with the original series. Paramount
unexpectedly dropped the idea, saying that only Roddenberry could do the show right.
Roddenberry changed his mind and agreed to do a new series.
Roddenberry was named Executive Producer of the series. During the next few months,
many character changes took place. Characters were revised many different times,
to many different degrees. Some of the actors who auditioned for the parts and were
unsuccessful in landing the roles were later given other roles. Two examples are Eric
Menyuk, the runner up for Data, who would later play "The Traveler"
in 3 TNG episodes, and Tim Russ, the runner up for Geordi LaForge, who would go on
to play a mercenary on TNG, a Klingon on DS9, a Starfleet Lt. in "Generations",
and "Tuvok" on "Voyager", and in an episode of DS9.
The 2-hour pilot, "Encounter at Farpoint" began filming on May 29, 1987. A one-minute
commercial was put on the Star Trek IV videocassette, released a few days before
TNG would premier.
On September 28, 1987, "Encounter at Farpoint" aired in some parts of the country,
while other parts saw the episode later in the week, one of the advantages of syndication.
TNG received good reviews throughout its 7-year run, even becoming the highest
rated show in syndication. Unfortunately, Gene Roddenberry passed away in 1991, and was
unable to see his creation come to an end.
On May 23,1994, with the airing of "All Good Things...", the series came to an end,
accumulating a total of 176 episodes. The feature film "Generations" began filming the
same year, immediately after the final episode. This movie featured the TNG crew along with
a few TOS cameos, and moved the characters from weekly episodic TV to feature movies.
Enterprise Crew: