"Trek" Auction Beams Up Big Bucks

Mon., Oct. 9, 2006 6:22 PM PDT by Joal Ryan

Maybe it's true Star Trek collectors don't buy just anything. But last week, they bought everything.

Bidders at a three-day Trek artifact auction in New York picked the place clean, snapping up all 1,000 lots, from Picardian flute to modeled-by-McCoy spacesuit, and dropping a combined $7.1 million, the auction house Christie's said.

"The ongoing passion and dedication of fans and collectors worldwide has impressed us yet again," CBS Paramount Television executive John Wentworth said in a statement.

More than a proud parent--Paramount is Star Trek's corporate home--the studio was the bottom-line beneficiary. The Thursday-Saturday Christie's event marked the first time the studio had put its own stash on the auction block.

The most prized item, judging by its sales price, was a 78-inch-long model of the U.S.S. Enterprise captained by Jean-Luc Picard in Star Trek: The Next Generation. It sold for $576,000--the most ever for an auctioned-off piece of Trek memorabilia, Christie's said.

By comparison, the Captain Kirk's bridge chair as seen in the original Trek TV series sold for $304,750 in 2002.

Other big-ticket from the Christie's auction included a spacesuit worn by Dr. McCoy in the 1968 Trek episode "The Tholian Web" and Captain Picard's precious flute, first featured in the 1992 Next Generation episode "The Inner Light." The former sold for $144,000; the latter for a mere $48,000.

Last May, Denise Okuda, who, along with husband Michael Okuda, combed the Paramount lot for suitable auction items, said the McCoy suit was her favorite find--a treasure unearthed from the bottom of a box.

Though billed as a 40th anniversary Trek auction, few, if any, of the items up for bid were actually 40 years old. Rather, the props and costumes were culled largely from the movies and Trek spinoff series, Next Generation, Deep Space Nine, Voyager and Enterprise.

Speaking last spring, Michael Okuda said he was careful to not just select just any old Federation doodad for the auction. "Just because there's Star Trek on it doesn't mean it'll make a lot of money," he said.

But as last week proved, if it's the right thing with Star Trek on it, then, yes, it can make a lot of money.