STV: Ira Steven Behr, Part I—on "Alphas," "DS9"... and what about that manuscript?!

Congrats to Ira Steven Behr, showrunner for the new SyFy Monday-night hit Alphas—according to early numbers and critical response—and thanks to him for sitting down for yet another talk about it... but this time, on guerilla-cam for Trekland.

Can I tell you a story? On my second working trip to Hollywood—but the first not be crazed, not on an insane deadline and for longer than five days—Ira was my very first interview subject during his first year on DS9. At the time I had no idea he'd just had a run-in with a well-known genre magazine writer. And his first sentence to me was, before I ever sat down on a chair in his Hart Building office: "You aren't going to fuck around with my quotes, are you?  You better not. Because I'm tired of being honest and being misquoted."

Welcome to Hollywood and Trekland, Larry.

But what a bonding moment. So thanks for sharing again, Ira—my ST VI Blu-ray audio-mate. I guess I faked the trust thing good enough.



And everybody else, stay tuned for the rest with Ira next week ...and for more new eps of Alphas on SyFy Mondays at 10 pm ET/PT. As for DS9 and The 4400—you can find 'em on DVD (October for Netflix).

As for Ira's book ...we'll have to be patient.

STV: Long-lost chat! Alphas/DS9's Ira Steven Behr—novelist?

In honor of Ira Steven Behr's new show Alphas premiering this week on SyFy (he's the showrunner, just not the creator—sound familiar?) ...

...Here's a vidchat he and I did, pre-HD, that was ready to go but delayed in posting at Trekland.com from back in December 2008, during the Hollywood writer's strike and just after the end of his show The 4400. I taped this just after we'd had lunch and recorded our joint audio commentary for the Blu-ray edition of ST VI: The Undiscovered Country.

The passion, idealism and, yes, a slightly twisted dark side all come through in Ira's years of running DS9--as well as his stint on UPN's Twilight Zone redux, and especially The 4400. What's you don't sense by merely watching his series, though, is that Ira is a hoot. And he knows his Hollywood stuff.

It all came back to me recently that, aside from his DVD bonus appearances, most fans haven't had a real chance to meet Ira—so I was pleased when he let me hound him for a little catch-up chat outside Mulberry's Pizza. The guy who brought multiple mainstream Ferengis, the Bell Riots and swingin' Vic Fontaine to Star Trek is the real deal. (And he's even using a computer now—wow.)

We had a hoot with ST VI, and the Blu-ray edition subsequently saw the light of day—which is more than I can say for this chat ... until now! (Notice this clip is still 4x3 aspect, not HD, and lacks the STV endtag theme: I chose to keep it pristine here, and not re-edit.)

I didn't realize it going in that day, but we wound up talking mostly about his big project of the strike-caused hiatus... a novel!  So—did he ever finish the manuscript from '08? For the answer, stay tuned HERE this week, and see... and check out Alphas at 10 p.m. Mondays PT/ET on SyFy, with encore airings through the week.

(More Ira, and of a more recent nature. Coming up this week ...!)