Creation Entertainment's Las Vegas "Real Deal" Convention took place last weekend at the Las Vegas Hilton, with a plethora of Star Trek fans, stars, attractions, parties, costumes and even a simultaneous virtual convention. This is the fourth report, covering the final day of the convention. To read about earlier events, click for Day One, Day Two (Part One) and Day Two (Part Two).

On Sunday, fans got a chance to look behind the scenes as well as a sneak peak into the future when Star Trek's award-winning Make-Up Designer and Supervisor Michael Westmore appeared. Showing off several busts and a slideshow in the main ballroom, Westmore's presentation also included a collection of never-before-seen slides from the upcoming "Star Trek: Nemesis," which he'd gotten clearance from Paramount to show right before he left for the convention.

Included in the Nemesis pictures were slides of Romulans, Remans, a lizard-like desert race that "chases Patrick [Stewart], Michael [Dorn] and Brent [Spiner] all over the place." Westmore is very excited about Nemesis, saying, "It's got that pace, it just throws you into it. It's going to blow your mind!"

He also spoke about creating the Remans for the film, the race from Romulus' sister planet, who live on the dark side of the planet. "For the Remans, it was the first time we experimented with gelatin, the light shows behind and through their ears, creating a very eerie look. We put wires in the ears to make them look like veins."

Westmore also had good things to say about the actual Nemesis, or villain of the picture, Tom Hardy. "He turns out to be such a great bad guy." He noted that Hardy, although appearing human, needed to resemble Picard, thus he wore "a Patrick Stewart chin, nose and teeth. We took a cast of Patrick's teeth."

Moving on to Enterprise, Westmore brought the lights up and showed an Andorian head, as well as a Suliban bust and talked about his hopes for future episodes. "I'm really hoping for Tellarites, there have been references in scripts and I'd really like to take a crack at them." In the Original Series, the pig-nose for the Tellarites was partially a result of the eye-holes hanging low, forcing the actor to tilt his head back to see, creating the up-turned nose.

With his years of Star Trek experience, Westmore could certainly spend the entire weekend displaying fascinating images and telling anecdotes about the massive history of make-up on Star Trek, but time constraints for the convention cut his presentation short. He thanked Art Department Coordinator Penny Juday, who was helping him out, as well as Rick Berman, Dave Rossi and everyone in the production office before clearing the stage for the next event.

After Westmore, the stage was taken by a panel of writers and editors from Pocket Books, discussing the remarkable and vast universe of Star Trek publishing, both fiction and non-fiction. The panel included: Paula Block, Executive Director of Publishing for Viacom Consumer Products; Margaret Clark, Executive Editor of Pocket Books' Star Trek division; Michael Okuda and Denise Okuda, authors of, among many other books, "The Star Trek Encyclopedia;" and Terry Erdmann, author of "The Deep Space Nine Companion."

The panel opened the floor for fan questions, which ranged from how fans can submit their work (check the SimonSays Web site below and read the submission guidelines) to why the Animated Series is not considered "canon" (Gene Roddenberry wanted it that way and according to Block, "What Gene wants, we want, too."), and why there aren't more books about Captains Pike or Sulu ("It's dictated by you guys [fans] and what you buy. If it doesn't sell ... It doesn't get published," said Block).

Upcoming releases discussed included a Star Trek: Voyager Companion, due out in March, which at present appears to be roughly 400-500 pages, a novelization of both parts of Enterprise's "Shockwave" two-parter, and an update for the TNG Companion. When asked why they don't update things like the Encyclopedia more often, the Okudas pointed out that their work on Enterprise takes up an awful lot of time, so extra work on books is difficult to squeeze in.

After the book panel, the Okudas gave a presentation themselves, highlighting their work on Enterprise, with slides of close-up shots of instrumentation panels on the NX-01 and signage throughout the ship, such as the signage by the airlock, which accurately gives the warning "Airlock Opens to Space." They also mentioned that they get to work with the stars of the show, and advanced to a shot of Porthos, drawing laughter and applause from the audience. As a side note, throughout the convention, the mere mention of Porthos by any star onstage resulted in enthusiastic applause, demonstrating who might be the breakout star of the show.

Next on the main stage, Enterprise cast mates Dominic Keating ("Malcolm Reed") and Anthony Montgomery ("Travis Mayweather") displayed their usual boundless exuberance as they took to the stage, high-fiving each other and taking a few choice moments throughout their appearance to interact with the crowd.

"I came to see you guys as much as you came to see us!" declared Montgomery, who seemed a bit dazzled by the myriad sights and sounds of Vegas. "This place is insane," he said. "I'm from Indiana, we had a very humble upbringing, and all this stuff here? It's a little bit over the top!" Countered Keating, "I saw him gambling up a storm last night — he was like a man possessed!" The duo mentioned the absence of John Billingsley ("Phlox"), who had to cancel his scheduled appearance because he was in Miami shooting the upcoming film "Out of Time" with Denzel Washington. "John Billingsley stiffed you to be a movie star!" joked Keating.

The two actors discussed jobs they'd held before landing the gig on Enterprise. Montgomery noted that he'd held at least 20 jobs before the show — his very first was at McDonald's. "It's honest work," he said. "You get a paycheck and you don't risk going to jail!" Quipped Keating, "That's what I was doing before I was on Enterprise — I was in jail." Later, Keating added that he had worked jobs as diverse as a coal mine and a knitting factory, and that he had been "fired from about every restaurant on the King's Road in Chelsea."

Keating and Montgomery also discussed one of the most popular episodes from Enterprise's freshman season — the Reed-centric "Shuttlepod One." "I didn't even think Dom could act before that!" joked Montgomery. Replied Keating, "Neither did I!"

The two actors were quite excited about the various Trek costumes sported by con attendees. Upon spying a woman dressed as an Orion slave girl in the crowd (complete with green body paint), Montgomery insisted she come up onstage for a photo op, and spent a few choice moments vamping it up with her.

Keating and Montgomery capped their appearance with an energetic, impromptu version of the Enterprise theme song, "Where My Heart Will Take Me" (aka "Faith of the Heart"), shouting out the lyrics in unison, much to the delight of the crowd. Keating also auctioned off a sexy black and white poster of himself for $370, with all the proceeds going to the Save the Children Fund.

Following the pair of Enterprise stars was a short video greeting from Billingsley, apologizing for his absence. His video began innocently enough, with a photo of Phlox being held in front of a camera as we heard Billingsley's serious voice apologizing for not being able to come because of his busy schedule. The picture then fell down to reveal the actor floating in a pool-chair, sipping an umbrella'd cocktail and enjoying the Miami sunshine. Seeing that he was caught, his serious demeanor cracked and he fell into the water to hide from the camera, eliciting a huge laugh and ovation from the Vegas crowd.

Next onstage was his Enterprise castmate, Linda Park ("Hoshi Sato"), who was appearing at only her third convention. She opened the floor for questions and was faced with a fan in costume as ... Hoshi Sato! "It's my evil twin, Yoshi Sato!" she joked.

She said that Enterprise is serving as her "grad school for acting," as it's one of the first jobs she's had, having only appeared before in small roles in "Jurassic Park III" and the series Popular (coincidentally, in a scene with Anthony Montgomery). She looks forward to the second season, saying "Hopefully this year she'll [Hoshi] get a lot tougher!"

When asked how she handles all of the alien languages she speaks, she mentioned that each script has a pronunciation page at the beginning, laying out all the dialogue phonetically, which helps, and that she's getting better the more she goes along. She looks at the script the night before and it's only a problem when she's dealing with guest stars, because then the language has to be consistent with more than just one actor. In real life, she speaks Korean and some French.

She also mentioned how when species reappear, such as an upcoming episode which will feature another appearance by the Kreetassans ("Vox Sola"), which requires her to go back and look at tape from the earlier episodes to get the right accents and pronunciations down.

Queried about the uniforms, she did say that they look comfortable, and when the actors are standing they're perfectly fine, but when they have to sit down, the uniform contracts and "we're in pain." She also noted that the Environmental Suits are "pure torture!"

Overall, she said she really enjoys the show and working with her castmates. She said everyone has their "roles" on the set: "Dominic is the Diva, Anthony is the Live Wire, even at 6:00 AM he's like that. It's a fun set to be on, everyone always laughing, it's like family."

Next up was Nana Visitor ("Kira Nerys"). Having just relocated back to Los Angeles from New York City at the beginning of the year, she said she has noticed at least one big difference. "I'm just getting my kitchen set up and it's like, 'Ah! I've got an LA kitchen now instead of a New York one,'" she told the crowd shortly after taking to the stage. "So I've got places to put things like the bacon press. In New York, you don't unpack your bacon press — forget it! You're lucky if you have places for spoons!"

Visitor noted that she ran into at least one old friend at the con. "I just saw Terry Farrell ("Jadzia Dax") for the first time [since she left Deep Space Nine]. And wait 'til you see her, she looks so stunning! I know that seems like, 'Duh, Nana, did you not get it before that Terry Farrell is stunning?!'"

Visitor discussed many aspects of her character during her session — including the bittersweet parting of Kira and Odo (Rene Auberjonois) in the series' final episode. "I said to the writers, 'Please don't make it a nice, tidy ending. Please don't put a bow on top of this package,'" Visitor remembered. "It was an adult relationship, an adult friendship, with maturity. Kira understood he had to go back to where he came from, because his journey was elsewhere. I was happy for that, and I think she was, too."

On the upside, Kira also got promoted in the final season of DS9 — a move which still has Visitor tickled pink. "The fact that I'm Colonel Kira? That so pleases me!" she exclaimed, noting that her promotion may require a change to the menu item named for "Major Kira" at the Experience's Trek-themed restaurant. "Did you have my chicken wings at Quark's Bar?" she asked. "I've got to talk to the manager — I want a change to 'Colonel Kira's Chicken Wings.' Doesn't it sound like I'm opening a franchise?"

Meanwhile, throughout the convention, Vir-Con 2002 took place in cyberspace simultaneously. Online attendees were able to virtually take part in the star appearances, play games like Trivia Challenge and Virtual Pursuit as well as chat with each other about Star Trek. Fans from all over the world, including the United States, United Kingdom, Canada, Ireland, Netherlands, Germany, Philippines, Taiwan, Hong Kong, The Middle East, El Salvador, Hungry, Australia and more took part.

W. Vito Montone, chairman of virtual-conventions, llc (whose company prefers their name in lower-case) had this to say: "The first-ever Vir-Con 2002 was a great success! Vir-Con 2002 had fans worldwide participating for the first time 'virtually' in a live Star Trek convention."

Online fans had their questions asked of the celebrities live in Las Vegas, including a 30-person Star Trek Club from the Philippines. Celebrities acknowledged Vir-Con 2002 attendees by waving and saying hello.

"Being a live event, you had to be there virtually to fully comprehend the Vir-Con experience," said Montone. "Thousands of Star Trek fans, both online and in Las Vegas, have a new appreciation as to the meaning of 'to boldly go where no man has gone before.' This is just the beginning."

Closing remarks overheard in the virtual Quark's Bar Sunday night included: "I don't want this to end", "you changed my life", "when is the next Vir-Con?", "Please keep the convention open all the time" and "this was the best time of my life."

Creation Entertainment's "Real Deal" convention was a huge success, and will now be an annual event at the Las Vegas Hilton, as next year is already booked for August 1-3. Creation hosts many Star Trek events throughout the year in other cities, so visit their web site below for more information on other conventions, perhaps one near you.

Story and Photos by Sarah Kuhn & Paul Plunkett

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