It is hard to believe that a few weeks ago, Anton Yechin who plays Chekov in the JJ Abrams’ Star Trek franchise has passed away. The films release this Friday is a tat bitter-sweet as everyone of the cast would like to celebrate the 27-year-old actor’s life, they must also mourn the loss of a family member.
“It’s devastating to lose a family member. We are at a point we are not only supposed to be celebrating this film but also this beautiful man, this talented man and for all of us it is incomprehensible to be at the point we have to talk about him in the past. The pain of the loss is still very raw. We went and spent time with Anton’s family and we know they will be very, very proud of his contribution to the film, and this film will forever be the most special experience for all of us. It represents a golden period where our family was together — fully together for the last time. It really was, as Simon (Pegg) said, the best summer of our adult lives. We love him so much; we miss him terribly,” mourned Karl Urban who plays Dr. “Bones” McCoy in the franchise.
There were some happy memories shared as Chris Pine recounts something you would not expect a mid-20s-something to do in their free time.
“He was beautifully, authentically Anton. There was not much of a censor on the boy. I remember one of the first times that I met him about 9 years ago and he was 17. I invited him back to my trailer to play guitar because he played really, really well and he goes, ‘I can’t man, I have to go back to my trailer!’ I asked him why and he was translating an esoteric Russian novel into English because that’s what he wanted to do. Eight, nine year later he was still translating it, he was still reading this book on physics that this French philosopher had written and was still trying to get all of us to go these…we were in Vancouver and he was trying to get us to go see this neo-German Expressionist film as if everyone has or should have seen it. He was a great guy. He was totally fearless. If you try to grasp on to something positive is that he was fearless creatively. He was always working on stuff, from his music projects to his photography projects; he was going to direct his first film this summer. He was just spectacularly interested in life in a really great way,” bemoaned Pine.
Star Trek Beyond opens nationwide on Friday, July 22, 2016. Be sure to see Anton Yechin in one of his final performances.
