At today’s virtual First Contact Day celebration, Paramount+ announced that Woman In Motion: Nichelle Nichols, Star Trek and the Remaking of NASA is headed to the streaming service. Director Todd Thompson’s film explores how Nichols went from playing Lt. Uhura on Star Trek to genuinely changing the real-life space program and the world with her campaign to bring diversity to NASA.
As a press release explains, “Despite an uphill battle against a bureaucracy that was hesitant to let her get involved, Nichols persevered and is credited by NASA for turning it into one of the most diverse independent agencies in the United States Federal Government.”
The trailer for Woman In Motion is jam-packed with familiar faces and shots of Nichols and her exuberant smile, from the bridge of the Enterprise to the offices of NASA. In the ’70s, she founded the company Women In Motion, Inc., and eventually recruited more than 8,000 African American, Asian and Latino women and men for NASA. The story the film tells is the kind that’s at first infuriating—NASA was a horribly exclusionary white men’s club—and then genuinely moving, as Nichols and her campaign take effect. “She changed the space program forever,” says “space educator” (what a great job title!) Dr. Kerry Mark Joels.
If you want to check out the First Contact Day panel on the documentary for yourself, it will eventually be uploaded on the Paramount+ YouTube Channel. They also released a poster for the film, pictured below:
Can you watch this trailer without getting a little choked up? I can’t. Gonna need some tissues when Women In Motion premieres on Paramount+ on June 3rd.
