Trekkers invited to beam down to festival.

Byline: Lewis Taylor The Register-Guard

PREVIEW Star Trek 40th Anniversary What: Celebration of the Gene Roddenberry TV show, which first aired on Sept. 8, 1966. When: 6:30 p.m. Friday Where: McDonald Theatre, 1010 Willamette St. How Much: Free

Eric Stillwell was too young to appreciate the first episode of Star Trek when it aired on television on Sept. 8, 1966, but it didn't take long for him to catch the fever.

"One of my best friends was obsessed with the show and I just started watching," Stillwell says. "I was fascinated with the aliens."

Stillwell's interest in the series didn't end there. He went on to play a vital role in one of the first Star Trek fan clubs and worked on the TV show "Star Trek: The Next Generation." He co-wrote an episode of that series, helped write the story line for an installment of "Star Trek: Voyager" and even played a Klingon in "Star Trek VI: The Undiscovered Country."

Like a lot of longtime Trekkers, Stillwell says Star Trek appealed to him for different reasons depending on where he was in his life. Over time, though, the show's morality tales drew him back again and again - that, and the overarching message of universal harmony.

"I think when people watch Star Trek, they get a hopeful and positive feeling about the future," Stillwell says. "There's this message that humans can get together and overcome their differences."

Stillwell, who lives in Eugene and works as a writer and producer of the children's TV show "Nanna's Cottage," will join fans throughout the world in celebrating the 40th anniversary of the Gene Roddenberry TV show that spawned a whole universe of sci-fi spin-offs. With the help of his co-host, Portland filmmaker Scott Cummins, he will oversee a Eugene meeting of Trekkers this Friday. The free event is part of the Eugene Celebration's Best of the Best film festival.

Years ago, Star Trek gatherings were famously skewered by William Shatner on "Saturday Night Live," but Stillwell says this event is not the geek convention some people might imagine. The anniversary celebration will include a screening of that very first Star Trek episode, a showing of the episode Stillwell wrote and a projection of the fan film "Starship Exeter's Tressaurian Intersection," directed by Cummins. The pair also will host a question and answer session for interested fans.

"I think Star Trek fans are unfairly categorized as nerds or geeks or whatever, but when you think about it, it's not really any different than sports fans who wear cheeseheads or go crazy and paint themselves green and yellow," Stillwell says. "It's just whatever you're into."

Stillwell is no longer involved in Starfleet, the fan group he helped get off the ground from Eugene in 1979 when he was just 18 years old. At that time, he says, he and his friends were just beginning to realize there were Star Trek fans in other parts of the world and thought it would be a neat idea to bring them together. The organization still operates today and is listed in the Guinness Book of World Records as the largest science fiction fan club in the world.

After graduating from the University of Oregon, Stillwell went to Hollywood and found a job working as a production assistant on "Star Trek: The Next Generation."

After being promoted to the job of script coordinator, he teamed up with two others to co-write the episode "Yesterday's Enterprise." The show, which aired in the third season, quickly became a fan favorite. It starred Whoopi Goldberg and involved a 20-year-old version of the U.S.S. Enterprise, an alternate timeline and a war with the Klingons.

With no new Star Trek TV shows or movies due out until 2008, Stillwell says the army of fans is currently driving the Star Trek phenomenon with videos, Web sites and other spin-offs.

He points to the fan film Cummins directed, an Internet series known as Starship Exeter being released in three parts. He says Cummins is hoping to screen the third act as a premiere at Friday's festival. Produced in Texas, the series features elaborate sets, impressive special effects and high production values.

"It's come full circle, in a way," Stillwell says. "The fans got it going and now they're really keeping it going."

At the same time that Friday's event is happening in Eugene, other Star Trek-themed gatherings will be happening around the country. In Seattle, a Star Trek gala will be going on all weekend atop the Space Needle, and in Las Vegas, Leonard Nimoy and William Shatner will host the official "Star Trek" convention. Sin City also offers a tour through an interactive Star Trek museum, a turn on the Borg Invasion thrill ride and the chance to renew wedding vows in a Vulcan ceremony.

In Sci-Fi-happy Eugene, Stillwell expects a solid turnout. He points to a local Star Trek convention in 1995 that drew more than 1,000 people, and adds that it doesn't hurt that the gathering is free.