Trivia / Star Trek S1 E15 "Shore Leave"

• Acting for Two: According to interviews with Bill Blackburn, he not only voiced the White Rabbit, but also did the announcements heard in Act One dismissing different sections of the ship for shore leave in alphabetical order.
• Contractual Immortality: The crew visits a planet that seems perfect for rest and relaxation. The landing party soon finds out that whatever they are imagining at the moment becomes reality. Dr. McCoy thinks that they are merely hallucinations, so when he is attacked by a lancing knight, he refuses to dodge the knight's attack and is promptly killed. As Kirk and Spock try to figure everything out, McCoy's body disappears. At the end of the episode it is revealed that the planet is a sort of "amusement park" built by aliens, and that everything that happens is only temporary. McCoy is brought back safe and sound, in the arms of two lovely cabaret girls he was thinking about.
• Deleted Scene: The Don Juan robot reaches from behind a tree and grabs Yeoman Tonia Barrows, who is wearing her princess costume and is shocked by the encounter. Protecting her, McCoy then fights off Juan, who flees the area. This incident took place immediately before the arrival of the Black Knight, footage which is shown in the episode.
• Edited for Syndication: Some syndicated versions have less of the Finnegan fighting and more Ruth interaction.
• Hostility on the Set: By all accounts, director Robert Sparr really didn't get along with the cast, who felt he was focusing too much on the camerawork and visual effects, and neglecting their performances.
• Missing Trailer Scene: The preview of this episode shows Yeoman Barrows being accosted by Don Juan while wearing her princess costume. This scene was not used in the final cut.
• Prop Recycling: The White Rabbit costume was borrowed from Ice Scapades by Bill Blackburn (a former pro-ice skater), who also "won" the "privilege" to put on the costume and play the rabbit himself.
• Throw It In!: When Sulu sees Spock materializing, he says "Someone is beaming down from the bridge!". This is an accidental flub from George Takei's part, which went unnoticed by the production staff, and wasn't even dubbed over in post-production. In the script, Sulu's line was "Someone is beaming down from the ship!"
• Troubled Production: Despite Theodore Sturgeon being credited for the script, the draft he produced was apparently just too bizarre and demanding in budgetary terms. Successive attempts at rewrites by Gene L Coon and Gene Roddenberry were sufficiently unsuccessful that Roddenberry was still working on the scripts as the episode was being filmed on location. The script issues meant that filming overran by a day, and the pressure on the director Robert Sparr caused him to somewhat neglect the cast, causing them to refuse to work with him again despite the good impression he made on the producers.
• What Could Have Been:
  • The script called for an elephant to appear in the episode. An elephant was indeed "hired" by the production staff and brought to the set, but due to running overtime and other difficulties during shooting, the animal never made it before the cameras - which made associate producer Robert H. Justman (who was not on the set at the time and couldn't oversee production) truly angry. Later, production staff members often jokingly asked assistant director Gregg Peters, "Say - when do you get to use your elephant?"
  • The original script featured Yeoman Rand as part of the landing party, but as the character was written out of the series, she was changed to Yeoman Tonia Barrows. Also, in Sturgeon's original script, the Yeoman had a share of close scenes with Kirk. In the rewrites, Gene L. Coon and Gene Roddenberry changed these to feature Doctor McCoy instead and introduced Kirk's old Academy flame Ruth to the story.
• Working Title: Finnagle's Planet.
• Writing by the Seat of Your Pants: The episode was being rewritten as it was being shot. Cast members recalled Gene Roddenberry sitting under a tree, frantically reworking the script to keep it both under budget and within the realms of believability. As a result the filming went over schedule and took seven days instead of the usual six.
• You Look Familiar: Angela Martine's actress, who was also in the immediately preceding aired episode (which was actually filmed seven episodes earlier) "Balance Of Terror", and who happened to be the casting director's wife, returns in this episode. She is called Angela by Esteban. But Kirk calls her by her last name which is Teller. The script had her character named Mary Teller but they changed her name to Angela when they realized that it was the same actress who played a girl named Angela in the aforementioned episode. However, due to the frantic and chaotic script rewriting proccess described above, in some parts of the script her original character name (at least her last name) remained, creating some confusion.

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