Chris Pine Talks About Anton Yelchin at STAR TREK 10th Anniversary Screening
It’s been ten years since J.J. Abrams’ Star Trek film was released and that means that a special 10th anniversary screening was to be held. The screening was also the trailer launch for the documentary about Anton Yelchin, Love, Antosha, who played Pavel Chekov in the new trilogy until he passed away in a motor vehicle accident in 2016, before Star Trek Beyond was released. Chris Pine, who plays James T. Kirk in the new movies, was at the screening and told THR a bit about his experience with Yelchin, including Yelchin’s struggle with cystic fibrosis, a condition that the actor kept private.
“While we were shooting [Star Trek Beyond], especially towards the end, I think we could all tell that something wasn’t right with Anton. I don’t think anyone knew that he was battling the illness that he was.
We had about a week of doing a pretty intense stunt, like a really grueling, physically demanding stunt. I haven’t actually thought about it until now, but looking back on it, I remember how hard it was for him to get through it. And he never complained.
He didn’t use [the disease] to get out of this fight scene, which he could easily have done, obviously.”
That’s incredible. Yelchin was an incredible actor and a friend to Pine. When talking about Yelchin’s illness, Pine said:
“He took that obstacle, which could’ve flattened clearly anyone, put it aside, compartmentalized it and just went on his merry way and went on with his life with positivity and humor and enthusiasm, all the while he’s battling something.”
Pine went on to explain that Yelchin was like everyone’s younger brother to the Star Trek cast:
“This curious, fascinating, complex, strange little dude who, when we started [Star Trek], he was about 10 years younger than all of us. He was kind of our younger brother, and we saw him grow up and continue to get stranger and more curious.”
Yelchin really is missed, but he left behind a fantastic legacy of films.
NOTE: This article has been updated to include that Anton Yelchin had cystic fibrosis, which was accidentally omitted from the original article. You can learn more about cystic fibrosis here.