When "Gene Roddenberry's Earth: Final Conflict" debuted in syndication in October, the Hollywood trade papers trumpeted Nielsen numbers that would thrill any station manager.
The sci-fi series, which stars Kevin Kilner, went on to take its place amid the top-ranked syndicated series. (It is currently being broadcast nationwide on cable station WGN at 12:30 a.m. Sunday night/Monday morning).
Kilner could consider his success a form of retribution for being ignominiously booted off the now-defunct CBS sitcom "Almost Perfect" last year -- when the network decided to make star Nancy Travis boyfriendless. But Kilner has no grudges about "Almost Perfect," though he says his public axing made him feel "like road kill."
He admits, "I was shocked. I thought we had a really smart, funny show. But you know, you can lie down and do nothing about it, or you can move on."
Succeeding in the game of life, he notes, has everything to do with how you respond to its inevitable shakeups and disappointments.
The 6-foot-3-inch actor's life has certainly taken some unusual turns. He started off in rural Monkton, Md., the son of a salesman and kindergarten teacher. He became an all-American lacrosse player, which landed him at Baltimore's Johns Hopkins University on a partial scholarship. Kilner graduated as an economics major in 1981 and became a credit analyst of the First National Bank of Maryland.
But pinstripes and banking weren't for him. He took evening courses in writing and journalism and, eventually, acting. He left banking behind in 1984 and was off to New York as the proverbial starving actor.
Ten years later, "Just when I was ready to quit, I got the break of my life," recalls Kilner.
He was almost resigned to the view he'd never do better than landing occasional guest parts on TV. He was about to go back to college to begin a new career as an English teacher, when he had what he calls the audition of his career, for a revival of Tennessee Williams' "The Glass Menagerie," on Broadway with Julie Harris.
Indeed, he later learned that it was Harris who insisted he be cast as the Gentleman Caller.
Another surprise came this year. The beginning of '97 found Kilner doing double duty on the big-screen side, starring in the just-opened "Home Alone 3," and in the independent feature, "Music From Another Room," due in February, with recent Oscar nominee Brenda Blethyn.
"I was going back and forth between Chicago and Los Angeles, working," recalls the actor. "then, one day, my agent called and said, 'Even though I know you never wanted to do TV again, I think you should take a look at this. I can't get it out of my mind that this guy is you.' "
"This," was "Final Conflict," a weekly sci-fi saga with story arcs planned to unspool over five years, dreamed up by none other than the late "Star Trek" creator Gene Roddenberry.
The "guy" was lead character, William Boone. Kilner calls Roddenberry's creation, "a mythic character who has come from a place of darkness in his life -- his wife's death -- a classic loner, intelligent and enigmatic."
"Gene Roddenberry finally wrote a show that was science fiction but did not take place on a spaceship -- the story of what would happen if a higher species came down to Earth to help us and to teach us, yet we don't know why they're here. There is violent opposition to them. ... This was the direction Roddenberry was going when he got called back to the 'Star Trek,' stories to do the movies," Kilner explains.
The actor, who as a child used to sneak a peek at "Star Trek" secretly -- it was on after his bedtime -- felt the lure of doing a Roddenberry show.
The project was initiated by the woman the team has come to call "the torchbearer," Roddenberry's widow, Majel Barrett Roddenberry (Nurse Chapel to fans of the original "Star Trek"), who also plays a role in the new show and is executive producer.
Kilner's only reservation -- and it was a big one -- was that making "Final Conflict" in Canada (it is filmed in Toronto) would mean living nine months a year away from his significant other, actress Jordan Banker ("Three Tall Women"). With Kilner hesitating, the production team went so far as to offer Baker a recurring part in "Final Conflict." But Baker had her own gig in L.A., in ABC's "Hiller and Diller" sitcom.
Kilner's agent and manager reminded the actor, "You're not a big name, and they're making a lot of concessions for you," and urged him to accept "Final Conflict" despite the personal difficulties it would entail.
Now, Kilner and Baker, who've been a couple for five years, are simply trying to make the best of their far-flung lifestyle, finding ways to visit each other whenever it's possible. They've bought a "fixer-upper" house in Los Angeles and share a New York apartment.
As for marriage, "We both feel we'll know when the time is right," says Kilner.
Right now, "I just feel very, very lucky and blessed."
By Creators Syndicate, December 1997
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