1. Galaxy Quest was, of course, a parody on Star Trek, its fandom and geek culture in general. There are countless moments and scenes that are direct references to Trek, but you may not know that the scene when Tim Allen is in the men's room and overhears how all his co-stars can't stand him, mirrors an actual event in William Shatner's life. Shatner discovered the exact same thing about himself in similar circumstances whilst attending a Star Trek convention.
2. Harold Ramis was originally hired to direct Galaxy Quest, he left the project over disagreements with the casting. Ramis wanted Alec Baldwin in the lead role of Jason Nesmith, but Baldwin turned him down. He then approached both Steve Martin and Kevin Kline, again they both said no. Eventually Dreamworks started championing Tim Allen for the part, but Ramis was not on board with the idea, so he quit. He later revealed that surprisingly he was very impressed with Allen's performance.
3. Tim Allen was on a bit of a career high at the time of Galaxy Quest. Home Improvement was coming to an end, after seven hugely successful years, and he had his pick of movie roles on the table. Allen chose to do Galaxy Quest, turning down the lead in Bicentennial Man, his decision swung by the chance to work with Sigourney Weaver, who he'd been a huge fan of since seeing her in Alien.
4. Allen admitted to being very start struck around Weaver throughout the whole shoot. He revealed:
"I kept looking at her and she is remarkably attractive, sexy and funny at the same time but too tall for me. I was afraid of her because I was going to have to kiss this woman."Allen owned an item of memorabilia from the Alien set that he pleaded Weaver to sign, but she kept putting it off until near the end of the shoot. She later told MTV,:
"He had this piece of the wall of the Nostromo or something, and he was so proud of it. I wrote on it: ‘Stolen by Tim Allen. Love, Sigourney Weaver'. He was so upset. “Why would you write that?! I was going to put it in my screening room!”"5. Sam Rockwell improvised many of his lines, including the "Oh, that's not right!" in the alien make-out scene. He won the part of Guy Fleegman (see, I know his last name. He'll be fine), beating Paul Rudd who also auditioned for the role.
6. Galaxy Quest marked Justin Long's first ever movie role. He beat actors Kieran Culkin, Eddie Kaye Thomas, and Tom Everett Scott to the part of Brandon. The role was going to be significantly smaller, but on a visit to the set Steven Spielberg suggested that the movie needed a human element to connect to the fans, and felt that Brandon would best provide that, so the film was reedited to increase his screen time. But when it came to the original DVD release, 'Justin Long' was not to be seen - the credits incorrectly labelled him as Brandon Long!
7.Galaxy Quest's script originally had references to Alan Rickman's character Alexander Dane having been knighted by Queen Elizabeth, but Rickman asked for this be changed because he believed it was not consistent with his character. Although all the knighting references were removed the character is still listed as "Sir Alexander Dane" in the credits.
8. Once completed Galaxy Quest was given an R rating, mainly due to some violence and a lot of profanity. Back to the editing suite they went, and along with some cuts to lighten the tone further many overdubs were recorded. One of the most obvious is in this scene...
...Sigourney Weaver very clearly says "Well, fuck that!" (a line that got the biggest laughs with test audiences), but the overdub changes it to "Well, screw that!".
When Galaxy Quest debuted on HBO in 2000 the line was dubbed once more to "Well, frell that!", in a nice nod to Farscape.
9. At the end of the movie just before the opening credits for the new Galaxy Quest series, the announcer says "Now back after 18 years, the New Adventures of Galaxy Quest". Not only is this yet another Star Trek reference (as the original Star Trek was cancelled in 1969 and Star Trek: The Next Generation premiered in 1987), but it turns out that it might just be a premonition of the future! Right now there is currently a Galaxy Quest TV series in development, announced just last month. It's very early days, and only being shopped around by Paramount at the moment, but if picked up it's unlikely to air until 2017 - 18 years after the movie!
10. At the 2013 annual Star Trek convention in Las Vegas a poll was taken to find Trek fandoms favourite Star Trek movie, the results were surprising...
- Winner - Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan
- Star Trek: First Contact
- Star Trek VI: The Undiscovered Country
- Star Trek IV: The Voyage Home
- Star Trek III: The Search For Spock
- Star Trek (2009)
- Galaxy Quest
- Star Trek Generations
- Star Trek: The Motion Picture
- Star Trek Nemesis
- Star Trek Insurrection
- Star Trek V: The Final Frontier
- Star Trek Into Darkness
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