Actor, director, author and activist George Takei is several sorts of icon rolled into one man. Along with being an avidly out proponent of LGBTQ rights, he is a vital member of the original “Star Trek” series enterprise, a social-media overlord (a Facebook force with over 10-million followers, to say nothing of an active Twitter feed) and a fighter for the rights of all immigrant cultures, as he and his family were forced into U.S.-run Japanese concentration camps during World War II. Now, he’s also an app crafter with House of Cats, a play on “House of Cards” and an augmented-reality app which gives players a role on the world’s political stage.
“The app combines what the Internet loves best: cats and politics,” says Takei of the app and its inaugural character “Trumpy Cat” — an avatar that you move anywhere, and add outrageous dialogue of your own or taken straight from the Tweeter-in-Chief — to share with friends.
PGN: It’s a sad day knowing Tab Hunter is no longer here. Did you know Hunter beyond passing celebrity hellos? What did his story say to you as an example of how to live a stately existence?
GT: I knew Tab Hunter. I had the distinct honor to be an interviewee and participant in his extraordinary 2015 documentary “Tab Hunter Confidential.” You know, when he was young, Tab Hunter was so much more than a teen heartthrob, though he certainly was that too. He was a celebrated actor, trailblazer and an icon for the LGBTQ community. Despite all that he was put through — the gossip, the shunning by Hollywood — he held his head high.
PGN: You must be amazingly vindicated that Scott Brunton changed his tune and admitted he lied. As so many of us were pulling for you and guessed at the real truth — yours — what is your take on a society and a set of freedoms that allow accusers to spout off without plausible evidence?
GT: These accusations came at a time when there was an important national conversation around the #MeToo movement. I did not want my denial of Mr. Brunton’s account to diminish the important things that others were finding the courage to do and say. That was far more important than what I personally may have been suffering through. And so I did not engage in a “he said/he said” beyond my denial. It was a difficult time for me, and for Brad, that is for certain. We are glad to be putting it behind us.
PGN: Recently, Donald Trump named his Supreme Court justice pick, Brett Kavanaugh. What are you deepest, darkest concerns for the LGBTQ community going forward with this — and any — Trump choice?
GT: No freedom worth fighting for has ever been won without a fight. We have been moving forward, and sometimes taking a few steps backwards, in the area of LGBTQ rights, especially since Stonewall nearly 50 years ago. I am of course concerned that our right to marry may be impacted by this, though I am hopeful that Obergefell will not be reversed. That would be cataclysmic, and I imagine would produce a second Stonewall-type reaction. I do fear, however, that the Court will give winks and nods to private individuals to trot out their prejudices publicly and deny services to LGBTQ people under the guise of “freedom of religion.” That is the new battleground. We fought it — and won — in Indiana under (then Gov.) Mike Pence. We will continue to fight it at the federal level as well. I also fear that a new era of anti-trans legislation will get tacit support from a newly comprised Supreme Court. We shall have to see, but we will not remain silent on the sidelines. We will fight.
PGN: Talking about anything Trump leads us straight into House of Cats — what you and yours claim is the first political app that puts users in the center of the action. Why did you create this in the first place? What were you hoping to say about your own politics, as well as the news/fake news of the day?
GT: Many years ago, there was a famous cat called Grumpy Cat who actually was up for a Shorty Award for Best Internet Meme, along with me. I won, by the way. Grumpy Cat came up again recently at a staffer meeting, and I thought to myself, Well, there’s a Grumpy Cat, why not a Trumpy Cat? That was the genesis of the idea, and now we have a full-blown app, House of Cats. You know, we live in a time where many of us are outraged by what is happening, and embarrassed by the state of our leadership in the White House. So, to soften that a bit, I wanted House of Cats to add some levity to our politics. House of Cats puts ordinary citizens in the political driver’s seat, letting them share their opinions with friends in a fun and funny way.
PGN: “Star Trek” technology aside, have you always been so up on cell/computer tech?
GT: I actually rely strongly on my staffers to keep me up to speed. You may have seen them teach me how to play Pokemon when it first came out. They are the “engineering” to my bridge.
PGN: Why did you focus on a Pokemon Go-style set of augmented-reality features?
GT: It was actually based on Pokemon itself. I had so much fun playing it, I thought that even older folks like me might have fun putting Trumpy Cat into their living rooms.
PGN: How and why did you choose to work with app development company BMAD? How did the collaboration play out? Are you a well-heeled animator?
GT: That was a collaboration between my team and the developers. Canadians are so clever, you know. And a bit cheaper. They are wonderful to work with, and given how much content we intend to put out there — a new Trumpy Cat speech every few days — they had better be fast too.
PGN: Are you a massive cat enthusiast? Or rather, why do cats best ID the commander-in-chief, in your humble opinion?
GT: We actually have five feral cats that we have been feeding at our home in Los Angeles. They’ve adopted us, you see. So you could say I’ve grown a fondness for cats.
PGN: Since you have been testing this in beta form, what have been the most outrageous places and situations you have put Trumpy Cat in? What have been the most radical phrases you have made him say?
GT: I haven’t made him say much yet, but I have come up with a few things for the animators to make. I found our president’s obsession with calling people “low-IQ individuals” to be particularly open to lampooning. So we recorded Trumpy Cat saying that he had his IQ tested and, he’ll have you know, he “scored a perfect 10.”
PGN: Surely, this moment in time is sad, freakish, tragic and bizarre. But I can’t help but know that you have lived through far worse as a child within the Japanese internment system of World War II, and as an actor who for so long had to cloak who he truly was/biding time until the moment was right. How will we get through the badness/lousiness of the moment? And how does Trump’s reign compare to the hardest moments of your life?
GT: Laughter is indeed a universal salve, medicine for the soul. We need more of it. Things are so bleak without it. I hope that House of Cats can be a part of that medicine. I have seen darker times than what we are seeing now, but I also know that the rhetoric that we hear now echoes strongly with that darker past. We cannot allow the spectre of hatred, bigotry and tyranny to raise its head again. I’ve dedicated my life to help ensure that things like internment camps never get built in America again. In 2018, we again have camps — this time for immigrant children, separated from their parents. This is something they didn’t even do to us during the Japanese internment. So the fears are real, and our work is cut out for us. But I do not despair because I know Americans are fundamentally good people. We sometimes make terrible mistakes, but we also know how to learn from those. And so I am hopeful, and filled with laughter that I hope many others will share too.
House of Cats is available to download from the Apple App Store and Google Play for 99 cents. A premium content-subscription version will be available soon. A percentage of the net profits from House of Cats will be donated to Refugees International. For more details, visit houseofcats.com.