ACT FOUR

The windswept surface of Rigel XII. There are rocks in the foreground,
hills in the background, and something that might be snow or might be
something more toxic swirling in the air. Kirk voiceovers,
"Captain's log. Transporting down to surface of planet Rigel XII
to acquire replacements lithium crystals. Expect further difficulties
from miners." We dissolve to an exterior view of a futuristic
Quonset hut with a pair of turning sensor antennas on top. It looks
very cramped and uncomfortable, and you definitely wouldn't want to
spend three years cooped up in it.

Kirk, Spock, and Mudd materialize in front of the hut, and immediately
find themselves being blasted by the wind. They look around, and
it's Mudd who spots the hut. The three make their way toward it.

Inside, there's a party going on. Kovacs is having a laugh with
Benton. Kirk, Spock, and Mudd enter, covered with dust, which they
brush off. Childress and Kirk exchange glares. The three newcomers
cross the room to where Childress is standing. In the background, we
see Bonaventure and Gossett enjoying each others' company. McHuron
is standing unhappily a few feet from Childress, next to a window with
a view of the desolation outside.

"All right, Childress, you've won," says Kirk. "Now I'll
take the lithium crystals."

Childress, clearly not a man to pass up the opportunity to be an
asshole, smirks, "When I have the time, Kirk," and laughs as he
moves past.

"Childress-"

"We're busy, Mr. Kirk," Childress smirks as he leans against a
wall next to McHuron. For her part, McHuron has her eyes on Kirk as he
walks away. As Childress starts chatting her up, we see her turn to
look out the window.

Kirk approaches Spock, who says, "We don't have the time to spare,
Captain."

"You got a better idea?" Kirk growls.

McHuron finally turns around to look at Childress as he says, "Blows
like that all the time." We see another shot of the desolate
surface, a few twisted black shrubs and some weed patches under a pink
sky, and the howling wind. Back to Childress and McHuron, as he
continues, "You can get lost a dozen feet from your own doorstep if
the wind comes up suddenly." Shots of Kirk and Kovacs as we hear a
hissing sound. "Magnetic storm," Childress explains. "That
means the wind'll really rip soon." McHuron looks as though
she's having second thoughts about settling down on Rigel XII. Maybe
cleaning canal mud off the floor back on her home planet isn't
looking so bad now.

Meanwhile, Kovacs is saying, "Dance with me," to Benton, an
anorak-clad middle-aged man with bristly black receding hair. Like the
other two miners, he could use a shave. Kovacs throws her arms around
him and the two slow-dance across the floor.

Childress, not wanting to be left out of the fun, circles around to
McHuron's side and says, "Would you like to dance?"

McHuron, looking rather unwell, gasps out a "No" before she
succumbs to a coughing fit. Kirk and Mudd both look on in concern,
though doubtless concerned about different things. "No," she
repeats. "I-I'm sorry, I . . . I guess it must be the dust."

"That's the way it is on Rigel," says Childress, "all the
time." He's definitely having second thoughts about McHuron. He
stalks away to where Bonaventure is dancing with Gossett, peels her off
of him, and swings her around. McHuron is on the verge of tears, while
Gossett looks a bit lost.
Gossett finally goes up to Benton and Kovacs and says, "Hey."

"Go away," Benton responds.

"I'm cutting in," says Gossett.

"Not on me," says Benton.

Gossett pushes Benton away and starts dancing with Kovacs. Mudd is
starting to look alarmed. An angry Benton shoves Gossett away from
Kovacs, then the two of them start grappling while Kirk, Spock, Mudd,
and Childress move in to try and break it up, and Bonaventure and
Kovacs laugh. Childress bellows, "What's the matter with you?"

McHuron, sobbing, lurches across the room to the outside door. "Why
don't you just run a raffle," she cries out, "and the loser gets
me?" She pulls open the door and throws herself outside.

Kirk and Spock rush to the door. Childress calls out, "You can't
go out there, you'll get killed!"

"Just have those crystals here when I get back," Kirk growls as he
shakes off Childress' hand and follows McHuron outside. Spock and
Mudd follow him.

We hear the hiss of the magnetic storm as McHuron staggers across the
surface of Rigel XII and falls. The background music is the same we
heard during Kirk's fight with Mitchell in "Where No Man Has Gone
Before". Kirk follows as McHuron climbs back to her feet and presses
on. "Eve!" he calls. "Eve!" We see McHuron stumble along,
then cut to Childress as he makes his way through the storm.

#

The Enterprise orbits Rigel XII. Kirk voiceovers, "Captain's log.
Have transported aboard the Enterprise to implement search with
infrared scanners and sensing systems.

We cut to the bridge where a concerned Mudd watches Spock, both of them
showing signs of wear from conditions on the surface. Spock is looking
at some sort of gizmo with a dial on top. Kirk continues, "Magnetic
storms on the planet's surface are cutting down speed and efficiency
of our equipment. Search now in progress for three hours, eighteen
minutes."

We see Kirk, also looking somewhat battered, turn to look as Farrell
says, "Traverse parallel three and four."

"Checking," says Sulu, "but not getting much."

"Storm is ionizing the atmosphere, Captain," says Spock.
"Getting difficult to probe through it."

"Captain," says Scott, "this is draining our batteries further.
If we only had those crystals-"

"But we don't," says an angry Kirk. "I didn't get any. I
should have found a way. Satisfied, Mr. Scott?"

"Losing communications with the miners, sir," reports Uhura.
"Magnetic storm seems worse."
"Has Childress reported in yet?" Kirk asks.

"No, sir. He and the girl are still missing."

Kirk turns back to Scott and says, "Sorry, Scotty." Scott gives
him an "It's all right" nod. "How much power do we have
left?"

"About five hours, sir."

#

On the surface of Rigel XII, we see Childress carrying an unconscious
McHuron into the Quonset hut. Inside, he carries her over to his bunk
and gasps as he sets her down. He looks down at her unconscious form
for a moment, then heads over to a wooden bench, lies down, and goes to
sleep.

#

The Enterprise orbits Rigel XII. Kirk voiceovers, "Captain's log.
I've expended all but forty-three minutes of power. Ship's
condition-critical."

Cut to Kirk looking weary in the Big Chair. "Search now in progress
seven hours, thirty-one minutes. Magnetic storms are easing."

Spock still has his dial gizmo as he taps Sulu's console and says,
"Infrared reading. Check traverse three, grid zero four zero."

"About eleven miles," says Farrell, "bearing one two one from the
mining company."

"That's Ben Childress's quarters," Sulu notes. Good grief,
Childress has his quarters eleven miles from the actual mine? No
wonder he's so grouchy. And no wonder they've been at it for three
years. And no wonder they can't attract any women, in spite of their
wealth.

"There's a heat unit operating there," Spock reports. "Could
be a cook stove."

"Have Mudd meet me in the transporter room," Kirk orders.

"Mudd?"

"The name of this game," says Kirk cryptically.

#

Childress's quarters. We see that the heat unit is indeed a cook
stove, and Eve McHuron is frying up some food. She has exchanged her
red dress for a shapeless green bathrobe, and her hair is kind of
frizzy.

Childress wakes up, and rises stiffly from the wooden bench. He pauses
at the aroma of breakfast cooking, and sees McHuron at the stove. He
scratches his head, hitches up his belt, and gives a chair a kick.
"I had things where I wanted them," he grumbles.

"I ate some of your food, so I paid with some chores."

Striding over to the stove, he adds, "And I do my own cooking." He
tries to move a frying pan, then gives a brief yelp of pain when he
finds out it's hot. McHuron smiles at his discomforture. She's
supposed to be in a state of post-drug ugliness, but she still looks
pretty darn hot even without any Vaseline on the camera lens.

"Now, I've not laid a hand on you, remember that," Childress
declares, and I have a sneaking suspicion that NBC's Broadcast
Standards insisted on that line being there, to make clear to the
audience that Childress and McHuron weren't fooling around when we
weren't looking.

McHuron sneers, "Oh, the sound of male ego. You travel halfway
across the galaxy, and it's still the same song," as she carries
breakfast over to the table. "There, you eat or talk."

Not to be outdone, Childress sneers back, "I guess I'm supposed to
sit, taste it, roll my eyes, and say, 'Ooooh, female cooking
again'." They trade glares before Childress grudgingly sits down
and starts to eat. "I've tasted better," he insists, "by my
own hand." I could make some sort of joke here about some other
things Childress might prefer by his own hand, but I'm not going to,
because I'm better than that.

"Well, you're tasting some of it now," McHuron volleys back.
"I couldn't scrape three layers of your leavings out of that
pan."

"You find me a well, some decent water, then talk."

In her most insultingly "duh" tone of voice, McHuron answers,
"Well, why don't you hang your pan out in the wind and let the sand
blast it clean? Or hadn't you thought about that?"

He glares at her and goes back to eating breakfast, but he's not too
proud to give the idea a try. After stringing up some line and hanging
his pots and pans from it, Childress returns to his quarters to find
McHuron, back in her red dress, amusing herself with some disk-shaped
playing cards. She's holding three in her hand, and the rest are
laid out in a pattern on the table, mostly face down. For the record,
the three cards in her hand are the seven of diamonds, the seven of
spades, and the jack of hearts. As Childress approaches, she picks up
the four of hearts and places it on a row of other cards.

"It might work," he admits.

He and McHuron exchange wary looks, and the Tholian Theme starts
playing again. Finally, awkwardly, he says, "This Solitaire?"

McHuron shakes her head. "Double-jack." Since a quick check of
Google doesn't turn up any references to a card game called
double-jack (other than a link to Memory Alpha's description of
McHuron playing it in this episode), I assume Kandel or somebody on the
writing staff made it up. This makes two fictional card games
mentioned in The Original Series.

Childress, at a loss to deal with this woman sitting in his quarters,
finally observes, "Red eight ought to go on the black nine."

"Not in double-jack."

Now he's starting to get pissed. "You're not only plain as an
old bucket, you're not even good company." When she doesn't
answer, he says, "Well, what the devil happened to your looks
anyway?"

"I got tired of you," McHuron says. "I slumped."

Really pissed now, he stalks over and grabs her by the arms. "Did
you hear what I said? You're homely! I've got enough in crystals
already to buy queens--by the gross!" He sweeps his hand across the
table, scattering the playing cards across the room.

Just how far Childress would have gone in expressing his anger will
never be known, because at that point the door to his quarters opens,
and Kirk and Mudd enter. Childress backs up and says, "I didn't
touch her." Not quite true, and it's possible that McHuron has
some bruises forming on her upper arms.

"Thank heaven you found her," says Mudd. Was he genuinely
concerned for her welfare, or was he just relieved that some valuable
merchandise has turned up intact? It seems to be the former, but this
is Harry Mudd, after all.

"She's been bubbling with gratitude ever since," Childress
remarks sourly.

"Sit down," Kirk orders Mudd. Mudd does, and so does Childress.
Kirk remains standing. "Tell him. Tell him, Harry."

Mudd's shifty eyes rattle around in his head for a moment before he
says, "Ah, yes, well . . . "

"The Venus drugs, Harry," Kirk prompts him. McHuron's eyes are
on Mudd.

"Venus drug?" says Childress. "I've heard of it, but . . .
it's not just one of those stories?"

"Oh, it exists," says Kirk. "Illegally."

"Well, actually, you see," Mudd starts babbling, "it's a
relatively harmless drug." He starts fumbling in his clothing,
eventually producing the silver jewelry case.

"Harmless?" says an outraged McHuron.

"Yes, uh, well," Mudd continues, "what it does is, give you more
of whatever you have. Well, with men, it makes them more . . .
muscular." Especially a certain muscle that we're not allowed to
mention on network television in 1966. "Women . . . rounder. Men
more aggressive, women more feminine, and--"

Kirk interrupts the flow of babble. "He gave it to the women before
you met them," he tells Childress.

Childress is looking unhappy as the implications unfold before him.
"Does that mean the others . . . they really look like she does?"

Mudd goes into full bullshit mode. "Mr. Childress, I-"

"Is that what it means?" Childress angrily interrupts.

"Yes, that's what it means!" McHuron bursts out.

A moment passes before Childress asks, "What happened to my
partners?"

"They left for their quarters during the storm," says Kirk.
"They're married. Subspace radio marriage." Because you can't
have single women sleeping with single men on network television in
1966.

Childress goes for Mudd's throat, but Kirk shoves him back in his
seat.

"It was a fraud," explains Kirk. "They can get out of it."

"If they want to," Mudd adds, still hoping to see a profit.

Childress turns to glare at McHuron. "Why?"

"You can't condemn the women," says Mudd with uncharacteristic
charity.

"I can," Childress declares. "A man goes out and fights, almost
dies. We all almost died. We should have, but we didn't. And now
that we've got the good life in our hands, you bring us women for
wives that-"

"You don't want wives," McHuron interrupts. "You want this!"
She grabs the jewelry case and picks out three of the pills. They
don't glitter like they did before, but maybe that's due to the
light in Childress' quarters. "This is what you want, Mr.
Childress! And I hope you remember it, and dream about it, because you
can't have it! It's not real!" She turns her back to the men
and swallows the pills. Mudd watches her with an odd look on his face.
Kirk's eyes flick back and forth between Childress and McHuron.
There's a little smile on his face.

McHuron turns around, looking reeeeeeal sexy. She looks at Childress,
and her eyes are saying, come and get it, big boy! "Is this the kind
of wife you want, Ben? Not someone to help you. Not a wife to cook
and sew and cry and need, but this kind." She slinks over and seats
herself in his lap. "Selfish, vain, useless. Is this what you
really want?" As the trophy wife phenomenon demonstrates, the answer
to that question seems to be "yes" for way too many men. "All
right, then, here it is."

"Quite a woman, eh, Childress?" says Kirk, still with that little
smile. Shatner gives the "eh" that special something that only
Canadians can.

Childress, still with McHuron in his lap, says, "A fake. Pumped up
by a drug."

"By herself," Kirk corrects him. "She took no drug."

McHuron turns to look at him in surprise. "I swallowed it."

"Colored gelatin."

McHuron looks at Mudd, who explains, "Yes, they took away my drug and
substituted that."

A confused McHuron says, "That can't be."

"There's only one kind of woman," Kirk states.

"Or man, for that matter," adds Mudd.

"You either believe in yourself, or you don't." After a
moment's pause, Kirk continues, "All right, Childress, I've gone
as far with you as I intend to. I want those lithium crystals, and I
want them now." He pulls out his communicator and signals,
"Enterprise, this is Kirk."

"Spock here, Captain," the communicator responds.

"Stand by." He looks at Childress. "Do I beam down a search
party?"

A stunned Childress says, "No, the, uh, the crystals are here, and
you're welcome to them."

"Stand by, Mr. Spock. We're coming aboard with the lithium
crystals."

"How many coming, Captain?"

"Eve will stay," says Childress. "The day, at least. We, uh, we
want to talk."

"Eve?" says Kirk.

She smiles at him and says, "You've got someone up there called the
Enterprise."

Kirk nods and says, "Two of us, Mr. Spock." Pulling Mudd up out of
his seat, he adds, "Come on, Mr. Mudd."

As they pause at the door to Childress' quarters, Mudd says quietly,
"Don't you think you could possibly, by accident, arrange to leave
me behind here? On this planet, that would be punishment enough."

"I can't do that, Harry," says Kirk. "But I will appear as a
character witness at your trial. If you think that'll help."

"They'll throw away the key," says an appalled Mudd.

#

The Enterprise departs from Rigel XII. On the bridge, Kirk is in the
Big Chair, McCoy beside him. "That must have been quite a talk you
made down there," says the doctor. "Ever try considering the
patent medicine business?"

"Why should I work your side of the street?"

"I'm happy the affair is over," states Spock as he walks over.
Handing Kirk a data slate, he adds, "A most annoying, emotional
episode."

"Smack," chides McCoy as he thumps himself in the chest, "right
in the old heart. Oh, I'm sorry." Thumping himself on the left
side of his ribs, he corrects himself. "In your case, it would be
about . . . here."

"The fact that my internal arrangement differs from yours, Doctor,
pleases me no end."

Kirk hands him back the data slate as Farrell reports, "Course
plotted and all systems in operation."

"Engines engaged," Sulu adds. "Helm answering."

As Scott enters from the turbolift, we pull back from Kirk and McCoy.

"Out of orbit, sir," says Farrell.

"Ahead full," orders Kirk.

"Ahead full, sir," Sulu acknowledges. McCoy turns and heads for
the turbolift as the closing credits come up.

DIRECTED BY HARVEY HART.

A shot of space as the Enterprise cruises past.

TELEPLAY BY STEPHEN KANDEL

STORY BY GENE RODDENBERRY

CREATED AND PRODUCED BY GENE RODDENBERRY

#

Closing credits:

The Enterprise orbiting Rigel XII.

STAR TREK

ASSOCIATE PRODUCERS
ROBERT H. JUSTMAN
JOHN D.F. BLACK

DIRECTOR OF PHOTOGRAPHY
JERRY FINNERMAN

PRODUCTION DESIGNER
WALTER M. JEFFERIES

Kirk, Spock, and Mudd in front of Childress' quarters.

THEME MUSIC BY
ALEXANDER COURAGE

MUSIC COMPOSED AND DIRECTED BY
FRED STEINER

GUEST STAR
ROGER C. CARMEL

Mudd's Women on the transporter stage.

CO-STARRING
KAREN STEELE

FEATURING
DEFOREST KELLEY AS DR. MCCOY

MAGGIE THRETT AS RUTH

SUSAN DENBERG AS MAGDA

The lithium cracking station on Delta Vega.

AND

JAMES DOOHAN -- SCOTT
GEORGE TAKEI -- SULU
JIM GOODWIN -- FARRELL
NICHELLE NICHOLS -- UHURA
GENE DYNARSKI -- BEN
JON KOWAL -- HERM
SEAMON GLASS -- BENTON
JERRY FOXWORTH -- GUARD

ART DIRECTOR
ROLLAND M. BROOKS

FILM EDITOR
BRUCE SCHOENGARTH

ASSISTANT DIRECTOR
MICHAEL S. GLICK

SET DECORATOR
CARL F. BIDDISCOMBE

COSTUMES CREATED BY
WILLIAM THEISS

POST PRODUCTION EXECUTIVE
BILL HEATH

MUSIC EDITOR
ROBERT H. RAFF

SOUND EDITOR
JOSEPH G. SOROKIN

SOUND MIXER
JACK F. LILLY

PHOTOGRAPHIC EFFECTS
WESTHEIMER COMPANY

SCRIPT SUPERVISOR
GEORGE A. RUTTER

People being thrown around the bridge.

MUSIC CONSULTANT
WILBUR HATCH

MUSIC COORDINATOR
JULIAN DAVIDSON

SPECIAL EFFECTS
JIM RUGG

PROPERTY MASTER
IRVING A. FEINBERG

GAFFER
GEORGE H. MERHOFF

HEAD GRIP
GEORGE RADER

PRODUCTION SUPERVISOR
BERNARD A. WIDIN

MAKEUP ARTIST
FRED B. PHILLIPS, S.M.A.

HAIR STYLES BY
VIRGINIA DARCY, C.H.S.

WARDROBE MISTRESS
MARGARET MAKAU

CASTING
JOSEPH D'AGOSTA

SOUND
GLEN GLENN SOUND CO.

Glistening Green Vina.

A DESULU PRODUCTION

IN ASSOCIATION WITH
NORWAY CORPORATION

EXECUTIVE IN CHARGE OF PRODUCTION
HERBERT F. SOLOW

Inside Star Trek notes that thanks to director Harvey Hart's intricate
camera set-ups, production of "Mudd's Women" ran a full day over
schedule, wrapping on Tuesday, June 14, 1966. This is the reason
"Mudd's Women" was the only episode Hart directed.

As noted earlier, the stardates on "Mudd's Women" indicate that this
episode actually took place before "The Corbomite Maneuver". If that's
the case, then in between the two episodes, Farrell was replaced by
Bailey at the navigation position, probably because his regular
rotation at the post ended.

"Mudd's Women" was the only episode of the Original Series to have a
direct sequel: "I, Mudd", also written by Stephen Kandel. "I, Mudd",
in turn, gave rise to no less than three mutually exclusive sequels.
The first was "Mudd's Passion", an episode of Star Trek: The Animated
Series written by Kandel. The second was "The Business, as Usual,
During Altercations", an original novella by J.A. Lawrence (aka Mrs.
James Blish) that was included with the two televised Mudd episodes in
the 1978 novelization Mudd's Angels. The third was the 1997 novel Mudd
in Your Eye by Jerry Oltion. This is by no means the record for
mutually exclusive sequels: that distinction belongs to the unnamed
Romulan commander in "The Enterprise Incident", who has enjoyed at
least half a dozen mutually excusive fates in published Star Trek
fiction ranging from 1977's The Price of the Phoenix by Marshak and
Culbreath to 1999's Vulcan's Heart by Sherman and Shwartz.

Stephen Kandel was a veteran television writer, having written episodes
of Sea Hunt, 77 Sunset Strip, and Burke's Law among other series when
he was hired by Desilu in 1965 to write the script for "Mudd's Women".
He went on to write episodes of I, Spy, Ironside, The Wild Wild West,
Hawaii Five-O, Mission: Impossible, Mannix, the "Mudd's Passion" and
"Jihad" episodes of Star Trek: The Animated Series, Charlie's Angels,
and MacGyver, which he also produced.

Next: a transporter accident leaves Captain Kirk beside himself in "The
Enemy Within".