Star Trek Director Gives Dying Fan Sneak Screening

A Star Trek fan with just days to live got to watch a rough cut of upcoming sequel Star Trek: Into Darkness after a plea on social media reached director JJ Abrams. The film won't be released until May, but Abrams and producer Damon Lindelof arranged for a copy to be sent to the home of New York Asian Film Festival co-founder Daniel Craft, who had discovered just weeks earlier that he had terminal cancer.

Craft's wife made popcorn and "he had spent the previous day resting so he could sit through the movie, and after signing about 200 non-disclosure agreements they watched the film and had a blast," a friend tells the Hollywood Reporter. Abrams and the producer told Craft and his wife, "'Please don't judge this—it's very rough, but we wanted you to see what we had,'" he says. "Of course, he loved the film. It was the last thing he got to do before he passed away." (More Star Trek stories.)