Actor, musician, singer, author, film director, spokesman, comedian, he’s done it all–from Captain Kirk to T. J. Hooker, from Denny Crane in The Practice to the spin-off Boston Legal, the indefatigable, irrepressible and one and only William Shatner just keeps re-inventing himself, winning Emmys and Golden Globes along the way. He also starred in the CBS sitcom $#*! My Dad Says and The Captains, a feature length documentary, which he also wrote and directed. Later, he starred in Get a Life! a documentary on Star Trek fandom.
Among his many documentaries and voiceover work, Shatner recorded a wake-up call that was played for the crew of STS-133 in the Space Shuttle Discovery in 2011. It was backed by the musical theme from Star Trek and featured a voiceover based on his spoken introduction from the series’ opening credits: “Space, the final frontier.”
In this roundtable interview, Shatner reveals his current passions and reminisces about the many projects that have made him so unforgettable.
Are you still doing anything with “Save the Whales”?
William Shatner: I am, actually. I’m a member of Green Peace. I’m a member of Sea Shepard. I narrated some documentaries on saving whales. I’m very much into whales and those species that are about to become extinct. Whales are certainly not extinct, but why do certain nations continue to kill whales for meat when they can eat something else? Everything’s so screwed up in our environment. Given half a chance, you see that an area that’s set aside for protection, like San Clemente island–a fish protected area–is restored within 10 years. Nature is so complex. We should all be aware of the interconnected-ness of nature.
You also ride horses, don’t you?
Shatner: I ride, breed and train horses. I was at a horse show last week. I won the championship there. I will be competing all year round in three different groups. I spent a good part of my adult life riding horses. Once I had some money, I started to ride competitively. I had to learn how to ride. Horsemanship is a spiritual act.
What do you think of the state of science fiction on television? How has it changed since Star Trek?
Shatner: There isn’t a real science fiction series on television that I know of. What’s happened is that computer graphics has reached such an extraordinary point that they’ve taken over the magic of movies. We can do things in movies just by imagining. These wonderful artists can draw things and bring them to life. That’s the magic of science fiction. Yet having said that, the other part of the magic is the word and your imagination. I’m in the midst of doing a science fiction comic book, which will be part of a program of filming a comic book and making it come alive. So there’s a lot of stuff that I’m doing that has to do with science fiction.
Do you have a favorite TV show?
Shatner: Dancing with the Stars–because they’re beautiful people dong beautiful things. And if you watch closely, you see an evolvement in the eyes, the gestures, the subtle ways these people change, not just physically as they improve as dancers, but their relationships. I’ve become friends with Tom Bergeron and we go out to dinner, not as frequently as I like, but I get all the gossip,
Will you be on Dancing with the Stars?
Shatner: I’ve been asked quite frequently, but I don’t have the time. It’s four months of an arduous workout.
What’s your favorite movie?
Shatner: I really enjoyed The life of Pie this year. I haven’t been to a movie in a long time.
You’ve been asked so many questions over the years about Star Trek. Is there anything you’d like people to ask you about the series?
Shatner: Many people ask me that question. They want me to ask a question of myself that I’ve never answered before. Do I wear a jockstrap? I don’t know. Over the years, pretty much everything has been examined. I don’t mind answering the same questions.
You’ve done sci-fi, action, comedy. What was your favorite and what was your most difficult?
Shatner: For the last couple of years, I’ve been out on tour. I opened a one-man show on Broadway called “Shatner’s World: We Just Live in It.” It’s an hour and half show. It went on tour in 40 cities and I’ll probably do 10 more. But every night I went out there, especially in the beginning, people would stand up and applaud at the end. I was overwhelmed by the feeling, and the affection that flowed across the floodlights was very meaningful to me. The tour was difficult because I had the stomach flu during the opening on Broadway and I was sick for about a week. But I kept thinking that one day, I’ll get through this and I’ll be talking to a large group of journalists and tell them about being sick on my opening night on Broadway (laughs).
If you were asked to redo Star Trek V, how would approach it?
Shatner: The story I’d tell about Star Trek V would be a one-line idea I had–that Star Trek goes in search of God. But I ran into flak about whose God would it be? And that would only alienate people. Then someone came up with the idea, what if you had an alien who thinks he’s God? The alien thinks he’s the devil and by projection, there’s a God. To get that film made, I agreed to it—that’s the compromise. And the difference between making a compromise and being political or standing on your standards is where do you do that? If the editor says, cut that line and you say, that’s my whole story, I’m sorry, you have to get rid of those words. Do you say, no, I’m not going to do it? Or do you say, okay, I’ll do it? So we’re making compromises and political judgments or standing on our standards in everything we do. How do you make those decisions? That’s what I had to learn on Star Trek V.
