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William Shatner to Star in New Reality TV Series

Posted by michael on from the proud-to-be-a-born-again-trek-fan dept.

Gildor writes "The small town of Riverside, Iowa has long billed itself as the birthplace of James T. Kirk. So they were thrilled when William Shatner came there to film a Star Trek prequel about the early life of Kirk. Except there was no movie. After about 9 days, Shatner announced they were actually filming a reality TV mini-series."

4 of 271 comments (clear)

  1. Sounds like a good thing all around. by lonesome+phreak · · Score: 4, Interesting

    According to the article, Shatner, when he announced it was a hoax, gave the town $100,000 as a gift. The crew of the "film" donated $12,000 to the library. Most people where just happy to have him in town...and Shatner said it wasn't going to make fun of anyone - the reality TV show was when a big Hollywood production company comes in to a small town.

    They also spent $1,000,000 to make the show, much of that going into the towns economy. What would be REALLY cool was if the reality show went over well and Shatner decided to actually make the movie into a real movie. That could be pretty cool, and it would already have tons of publicity and marketing started for it.

    --
    Maybe we DID take the blue pill. You wouldn't remember anyway.
  2. Fraud in the name of Television by LostCluster · · Score: 4, Interesting

    This seems to be a going trend for TV producers to claim they are working on project A in order to get people to unwittingly participate in project B... here on Slashdot not to look ago there was a warning story about MTV Networks fooling experts into appearing on a Comedy Central project called "Crossballs"

    MTV Networks seems to be making a habit of this. MTV itself fooled a half dozen college students who thought they were interning on a music video project into being the stars of Faking the Video. And let's not forget TNN/SpikeTV's project called The Joe Schmo Show.

    There oughta be a law against these things... because apparently basic fraud hasn't caught up to when fraud is being done in the name of TV.

    1. Re:Fraud in the name of Television by Animats · · Score: 4, Interesting
      Yeah. I'd get a good lawyer, not take the money.

      Many years ago, the first "reality TV show", "Candid Camera", actually did get busted. They were operating in a store, and when a customer put his hat on the counter (this was a long time ago), they tried to sell the hat back to him. During the dispute with the customer, a cop walked in. Listened to the participants. Said, to the Candid Camera guy, "That's not a new hat. You're under arrest". The Candid Camera people came out from hiding, showed the camera, and said they were filming a TV show. The cop told them "It doesn't matter. You tried to steal the guy's hat. You're still under arrest", called for backup, and sent the whole crew to the lockup.

      This was back when New York City's official policy on filming was "This city is too busy to make way for film crews". Now it's "Free permits, free locations, free police assistance". And tax credits.

  3. Re:shitener by DeepHurtn! · · Score: 4, Interesting

    Oh, that's not really fair. Have you read his "Get a Life"? Contempt is the last word I would use to describe his feelings towards his fans. (The book title is mocking his (in)famous joke on SNL, btw.)