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The Many Iterations of William Shatner
pickens writes "The NY Times weekend magazine has a long profile, well worth reading, of self-described 'working actor' William Shatner. He began acting at age 6 and at one point in the late 1950s was mentioned in the same breath as his contemporaries Steve McQueen, Paul Newman, and Robert Redford — until, without explanation, his career faded before it bloomed. Shatner, now 79, pulls no punches in his memories of the Star Trek years. 'I never thought it'd become a big deal, just 13 episodes and out,' says Shatner. 'I didn't think I was hard to get along with. There were a few disaffected actors who came in once a week. I had nothing to do with them. Friendly! I was working seven days a week, learning 10 pages of dialogue a day. They had one line!' Which was the beginning of the William Shatner character. 'They said I was this William Shatner character, and I figured I had to be it. Pompous, takes himself seriously, hardheaded.' Shatner said that that character evolved slowly, until one day he realized he couldn’t change it. 'So I played it. But I didn’t see it. That character doesn’t seem like me to me. I know the real William Shatner.'"
Yes.... well... this... should.... be an interesting.... read...
...News day?
Have you heard about SoylentNews?
...I can't hear you over the sound of how awesome I am.
but it's been a long time and I've worked hard to block out certain memories.
My main memory of Generations was my wife and I sitting in the theater, watching Kirk ride a horse. At one particular scene where Kirk is on his horse, silhouetted against the sky, I turned to my wife and said in my best pair of mock upper-class British accent:
"Did you hear about old Kirk? He's retired from Starfleet and went to some godforsaken planet to marry a horse."
"Marry a horse? Is it a female horse?"
"Of course it's a female horse. There's nothing queer about old Kirk!"
The laughter in my section indicated that this was a bit louder than I had intended. That's my story, and I'm sticking with it.
Certainly I don't know what Tim Allen was doing. He seemed to be the head of a group of actors and for the life of me I was trying to understand who he was imitating. - William Shatner, on Galaxy Quest
At the 2009 Vegas ST convention Shatner was on stage and fans were asking questions. A fan of the original series went up to the mic and told him how good of an actor he was; he then proceeded to take the next 20 minutes agreeing with her. At some point I said in a low voice 'It's like throwing gasoline on a flame,' (a quote from Galaxy Quest describing the parody character of Kirk at a convention) and the entire section burst out laughing so much he had to stop talking to find out what was going on.
"Powers. I have them."
When his wife died by drowning in the pool at their home, I got weirded out because I had just watched an episode of Columbo where he played the murderer and, you guessed it, he killed his wife by drowning her in the pool.
Truly, a life imitates art moment.
Well he is from the Stanislavski school...
#DeleteChrome
Oh, yeah? I'd ask Wil Wheaton about that.
http://www.rootstrikers.org/
The golden age of SNL is 17.
Preventive War is like committing suicide for fear of death. - Otto Von Bismarck
I haven't fully researched this, but I'm guessing that Shatner went on to a bigger career after Incubus than anyone else who starred in any Esperanto film.
Well, to be fair, when looking at the constant downward slope of quality over the life of SNL, that statement is true no matter which point on the X axis you choose...
Culture is more than commerce
I really thought the title read "The Many Irritations of William Shatner" :)