By Steve Krutzler / 09:24, 12 March 2004 / TrekWeb Features

An Evening with William Shatner
By Jacqueline Bundy

To millions of people around the world he is, and always will be, the heroic and beloved Captain James T. Kirk. William Shatner's 50-year television career parallels the history of the medium; and throughout that career William Shatner has proven himself to be one of the most popular and endearing forces in television. From his screen debut in 1951 at the age of twenty in the Canadian production of The Butler's Night Off, through the heyday of live television and radio drama, the Broadway stage and his numerous television and movie roles Shatner has remained one of the world's most popular and versatile entertainment personalities.

At the 21st William S. Paley Television Festival, The Museum of Television and Radio's annual salute to the history of television, William Shatner was a featured guest at the two-week event. On a warm Los Angeles evening several hundred people filled the theater at the Director's Guild of America building as the festival honored William Shatner's astonishing career.

The curator of the New York branch of the Museum of Television and Radio, Ron Simon, introduced Mr. Shatner by saying "Tonight we take a look at the enduring and beloved career of William Shatner, a man that has been a vital presence on American television for over fifty years." Mr. Simon stated that Shatner "was a mainstay of live television in both New York and Los Angeles. After live television left he then moved on to some of the most well known programs on film in LA, programs like the Twilight Zone and The Fugitive. In the 60's he had several choices through the years to be a lead actor and he choose, of course, STAR TREK and created one of the most memorable characters, James Kirk, in the history of American television."

After this introduction Shatner was warmly welcomed by the enthusiastic applause and he thanked the audience for coming. "So many eras," he joked, "In one era and out the other."

The program started with a film of clips put together by the Museum staff that were meant to document the different eras of Shatner's career. The film included clips from appearances in live television broadcasts during the 1950's in productions by Studio One and Climax but the bulk of the clips were from appearances in the 50's and 60's on such shows as The Defender, Alfred Hitchcock Presents, The Outer Limits, Dr. Kildare, Thrillers, and Outlaws. One of the clips had never been seen before, the 1964 pilot episode of Alexander the Great in which Shatner had been cast as Alexander.

The other decades of Shatner's television career weren't neglected and included things such as the 1970 television production of The Andersonville Trial, his famous appearance as himself on Saturday Night Live, his role as TJ Hooker and his memorable role on Third Rock from the Sun. The last portion of the film began with the starship Enterprise sailing across the screen before the clips from Star Trek were shown, which included a montage of Captain Kirk 'getting the girl'.

After the film Mr. Shatner sat down with Ron Simon to talk about his prolific career. Simon began by commenting that Shatner's love of acting was evident to which Shatner quipped, "a little too much at times," much to the delight of the audience who he held easily in the palm of his had throughout the entire discussion.

Asked when he caught the acting bug Shatner explained that he was only six and attending a summer camp run by his aunt when he had his first stage experience. He admitted that he liked the applause and attention he received and that he "continued to hunger for it."

And so a career was born that started out in his native Canada, Shatner spoke a bit about his three years with the Stratford Ontario Shakespeare Festival saying that it was, "a creative and formative period in my life." He talked about the legendary English stage director, Tyrone Guthrie, who was the artistic director of the company during Shatner's time there. Shatner said that Tyrone Guthrie was the model he used for his latest role in the ABC drama The Practice. Shatner said he would be playing a lawyer named Denny Crane who he described as, "a top man in the firm, an icon that seems like a buffoon but he's really smart."

After three years of radio and film work in Montreal and Ottawa, for Shatner Stratford was hitting the big time. Good reviews in a New York play lead to his getting parts in the 1950's in the thriving live television broadcast arena and Shatner talked a bit about what that experience was like. "Live television was fraught with danger," Shatner said. "No tape, no delay, just you and this camera." It could be a difficult job, you had to learn a new script each week and "you went into it a like a prizefighter."

Sharing a couple of memorable moments of when things did go wrong Shatner recounted the story of working with Basil Rathbone in a 1955 Canadian production of the drama Billy Budd. Admitting that he and the other actors were rather intimidated by the idea of working with Mr. Rathbone they all rehearsed extensively. Then on the night of the broadcast Basil Rathbone stepped onstage and right into a bucket, Consequently Rathbone couldn't deliver his next lines as he struggled to free his foot.

Asked about the pilot for the television drama Alexander the Great that was produced by Selig J. Seligman, who is perhaps best known for the World War II drama Combat, Shatner said, "Combat was a huge success so the next thing Selig wanted to do was Alexander the Great. It was like Combat in drag. We would have predated all the gay shows. But old stodgy ABC wouldn't accept it."

Shatner worked hard preparing for the role knowing it would require a great deal physically. "I knew I'd be required to ride horses. I had to ride bare back, and I started weight lifting and I rode and I really prepared for this role. We did it as a pilot, and when it came out it was a two-hour movie." Despite the pull Seligman had with the studio the show was immediately cancelled by ABC.
About a year after that Norman Corwin, a noted poet and radio playwright who Shatner greatly admired wrote a play for Shatner. "This was in the mid 60's when I was living in LA," Shatner said. The play opened at the University of Utah where it was to run for two weeks before moving to Broadway. "Before that," Shatner recounted, "I had done a pilot named Star Trek and then I forgot about it. Now I was with Norman Corwin doing this wonderful play when I got this call that the Star Trek pilot had sold and I had to tell Norman I couldn't go to Broadway."

Prior to accepting the lead role in Star Trek Shatner had turned down other leading roles in shows like The Defenders and Dr. Kildare, although he did guest roles for both shows. Asked why he decided that he wanted to play the classic hero figure of Kirk, Shatner replied, "I'll tell you why- Steve McQueen. Steve McQueen did it. When I had come to New York a series was kind of looked down on. It was something you might do if you couldn't do anything else."

Then Steve McQueen made the jump; he accepted a role in Wanted: Dead or Alive. "Somehow something about the magic of Steve McQueen leapt from the television screen and suddenly it was not only all right, it was almost a necessity to get a series to get the theater roles you wanted."

When Shatner took a few questions from the audience, one attendee wanted to know how he felt about the numerous parodies of him, if it bothered him or not. Shatner replied with good humor, "I don't know what they are doing."

He then recounted a story about being asked if he was interested in doing something with Kevin Pollack, a comedian that has done a lot of Shatner parodies. He agreed to meet with him over lunch where Shatner said to him "I hear you do me." To which Pollack replied "Yeah I do." Shatner continued, "So I said- do me." Shatner then proceeded to imitate Kevin Pollack imitating him much to the delight of the audience.

"I said, Kevin that's not me, I don't do that. He said yes you do, I said no I don't. So I found myself arguing with Kevin Pollack as to who I am."

Another audience member asked him about working with Spencer Tracy on the film Judgment at Nuremberg and Shatner recounted his memories of arriving for work the first day where he was turned away by the guard on the gate at MGM who said his name wasn't on the list. Once he finally was admitted though he admitted to being in awe of "the magnificent actors I got to see. I was mesmerized, I was so star struck."

He also recalled the first time he saw Spencer Tracy film a scene. It was a ten-minute oration that Mr. Tracy delivered without a hitch. "Now I'm this callow theater actor right, and I'm looking at Spencer Tracy," Shatner explained. Shatner was so impressed that he went up and introduced himself and gushed that he didn't know that screen actors could do that.

Someone else in the audience wanted to know about his performance in Star Trek The Motion Picture, asking why his performance of Captain Kirk in that film was so subdued compared to his portrayal of Kirk in the television show. Shatner answered, "That's an interesting observation. 10 to 15 years later they say we want you to play Captain Kirk again." He found himself thinking, "How the heck did I play that role?" He decided to take a different approach to the part; he made a conscious choice to underplay it. "I tried to avoid being too big in Robert Wise's movie. I learned after I saw it, that I had made the wrong decision so for the second movie I took it up again."

The final question of the evening was about Kirk's death scene in Star Trek Generations. The audience member wanted to know if Shatner had any say in Kirk's death, in how Kirk died, and how it felt to watch the character die. Shatner explained that when he was told they were going to kill off the character of Kirk in that movie, "I thought was better for me to agree and play Kirk's death rather than let him dwindle."

Shatner did have his own ideas about the death scene but says they got lost along the way and then ultimately the studio decided to reshoot the ending. "I've always tried to play Captain Kirk honestly," Shatner said. He spent the night before filming that scene thinking about the death and trying to imagine the moment of death, wondering what you would be thinking and feeling. Ultimately he decided to play it as if "at the moment of his death, Kirk would look up and see death approaching," but Shatner admitted that it didn't quite work.

Throughout the evening Shatner recounted many stories and antidotes from his long career at one point commenting, "Nobody remembers anything I remember anymore."

It is impossible to recount the atmosphere that William Shatner managed to create in the theater on that unforgettable evening of the festival as he shared his memories of his career. Every yarn, every reminiscence was recounted with his own unique style and humor and the audience was spellbound. Early in the program he called himself "a repository of memories." He certainly is, and was. I'm just grateful that I was lucky enough to be there as he shared them.

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You can learn more about The Museum of Television and Radio and the William S. Paley Television Festival by visiting the museum's web site at http://www.mtr.org/