Maybe you were there: Anaheim Stadium, late ’70s, William Shatner on stage?
“It was enormous,” Shatner says, expanding on one of the many stories he shares in “Up Till Now” (Thomas Dunne Books, $25.95), his new autobiography.
“I had a huge screen behind me, and some 30,000 people in the stands,” the actor says of his performance there, dramatic readings of science fiction classics while an orchestra played behind him.
“And I had such a good sound system that I could whisper and they could hear it. Not only that, but there was an electrical storm glowering in the background, so there was this background of thunder all the time.
“And all somebody had to do, in those 30,000 people, was yell, ‘Beam me up, Scotty!’ or something to destroy the illusion, and I’d have been dead,” Shatner says. “But nobody did.”
If it feels like Shatner has always been there, well, as the book makes clear, that’s because it’s partly true.
After a childhood in Montreal, by the early ’50s Shatner was acting in New York City, on stage and in early television, where he stayed into the ’60s, starring in Broadway plays, films such as “Judgment at Nuremberg,” and television series such as “The Twilight Zone.”
The mid-’60s landed the role that would define the rest of his life: Capt. James T. Kirk, commander of the Starship Enterprise, though as the book reminds us, it was not a huge success in its initial three-year run, and by the end of its flight through space and television, Shatner wasn’t any better off financially than he had been when it started.
The ’70s brought constant guest spots on dozens of hit TV series. The ’80s were defined by his second hit series, “TJ Hooker,” and the revival of “Star Trek” as a series of blockbuster movies.
Most recently, his work on “The Practice” and “Boston Legal” – playing eccentric lawyer Denny Crane – brought him roles worth of Emmy nominations and wins.
And we’ve not even mentioned his singing.
So there would seem to be plenty of good reasons for the 77-year-old Shatner to want to share the stories of his life, but when you ask him, the one he gives you is unexpected.
“I wrote it because I had the opportunity to,” he says, speaking in his deliberate way by phone after a day on the set of “Boston Legal.” “And I chose to do it because I felt it was a way of explaining to my children and grandchildren who I was … in some minuscule form, like a book.
“So the last while I’ve been trying to do things that may explain who this creature was that they were looking at, and what was going on inside.”
In a way, he explains, one of the most recognizable faces in show business needed to write a book to help his own family recognize who he was and what his life had meant for all those years he’d spent in the spotlight. It was an experience, that Shatner says showed him things about himself he’d never before recognized.
Shatner told his stories into a recorder and sent them to co-author David Fisher, who worked them into rough drafts of chapters, which mapped the actor’s life in ways he’d never considered it before, he says.
“I saw my life laid out in a pattern, laid out in a sequential way that I’d never thought of it before, and then I went through the process of puzzling out what was the meaning of all this, where were the repetitions, the habits – why did I do the things that I did?
“And it was alarming! First of all, the time, the interval between the first story and the last story in my head is about seven weeks,” Shatner says. “But it turns out to be considerably longer than that. And it all happened so quickly and I had no idea that it was happening.”
Seeing the passage of time in his life’s story, Shatner says, encouraged him not just to complete the book, but also to consider everything else that he wanted to accomplish in his life.
“It reinforces a feeling of anxiety of getting thing done, of doing the things you meant to do, or you have in mind to do,” he says. “There’s an urgency involved that wasn’t there before.”
And so he talked and talked, and Fisher sculpted the stories into chapters and a book that is filled with stories.
Many are funny – his encounter with Koko the famous gorilla, who decided to grab him by a most sensitive part of the anatomy, helps open the book.
Others poignant – after “Star Trek” ended, freshly divorced and completely broke, he was practically homeless, working in summer stock around the country, sleeping behind the theaters in his pickup truck to save money.
Much of it is told with the self-deprecating tone you’ve seen him use on TV over the years – talking about how he launched his singing career with uber-dramatic readings of songs such as Elton John’s “Rocket Man” (which if you haven’t seen, both he and I urge you to look up on YouTube.com.)
The tragedy of his life – the drowning death of his third wife Nerine – is heartbreakingly told, Shatner finding her body in their swimming pool after returning from a visit to his daughter and grandkids in Orange County.
But other than those few very sad moments, “Up Till Now” is a fun read, an entertaining book, with off-beat devices used throughout to keep readers on their toes. Periodically, Shatner breaks the flow of his story to suggest readers take a moment to visit WilliamShatner.com and maybe pick up a DVD of “Incubus,” the ’60s cult movie film in Esperanto in which he starred, or a 25th anniversary “Wrath of Kahn” Kirk action figure.
“The idea is that there’s an offhand way of telling a story, that I think insinuates itself better than sometimes just telling the story straight,” Shatner says of the casual voice he adopts for the book and the tongue-in-cheek asides for his Web site, his charities and other random thoughts.
“There’s more fun, and the idea here was to entertain you both in a comical way and a serious way,” he says. “To try to give you rhythms of that and alter you, the reader’s, feelings.”
What comes through in the end – what his kids and grandkids hopefully will see – is the love of his work and of working that have ruled his life since he was a boy. Always Shatner was ready to work – whether as star of a TV series or a paid contestant on a game show or as a commercial pitchman for companies such as Priceline.com (a gig that worked out well, given the stock options with which he was paid.)
So while he thinks “Boston Legal” will be renewed for another season, even if it’s not, there’s no reason he can think of why he wouldn’t just look for the next job after that.
“Retirement? I keep saying, ‘To where?’ TGIF – you know, I don’t understand that phrase. If you’re thanking God it’s Friday, then you don’t like what you’re doing Monday through Friday, and that’s a terrible way to spend your life.”
And it’s a life he says he’s truly relished living, so much so that other than the writing of this book, he’s seldom stopped to contemplate whether the past was better or the future might be brighter.
“You know, I feel like a woodworker, who is totally involved in the grain of the wood, and the fineness of the texture of the material, and carving out a little detail here or there,” he says. “I’m so close to it that I don’t see the table, I’m only looking at this one particular moment, and looking back and looking forward is not something I like to do.
“It’s living in the present and trying to bring the sum of my experience to whatever I’m doing,” Shatner says. “Whether it’s talking to you, or saying hello to a grandchild.”
Contact the writer: 714-796-7787 or plarsen@ocregister.com
