Ask William Shatner Whatever You'd Like

He's Canadian, he's proven himself a successful comedic actor and writer, filmmaker, and musician, but (no matter what else he does) in many people's minds he will always be James Tiberius Kirk, captain of the USS Enterprise. Now, William Shatner has agreed to answer your questions. We'll pass on to him a selection of the best reader questions; you might want to read up on Shatner's official home page (and the Wikipedia link above) to knock out some of the most obvious ones. We'll pass on to him a selection of the best questions. Note: it's tempting to pile them on, but please try to follow the interview question guidelines by posting one question per post — ask as many questions as you'd like, though. Shatner is on vacation right now, but will work on answering your questions when he gets back.

Question

[MightyMartian]

Mr. Shatner, how did you get to be The Man? I mean, let's face it, I can't speaker for the younger generations, but as a kid who grew up on Star Trek reruns in the 1970s, your portrayal of Kirk made you The Man. Heck, I watch you on Raw Nerve, and you're still The Man.

Green

[Vrallis]

Once you go Green, do you ever go back?

Re:Quick equestrian question

[rbrightwell]

I got a good chuckle at this comment, but just to set the record straight Shatner is more like a 10 trick show horse. Kirk, Hooker, Denny Crane, talk show host, accomplished writer, business man, comedian, philanthropist, martial artist, father, equestrian, and probably more. Even if you deduct points for singing and poor driving, he's much more accomplished than most in Hollywood.

Re:Pls be candid...

[Hatta]

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.

You could say the same thing about any role Tim Allen has played.

Tek and a vision of the future.

[The Bastard]

Mr. Shatner,

It's been 22 years since TekWar was first published; seventeen since the television series gave us a "common" visualization of Tek itself. Since those two milestones, I've found it intriguing how our technological advancement seems to be aiming towards the development of Tek. And not just advancement with computers and the Internet, but within the neuroscience and brain-computer interface fields also. It is within the realm of possibility that Tek--or similar digital drug--will exist within a couple of decades.

Could you talk about how the concept of Tek came about? Was it just a "crazy idea" that hit you while riding one of your horses, or did you sit down by yourself or others to develop a vision of the future and build a story around that? Also, looking around at people addicted to using smartphones everywhere, what are your thoughts regarding a form of Tek coming into existence in the next decade or two?

Thanks for your answer, and thanks also for a great career.