Long stories, short memory, Shatner still entertains

Host Ernie Manouse, left, and actor William Shatner
greet the audience Jan. 14 at the Smart Financial
Centre in Sugar Land following a screening of
“Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan.”

He’s still got it, but sometimes he can’t remember where he put it.

Last Saturday Sandy and I attended the screening of “Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan” and the appearance by Captain Kirk himself, William Shatner, at the Smart Financial Centre in Sugar Land. I didn’t know it at the time, but that was the first time Sandy had seen the 40-year-old movie. Suddenly references from the newer Trek movies came clear to her. I, of course, remember “Khan.” It was my second-favorite movie after “Star Wars” for many years.

While Sandy found the special effects to be cheesy, I thought they held up remarkably well. They definitely held up better than Shatner’s memory. I certainly can’t fault a nearly 92-year-old for being a bit forgetful. I logically hope that I have the vitality and mental acuity that he does should I reach that age.

Shatner was all over the stage at the Smart Financial Centre. He was probably in search of his thoughts, as his stories followed many rabbit trails. They were good, funny stories, but at times unrelated to the question he was asked. Most of the time he’d come back to the question, but not after wondering around a galaxy of anecdotes in the process.

For example, when asked by host Ernie Manouse why he chose “Star Trek II” to screen on his tour, he went into a long explanation of how “Star Trek: The Motion Picture” came to be made. Only he kept referring to it as “Star Trek: The Movie.” He eventually got to the making of “Star Trek II” and the huge box office success it had.

Manouse asked him about how he and Khan actor Ricardo Montalbán never saw each other while making the movie as they did not have any scenes together. That sent Shatner off telling his history with the “Fantasy Island” star. As a boy, Shatner first saw Montalbán in a Broadway musical. They met years later and Montalbán corrected Shatner on the pronunciation of his name.

“Riiicardo Montalbán,” Shatner said, mimicking his Spanish accent.

That became a running joke for Shatner as he used the full, accented name each time he referenced Montalbán.

Shatner shared many stories about his career throughout the 90-minute Q&A. When he was inevitably asked which was his favorite “Star Trek” episode, he said he doesn’t like to watch himself on film and therefore doesn’t really have a favorite except for those episodes that dealt with societal issues, such as racism.

He then told the story of how the late physicist Stephen Hawking once wanted to ask him a question. Thinking they were going to get into a deep discussion about black holes or something, Shatner was surprised when Hawking – one of the greatest intellects of the 20th century – wanted to know what his favorite episode was.

Manouse asked Shatner if they were aware of the cultural statement they were making when he did the first televised interracial kiss with Nichelle Nichols. He said he was aware, but was more excited about kissing the lovely Nichols than he was about making a statement.

That led him into telling the story of how he once filmed a nude scene with Angie Dickinson. She got to dictate who could stay on set, but nobody cared to ask him. “And I’m naked!” he said.

For laughs, Shatner was asked “boxers or briefs?”

“Depends.”

At the conclusion of the talk, Manouse asked Shatner about his experience going on a sub-orbital space flight. The ride on Oct. 13, 2021, in a Blue Origin capsule made him the oldest person to go to space at age 90.

Shatner has said he anticipated making some grandiose connection between his fictional and real-life space adventures and the need to explore other worlds. What he discovered was something very different.

“That’s life,” he said, looking down. “That’s death,” he said, looking up.

“I get out of the spaceship and I find myself crying,” he said. “Not just (sniffles), I’m weeping. And I don’t know why I cried.”

He later figured it out. He experienced what many astronauts do when leaving Earth.

“I’m in grief for our world. I’m in grief for the extinction of everything that’s happening. We’ve got to do something! We’ve got to do something!” he said, his voice rising.

His answer was to make a musical album containing “So Fragile, So Blue,” a song about his experience.

He said he’s making “A music video of ‘So Fragile, So Blue’ encapsulating what I’ve just described to you about my experience going up into space, and being thrilled of course, but seeing more clearly than I ever had before what’s happening to our world. And how much it depends on every one of us to do something about it. And my calling, my reason for existence, may be this again is in my imagination, this music video, because entwined in all the lyrics is the phrase, ‘what can we do?’ What can we do and it ends. What can we do and the music comes to a peak and that will be a music video in the next few months.”

It was my third time seeing Shatner in person and the first since his space flight. Given his age, I keep thinking each time I see him is probably the last. Whether it is or not, it’s safe to say that Shatner has lived long and prospered.

Joe Southern is the managing editor of the Wharton Journal-Spectator and the East Bernard Express. He can be reached at news@journal-spectator.com.