William Shatner

William Shatner is most famous for his portrayal of Captain James T. Kirk in the original Star Trek tv series and the subsequent first 7 Star Trek movies, but William Shatner has worked as a actor in six decades and shows no sign of stopping anytime soon. In fact, William Shatner has acted in 195 different films and television productions, directed episodes of 4 different tv shows and 2 movies and also written and/or produced over 20 other film productions. The man synonymous with Captain Kirk has also performed on a number of records, soundtracks and commercials.

Over the years, William Shatner has won awards both lauding and panning his performances. Shatner's unorthodox delivery of lines has made him a staple of comedians, fans and imitators for decades. Over the past ten years, William Shatner has gotten in the fun, mocking his own "musical readings" from albums he made back in the 1970s on a series of successful Priceline commercials. The past decade has been kind to William Shatner, who received an Emmy and a Golden Globe for his portrayal of Denny Crane on Boston Legal. Shatner has also been nominated multiple times for Golden Rasperry Awards, or Razzies, for his portrayals of Captain Kirk on the big screen. (Razzie Awards are given for the worst actors of that particular year and are given out the day before the Oscars.)

Besides his work in the film and television industries, William Shatner has been a successful author, writing several Star Trek novels and launching the TekWar novels in the 1990s, which led to a tv series Shatner produced and starred on.

William Shatner and Denny Crane

In recent years, a septuagenarian William Shatner has won Emmies for his portrayal of legendary (and unbeaten) Boston trial lawyer, Denny Crane. Despite his unbroken string of successes in the courtroom, Denny Crane, has mild cognitive impairment and fears he may be feeling the early onset of Alzheimer's Disease.

Much of the show's later seasons involve the close relationship between colleagues Alan Shore (James Spader), a younger-generation, liberal lawyer working for Crane's firm, and Denny Crane, who is conservative. Denny tends to use his legend status to his advantage, sometimes relying entirely on his reputation to get by. The legend is famous for beginning a conversation with a short introduction: "Denny Crane."

William Shatner and T.J. Hooker

William Shatner had a career renaissance in the 1980s, after he had trouble finding work throughout the latter stages of the 1970s. Besides starring in the successful Star Trek movie franchise in the Eighties, William Shatner had a successful television run playing the title character in the T.J. Hooker series. Already approaching middle age by the time T.J. Hooker premiered, William Shatner was cast as a former police detective who returned to the streets as a patrol officer after his partner was murdered. Teaming with a younger officer, the divorced veteran cop became a mentor for the rookie cop, Vince Romano, in the job and in life.

T.J. Hooker as played by William Shatner was in the classic no-nonsense mold and he had his share of run-ins with Captain Sheridan, his commanding officer, for Hooker's bending the rules on occasion. Because it was a William Shatner role, T.J. Hooker was also a ladies' man, as he was recently divorced. Later seasons saw Sheridan's daughter, Stacy Sheridan, come onto the force. Stacy and her partner, Jim Corrigan, became major characters on the show, too. Stacy Sheridan was famously played by Heather Locklear.

T.J. Hooker mixed certain amounts of humor with what passed for gritty cop drama in 1980s television and was wildly successful in its first year. The show ran from 1982 to 1986, though the final season moved from ABC to CBS.

William Shatner and TekWar

The Tekwar Novels involved a digital drug named "Tek", which entered the brain and transported the human mind to a Matrix-like alternate reality. Because Tek was both addictive and mild-altering, the drug was illegal. The first novel began with the investigation of the mysterious death an heiress, who turned out to be using Tek. William Shatner has stated in interviews that he began writing TekWar by jotting down notes on the set of Star Trek V. Shatner considered TekWar to be a blend of Star Trek (futuristic) and T.J. Hooker (cop drama). The novels proved successful enough to spawn a tv series, a comic book (TekWar Chronicles) and TekWar trading cards.

William Shatner has also written Star Trek novels, which generally revolve around Captain James Kirk's brave exploits. In one, Kirk defeat Commander Worf in a hand-to-hand battle. After Kirk's death in Star Trek VII: Generations, William Shatner proposed a way to bring back Captain Kirk in the novels and movies. The producers of Star Trek at the time had no interest in the idea. Since then, J.J. Abrams has found a way to resurrect Captain Kirk with a clever retcon, though the role of this newest version of the hero of the Star Trek universe went to 29-year old Chris Pine.

Parodies of William Shatner

There have been a number of famous parodies of Star Trek and Captain Kirk, in particular, over the years. One of the earliest was a Saturday Night Live skit where John Belushi plays Captain Kirk, who refuses to admit Star Trek isn't real and the show has been cancelled, even when production crew members begin to tear down the set of the bridge of the Enterprise. Another successful parody was the 1999 major motion picture, Galaxy Quest, where Tim Allen plays a self-absorbed analogue of Captain Kirk, whom the rest of the cast members tend to despise.

Most of the parodies have been loving ones performed by fans of the show, despite the general criticism that William Shatner hams it up in the role.

References to William Shatner are also legion. One classic scene in Fight Club has Edward Norton and Brad Pitt discussing who each would choose to battle in the ultimate fight, and Edward Norton replies, "Shatner. I'd fight William Shatner." In a reference to the likely same scene Norton's character is referencing, the movie Cable Guy has a scene where Jim Carrey's character duels Matthew Broderick's character imitates Captain Kirk's famous battle in the "Amok Time" episode of Star Trek.

The Michael Meyers character in the original Halloween movies wore a William Shatner mask. Because the mask was painted white and the hair was styled in a wild fashion, and perhaps because the mask wasn't a very good depiction of William Shatner, few ever noticed that the crazed killer was wearing a William Shatner mask. John Carpenter claims the mask created a "shiver" in the room and the production team knew they had "something special".