Yes, it’s William Shatner’s world. We just live
in it.
The Shatman appears not just in “Star Trek” reruns daily and on “Boston Legal” Tuesday nights at 10, 9 Central. He’s also occupying airtime on Comedy Central and even -- holy Federation! -- The History Channel.
He’s out on DVD, too, thanks to new releases from those cable productions.
Uncensored admiration/abuse fills the R-rated “Roast of William Shatner” (Comedy Central DVD, list price $20), an 80-minute extended version of the raunchy party-hearty shot for Comedy Central last year. Jason Alexander plays roastmaster, presenting Shatner’s arrival on a white steed. (Why not?) On-stage praise and digs come from the foul mouths of fellow Trekkers Nichelle Nichols [below with Shatner] and George Takei, comics like Andy Dick [right] and Artie Lange, and Farrah Fawcett and Betty White. Other Trek cast members howl in the audience. (Don’t look for Leonard Nimoy, though. Nowhere to be found.)
Bonus features include red carpet interviews with attendees (9 minutes), backstage epithets and ethnic insults (4 minutes), and a making-of short showing Shat getting his act together (3 minutes). But the main show’s the thing. Besides the naughty talk, it’s packed with clips of Shatty tube stints in “Trek,” “T.J. Hooker” and other shows, plus the infamous “SNL” get-a-life sketch and our honoree’s musical, um, “song stylings.” And there’s nothing quite like watching 84-year-old Betty White talk filthy.
“How William Shatner Changed the World” (hitting shelves April 10 from Allumination, list price $20) may be a fanciful title, but the two-hour 2005 production is actually a documentary look at the ways futuristic images from “Star Trek” have become our reality -- Federation communicators into current-day flip-phones, Dr. McCoy’s noninvasive sick-bay readouts into modern medical computer imaging, et al.
Shatner hosts and narrates in high style, presenting interviews with scientists who were awestruck by “Star Trek” as kids and inspired by its technological whimsy to help invent the real thing. The widescreen special was nominated for two Emmys (nonfiction special, nonfiction writing).
Enjoy ’em. Just don’t hold your breath waiting for Shatner’s short-lived ABC gamer “Show Me the Money” to hit the disc bins.
[Photos by Jason Merritt/Film Magic]
Comments (1)
Betty White deserves sainthood.