Topic: Fan Club

As William Shatner celebrates his birthday today and takes a moment to reflect upon the last 12 months, he'll have to admit to himself that this has been a very good year. He won an Emmy for his skillful portrayal of the cunning, eccentric senior lawyer Denny Crane o­n ABC-TV's The Practice, and went o­n to capture a Golden Globe for his reprisal of the character o­n the spin-off series, Boston Legal. He showed several horses at the world championships in Louisville, Kentucky and expertly drove o­ne of his horses to victory, winning the Fine Harness Amateur Championship. Last Fall, he released an album with Ben Folds, his first in decades. The album entitled Has Been received wide critical acclaim landing o­n Rolling Stone's list of top 10 picks for the year. And now as March is winding down, he's just warming up.

It was a little over an hour into Ben Folds' recent concert at the El Rey Theatre in Los Angeles when William Shatner slipped o­nto the stage and shyly approached the microphone amid enthusiastic clapping and cheering from the sold-out crowd. The love and energy from the audience was palpable and Bill seemed like he couldn't quite believe this overwhelming acceptance of his foray back into the music scene.

William Shatner's much anticipated new album "Has Been" will hit stores o­n October 5, 2004. The album was produced by musical artist Ben Folds and is being distributed by Shout! Factory. It contains a wonderfully diverse collection of personal songs and heartfelt verse, much of which was written by Bill himself. The album was recorded at Javelina Studios in Nashville, Tennessee (the same studio where Elvis Presley performed) and it has already gotten some very good reviews. "Esquire Magazine" raves that it's "so droll and profound that we're thinking Grammy."

This year, we decided to combine our annual fan club get together, Shatner Weekend 2004, with the Hollywood Charity Horse Show affording members the opportunity to attend both events during the same 3-day period. We scheduled a full slate of activities between Friday, April 30th and Sunday, May 2nd including lunch with Bill, a VIP tour of Paramount Pictures, and several visits to the Los Angeles Equestrian Center, site of the 14th Annual Hollywood Charity Horse Show. Just two days before the start of the Weekend, Bill invited us to attend the taping of his appearance o&shy;n the <em>On-Air with Ryan Seacrest</em> show and we were delighted to juggle the itinerary to include this special event. It provided a wondrous complement to an absolutely magical Weekend.

Once again this year, William Shatner was a featured guest at Creation Entertainment?s annual Grand Slam convention which took place&nbsp;March 26-28th in Pasadena, California. Bill appeared on Saturday afternoon full of energy, sporting a beautiful black pin striped suit and spent close to an hour entertaining the audience filling the large auditorium. He arrived o&shy;n stage to a standing ovation?well at least a standing ovation from the back half of the audience. "Everybody in the back is standing up and nobody in the front is standing up," he quipped. That?s because most everybody up front was busy taking pictures!