Once again this year, William Shatner was a featured guest at Creation Entertainment?s annual Grand Slam convention which took place 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 o­n 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!

When Bill opened the floor to questions, o&shy;ne audience member wanted to know if Bill could elaborate o&shy;n what is the most difficult aspect of directing. Bill said it was an interesting question and went o&shy;n to explain some of his experiences directing <em>Star Trek V: The Final Frontier</em>. He mentioned that he came up with the premise that <em>Star Trek</em> goes in search of God, but the studio had two concerns. O&shy;ne was "who?s God?" The second was a fear that they would alienate people with that premise. Bill said that someone came up with a compromise, suggesting that it?s an alien that looks like the devil. He said "I so desperately wanted to do <em>Star Trek</em> in search of God, that I said, ?Okay, that sounds good, that will work? and thus began the fist compromise in the journey of compromises."

Bill went o&shy;n to elaborate. "Compromise.&nbsp; When do you compromise? How much do you compromise? It?s a lesson in life, really, that we all have to learn. When is it principle and when is it accommodated? When do you say, ?No, no, no, I?m not going to do that. If it costs me my job, I don?t care. It goes against my principles.? Or when do you say, ?Oh, I understand your opposition to that. Let me see if I can accommodate that in what I have to do??" He went o&shy;n to add, "It?s an interesting question. It follows you all through life. There?s no course for a director in Political 101. It?s a life experience. So, I made the first compromise o&shy;n a very basic premise of that movie, and from then o&shy;n, it was a series of accommodations."

The rock creatures in the movie were another source of compromise for Bill. In the beginning, he wanted ten fire-breathing, smoking rock creatures. At $350,000 each, that was out of his budget. So, he agreed to go with five, then two?and finally just o&shy;ne rock creature. He had the audience in his hand as he described his vision, his efforts to make the rock creature a reality. His energy was infectious. Unfortunately, when the $350,000 suit arrived the night before filming began, Bill was told by the special effects team that they couldn?t incorporate the flames into the costume. "It would singe the guy inside." When they began filming, the smoke effect wasn?t really visible, because there was a dessert breeze. It didn?t work. Bill summed up his answer to the question quite eloquently when he said, "A director spends money judiciously, has priorities, and tries to make as few compromises as possible--and I made a few."

One gentleman wanted to know who came up with the idea for his record, The Transformed Man. Bill said that it was his idea to take great pieces of literature and combine them with music, to show "how poetry is universal." He went o&shy;n to explain that each piece of literature o&shy;n the album was teamed with a song that "contrasted the philosophy of that literary piece." Unfortunately, the selections ended up being taken out of context and were largely misinterpreted.

In an interesting turn of events, the latter-day distributors of The Transformed Man, the Foos brothers, contacted Bill last year and asked him to do another album for them. As you may know, Bill recorded the album last December in Nashville, Tennessee. " The album reflects some of the thoughts and experiences I have had, and the reaction so far for the seven or eight cuts that are ready right now has been remarkable." He said he?s waiting with great anticipation for the album?s release. It features selections by Brad Paisley, Henry Rollins and Joe Jackson, to name a few.

Next up, Bill auctioned off two Enterprise set visits,&nbsp;kindly&nbsp;donated by Rick Berman, to benefit the Hollywood Charity Horse Show. Over the years, Creation Entertainment has generously supported Bill?s annual horse show, and with Adam Malin?s assistance, Bill got the bidding up to $5,200. The visits were awarded to the top two bidders. They were delighted and Bill called both of them up o&shy;n stage to shake their hands.

All good things come to an end and all too soon it was time for Bill to leave. o&shy;n the way out, he introduced Creation?s next set of guests, Gary Lockwood and Sally Kellerman.

You may recall that both Gary and Sally starred in the second <em>Star Trek</em> pilot, <em>Where No Man Has Gone Before</em>. It was great seeing them all o&shy;n stage together. Bill even related a story about Gary splitting his pants while filming the final scenes of the episode.&nbsp; He&nbsp;really is a&nbsp;great storyteller.&nbsp;

While this week Bill is off to begin work o&shy;n the sequel to <em>Miss Congeniality</em>, he?s still set to appear at several conventions between now and the end of the year.&nbsp;&nbsp;Your next opportunity to see him is in Chicago&nbsp;on Sunday, April 25th at a Creation convention.&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;

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