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On Sunday, August 3rd, Bill appeared at Creation Entertainment’s second annual Las Vegas Star Trek convention. It was held at the Las Vegas Hilton, home of Star Trek: The Experience. Creation Entertainment put together a complete Star Trek experience for fans again this year. With an impressive guest list from the original series, The Next Generation, Deep Space Nine, Voyager and Enterprise, there was something for everyone. |
<p align="right"> One of the most popular events was Friday night’s party at Star Trek: The Experience which was a sell-out. Saturday night featured a cabaret with performances by several Trek guests as well as the Idol Talent competition with guest judges Chase Masterson, J.G. Hertzler and Robert O’Reilly. Sunday opened with Creation’s annual charity breakfast, followed by an actors workshop with Robert Picardo and Ethan Phillips and the sold out Klingon Feast!<p align="right">Adam Malin and Gary Berman, who head up Creation Entertainment, expressed their appreciation to the fans for their support in making this year’s Las Vegas convention such a success. We're pleased to announce that they're already in the planning stages for next year's show. Our thanks and congratulations to Adam and Gary and entire Creation Entertainment team for making this o­ne of the best conventions ever. Over 4,000 fans attended this year’s 3-day event. Bill took to the stage amid thunderous cheers and applause following o­ne of Creation’s famous video montages late Sunday afternoon. Before opening the floor to questions, he gave everyone a brief update o­n some of his upcoming projects. <p align="center"> Bill announced that in the month of November he’s going to make an album with avant guard musical artist Ben Folds—in Nashville, Tennessee! He worked with Ben Folds o­nce before, collaborating o­n a song called Still in Love o­n Folds’ Fear of Pop album. The song was the most popular cut o­n Folds’ album. So, hopefully they’ll be able to generate the same magic in the studio this fall. It’s evident that Bill is having a lot of fun working with musicians. He fondly recalled his experiences rapping a song with the group Rated R during the filming of Free Enterprise, calling it a "tremendously creative moment." Bill said that the Sci-Fi Channel (which recently aired Groom Lake) is interested in working with him again. They want to produce a film involving an alien that’s never been seen before. So, Bill has stepped up to the plate and is anticipating commencing production in January of 2004. The project is tentatively titled Inferno of Hate. <p align="center"> <p align="left">Bill said he had great fun commanding the "red shirts" during the SPPLAT Attack paintball event o­n Labor Day weekend last year, and he’s looking forward to this year’s competition at EMR Paintball Park in New Milford, Pennsylvania o­n August 31st. This year, the event is preceded by a convention which will be held in Binghamton, New York o­n Saturday afternoon. Bill poked good-natured fun at the name of the city, calling it BING…BING…BINGHAMTON (and several other incarnations of the name o­nly he could come up with). He also revealed that o­n Labor Day, the day after the SPPLAT Attack II, he’s going to be participating in a motorcycle tour of the Finger Lakes in upstate New York for charity. Does he ever rest? o­ne more project he has in the works is a television series o­n his book about fans called Get a Life! A television producer is interested in bringing the book to the small screen as a series of half hour shows profiling 2-3 fans in each segment. The project is still in the planning stages at this time.<p align="left">When Bill opened the floor to questions, someone asked if he enjoyed working o­n T.J. Hooker. He said it was a lot of fun and related a story involving James Darren and his fear of pigeons while filming the show o­n the rooftops of a building in downtown Los Angeles. He said that he still maintains contact with James Darren. They get together every so often.Someone else asked Bill how much he’s like the TV character of Captain Kirk. He responded with, "All the girls want to know that" which was met with both laughter and applause. Bill explained that an actor usually starts out with an ideal of how they’d like to portray a character, but the long shoot days which average between 12 and 18 hours, and learning approximately 10 pages of new dialogue each day is overwhelming. After awhile, fatigue sets in. So, in the end the character tends to become more and more like the actor. <p align="center"> The Bring Back Kirk campaign was another topic of discussion. O­ne fan wanted to know how Bill felt about it. He said that Star Trek is a good premise, but he thinks we’ve reached an interesting point with the <em>Star Trek</em> franchise. He said that he saw the last movie and he thought it was pretty good, but he hasn’t seen much of the new Enterprise series. He let o­n that he has an idea…but he didn’t elaborate o­n it. So, stay tuned! <p align="left"> Finally, Bill was asked whether he had a mentor when he was in high school. He said that he really didn’t—other than his father who told him not to go into show business! He said he struggled all the way. But he went o­n to say that he admired Tyrone Guthrie, a director of "great English actors" who put o­n big theatrical plays. Bill came to work under Guthrie at Stratford (in Canada) back in the early 1950’s. He told the story of meeting Tyrone Guthrie for the first time…and within a short period of time being asked to understudy for Christopher Plummer in Henry V. He said that he had been running the lines by himself silently every chance he got (even in bathrooms), when he Guthrie asked if he could possibly go o­n that evening for Plummer who’d taken ill. Unfortunately, Bill had not yet even met the cast for that particular play yet, nor had he ever spoken the lines out loud! But, without hesitation, he told Guthrie he could fill in for Plummer that evening. And he did—and he was good. His performance brought rave reviews from the critics! Bill said the muse was with him…but in listening to him tell the story, it was evident that he’d also put in a LOT of hard work. <p align="left">If you’ve never had the chance to see Bill at a convention, you'll have another opportunity later this month at the Creation convention in Binghamton, New York<em>.</em> Creation has a number of really good conventions planned during the next year, so be sure to check their schedule and get your tickets early.<p align="right">Contributed by Jane Singer and Sandy Moruzzi_________________________________________________________________________<font size="2"><p align="right"> Shatner & Friends International is William Shatner'sofficial fan club. We are a community of friends drawn together by an appreciation of William Shatner, the actor and the man. <p align="right">Our first newsletter, The Best of Times, is posted o­nline. Each issue features the latest news about Bill and his activities, exclusive interviews, articles,lots of candid photos, charity updates and much more. The next o­ne will be published in the summer of 2003. We will post time sensitive information concerning Bill's appearance schedule within Bill's o­nline calendar. It's updated regularly, so keep checking back. <p align="right"> <p align="left"></font><font size="2">If you're interested in joining the Club, annual membership includes a beautiful autographed 8x10 photograph of William Shatner as Captain Kirk, a copy of Bill's credits, a short biography, a subscription to The Best of Times and the opportunity to participate in our annual Shatner Weekend. Membership also grants access to the Captain's Club, an exclusive members-only part of WilliamShatner.com which includes a bulletin board and Club merchandise. Click </font><font size="2">here</font><font size="2"> to join.We are excited to be part of WilliamShatner.com and we will continue to make regular updates to the website </font> |
