William Shatner: You Can Call Me Bill (2023) Movie Script
1
- When you take away the mask,
what is there
to boldly go into?
Boldly go into your life.
Live your life fully,
passionately.
We all have our loves,
and what a miracle
that is on this planet.
I'm afraid of being alone.
Everything loves.
Every living thing loves.
What's your legacy?
What are you leaving behind,
good deeds?
Also, a tree.
I've always had dogs
in my adult life.
In my childhood, my parents
wouldn't let me have a dog.
And so I yearned
to have a dog.
I did have one dog when
I was nine, ten years old.
Parents didn't like it
very much because my father,
who was an earnest man
who worked very hard
and thought, why am
I spending money on a dog
when I could be saving it?
I used to come home from
school and climb the fence
to our little backyard
where the dog would be
and interact with the dog.
One day, I climbed the fence,
there was no dog.
My mother was in the house.
"Where's the dog?"
And she said reluctantly,
he's outside, Bill-Billy.
And I knew something
was wrong, and I ran outside.
And there was my beloved dog,
dead on the street.
It'd been hit by a car.
And I remember gathering
the little-ish dog in my arms.
We had stairs to the-
This was a quadraplex.
And underneath those stairs
was a space.
There was sunlight,
and the latticework
cast a latticework of light
over the dog.
And I was holding the dog,
crooning in pain.
And I lost my dog.
The dog that meant so much
to me as a kid was dead.
I didn't quite understand
what dead was, I think,
but I remember
being bewildered.
And, finally,
I buried the dog.
I think I must have buried it
under those stairs.
And never had a dog since
until I was married-
about 25, 26.
And the first thing
I did was get a dog.
They speak to you.
Dogs speak to you.
Horses speak to you, too.
Trees communicate.
There's this fungi network
which the trees are using
like brain stems.
There's a pattern
in the ground
for a latticework.
I'd like to think there's
a latticework in the universe.
Everything else
has a structure.
Why wouldn't there be
a structure there?
All these things that took
5 billion years to grow,
to become-
I'm working myself up into
an emotional storm here.
It took 5 billion years
to evolve what we see now
in nature.
The preciousness
of everything-
the snails, the worms,
the gnats-
took 5 billion years
of exquisite...
agony.
And the reason I feel so sad
about it
is because...
Extinction is happening
so rapidly now...
By mankind's own hands,
by pollution.
All that is disappearing.
And I'm overwhelmed with it
because we're living
in a miracle.
The little brain that got us
out of the tree
and invented things,
made tools
also has allowed us
to look up into the sky
and look down on the ground,
and realize the miracle
of what we're living in-
the miracle of the universe,
the miracle of the ground,
the miracle...
No, no-
No, no, no, no, no!
I'm not beaming in.
You said I could make
an entrance
with a rocket
strapped to my ass.
By the time people see
what we're filming...
I will have received
a lifetime-achievement award,
a rather prestigious one.
- And we are forever
in your debt.
- What do you achieve
in a life
that's worth an award?
Save yourself...
some money.
Whether you're celebrated
for your death
and your statue's knocked
down 50 years later...
- It's what
he would have wanted.
- Or you died in battle
and were buried
in an unmarked grave.
- It really doesn't matter
'cause it's all over so soon.
So...
the occasion of your death
is meaningless.
You're one
of billions upon billions
who lived and died on Earth.
I thought
about that quite a bit.
And the only answer
I came up with...
is this.
In my life-
So I was born in Montreal.
And when I was
six years of age,
I was at a camp
in the Laurentian Mountains-
city boy going for two weeks
into the woods.
And the camp put on a play,
and I was in the play,
and something they had
written for me that I said
caused the audience to cry.
- This is about Willy.
- Zero hour...9:00 a.m.
And I was bitten by the bug.
And I'm gonna be high.
Maybe it was communication.
Maybe it was, wow,
I made people cry.
I'll try and make them laugh.
And that was a lifetime.
He died
of a heart attack onstage.
That's what he died-
That's the way I want to go.
Not tonight.
I see you walking around
town with the girl I love
And I'm like, you
I guess the change
in my pocket wasn't enough
I'm like, you,
and, uh, her, too
That's the story of my life.
Nothing there particularly
to get an award for.
I just did what any actor
was doing
to one degree or another.
But what I did do,
somewhat consciously...
Was take care
of the inner child,
that curious baby
who looked around
and said, why is the sky blue?
Do worms have eyes?
What are they doing
under the ground?
Why are we here?
Is there a God?
What happens after death?
We ask ourselves questions.
Why?
- Excuse me,
I'd just
like to ask a question.
What does God need
with a Starship?
- Will they reach New York
all right now?
Are we gonna live in the East?
Are we gonna live in the West?
Are we gonna live
in this country?
- And then as you...
get a job and you get married
or you have children,
life's exigencies prey on you,
and that curiosity
is generally beaten
out of you in school, in life.
You lose the curiosity.
And that's a shame
because that curiosity
is what keeps us...
Alive.
- Children never age.
Eternal childhood
filled with play.
No responsibilities.
It's almost like a dream.
- I wouldn't examine
that dream too closely.
It might not turn out
to be very pretty.
- It's the search for love
that sends everybody
in motion,
whether you're searching
for the love of God-
whoever that is,
whatever that is-
the love of nature,
the love of a woman or a man,
the love of curiosity.
And I think curiosity
is love...
is the fulfilled life.
And I've tried
to inculcate myself
to be aware...
to be aware, live in the now,
and say,
why is that happening?
What is that?
Oh, how interesting.
What do you think?
What's your story?
How do you feel?
And I've been able to do that
to a degree,
and I'm kind of proud of that.
And if I am to receive
any kind of an award,
it would be for taking care
of my inner child.
I'm a grandfather
more than once.
My granddaughter-in-law
had her family
at this birthday party
in the park,
and my family was there.
I was looking at it
like a three-layered cake.
I'm on the bottom layer.
And I'm looking around,
and I'm thinking,
my God, I'm out of here soon.
And I hate that phrase.
I'm gonna die soon.
I'll never see
these babies grow up.
I'll never know
what they're going to become.
We're all connected.
I'll come back to this
time and time again...
because I know nothing.
Our ignorance is so profound.
And the more we know,
the more we realize how stupid
and how egotistical
human beings are,
thinking we're the only ones.
- I don't believe we can stop.
I don't believe
we're meant to.
Do you wish...
the first Apollo mission
hadn't reached the moon
or we hadn't gone on to Mars
and then to the nearest star?
That's like saying you wish
that you still operated
with scalpels
and sewed your patients up
with catgut,
like your great-great-great-
great-grandfather used to.
- Animals very rarely have...
duplicity.
We're the ones
who are greatly duplicitous
and have the masks up.
The thing that makes me feel
a connection
to whatever we call it
is nature or animals
or people.
But...
you reach a connection
with a horse that is-
can be something mystical.
And I think the mysticism
is all in the human feeling,
not in the horse.
The horse is there-
oh, jeez, he's got
on my back again.
But you're thinking,
this magnificent animal,
and he and I, or she and I,
are at one.
Horses live in the now.
So that's the first thing
you learn about horses.
They're here and now.
Live in the now.
So, if you're
in communication...
with that horse,
if you and the horse
are vibrating
at the same rate...
that horse...
that horse is and you are
in each other's thrall,
you are mystically bound.
Well, you're at one
with the horse,
but you're also at one
with the Earth.
You're also at one
with the planet.
You're at one with the stars.
You're at one with the sky.
You're at one with the breeze
in your face.
You're at one with-
and this is where
we get crazy-
with the creator, whoever-
whatever that is.
He or she or whatever
that is, where it started,
you're suddenly at one.
And it's humbling.
It's like you're there.
And it's so large.
It's so gigantic.
It may be the answer
to what happens when you die.
It's just- you can't be
egotistical about that.
The ecstasy of that
is what brings you
to that cathedral of the barn,
where you and the horse
are vibrating on the same...
whatever that is, channel.
And that's the mystique
and the mysticism
about being at one
with the universe.
And that can be done.
It happened to me
in a performance
three weeks
before this is being taped.
- So fragile, so blue
What can we do?
What can we do?
What can we do?
What can we do?
What can we do?
Thank you, and good night.
I was at one
with the audience.
For me, with an audience, it
happens with some regularity.
I'm there with the audience.
The audience is there with me.
And it's a performance.
And suddenly
the silence is palpable.
What do you mean
you're communicating
with an audience?
And yet, it is.
And it happens enough
that you can repeat
the experience.
So there must be something
that we are dimly aware of.
That feeling...
of being at one...
Is...
religious.
It's animistic, I think.
And that's where paganism
comes in,
where a rock may contain,
not a God in our language
but a spirit.
The tree has a spirit.
People who live
close to the Earth
realize that these gifts
from the Earth
need to be thanked.
So, whether it's
Thank You, God, for this
or for a moment of reflection,
just thank the Earth
for being what it is.
And that's the sadness.
I have some property
in the foothills
of the Sierras.
And I was going through
some tough times financially.
The land is on a wild river.
So one day I'm
in the wild river naked.
And I'm thinking, you know,
I've got to sell this land.
I got to get the money
and sell this land.
And I'm sitting there naked,
and there's a lizard.
And the lizard's going...
I think, oh, my Lord,
the lizard gets its water
by catching droplets
from the river.
I can't possibly sell
this land.
And I didn't.
- Come on, let's go.
- When I was a kid, RKO,
which is now CBS,
was turning out Westerns by-
you know,
I think they made
them in a week.
And I loved them.
I lived in Montreal, just off
of a street called Monkland.
And there was
a Monkland movie theater.
It's Canada, but it was
right out of Middle America.
Have a soda, pay a dime or-
It went to a quarter
at one point,
where they would
play movies all day.
So you could go in
and see three movies.
- Bambi!
- I must have seen "Bambi"
two or three times.
Father came in
and picked me up,
and I remember hanging on
to a railing
'cause I didn't want to go.
He's pulling me off.
"Bambi!"
I was enthralled with movies.
So I think that was a big part
of becoming an actor.
I couldn't get enough.
You know, I'm just
beginning to realize now,
as I talk to you...
that those Westerns
and those horses,
the legend
of the American West
was everything.
I rode a great
saddle-bred
stallion bareback
in a movie we made
on Alexander the Great.
Alexander was
Captain Kirk in 300 BC.
I rode bareback,
which is very difficult to do,
at a gallop with a sword and
a shield
and holding the horse.
And I worked for six months
getting myself ready
for that movie.
And that was, like,
everything.
I admire people who...
go home in the role.
I mean, they bring the role
home with them.
My actor heroes were
Olivier and Marlon Brando,
two opposite poles
of the acting rainbow,
if you will.
And being Canadian,
I was in between the English
and the American worlds.
So I had long since learned
to learn the words,
do the best you can
with the character.
- My office is next to yours
at the Palace of Justice,
if you need anything.
- Thank you.
- Senator.
- And when it was done,
you were done.
I mean, you're
a professional actor.
A carpenter doesn't come home
and try to fix the
dining-room table necessarily.
But if you say, this character,
is on a five-year mission
to discover
and he's filled
with awe and wonder
about what he's discovering,
what else do you need to know?
- Gentlemen,
they're debating
in a vacuum.
Let's go get some answers.
- Every line then becomes,
wow, look at that.
Look at this.
Look at that.
- I prefer this-
double-action .357 Magnum,
loaded with hollow points.
- TJ Hooker,
a recalcitrant policeman
who doesn't want to do
all these new things
like read Miranda rights-
what the hell is that?
- It'll tear a 6-inch hole in
you going in
and the Holland Tunnel
coming out.
Resist arrest.
Resist arrest, please.
- He's a bad guy.
You mean I have to?
For God sakes.
Okay, I will.
- Now to prison,
When a bust does stick,
we house them,
give them color TV
and their wives on weekends.
If that makes sense to you...
then you and I are about
to have a problem,
because
I'm your instructor here,
and I love to weed out
airheads and marshmallows.
- That's the character.
And Denny Crane,
like, confused.
Like...
I don't quite remember.
- Denny Crane.
- Yes, I know
you're Denny Crane.
Why do you always
tell me your name?
Is it so you won't forget?
- Two wild things that
David E. Kelley wrote
that I don't even think
he knew
'cause he never offered
an explanation.
Two things.
One is, he had the character
say the name Denny Crane.
Denny Crane.
So he'd write out Denny Crane,
Denny Crane, Denny Crane.
- Denny Crane.
Denny Crane.
Denny Crane.
- I'm ahead of you there.
- Denny Crane.
- Good for you.
- What the hell
does that mean?
What's he saying?
I had a picture
of reptiles
who flick out their tongue
to get a reading
on what the atmosphere
is like, its scent.
That flicking is not-
That's their nose
and their apprehension
and comprehension
of their environment.
So Denny Crane,
I pictured,
Denny Crane, Denny Crane.
Eh, Denny Crane.
And getting a reading.
When I say Denny Crane,
what's your reaction?
- What's my name?
- Denny Crane.
- Like you mean it.
- Denny Crane.
- What's my name?
- Denny Crane!
- No further questions.
- Oh, you know me.
You don't know me?
Denny Crane. Denny Crane.
- Could you just
say those two little words
I so long to hear?
- Denny Crane.
- Thank you.
- Then...
every so often
in the five years
that we did the show,
he'd write-
the character would say,
"Play the music."
I'd say to the director,
do you understand what-
Who am I saying,
play the music?
Do you understand play-
No, I don't know.
So I'd say, play the music.
I didn't know what
to do with the line.
On the last show,
the last season,
he has the character say...
"I think of my life
as a TV show."
That's why he's saying
play the music.
- Cue the music.
- So that's the discoveries.
That's the fuel.
And from then,
you just maneuver
the ship anywhere you want,
but you've got
an engine going.
Remembering the lines
is an unspoken-about skill.
Laurence Olivier came onstage
and forgot his lines-
we call it going dry-
in his acceptance speech
for the Academy Award.
I remember saying,
what did he say?
- In the great wealth,
the great firmament
of your nation's generosities,
this particular choice
may perhaps be found
by future generations
as a trifle eccentric,
but the mere fact of it...
- Either that day
or days later,
he explained he didn't know
what he was saying
'cause he was so panicked
being in front
of that audience.
He just spoke words.
He made absolutely no sense.
He just strung phrases
that he had remembered
from Shakespeare plays
and anything
you could think of.
There's a pen on the desk,
and it writes beautifully.
- And the extraordinary
elation,
the euphoria that happens
to so many of us
at the first breath
of the majestic glow
of a new tomorrow.
- And we all are fearful
of forgetting.
I would imagine-
I've not talked about this
at any great length
with other actors.
But for me, learning the words
is the work of the actor.
Everything else is a kick.
Without paying the penalty
of sky-high fuel bills.
I'm delighted
to be part of the future...
of Kero-Sun.
I really am.
Now I go.
- An actor brings himself.
Again, Laurence Olivier-
they used to say,
with his makeup on,
first the nose came onstage,
followed by Larry.
No matter what you do-
with some exceptions,
like De Niro
putting on a lot of weight,
and then taking the weight off
to play that boxer.
That was extraordinary
and unhealthy.
But for the most part,
all the actor can do
is bring who he is
to the role.
Every human being is limited
by what they are,
whether it's in business-
Whatever business you're in,
you bring
your own sensibilities to it.
No matter how much you pretend
I'd like to be so-and-so,
you can't be.
You're yourself.
I think that everybody
wears a mask-
everybody-
until you take it down.
We're all holding a mask up
to various times
to various people.
We're holding up the mask
that I think
is what we expect them
to think.
I want them to realize
what you're thinking about me
is true,
and here's my mask.
I think that's it.
So you hold the mask
up of being intelligent.
- And here I thought
you were in shock.
- No, you didn't.
You thought I was confused...
perhaps scared...
and probably playing for time.
- Amazing.
- Why do birds
suddenly appear?
- Or being funny
or being wise.
Hello, I'm William Shatner,
and I'm a shaman.
I'm a conduit of
the ancient forces of nature.
Or being Daddy,
husband, lover.
Mask.
- Hi. I'm your host on this
visit to Washington, D.C.
When do you take
away the mask,
and how do you know you've
taken away the mask?
- What-
What does it mean?
There is no myself.
I'm an actor.
Man of a thousand faces-
one for Farragut,
one for Norland, one for Lila,
one for the children, one-one-
There's no myself anymore.
There's nothing in the mirror.
- You look in the mirror.
You don't really see yourself
when you look in the mirror.
I mean, you'd be appalled
at what you really look like
if you could just see
the reality of-
That's why I don't watch film
on myself,
because
you can't peel away the-
That's real.
There was a close-up
of me as Kirk dies.
And I wanted Kirk
to die the way he lived-
with courage-
'cause I always played Kirk...
with curiosity.
He would say,
oh, my God, what's that?
I wanted that to be his death.
And I didn't quite-
I wish I'd had
another take at it.
- It was...
Fun.
Oh, my.
- I wanted to be, "Oh, my"...
like, wow, death is coming.
How interesting.
Because that's the way
he led his life.
We'll die the way we live.
I mean, we don't change...
When you die, I guess.
I don't know.
Does anybody know?
Nobody knows.
Doesn't anybody know?
Does anybody know?
What's that line from a song?
Nobody knows.
It is slightly darker
than I wanted it to be.
And maybe that's the way
it should be.
- Captain, I just wanted
to assure you
that I did what I thought best
to save both you and the men.
- Noted.
You should know, however,
that there's very little
a Starbase can do
that a Starship can't.
- If I may say so, Captain,
I am now quite aware
of what a Starship can do
with the right man
at the helm.
- Commanding officers-
really good
commanding officers-
I don't know
whether I knew this then,
all those years ago,
but, certainly,
I've observed that...
don't say
all right, let's turn left.
That's what they did
on the pilot.
- We aren't going to go
to be certain?
- Not without any indication
of survivors, no.
Continue on to the Vega colony
and take care of our own sick
and injured first.
You have the helm.
Maintain present course.
- Yes, sir.
- And they presented it to NBC.
And NBC said,
well, it's a great idea
but we don't like the cast.
Do another thing.
And I was in the second pilot.
- I'll have you checkmated
your next move.
Have I ever mentioned you play
a very irritating game
of chess, Mr. Spock?
- Irritating?
Ah, yes, one
of your Earth emotions.
- Certain you don't know
what irritation is?
- As long as he has
the command presence,
he can be a joker.
He could be light.
He could be heavy.
He could be...
But that command presence
is what you need.
And that's what I think
I tried to do
most of the time.
- I'm in command.
I could order this.
But I'm not...
Because Dr. McCoy is right...
in pointing out
the enormous danger potential
in any contact
with life and intelligence
as fantastically advanced
as this.
But I must point out
that the possibilities,
the potential...
for knowledge and advancement
is equally great.
- Just be present there
with the ability to know-
I know exactly
what we have to do,
and I'll tell you what-
you know, just go over there,
stand there,
and be ready when I count.
- Given
the same circumstances...
I would do the same thing
without hesitation,
because the steps I took
in the order I took them...
were absolutely necessary
if I were to save my ship.
And nothing...
is more important
than my ship.
- And so I think
I brought more humor, more...
I didn't think it needed
to be as...
we're on a mission.
And took it from seeing
real guys,
real commanders
who don't do that.
- When I think of the hospitals
in which
over 130,000 other men
of the Third Army...
have had a damn good time,
usually.
- Why me?
- I've never heard
of a network saying
to a company,
here's the money to do another
pilot
of the same show.
Just change the cast
and, of course, another story.
- I believe there's some hope
for you after all, Mr. Spock.
- Could you define
for me Shatnerian?
What is that?
- Oh, Shatnerian.
- Shatnerian.
- I have no idea.
I've heard that phrase.
- I see myself in you, Joey,
at your age.
I just wish someone
had given me
the opportunity that you have.
We grow up too soon, Joey.
- I have no idea
what they mean.
I hear people going...
And he talks like this.
And when
they started doing that,
I remember turning to my wife-
is that me?
Is that what they're doing?
- Normally, Shatner talks at
a pretty lightning-fast pace.
He's William Shatner.
He's talking.
And when sometimes the lines
aren't as...
obvious to him,
he slows down.
Becomes more deliberate
in his approach...
until he gets it,
then he's back
speeding up again and talking.
- People's supposed imitation
of me is...
I don't know.
I don't hear it.
- Listen to me.
Time and space-
you're taking up
valuable time and space.
- And when I speak,
I never,
ever talk like every word
is its own sentence.
- I became friends
with Edward G. Robinson.
As an actor, he did
a lot of nyah, nyah.
Well, I'm gonna rub them out.
Nyah.
So I said to him one day...
Do you know you go, nyah?
He's like, I go, nyah?
- I turn on the radio,
what do I hear?
Nyah, nyah, nyah.
Everybody on television,
nyah, nyah, nyah.
The day...
the day my little baby
was born,
the first time that
I picked him up in my arms,
all other babies say,
goo, goo, dada.
He looked up at me, and
he said, nyah, nyah, nyah.
- Comedy is as delicate
as a heart operation.
If you say take my wife...
please, you know...
if you say, take my wife,
please, it's not funny.
But if there's a mystical-
a mist, not mystical-
but a mist...
of humor.
- How are you all?
I'm glad to be here.
Take my wife, please.
- One wrong move,
and you've lost the humor,
lost the joke.
I mean, if you're saying-
go back to the other line-
take my wife, please.
I don't know why I keep
going back to that.
I don't want you
to take my wife.
Please don't take my wife.
Take my-
Please.
Somebody in the office-
in the audience coughs...
it destroys the laugh.
It's empty.
One slight deviation
from the timing of the line,
but particularly
the feed line-
There's a feed line
and a snapper,
the joke line and laugh.
The timing on that is
exquisite, exquisite.
Fred Willard,
I've been watching your career
for many years,
and I can honestly say...
I don't get it.
You're just so dry.
If you were any dryer, you'd
be in Betty White's underwear.
You rehearse in a room,
and you think it's funny.
And then opening night
in front of a trial audience,
the play changes completely,
'cause there's
another character in the play-
the audience.
Hello.
- Captain on the bridge,
captain on the bridge!
You're William Shatner.
- You can call me Bill.
- Can I call you Captain?
- No.
- Please?
- No.
And, slowly,
you play that music
of allowing the audience in,
incorporating the audience in
so that...
you're playing
to the audience,
but you're not playing
to the audience.
- I've appeared onstage
at Stratford,
at Carnegie Hall, Albert Hall,
and the Monkland Theater
in MBG.
And, yes, I've gone where
no man has gone before,
but...
I was in Mexico, and
her father gave me permission.
My name is William Shatner,
and I am Canadian!
And you're aware
of the audience,
but you're not aware
of the audience.
It's a delicate balance
everywhere.
And the moment you lose that
balance, you lose the laugh.
You lose the continuity.
You lose the character.
Everything
goes out the window.
That first laugh...
It's like suckling
on mother's milk.
It's just...
- Ladies and gentlemen,
William Shatner.
- Empowering.
- Thank you, thank you.
Thank you very much.
Thank you.
The producer said, we'd like
you to do the opening
for George Lucas's
Lifetime Achievement Award.
And the sketch for me-
It was literally a sketch.
You go out there and act
as though you're
at a "Star Trek" convention.
"Star Trek"
changed everything.
And aren't these conventions
wonderful?
And then discover
that it's "Star Wars"...
And then get off
as fast as you can.
So I take a piece of paper
out of my hand.
"Mr. Shatner, we want you
to open the show.
'Star Wars'?"
And they got it,
and they started to laugh.
And the moment
they started to laugh,
I realized that I had them,
because that's
a very delicate balance.
Imagine...
if they didn't get it.
George.
It's George, isn't it?
May I call you George?
Thank you.
You can call me Mr. Shatner.
That's how delicate
a balance comedy is.
That's the...
springboard...
that you dive off of
from a 30-foot height,
and you hope there's water
in the pool.
That's comedy.
That's the courage
of a madman.
And...
when you fail...
I failed.
I did fail once,
more than once, but this
was a memorable failure.
So I was asked to do
a stand-up comedy routine.
So I got a great idea.
I'll come out as Captain Kirk,
who thinks
he's a stand-up comic.
Take my wife, please.
'Cause he's got no timing
'cause he's a captain of
a Starship, he's not a comic.
And what if he's the worst
stand-up comic that ever was?
That sounds funny to me.
Take my wife, please.
Nobody's laughing.
Shit.
That was my lesson
in comedy failing.
I almost forgot it,
it was so painful.
It's embarrassing.
And apparently a lot of,
if not all, stand-up comics-
even the good ones,
even the ones
that are, like, now popular
and they're trying a
new routine out
and it doesn't work,
and it's like-
It's death. It's death.
You want to die.
You want to die now.
And they go on, you know.
They keep going.
Maybe this one will work.
- Great. I think we've got it.
Bill, I hope you
come back tomorrow.
I hope you haven't had enough.
- That's the best line yet.
"I hope you come back
tomorrow."
No, I'm gonna go ride
a horse tomorrow.
The thing about getting old
is you don't realize
you're getting old.
Oh, yeah.
We're both too old
for this kind of thing.
- As a kid in Montreal,
at some point when I was six
or seven or eight,
my dad could afford
to rent a cottage,
a little old cottage
on a little old lake,
and not too far away
was a welfare camp.
And by the time
I was 15 or 16,
I applied to the camp
to be a counselor.
These were tough kids from
the tough part of Montreal.
So I defended myself
by telling stories.
I was in demand
as a storyteller.
And...
I used to tell them
ghost stories.
Once upon a midnight dreary...
While I pondered weak
and weary
over many a quaint
and curious volume
of forgotten lore...
while I nodded,
nearly napping,
suddenly there came a tapping.
I was an actor
when I was six years old,
and being an actor,
taking material
that you don't let-
even in your innocence
because you're a child,
you don't know anything about,
and putting it out
for the first time
in front of an audience
is an adventure itself.
- Corbis.
I'll face whatever you have
behind those doors
and come out exactly
as I went in.
- Everything, by the way,
is an adventure.
My talking to you
should be an adventure
for you and for me
so that I'm discovering what
I'm saying as I'm saying it.
Everything's risky.
Actors want to be
loved and liked.
And no matter
what the role is,
the jeopardy is the same.
- Jump, jump.
That a girl.
- Playing the leading role
in any of these series
that I've done,
that's a risk.
- Aah!
- I do have a sense
of adventure.
I did a series called
"Voice of the Planet."
And I'm there on a-
I don't know-
12,000-, 14,000-foot mountain
on a glacier,
standing there like that.
I hear a crack there,
oh, and a crack there.
I don't know
what's between my legs,
whether I could fall in there
to an icy blue-ice death.
And I'm standing there
thinking,
what am I doing here?
Why have I done this?
I've done a number
of those things
over a period of my life,
and I don't know why.
But there's something
beautiful about that.
- Risk.
Risk is our business.
That's what the Starship
is all about.
That's why we're aboard her.
- Fighting against myself
as a character,
you got to look
for characteristics
that are obvious enough
so the audience will know
which one it is.
- You can't hurt me.
You can't kill me.
You can't.
Don't you understand?
I'm part of you.
You need me.
I need you.
- It's a sale.
Nothing beats a sale.
- Wrong move.
- You.
- You can save
up to half-off that sale
when you name your own price
on Priceline.
- But this one's a deal,
trust me.
- It's only pretending
to be a deal.
Here, bid $79.
Got it. Wow.
- You win this time,
good twin.
- I did a film in Spain
between seasons
at "Star Trek."
And the idea was...
there was a good twin
and a bad twin.
- I'll be in the place
called Rio Hondo.
I'll wait...
four days.
Either you come
and meet me there alone,
or I'll find you again.
One of us must die.
- Of course, they looked alike
'cause they were twins.
And they rode
distinctive horses.
Each twin
had a particular horse
so they could say, oh, no,
that was the other twin.
But in addition, in reality,
you needed two horses,
because for long shots, you
needed a horse that would run.
And for close-ups,
you needed a horse
that was calm.
So I had four horses...
two for each character
that I was playing.
The horse for close-up
was named El Tranquilo,
the tranquil one.
And the one for long shots
was El Nervioso,
the nervous one.
- You should make
a very convincing Nazi.
- In "Star Trek,"
there was a Nazi guy,
and then there was
the evil guy, evil Kirk.
- I'm Captain Kirk.
I'm Captain Kirk!
I'm Captain Kirk!
- A couple-
at least three of them.
Maybe there were
three or four.
But in doing that,
I needed to find a core
of the other character.
- Look at me carefully, Spock.
Can't you tell
I'm your captain?
- Well, there's one difference
between us-I'm hungry.
- The difference is
your weakness, Captain,
not mine.
- Captain Kirk
was the good guy,
but what did the bad guy-
What does a bad guy do?
And what does a Nazi do that
makes him more distinctive?
- Now...
Janice Lester takes
the place of Captain Kirk.
I already possess
your physical strength.
Only this Captain Kirk is
not afraid to kill.
- I've played Captain Kirk
as a woman.
How do you play a woman?
The key is to find a core.
There are keys,
if you think
about it enough-
- Rocket man...
- That make a character
sufficiently different enough
that it's recognizable,
but it's still you.
- Who are you?
Who are you really?
- What do you mean?
I'm the host of the hit series
"Rescue 911."
- I thought
that was Robert Stack.
- Robert Stack?
Are you insane?
- So what does
"know yourself" mean?
I've often thought of that.
"Know thyself."
Like what?
Like you like spaghetti?
Okay.
You know, but...
what are you going to do
in a situation?
You don't know what you're
going to do in a situation.
Standing on that train,
what was I doing?
Was I showing off?
Was I trying to make
a better movie?
Was I interested
in what it felt like?
That was the dumbest thing
I could have ever thought of,
putting myself in jeopardy
like that.
But logic only came in
after the passion.
- be so obsessed.
- Obsessed?
- That you could destroy
yourself, uh, your career.
- And we know that passion
overrides anything.
Overrides logic.
The reptilian brain of passion
overrides
the frontal lobe's thoughts.
It's unfortunate, but that's
what human beings are.
"What have I done?"
Which is a phrase
that I've used in my songs
quite a bit.
What have I done?
- My God, Bones.
What have I done?
- What you had to do...
what you always do...
turned death into
a fighting chance to live.
- There's no ego involved,
as far as I can consider.
I don't care.
I would do whatever
I was doing in a vacuum.
- Sea monkeys?
- Piranha.
- Their lives exude
a beautiful simplicity-
savage, ruthless,
existing only
to devour and destroy,
to taste blood, to rend flesh.
Sounds like me, right?
- What's it like to do that?
What's it like?
What's it feel like?
There is a curiosity about it.
Can I do that?
Can I do that
without hurting myself?
You're going
against all the instincts
and intuition
of self-preservation
by doing these-
by challenging your life.
- Have I the right
to jeopardize my crew, my ship
for a feeling
I can't even put into words?
No man achieves
Starfleet Command
without relying on intuition.
But have I made
a rational decision?
Am I letting the horrors
of the past
distort my judgment
of the present?
- When you talk about thrills
and danger,
all that pales besides
the search for passion.
You should be passionate
about everything.
You should be passionate
about talking, about eating.
I want a deep-fried turkey
I want a moister,
tastier turkey
I want a deep-fried turkey
About loving.
About exploring.
I mean, name a verb,
and you should be passionate
about it.
Go boldly passionately.
Without that,
everything is academic.
Boldly go, go into war.
Sail your vessel.
Put your vessel next
to the bad guys
and shields up.
But now...
in the aftermath...
what is there
to boldly go into?
The last thing is death.
So boldly go into your life.
Live your life fully,
passionately.
Have some effect,
do something good,
either to yourself,
to the people.
Leave something
that, you know,
that has some quality,
that has some value.
And then boldly go
into the next...
thing,
whether it's emptiness or...
whatever it is.
So it's an interesting phrase-
"Go boldly."
Go boldly.
Go with courage.
Go fully.
Go with commitment.
That's what it means.
Don't do it half-heartedly.
Whatever it is you do,
do it fully.
Do it passionately.
Do it with your whole being.
This is what I believe in
for the next five minutes,
and then I'll believe
in something else.
That's what it means.
I've often talked about regret.
You can't regret.
Oh, I should have turned left.
Because you went to the left
because that was your passion.
Either turn around and go
the right, if you can,
or boldly go to the left.
See if you can make a purse
out of a pig's ear.
So I've tried to limit
my sense of regret.
And that's why you
shouldn't have regrets.
You should try-
Ah, there's no "you should."
I don't know
what I'm talking about.
I...
tried not to do that.
I left home when it was safer
to stay home
and I wanted to stay home.
I...
I went onstage
as an understudy
for "Henry V."
Chris Plummer
was playing Henry.
Something was telling me-
drill those words,
drill those words.
Close the wall up
with our English-
Yeah, yeah,
I got it, I got it.
Once more unto the breach,
dear friend.
Once more unto the breach,
dear friend.
Once more un-
And I would work
and work at it.
And about a week
into the opening
of "Henry V," less,
somebody says to me...
the director wants to talk
to you.
Says, Chris is ill
in the hospital.
Can you go on?
Now,
what did he know?
And I said, yes.
I can go on.
- Timothy Leary,
on his deathbed,
took his final breath...
And said, "Of course."
That's all he said.
He didn't give us
any explanation.
Of course what?
Of course what?
What did he see?
What did he see?
Maybe he said, "Off course."
I don't know!
He didn't give us any context!
Loneliness is a...
a strange beast.
We all are essentially alone.
We don't realize it.
We're born alone.
We die alone.
In between,
we have relationships.
And the relationships
are good.
But do we really know
each other?
Do we really know ourselves?
Do we really know that...
we're not alone
because that person
or persons is...
is in us, with us, beside us?
I think that...
essentially we're all alone.
- I'm alone!
Alone.
Alone.
- And some of us,
I think I'm included,
have been alone all our lives.
Never really had...
the friendship
that we read about.
I knew some kids
on the street,
but I never had a real friend.
I think...
the women in my life,
the loves of my life,
have been my friend
and has assuaged
that loneliness.
But I just have been alone...
all my life, pure and simple.
It goes along
with the idea of masks
and what we hold up,
and do we ever present
ourselves as we really are,
as we really are
to somebody else?
Can we be absolutely honest?
I mean,
for a longer period of time
than a flash of passion.
I'm conflicted by it.
I don't want to be alone.
I'm afraid of being alone.
I've gone to great lengths
not to be alone.
And the thing
that frightens me most
about dying is dying.
- What am I-a dog that I die
when I am dead?
No.
I am a man with a God.
And when I die...
I live.
- Do you think about dying?
- All the time.
- Yeah?
- Yeah.
- Do you think it's going
to be pretty exciting?
- No.
- I think it is.
- I don't want to leave.
- Really?
- Well, I'm having
too good a time.
I'm more active now
than I've ever been.
I'm more productive,
more creative.
So I'm not languishing.
But what would happen
if you were languishing?
Do you communicate?
Do you say,
I'm dying and I'm afraid?
Can you talk about that?
Does anybody know
what they're talking about
when they talk to you
about it?
Oh, don't be afraid.
What do you mean
don't be afraid?
I'm the one that's dying.
No, it's going to be
all right.
You'll go to heaven.
What do you mean?
What's heaven?
What is heaven?
Well, all right, so you'll
just be part of the universe.
Great.
So I'll be unconscious.
Yes, 'cause you'll be an atom
or gas or something.
I've had enough gas.
So loneliness is endemic.
I saw a dog the other day
on the street
frantically looking around.
And is that what lonely people
do emotionally?
Emotionally,
frantically look around,
trying to find
some attachment?
I had a wild experience.
Went to Hawaii with my family.
And on that particular beach,
there was police tape.
There was a body.
Oh, somebody died?
No, no, no, said the Hawaiian.
That's a monk seal.
She comes every so often,
comes up on the beach
and lies there.
And we got tape around her
so people won't bother her.
After a while,
the monk seal disappeared.
And I think
it was the next morning.
And I'm swimming,
and suddenly I'm grasped
from behind.
And I turned around.
And I'm looking at this thing
that's holding me.
It's the monk seal.
Had grasped me in its arms.
And I went, aah!
I screamed.
And the thing...
And it swam off.
And I thought
about that monk seal...
a lot...
alone...
but that was
like an animal so lonely
that it took the only thing
in the ocean to hug.
Dogs will howl in pain.
They cry out
'cause you've left them alone.
What is that?
The pack is gone.
Everything they belonged to
is gone.
And they howl.
And that howl is pain.
I'm alone!
I've howled like that
at various times
in pain of being alone.
I'm talking about
an existential loneliness.
I'm overwhelmed
with it all the time.
Love of other people-
that hasn't got anything
to do with it.
Oh, I love you.
Yeah, good.
But what do you do
in the middle of the night?
- See, here's the thing-
I've just moved into Caxton,
and I'm anxious to meet
some young people here.
But I don't have any contacts.
Isn't that a sad story?
- I'm Jewish,
and I went to school
in a non-Jewish area.
I was bullied a lot.
I would have a fight
every day.
And then a ring of students
would go, fight, fight, fight!
I was a kid who was interested
in acting,
and I was a kid
that was interested in sports.
The jocks
didn't understand acting,
and the actors
didn't understand
my love of sports.
I was in between
two worlds again.
And I spent a great deal
of time like that,
and I think a lot of that
has rubbed off
into who I am today.
I was in grade school,
and the teacher said,
all right,
it's Valentine's Day tomorrow.
Everybody send
valentines to each other
and say nice things-
you know,
write a nice message.
And for some reason...
My voice said, you'd better
write yourself
five or six valentines
to yourself.
So I wrote five or six
valentines to myself.
And then on Valentine's Day,
I got five or six valentines.
I had written-the only
valentines I got were to me.
Now, why is that?
And you try to examine.
Am I antisocial?
Do I smell bad?
Do I offend people?
So what happened there?
I don't know.
But I suppose it went along
with the bullying
or the attempt to bully me
and my fights every day.
My father was...
not ostensibly a loving man,
but he loved his family,
and he loved me,
although I heard the phrase
"this is going to hurt me
more than it hurts you,"
and off his belt would come.
And that phrase, "it hurts
me more than it hurts you"
stuck in my craw ever since.
But he was...
charitable to a fault
and to his family,
and he was
a very honorable citizen.
He was such
a worthwhile human being.
I loved my dad.
He was a Canadian snowbird.
And he was down in Miami
with my mother,
and he had a heart attack.
And she said
he was weeping
at the end and died.
And that mystery of,
what was he crying about,
has haunted me.
What was he crying about?
Was he crying for his fate?
Did he want to see me?
Did he think, what have
I done with my life?
I was shooting "Star Trek,"
and it was lunch hour,
and the phone rings.
My mother said,
your father just passed away.
You got to come here.
It's noon.
And, what am I going to do?
So I thought, maybe we can
continue shooting the scene.
- Sadness...
Sadness...
for the end of things.
Go into the tunnel.
There is a passageway.
Quickly, quickly.
- I couldn't remember
the words,
and Leonard and the cameraman,
Jerry Finnerman,
just stood by me
the whole time-it was wild.
And the other vivid memory
is the sound of the Earth
hitting the casket,
I can hear now
as loud as thunder.
Boom.
Oh, I won't forget that.
And...
and that was my dad.
And he died before I achieved
any real success.
I mean, I was living
hand to mouth for many years.
My father I knew loved me,
but my mother wasn't
demonstrably loving
in that way.
I would watch sometimes
these athletes,
they get chosen
to be on the team
and they're
surrounded by their family,
and the mother hugs the boy,
and the boy hugs the mother
before the father.
Wow.
That's something.
I marvel at it all the time.
Oh, Johnny, you made the team.
I'm so proud.
Mom! I did it, Mom!
Wow.
I never said "Mom."
I don't say "my mom."
"I love my mom."
Mom?
What the hell is mom?
It's "my mother."
When children talk
about their female parent
and they say "my mom"-
like, wow.
That's so warm and loving,
and I never had that.
I never had that with her.
She never offered
a motherly thing.
Oh, it's all right,
sweetheart.
We grieve all the time
for things that we lose.
We're in grief
a great deal of our life.
And we have to learn
to live with grief.
And then you learn to grieve
for the end of life,
like I'm losing life.
I'm losing my life.
I'm in-
What was that line
from Chekhov?
- Why do you always
wear black?
- I'm in mourning...
for my life.
- I'm in mourning
for my youth.
Why are you wearing black?
I'm in mourning for my youth.
Are atoms lonely?
Is an electron lonely when it
doesn't go around the nucleus?
Are scientists
as lonely as that
when they look
through a telescope
out into the space
and they see how far and
how enormous everything is?
How dictatorial...
the laws of nature are?
There's no bending there.
You can go around in a circle,
and you enter
into a black hole,
and you're gone forever.
There seems
no escape from any of that.
We're aware of the...
imponderable mysteries
out there.
We don't know anything.
I mean, the Earth-
the Earth is alone.
There's nothing like it
in our solar system,
and for us to get beyond the
solar system is monumental.
- We are leaving that vast
cloud of stars and planets
which we call our galaxy.
Behind us, Earth, Mars, Venus,
even our sun
are specks of dust.
A question...
what is out there
in the black void beyond?
- The planet is all we have.
And it is so...
ephemerally small.
We don't grasp how small it is
until you look at it.
My God.
So you talk about loneliness.
This is loneliness, man.
The whole planet is alone.
Human beings walking around
are alone.
And I think that,
and I feel that.
So it's more than Mommy.
It's...
it's huge.
- Science fiction became
science fact
for actor
William Shatner today.
At 90 years old,
"Star Trek's" Captain Kirk
became the oldest person
to travel to space.
- I'm lying in the seat...
and the engines
are fulminating.
- Our astronauts
can feel that.
They are sitting at the top
of a 60-foot rocket.
- And I hear, all right,
we're starting our countdown.
But before we start
a countdown-
This is almost verbatim.
Before we start
the countdown,
we're going to remove
the gantry.
So, if anybody decides
that they don't want to go,
now's the time to get off.
Huh?
I could go.
No, I can't go.
I can't go.
I'm Captain Kirk.
Now it's a go.
Countdown.
Hold on. There's an anomaly
in the engine.
An anomaly.
That's a great English word.
- There's something different
about this engine.
And all those thoughts
were flooding my brain.
I could've got off.
The "Hindenburg."
All right,
the anomaly's solved.
And we continue the countdown.
And now we're into liftoff,
and I'm looking out
the window,
and I see clouds of-
Oh, shit, I hope
this thing takes off.
My heart skipped a beat.
And on the brink of an eye,
it all happened so fast.
A thunderous blast shot up
as clouds passed.
Punched a hole in the sky!
And...
And it starts to go.
Holy cow.
And we're up in the-
And I'm looking
at the disappearing-
it's on my right-hand side-
disappearing Earth.
And we're up.
And the Gs are enormous.
Oh, God.
And then, bom!
Weightlessness.
- God.
- Weightlessness.
Oh, Jesus.
During the heyday
of the "Star Trek" I was on,
there was the activity
to get to the moon.
So they invited me
to come to Kennedy.
And I came to Kennedy.
And at that point,
"Star Trek" was-
my "Star Trek" was on the air.
And I got there,
and they literally rolled out
the red carpet
and took me
into this giant space
where they assembled
the rockets.
Now, I don't know,
two years later,
Star Trek has been canceled.
I've been divorced.
I'm broke.
I'm-
That word is really weird,
isn't it?
"I'm broke."
No, I'm not broken.
I don't have any money.
I was in a pasture.
In order to save motel
expenses and eating expenses,
I had bought a wrecked truck.
And I'm lying on the bed
in that little cab,
and I've got a 4-inch
black-and-white television set
on my chest.
And I'm looking through
the window at the moon.
It was a clear night
that night.
And I'm looking
at Armstrong...
stepping down from the...
I'm at my nadir.
I have no money.
I'm living like a bum.
I've got my dog.
I mean, at one point,
I couldn't cash a $15 check
after "Star Trek."
- One giant leap for mankind.
- And I'm looking at the...
incredible feat...
F-E-A-T,
and his feet, F-E-E-T,
as he placed it
for one small step for man,
one giant step for mankind.
I hear him say those things,
and I'm thinking,
my God, that's fantastic.
And only a short while ago,
I was a part of it.
I mean, they used to say
that when the "Star Trek's"
ratings went up,
the government
voted more money.
It was like
a self-energizing loop.
And so I was a teeny, teeny,
infinitesimally small part
of him landing on the moon.
And I'm here, and he's there.
And as I went to sleep,
I thought of the irony of it.
I subsequently recovered,
but that was a moment.
There I was
in a giant lifetime
coincidence...
of symmetry...
of chance.
Yeah.
I had seen...
footage of the interior
of the "Blue Origin" spaceship
on the first trip,
which had Jeff Bezos,
his brother, some young kid,
and this older astronaut.
And when I saw the footage,
I was like, my God.
I mean, that's fun.
That's funny.
To tell it, it's funny.
But is that
what you want to do
in the three minutes
you have in space?
Once beyond gravity,
we unlocked the key
and set ourselves free,
floating around the inside.
While some tumbled and danced
in that weightless trance,
I had to take my chance
to the window
to witness the ride.
I needed to see
what was out there
for me, in the endless sea,
to meet my fate,
I could never anticipate
what I saw.
Filled me with awe.
But also something cold
and pitiless and raw-
an instinct to withdraw,
a hot coal to be dropped.
Relentless blackness
was all I could see,
like a depthless eternity,
a benevolent mystery
that could never be stopped.
Endless darkness.
No twinkling stars, no magic
lights that call from afar,
no breathable air,
nothing to care,
no message to send,
no beginnings or ends,
no life could sustain,
no dreams could remain,
nearly drove me insane,
and I felt a deep pain.
What I saw stopped me cold,
collapsed all my breath.
All I could see...
was death.
I thought, my God,
that's probably the darkness
you see when you die.
Boom.
There's no light.
It's all over.
And then I referred
back to Earth.
And I saw the white clouds.
I saw the beige of the...
Texas desert.
I saw all of it filtered
through the blue air,
the refraction of sunlight
through the water vapor
in the air.
And I saw the curvature
of the Earth.
I could delineate the Earth.
It is this little, tiny thing.
We're a moat of dust
in the universe.
We are living on debris
from the solar system.
Our brains aren't made
to encompass
the vastness of the things
we're talking about.
I stumbled and said,
I can't believe it.
But we can't imagine
what it is.
Einstein said,
it's a spooky place.
And it's a spooky place.
And I realized that
little tiny rock...
is all we have to live on.
So we land,
and I go to get off,
and I suddenly feel myself
crying uncontrollably.
What you have given me
is the most profound
experience I can have.
I'm so filled with emotion
about what just happened,
I just-
It's extraordinary,
extraordinary.
What the heck?
What am I crying about?
What am I crying about?
I did an interview with a guy
the day before yesterday,
a well-known interviewer.
He said, I don't believe
in global warming.
What do you mean you don't
believe in global warming?
Do you believe in a
red light saying-
stopping you?
Or do you say, that's-
I know it's a red light,
but I don't believe in it,
and you go right through?
I mean, what do you mean
you don't believe in-
it's, like, insane.
Frankly, I hope
this planet survives.
I really do.
But I am getting
sick of you smug,
hybrid-driving socialists
telling the rest of us
how to live our lives.
I'm rich, okay?
I like to guzzle a
little gas now and then.
I keep my thermostat at
72 during the winter.
And I prefer night games
in football.
And I am fed up with you
global warming wusses
raining on my electric parade!
- Earth is our home.
Space has no people,
passion, or love.
An endless question
hangs from above
we know almost nothing of.
We are...approaching...
A very, to put it mildly,
a very tough time for the
people who come after us.
And we've got our heads
in the sand, mostly.
It's total denial
on a global scale.
Because what is reality
is so painful that it-
you'd better not face it.
Lieutenant, how
would you handle this?
- We could try
ignoring it, sir.
- I see.
Pretend nothing has happened
and hope everything turns
out all right in the morning.
- Just a thought, sir.
- I've considered that.
There's got to be
a better angle.
I heard an author
some years ago say,
well, it doesn't bother
me because I'm out of here
very soon.
But what about your
loved ones?
What are you going
to do about that?
That's-really bothers me.
I can understand
the violence of a storm.
It's a natural thing not
meant to harm anyone.
But the violence of men,
that cruelty and
savageness to one another,
to themselves-
And I thought of all
those things as I came down.
And I was-
I realize now it took me hours
to come to the conclusion,
I was in grief for the Earth.
I hope I never recover
from what I discovered.
Like a long-lost lover, I had
left to neglect mountains,
trees, birds, beasts.
Life-giving water,
magnificent feasts.
North, South, West, East.
All human reactions,
from terror to fun.
All that breathes,
swims, flies, or runs.
Literally everything
under the sun!
We all have our loves.
And what a miracle
that is on this planet.
Snails, lions, sand-
You know?
And everything loves.
Every living thing loves.
...touching the skies.
The percentages of the
degradation of wildlife
on Earth is enormous.
We don't realize it,
but it's like-
it's like having termites,
you know?
I'm dancing on the floor,
and one day,
you fall through the floor.
How did that happen?
It's all there-
it's all being eaten away.
It's all so fragile.
What can we do?
What can we do?
It's so fragile.
So blue.
What can we do?
What can we do?
When my time has come,
don't put me in a box.
And skip the fancy shiva.
No platters of bagels and lox.
Lay down that spike
and chisel.
No headstone will I need.
Yeah, when I die,
my wish is clear.
Just plant me like a seed.
'Cause I want to be a tree.
Yeah, I want to be a tree
with plenty of leaves
and bark to spare.
For everyone to see.
I want to be a tree.
Yeah, I want to be a tree.
You can sit right
down under my shade.
That'll be enough for me.
How much of our lives are
spent not doing anything?
You know?
You're in a waiting room
of your life
waiting for something that
you hope will happen,
that you try to make
happen, that you
think is going to happen,
and you wait.
So making-
the fullness of your life
is really fraught
with a lot of waiting.
A full life is a life
that's lived with awareness.
You see,
I read it and it's true.
Make a pod from my remains
and stick me in the ground
and pray for sun and rain.
The richness from my body
will supercharge the Earth.
And like a natural
maternity ward,
to a sapling I'll give birth.
I haven't changed the world.
I mean, if you talk about
fame, my heroes of the screen
have now been dead
for many years.
Of course,
they were great artists.
But they no longer are.
They're gone.
The nitrate
on the film is oxidized.
The billboards are burned.
The statues are torn down.
But what does remain,
what is a legacy,
are the good deeds.
Yeah, I want to be a tree.
You can sit right
down under my shade.
That'll be enough for me.
And helping an old
lady across the street,
that deed reverberates
like the butterfly wings
which disturbs the air
and changes fate.
You've just changed somebody's
or something's fate
by your contribution,
and that will be- that
will stand the test of time.
Everything else, you, me,
everything,
fades into oblivion
very quickly.
But that good deed
reverberates.
And I feel that.
If humankind were to
disappear tomorrow,
the world would come
back very quickly.
The trees would grow back.
The lungs of the Earth
would come back.
So don't stick me in an urn
for some relative to keep.
And please,
don't throw me overboard
to the bottom of the deep.
No 21-gun salute.
So just put those guns to bed.
I've got a much
more peaceful wish.
Bring the garden tools
instead!
And so I have
made arrangements
that my body will be cremated.
I'll be put in a bag
as an open sack.
A tree, a Redwood-
I wanted a Sequoia, but a
Redwood will be placed on-
over the bag.
The bag will nourish the tree.
I have this kind
of raw land where
I know where I want to do it.
The idea of still
being part of nature,
and flowering and there
and the tree grows,
and we know the
tree communicates-
and there's such a
mystique about trees,
and these wonderful,
large trees
that live for 1,000,
5,000 years.
There's a windswept Cypress
on the edge of a cliff
in Western California
on the coast.
The Lone Cypress.
And it's like an old,
gnarled grandfather.
It's, I'm here, and
I'm going to stay here!
What a thing.
What a thing to look at.
And those Sequoias, they're
1,000, 1,500 years old.
And they've lived
all that time,
enduring everything
that nature threw at them.
And fires of this year
killed Sequoia trees.
Where they are built
to survive any fire
because of their bark,
these fires were so bad that
Sequoias died as a result.
That's how bad it is.
Yeah, I want to be a tree
with plenty of leaves
and bark to spare,
for everyone to see.
Yes, I want to be a tree.
I want to be a tree standing,
swaying, firm and tall.
Glorious and free.
I want to be a tree.
Can you imagine?
So you think,
what's your legacy?
What are you leaving behind?
Good deeds?
Also a tree.
But that one's for you.
You can
sit under the shade.
And that'll be enough for me.
That'll be enough for me.
- One, two, three, four...
- I have saved the world
in the movies.
So naturally,
there's folks who think
I must know what to do.
And just because you've
seen me on your TV...
doesn't mean I'm any more
enlightened than you.
- And while
there's a part of me
in that guy you've seen
up there on that screen
I am so much more.
And I wish I knew
the things you think I do
I would change this world
for sure.
But I eat and sleep and
breathe and bleed and feel.
Sorry to disappoint you
but I'm real
- I'd love to help the world
and all its problems.
But I'm an entertainer
and that's all.
So the next time
there's an asteroid
or a natural disaster,
I'm flattered
that you thought of me,
but I'm not the one to call.
- And while there's
a part of me
in that guy you see
up there on that screen
I am so much more.
And I wish I knew the things
you think I knew
I would change this world
for sure.
But I eat and sleep and
breathe and bleed and feel.
Sorry to disappoint you,
but I'm real.
- And while
there's a part of me
in that guy you've seen
up there on that screen...
I am so much more.
- And I wish I knew
- And I wish I knew...
- the things you think I do
- the things you think I do.
- I would change this world
- I would change this world...
- for sure
- for sure.
- But I eat
- But I eat...
- and sleep and breathe
- and sleep and breathe...
- and bleed and feel
- and bleed and feel.
Sorry to disappoint you...
...but I'm real.
- When you take away the mask,
what is there
to boldly go into?
Boldly go into your life.
Live your life fully,
passionately.
We all have our loves,
and what a miracle
that is on this planet.
I'm afraid of being alone.
Everything loves.
Every living thing loves.
What's your legacy?
What are you leaving behind,
good deeds?
Also, a tree.
I've always had dogs
in my adult life.
In my childhood, my parents
wouldn't let me have a dog.
And so I yearned
to have a dog.
I did have one dog when
I was nine, ten years old.
Parents didn't like it
very much because my father,
who was an earnest man
who worked very hard
and thought, why am
I spending money on a dog
when I could be saving it?
I used to come home from
school and climb the fence
to our little backyard
where the dog would be
and interact with the dog.
One day, I climbed the fence,
there was no dog.
My mother was in the house.
"Where's the dog?"
And she said reluctantly,
he's outside, Bill-Billy.
And I knew something
was wrong, and I ran outside.
And there was my beloved dog,
dead on the street.
It'd been hit by a car.
And I remember gathering
the little-ish dog in my arms.
We had stairs to the-
This was a quadraplex.
And underneath those stairs
was a space.
There was sunlight,
and the latticework
cast a latticework of light
over the dog.
And I was holding the dog,
crooning in pain.
And I lost my dog.
The dog that meant so much
to me as a kid was dead.
I didn't quite understand
what dead was, I think,
but I remember
being bewildered.
And, finally,
I buried the dog.
I think I must have buried it
under those stairs.
And never had a dog since
until I was married-
about 25, 26.
And the first thing
I did was get a dog.
They speak to you.
Dogs speak to you.
Horses speak to you, too.
Trees communicate.
There's this fungi network
which the trees are using
like brain stems.
There's a pattern
in the ground
for a latticework.
I'd like to think there's
a latticework in the universe.
Everything else
has a structure.
Why wouldn't there be
a structure there?
All these things that took
5 billion years to grow,
to become-
I'm working myself up into
an emotional storm here.
It took 5 billion years
to evolve what we see now
in nature.
The preciousness
of everything-
the snails, the worms,
the gnats-
took 5 billion years
of exquisite...
agony.
And the reason I feel so sad
about it
is because...
Extinction is happening
so rapidly now...
By mankind's own hands,
by pollution.
All that is disappearing.
And I'm overwhelmed with it
because we're living
in a miracle.
The little brain that got us
out of the tree
and invented things,
made tools
also has allowed us
to look up into the sky
and look down on the ground,
and realize the miracle
of what we're living in-
the miracle of the universe,
the miracle of the ground,
the miracle...
No, no-
No, no, no, no, no!
I'm not beaming in.
You said I could make
an entrance
with a rocket
strapped to my ass.
By the time people see
what we're filming...
I will have received
a lifetime-achievement award,
a rather prestigious one.
- And we are forever
in your debt.
- What do you achieve
in a life
that's worth an award?
Save yourself...
some money.
Whether you're celebrated
for your death
and your statue's knocked
down 50 years later...
- It's what
he would have wanted.
- Or you died in battle
and were buried
in an unmarked grave.
- It really doesn't matter
'cause it's all over so soon.
So...
the occasion of your death
is meaningless.
You're one
of billions upon billions
who lived and died on Earth.
I thought
about that quite a bit.
And the only answer
I came up with...
is this.
In my life-
So I was born in Montreal.
And when I was
six years of age,
I was at a camp
in the Laurentian Mountains-
city boy going for two weeks
into the woods.
And the camp put on a play,
and I was in the play,
and something they had
written for me that I said
caused the audience to cry.
- This is about Willy.
- Zero hour...9:00 a.m.
And I was bitten by the bug.
And I'm gonna be high.
Maybe it was communication.
Maybe it was, wow,
I made people cry.
I'll try and make them laugh.
And that was a lifetime.
He died
of a heart attack onstage.
That's what he died-
That's the way I want to go.
Not tonight.
I see you walking around
town with the girl I love
And I'm like, you
I guess the change
in my pocket wasn't enough
I'm like, you,
and, uh, her, too
That's the story of my life.
Nothing there particularly
to get an award for.
I just did what any actor
was doing
to one degree or another.
But what I did do,
somewhat consciously...
Was take care
of the inner child,
that curious baby
who looked around
and said, why is the sky blue?
Do worms have eyes?
What are they doing
under the ground?
Why are we here?
Is there a God?
What happens after death?
We ask ourselves questions.
Why?
- Excuse me,
I'd just
like to ask a question.
What does God need
with a Starship?
- Will they reach New York
all right now?
Are we gonna live in the East?
Are we gonna live in the West?
Are we gonna live
in this country?
- And then as you...
get a job and you get married
or you have children,
life's exigencies prey on you,
and that curiosity
is generally beaten
out of you in school, in life.
You lose the curiosity.
And that's a shame
because that curiosity
is what keeps us...
Alive.
- Children never age.
Eternal childhood
filled with play.
No responsibilities.
It's almost like a dream.
- I wouldn't examine
that dream too closely.
It might not turn out
to be very pretty.
- It's the search for love
that sends everybody
in motion,
whether you're searching
for the love of God-
whoever that is,
whatever that is-
the love of nature,
the love of a woman or a man,
the love of curiosity.
And I think curiosity
is love...
is the fulfilled life.
And I've tried
to inculcate myself
to be aware...
to be aware, live in the now,
and say,
why is that happening?
What is that?
Oh, how interesting.
What do you think?
What's your story?
How do you feel?
And I've been able to do that
to a degree,
and I'm kind of proud of that.
And if I am to receive
any kind of an award,
it would be for taking care
of my inner child.
I'm a grandfather
more than once.
My granddaughter-in-law
had her family
at this birthday party
in the park,
and my family was there.
I was looking at it
like a three-layered cake.
I'm on the bottom layer.
And I'm looking around,
and I'm thinking,
my God, I'm out of here soon.
And I hate that phrase.
I'm gonna die soon.
I'll never see
these babies grow up.
I'll never know
what they're going to become.
We're all connected.
I'll come back to this
time and time again...
because I know nothing.
Our ignorance is so profound.
And the more we know,
the more we realize how stupid
and how egotistical
human beings are,
thinking we're the only ones.
- I don't believe we can stop.
I don't believe
we're meant to.
Do you wish...
the first Apollo mission
hadn't reached the moon
or we hadn't gone on to Mars
and then to the nearest star?
That's like saying you wish
that you still operated
with scalpels
and sewed your patients up
with catgut,
like your great-great-great-
great-grandfather used to.
- Animals very rarely have...
duplicity.
We're the ones
who are greatly duplicitous
and have the masks up.
The thing that makes me feel
a connection
to whatever we call it
is nature or animals
or people.
But...
you reach a connection
with a horse that is-
can be something mystical.
And I think the mysticism
is all in the human feeling,
not in the horse.
The horse is there-
oh, jeez, he's got
on my back again.
But you're thinking,
this magnificent animal,
and he and I, or she and I,
are at one.
Horses live in the now.
So that's the first thing
you learn about horses.
They're here and now.
Live in the now.
So, if you're
in communication...
with that horse,
if you and the horse
are vibrating
at the same rate...
that horse...
that horse is and you are
in each other's thrall,
you are mystically bound.
Well, you're at one
with the horse,
but you're also at one
with the Earth.
You're also at one
with the planet.
You're at one with the stars.
You're at one with the sky.
You're at one with the breeze
in your face.
You're at one with-
and this is where
we get crazy-
with the creator, whoever-
whatever that is.
He or she or whatever
that is, where it started,
you're suddenly at one.
And it's humbling.
It's like you're there.
And it's so large.
It's so gigantic.
It may be the answer
to what happens when you die.
It's just- you can't be
egotistical about that.
The ecstasy of that
is what brings you
to that cathedral of the barn,
where you and the horse
are vibrating on the same...
whatever that is, channel.
And that's the mystique
and the mysticism
about being at one
with the universe.
And that can be done.
It happened to me
in a performance
three weeks
before this is being taped.
- So fragile, so blue
What can we do?
What can we do?
What can we do?
What can we do?
What can we do?
Thank you, and good night.
I was at one
with the audience.
For me, with an audience, it
happens with some regularity.
I'm there with the audience.
The audience is there with me.
And it's a performance.
And suddenly
the silence is palpable.
What do you mean
you're communicating
with an audience?
And yet, it is.
And it happens enough
that you can repeat
the experience.
So there must be something
that we are dimly aware of.
That feeling...
of being at one...
Is...
religious.
It's animistic, I think.
And that's where paganism
comes in,
where a rock may contain,
not a God in our language
but a spirit.
The tree has a spirit.
People who live
close to the Earth
realize that these gifts
from the Earth
need to be thanked.
So, whether it's
Thank You, God, for this
or for a moment of reflection,
just thank the Earth
for being what it is.
And that's the sadness.
I have some property
in the foothills
of the Sierras.
And I was going through
some tough times financially.
The land is on a wild river.
So one day I'm
in the wild river naked.
And I'm thinking, you know,
I've got to sell this land.
I got to get the money
and sell this land.
And I'm sitting there naked,
and there's a lizard.
And the lizard's going...
I think, oh, my Lord,
the lizard gets its water
by catching droplets
from the river.
I can't possibly sell
this land.
And I didn't.
- Come on, let's go.
- When I was a kid, RKO,
which is now CBS,
was turning out Westerns by-
you know,
I think they made
them in a week.
And I loved them.
I lived in Montreal, just off
of a street called Monkland.
And there was
a Monkland movie theater.
It's Canada, but it was
right out of Middle America.
Have a soda, pay a dime or-
It went to a quarter
at one point,
where they would
play movies all day.
So you could go in
and see three movies.
- Bambi!
- I must have seen "Bambi"
two or three times.
Father came in
and picked me up,
and I remember hanging on
to a railing
'cause I didn't want to go.
He's pulling me off.
"Bambi!"
I was enthralled with movies.
So I think that was a big part
of becoming an actor.
I couldn't get enough.
You know, I'm just
beginning to realize now,
as I talk to you...
that those Westerns
and those horses,
the legend
of the American West
was everything.
I rode a great
saddle-bred
stallion bareback
in a movie we made
on Alexander the Great.
Alexander was
Captain Kirk in 300 BC.
I rode bareback,
which is very difficult to do,
at a gallop with a sword and
a shield
and holding the horse.
And I worked for six months
getting myself ready
for that movie.
And that was, like,
everything.
I admire people who...
go home in the role.
I mean, they bring the role
home with them.
My actor heroes were
Olivier and Marlon Brando,
two opposite poles
of the acting rainbow,
if you will.
And being Canadian,
I was in between the English
and the American worlds.
So I had long since learned
to learn the words,
do the best you can
with the character.
- My office is next to yours
at the Palace of Justice,
if you need anything.
- Thank you.
- Senator.
- And when it was done,
you were done.
I mean, you're
a professional actor.
A carpenter doesn't come home
and try to fix the
dining-room table necessarily.
But if you say, this character,
is on a five-year mission
to discover
and he's filled
with awe and wonder
about what he's discovering,
what else do you need to know?
- Gentlemen,
they're debating
in a vacuum.
Let's go get some answers.
- Every line then becomes,
wow, look at that.
Look at this.
Look at that.
- I prefer this-
double-action .357 Magnum,
loaded with hollow points.
- TJ Hooker,
a recalcitrant policeman
who doesn't want to do
all these new things
like read Miranda rights-
what the hell is that?
- It'll tear a 6-inch hole in
you going in
and the Holland Tunnel
coming out.
Resist arrest.
Resist arrest, please.
- He's a bad guy.
You mean I have to?
For God sakes.
Okay, I will.
- Now to prison,
When a bust does stick,
we house them,
give them color TV
and their wives on weekends.
If that makes sense to you...
then you and I are about
to have a problem,
because
I'm your instructor here,
and I love to weed out
airheads and marshmallows.
- That's the character.
And Denny Crane,
like, confused.
Like...
I don't quite remember.
- Denny Crane.
- Yes, I know
you're Denny Crane.
Why do you always
tell me your name?
Is it so you won't forget?
- Two wild things that
David E. Kelley wrote
that I don't even think
he knew
'cause he never offered
an explanation.
Two things.
One is, he had the character
say the name Denny Crane.
Denny Crane.
So he'd write out Denny Crane,
Denny Crane, Denny Crane.
- Denny Crane.
Denny Crane.
Denny Crane.
- I'm ahead of you there.
- Denny Crane.
- Good for you.
- What the hell
does that mean?
What's he saying?
I had a picture
of reptiles
who flick out their tongue
to get a reading
on what the atmosphere
is like, its scent.
That flicking is not-
That's their nose
and their apprehension
and comprehension
of their environment.
So Denny Crane,
I pictured,
Denny Crane, Denny Crane.
Eh, Denny Crane.
And getting a reading.
When I say Denny Crane,
what's your reaction?
- What's my name?
- Denny Crane.
- Like you mean it.
- Denny Crane.
- What's my name?
- Denny Crane!
- No further questions.
- Oh, you know me.
You don't know me?
Denny Crane. Denny Crane.
- Could you just
say those two little words
I so long to hear?
- Denny Crane.
- Thank you.
- Then...
every so often
in the five years
that we did the show,
he'd write-
the character would say,
"Play the music."
I'd say to the director,
do you understand what-
Who am I saying,
play the music?
Do you understand play-
No, I don't know.
So I'd say, play the music.
I didn't know what
to do with the line.
On the last show,
the last season,
he has the character say...
"I think of my life
as a TV show."
That's why he's saying
play the music.
- Cue the music.
- So that's the discoveries.
That's the fuel.
And from then,
you just maneuver
the ship anywhere you want,
but you've got
an engine going.
Remembering the lines
is an unspoken-about skill.
Laurence Olivier came onstage
and forgot his lines-
we call it going dry-
in his acceptance speech
for the Academy Award.
I remember saying,
what did he say?
- In the great wealth,
the great firmament
of your nation's generosities,
this particular choice
may perhaps be found
by future generations
as a trifle eccentric,
but the mere fact of it...
- Either that day
or days later,
he explained he didn't know
what he was saying
'cause he was so panicked
being in front
of that audience.
He just spoke words.
He made absolutely no sense.
He just strung phrases
that he had remembered
from Shakespeare plays
and anything
you could think of.
There's a pen on the desk,
and it writes beautifully.
- And the extraordinary
elation,
the euphoria that happens
to so many of us
at the first breath
of the majestic glow
of a new tomorrow.
- And we all are fearful
of forgetting.
I would imagine-
I've not talked about this
at any great length
with other actors.
But for me, learning the words
is the work of the actor.
Everything else is a kick.
Without paying the penalty
of sky-high fuel bills.
I'm delighted
to be part of the future...
of Kero-Sun.
I really am.
Now I go.
- An actor brings himself.
Again, Laurence Olivier-
they used to say,
with his makeup on,
first the nose came onstage,
followed by Larry.
No matter what you do-
with some exceptions,
like De Niro
putting on a lot of weight,
and then taking the weight off
to play that boxer.
That was extraordinary
and unhealthy.
But for the most part,
all the actor can do
is bring who he is
to the role.
Every human being is limited
by what they are,
whether it's in business-
Whatever business you're in,
you bring
your own sensibilities to it.
No matter how much you pretend
I'd like to be so-and-so,
you can't be.
You're yourself.
I think that everybody
wears a mask-
everybody-
until you take it down.
We're all holding a mask up
to various times
to various people.
We're holding up the mask
that I think
is what we expect them
to think.
I want them to realize
what you're thinking about me
is true,
and here's my mask.
I think that's it.
So you hold the mask
up of being intelligent.
- And here I thought
you were in shock.
- No, you didn't.
You thought I was confused...
perhaps scared...
and probably playing for time.
- Amazing.
- Why do birds
suddenly appear?
- Or being funny
or being wise.
Hello, I'm William Shatner,
and I'm a shaman.
I'm a conduit of
the ancient forces of nature.
Or being Daddy,
husband, lover.
Mask.
- Hi. I'm your host on this
visit to Washington, D.C.
When do you take
away the mask,
and how do you know you've
taken away the mask?
- What-
What does it mean?
There is no myself.
I'm an actor.
Man of a thousand faces-
one for Farragut,
one for Norland, one for Lila,
one for the children, one-one-
There's no myself anymore.
There's nothing in the mirror.
- You look in the mirror.
You don't really see yourself
when you look in the mirror.
I mean, you'd be appalled
at what you really look like
if you could just see
the reality of-
That's why I don't watch film
on myself,
because
you can't peel away the-
That's real.
There was a close-up
of me as Kirk dies.
And I wanted Kirk
to die the way he lived-
with courage-
'cause I always played Kirk...
with curiosity.
He would say,
oh, my God, what's that?
I wanted that to be his death.
And I didn't quite-
I wish I'd had
another take at it.
- It was...
Fun.
Oh, my.
- I wanted to be, "Oh, my"...
like, wow, death is coming.
How interesting.
Because that's the way
he led his life.
We'll die the way we live.
I mean, we don't change...
When you die, I guess.
I don't know.
Does anybody know?
Nobody knows.
Doesn't anybody know?
Does anybody know?
What's that line from a song?
Nobody knows.
It is slightly darker
than I wanted it to be.
And maybe that's the way
it should be.
- Captain, I just wanted
to assure you
that I did what I thought best
to save both you and the men.
- Noted.
You should know, however,
that there's very little
a Starbase can do
that a Starship can't.
- If I may say so, Captain,
I am now quite aware
of what a Starship can do
with the right man
at the helm.
- Commanding officers-
really good
commanding officers-
I don't know
whether I knew this then,
all those years ago,
but, certainly,
I've observed that...
don't say
all right, let's turn left.
That's what they did
on the pilot.
- We aren't going to go
to be certain?
- Not without any indication
of survivors, no.
Continue on to the Vega colony
and take care of our own sick
and injured first.
You have the helm.
Maintain present course.
- Yes, sir.
- And they presented it to NBC.
And NBC said,
well, it's a great idea
but we don't like the cast.
Do another thing.
And I was in the second pilot.
- I'll have you checkmated
your next move.
Have I ever mentioned you play
a very irritating game
of chess, Mr. Spock?
- Irritating?
Ah, yes, one
of your Earth emotions.
- Certain you don't know
what irritation is?
- As long as he has
the command presence,
he can be a joker.
He could be light.
He could be heavy.
He could be...
But that command presence
is what you need.
And that's what I think
I tried to do
most of the time.
- I'm in command.
I could order this.
But I'm not...
Because Dr. McCoy is right...
in pointing out
the enormous danger potential
in any contact
with life and intelligence
as fantastically advanced
as this.
But I must point out
that the possibilities,
the potential...
for knowledge and advancement
is equally great.
- Just be present there
with the ability to know-
I know exactly
what we have to do,
and I'll tell you what-
you know, just go over there,
stand there,
and be ready when I count.
- Given
the same circumstances...
I would do the same thing
without hesitation,
because the steps I took
in the order I took them...
were absolutely necessary
if I were to save my ship.
And nothing...
is more important
than my ship.
- And so I think
I brought more humor, more...
I didn't think it needed
to be as...
we're on a mission.
And took it from seeing
real guys,
real commanders
who don't do that.
- When I think of the hospitals
in which
over 130,000 other men
of the Third Army...
have had a damn good time,
usually.
- Why me?
- I've never heard
of a network saying
to a company,
here's the money to do another
pilot
of the same show.
Just change the cast
and, of course, another story.
- I believe there's some hope
for you after all, Mr. Spock.
- Could you define
for me Shatnerian?
What is that?
- Oh, Shatnerian.
- Shatnerian.
- I have no idea.
I've heard that phrase.
- I see myself in you, Joey,
at your age.
I just wish someone
had given me
the opportunity that you have.
We grow up too soon, Joey.
- I have no idea
what they mean.
I hear people going...
And he talks like this.
And when
they started doing that,
I remember turning to my wife-
is that me?
Is that what they're doing?
- Normally, Shatner talks at
a pretty lightning-fast pace.
He's William Shatner.
He's talking.
And when sometimes the lines
aren't as...
obvious to him,
he slows down.
Becomes more deliberate
in his approach...
until he gets it,
then he's back
speeding up again and talking.
- People's supposed imitation
of me is...
I don't know.
I don't hear it.
- Listen to me.
Time and space-
you're taking up
valuable time and space.
- And when I speak,
I never,
ever talk like every word
is its own sentence.
- I became friends
with Edward G. Robinson.
As an actor, he did
a lot of nyah, nyah.
Well, I'm gonna rub them out.
Nyah.
So I said to him one day...
Do you know you go, nyah?
He's like, I go, nyah?
- I turn on the radio,
what do I hear?
Nyah, nyah, nyah.
Everybody on television,
nyah, nyah, nyah.
The day...
the day my little baby
was born,
the first time that
I picked him up in my arms,
all other babies say,
goo, goo, dada.
He looked up at me, and
he said, nyah, nyah, nyah.
- Comedy is as delicate
as a heart operation.
If you say take my wife...
please, you know...
if you say, take my wife,
please, it's not funny.
But if there's a mystical-
a mist, not mystical-
but a mist...
of humor.
- How are you all?
I'm glad to be here.
Take my wife, please.
- One wrong move,
and you've lost the humor,
lost the joke.
I mean, if you're saying-
go back to the other line-
take my wife, please.
I don't know why I keep
going back to that.
I don't want you
to take my wife.
Please don't take my wife.
Take my-
Please.
Somebody in the office-
in the audience coughs...
it destroys the laugh.
It's empty.
One slight deviation
from the timing of the line,
but particularly
the feed line-
There's a feed line
and a snapper,
the joke line and laugh.
The timing on that is
exquisite, exquisite.
Fred Willard,
I've been watching your career
for many years,
and I can honestly say...
I don't get it.
You're just so dry.
If you were any dryer, you'd
be in Betty White's underwear.
You rehearse in a room,
and you think it's funny.
And then opening night
in front of a trial audience,
the play changes completely,
'cause there's
another character in the play-
the audience.
Hello.
- Captain on the bridge,
captain on the bridge!
You're William Shatner.
- You can call me Bill.
- Can I call you Captain?
- No.
- Please?
- No.
And, slowly,
you play that music
of allowing the audience in,
incorporating the audience in
so that...
you're playing
to the audience,
but you're not playing
to the audience.
- I've appeared onstage
at Stratford,
at Carnegie Hall, Albert Hall,
and the Monkland Theater
in MBG.
And, yes, I've gone where
no man has gone before,
but...
I was in Mexico, and
her father gave me permission.
My name is William Shatner,
and I am Canadian!
And you're aware
of the audience,
but you're not aware
of the audience.
It's a delicate balance
everywhere.
And the moment you lose that
balance, you lose the laugh.
You lose the continuity.
You lose the character.
Everything
goes out the window.
That first laugh...
It's like suckling
on mother's milk.
It's just...
- Ladies and gentlemen,
William Shatner.
- Empowering.
- Thank you, thank you.
Thank you very much.
Thank you.
The producer said, we'd like
you to do the opening
for George Lucas's
Lifetime Achievement Award.
And the sketch for me-
It was literally a sketch.
You go out there and act
as though you're
at a "Star Trek" convention.
"Star Trek"
changed everything.
And aren't these conventions
wonderful?
And then discover
that it's "Star Wars"...
And then get off
as fast as you can.
So I take a piece of paper
out of my hand.
"Mr. Shatner, we want you
to open the show.
'Star Wars'?"
And they got it,
and they started to laugh.
And the moment
they started to laugh,
I realized that I had them,
because that's
a very delicate balance.
Imagine...
if they didn't get it.
George.
It's George, isn't it?
May I call you George?
Thank you.
You can call me Mr. Shatner.
That's how delicate
a balance comedy is.
That's the...
springboard...
that you dive off of
from a 30-foot height,
and you hope there's water
in the pool.
That's comedy.
That's the courage
of a madman.
And...
when you fail...
I failed.
I did fail once,
more than once, but this
was a memorable failure.
So I was asked to do
a stand-up comedy routine.
So I got a great idea.
I'll come out as Captain Kirk,
who thinks
he's a stand-up comic.
Take my wife, please.
'Cause he's got no timing
'cause he's a captain of
a Starship, he's not a comic.
And what if he's the worst
stand-up comic that ever was?
That sounds funny to me.
Take my wife, please.
Nobody's laughing.
Shit.
That was my lesson
in comedy failing.
I almost forgot it,
it was so painful.
It's embarrassing.
And apparently a lot of,
if not all, stand-up comics-
even the good ones,
even the ones
that are, like, now popular
and they're trying a
new routine out
and it doesn't work,
and it's like-
It's death. It's death.
You want to die.
You want to die now.
And they go on, you know.
They keep going.
Maybe this one will work.
- Great. I think we've got it.
Bill, I hope you
come back tomorrow.
I hope you haven't had enough.
- That's the best line yet.
"I hope you come back
tomorrow."
No, I'm gonna go ride
a horse tomorrow.
The thing about getting old
is you don't realize
you're getting old.
Oh, yeah.
We're both too old
for this kind of thing.
- As a kid in Montreal,
at some point when I was six
or seven or eight,
my dad could afford
to rent a cottage,
a little old cottage
on a little old lake,
and not too far away
was a welfare camp.
And by the time
I was 15 or 16,
I applied to the camp
to be a counselor.
These were tough kids from
the tough part of Montreal.
So I defended myself
by telling stories.
I was in demand
as a storyteller.
And...
I used to tell them
ghost stories.
Once upon a midnight dreary...
While I pondered weak
and weary
over many a quaint
and curious volume
of forgotten lore...
while I nodded,
nearly napping,
suddenly there came a tapping.
I was an actor
when I was six years old,
and being an actor,
taking material
that you don't let-
even in your innocence
because you're a child,
you don't know anything about,
and putting it out
for the first time
in front of an audience
is an adventure itself.
- Corbis.
I'll face whatever you have
behind those doors
and come out exactly
as I went in.
- Everything, by the way,
is an adventure.
My talking to you
should be an adventure
for you and for me
so that I'm discovering what
I'm saying as I'm saying it.
Everything's risky.
Actors want to be
loved and liked.
And no matter
what the role is,
the jeopardy is the same.
- Jump, jump.
That a girl.
- Playing the leading role
in any of these series
that I've done,
that's a risk.
- Aah!
- I do have a sense
of adventure.
I did a series called
"Voice of the Planet."
And I'm there on a-
I don't know-
12,000-, 14,000-foot mountain
on a glacier,
standing there like that.
I hear a crack there,
oh, and a crack there.
I don't know
what's between my legs,
whether I could fall in there
to an icy blue-ice death.
And I'm standing there
thinking,
what am I doing here?
Why have I done this?
I've done a number
of those things
over a period of my life,
and I don't know why.
But there's something
beautiful about that.
- Risk.
Risk is our business.
That's what the Starship
is all about.
That's why we're aboard her.
- Fighting against myself
as a character,
you got to look
for characteristics
that are obvious enough
so the audience will know
which one it is.
- You can't hurt me.
You can't kill me.
You can't.
Don't you understand?
I'm part of you.
You need me.
I need you.
- It's a sale.
Nothing beats a sale.
- Wrong move.
- You.
- You can save
up to half-off that sale
when you name your own price
on Priceline.
- But this one's a deal,
trust me.
- It's only pretending
to be a deal.
Here, bid $79.
Got it. Wow.
- You win this time,
good twin.
- I did a film in Spain
between seasons
at "Star Trek."
And the idea was...
there was a good twin
and a bad twin.
- I'll be in the place
called Rio Hondo.
I'll wait...
four days.
Either you come
and meet me there alone,
or I'll find you again.
One of us must die.
- Of course, they looked alike
'cause they were twins.
And they rode
distinctive horses.
Each twin
had a particular horse
so they could say, oh, no,
that was the other twin.
But in addition, in reality,
you needed two horses,
because for long shots, you
needed a horse that would run.
And for close-ups,
you needed a horse
that was calm.
So I had four horses...
two for each character
that I was playing.
The horse for close-up
was named El Tranquilo,
the tranquil one.
And the one for long shots
was El Nervioso,
the nervous one.
- You should make
a very convincing Nazi.
- In "Star Trek,"
there was a Nazi guy,
and then there was
the evil guy, evil Kirk.
- I'm Captain Kirk.
I'm Captain Kirk!
I'm Captain Kirk!
- A couple-
at least three of them.
Maybe there were
three or four.
But in doing that,
I needed to find a core
of the other character.
- Look at me carefully, Spock.
Can't you tell
I'm your captain?
- Well, there's one difference
between us-I'm hungry.
- The difference is
your weakness, Captain,
not mine.
- Captain Kirk
was the good guy,
but what did the bad guy-
What does a bad guy do?
And what does a Nazi do that
makes him more distinctive?
- Now...
Janice Lester takes
the place of Captain Kirk.
I already possess
your physical strength.
Only this Captain Kirk is
not afraid to kill.
- I've played Captain Kirk
as a woman.
How do you play a woman?
The key is to find a core.
There are keys,
if you think
about it enough-
- Rocket man...
- That make a character
sufficiently different enough
that it's recognizable,
but it's still you.
- Who are you?
Who are you really?
- What do you mean?
I'm the host of the hit series
"Rescue 911."
- I thought
that was Robert Stack.
- Robert Stack?
Are you insane?
- So what does
"know yourself" mean?
I've often thought of that.
"Know thyself."
Like what?
Like you like spaghetti?
Okay.
You know, but...
what are you going to do
in a situation?
You don't know what you're
going to do in a situation.
Standing on that train,
what was I doing?
Was I showing off?
Was I trying to make
a better movie?
Was I interested
in what it felt like?
That was the dumbest thing
I could have ever thought of,
putting myself in jeopardy
like that.
But logic only came in
after the passion.
- be so obsessed.
- Obsessed?
- That you could destroy
yourself, uh, your career.
- And we know that passion
overrides anything.
Overrides logic.
The reptilian brain of passion
overrides
the frontal lobe's thoughts.
It's unfortunate, but that's
what human beings are.
"What have I done?"
Which is a phrase
that I've used in my songs
quite a bit.
What have I done?
- My God, Bones.
What have I done?
- What you had to do...
what you always do...
turned death into
a fighting chance to live.
- There's no ego involved,
as far as I can consider.
I don't care.
I would do whatever
I was doing in a vacuum.
- Sea monkeys?
- Piranha.
- Their lives exude
a beautiful simplicity-
savage, ruthless,
existing only
to devour and destroy,
to taste blood, to rend flesh.
Sounds like me, right?
- What's it like to do that?
What's it like?
What's it feel like?
There is a curiosity about it.
Can I do that?
Can I do that
without hurting myself?
You're going
against all the instincts
and intuition
of self-preservation
by doing these-
by challenging your life.
- Have I the right
to jeopardize my crew, my ship
for a feeling
I can't even put into words?
No man achieves
Starfleet Command
without relying on intuition.
But have I made
a rational decision?
Am I letting the horrors
of the past
distort my judgment
of the present?
- When you talk about thrills
and danger,
all that pales besides
the search for passion.
You should be passionate
about everything.
You should be passionate
about talking, about eating.
I want a deep-fried turkey
I want a moister,
tastier turkey
I want a deep-fried turkey
About loving.
About exploring.
I mean, name a verb,
and you should be passionate
about it.
Go boldly passionately.
Without that,
everything is academic.
Boldly go, go into war.
Sail your vessel.
Put your vessel next
to the bad guys
and shields up.
But now...
in the aftermath...
what is there
to boldly go into?
The last thing is death.
So boldly go into your life.
Live your life fully,
passionately.
Have some effect,
do something good,
either to yourself,
to the people.
Leave something
that, you know,
that has some quality,
that has some value.
And then boldly go
into the next...
thing,
whether it's emptiness or...
whatever it is.
So it's an interesting phrase-
"Go boldly."
Go boldly.
Go with courage.
Go fully.
Go with commitment.
That's what it means.
Don't do it half-heartedly.
Whatever it is you do,
do it fully.
Do it passionately.
Do it with your whole being.
This is what I believe in
for the next five minutes,
and then I'll believe
in something else.
That's what it means.
I've often talked about regret.
You can't regret.
Oh, I should have turned left.
Because you went to the left
because that was your passion.
Either turn around and go
the right, if you can,
or boldly go to the left.
See if you can make a purse
out of a pig's ear.
So I've tried to limit
my sense of regret.
And that's why you
shouldn't have regrets.
You should try-
Ah, there's no "you should."
I don't know
what I'm talking about.
I...
tried not to do that.
I left home when it was safer
to stay home
and I wanted to stay home.
I...
I went onstage
as an understudy
for "Henry V."
Chris Plummer
was playing Henry.
Something was telling me-
drill those words,
drill those words.
Close the wall up
with our English-
Yeah, yeah,
I got it, I got it.
Once more unto the breach,
dear friend.
Once more unto the breach,
dear friend.
Once more un-
And I would work
and work at it.
And about a week
into the opening
of "Henry V," less,
somebody says to me...
the director wants to talk
to you.
Says, Chris is ill
in the hospital.
Can you go on?
Now,
what did he know?
And I said, yes.
I can go on.
- Timothy Leary,
on his deathbed,
took his final breath...
And said, "Of course."
That's all he said.
He didn't give us
any explanation.
Of course what?
Of course what?
What did he see?
What did he see?
Maybe he said, "Off course."
I don't know!
He didn't give us any context!
Loneliness is a...
a strange beast.
We all are essentially alone.
We don't realize it.
We're born alone.
We die alone.
In between,
we have relationships.
And the relationships
are good.
But do we really know
each other?
Do we really know ourselves?
Do we really know that...
we're not alone
because that person
or persons is...
is in us, with us, beside us?
I think that...
essentially we're all alone.
- I'm alone!
Alone.
Alone.
- And some of us,
I think I'm included,
have been alone all our lives.
Never really had...
the friendship
that we read about.
I knew some kids
on the street,
but I never had a real friend.
I think...
the women in my life,
the loves of my life,
have been my friend
and has assuaged
that loneliness.
But I just have been alone...
all my life, pure and simple.
It goes along
with the idea of masks
and what we hold up,
and do we ever present
ourselves as we really are,
as we really are
to somebody else?
Can we be absolutely honest?
I mean,
for a longer period of time
than a flash of passion.
I'm conflicted by it.
I don't want to be alone.
I'm afraid of being alone.
I've gone to great lengths
not to be alone.
And the thing
that frightens me most
about dying is dying.
- What am I-a dog that I die
when I am dead?
No.
I am a man with a God.
And when I die...
I live.
- Do you think about dying?
- All the time.
- Yeah?
- Yeah.
- Do you think it's going
to be pretty exciting?
- No.
- I think it is.
- I don't want to leave.
- Really?
- Well, I'm having
too good a time.
I'm more active now
than I've ever been.
I'm more productive,
more creative.
So I'm not languishing.
But what would happen
if you were languishing?
Do you communicate?
Do you say,
I'm dying and I'm afraid?
Can you talk about that?
Does anybody know
what they're talking about
when they talk to you
about it?
Oh, don't be afraid.
What do you mean
don't be afraid?
I'm the one that's dying.
No, it's going to be
all right.
You'll go to heaven.
What do you mean?
What's heaven?
What is heaven?
Well, all right, so you'll
just be part of the universe.
Great.
So I'll be unconscious.
Yes, 'cause you'll be an atom
or gas or something.
I've had enough gas.
So loneliness is endemic.
I saw a dog the other day
on the street
frantically looking around.
And is that what lonely people
do emotionally?
Emotionally,
frantically look around,
trying to find
some attachment?
I had a wild experience.
Went to Hawaii with my family.
And on that particular beach,
there was police tape.
There was a body.
Oh, somebody died?
No, no, no, said the Hawaiian.
That's a monk seal.
She comes every so often,
comes up on the beach
and lies there.
And we got tape around her
so people won't bother her.
After a while,
the monk seal disappeared.
And I think
it was the next morning.
And I'm swimming,
and suddenly I'm grasped
from behind.
And I turned around.
And I'm looking at this thing
that's holding me.
It's the monk seal.
Had grasped me in its arms.
And I went, aah!
I screamed.
And the thing...
And it swam off.
And I thought
about that monk seal...
a lot...
alone...
but that was
like an animal so lonely
that it took the only thing
in the ocean to hug.
Dogs will howl in pain.
They cry out
'cause you've left them alone.
What is that?
The pack is gone.
Everything they belonged to
is gone.
And they howl.
And that howl is pain.
I'm alone!
I've howled like that
at various times
in pain of being alone.
I'm talking about
an existential loneliness.
I'm overwhelmed
with it all the time.
Love of other people-
that hasn't got anything
to do with it.
Oh, I love you.
Yeah, good.
But what do you do
in the middle of the night?
- See, here's the thing-
I've just moved into Caxton,
and I'm anxious to meet
some young people here.
But I don't have any contacts.
Isn't that a sad story?
- I'm Jewish,
and I went to school
in a non-Jewish area.
I was bullied a lot.
I would have a fight
every day.
And then a ring of students
would go, fight, fight, fight!
I was a kid who was interested
in acting,
and I was a kid
that was interested in sports.
The jocks
didn't understand acting,
and the actors
didn't understand
my love of sports.
I was in between
two worlds again.
And I spent a great deal
of time like that,
and I think a lot of that
has rubbed off
into who I am today.
I was in grade school,
and the teacher said,
all right,
it's Valentine's Day tomorrow.
Everybody send
valentines to each other
and say nice things-
you know,
write a nice message.
And for some reason...
My voice said, you'd better
write yourself
five or six valentines
to yourself.
So I wrote five or six
valentines to myself.
And then on Valentine's Day,
I got five or six valentines.
I had written-the only
valentines I got were to me.
Now, why is that?
And you try to examine.
Am I antisocial?
Do I smell bad?
Do I offend people?
So what happened there?
I don't know.
But I suppose it went along
with the bullying
or the attempt to bully me
and my fights every day.
My father was...
not ostensibly a loving man,
but he loved his family,
and he loved me,
although I heard the phrase
"this is going to hurt me
more than it hurts you,"
and off his belt would come.
And that phrase, "it hurts
me more than it hurts you"
stuck in my craw ever since.
But he was...
charitable to a fault
and to his family,
and he was
a very honorable citizen.
He was such
a worthwhile human being.
I loved my dad.
He was a Canadian snowbird.
And he was down in Miami
with my mother,
and he had a heart attack.
And she said
he was weeping
at the end and died.
And that mystery of,
what was he crying about,
has haunted me.
What was he crying about?
Was he crying for his fate?
Did he want to see me?
Did he think, what have
I done with my life?
I was shooting "Star Trek,"
and it was lunch hour,
and the phone rings.
My mother said,
your father just passed away.
You got to come here.
It's noon.
And, what am I going to do?
So I thought, maybe we can
continue shooting the scene.
- Sadness...
Sadness...
for the end of things.
Go into the tunnel.
There is a passageway.
Quickly, quickly.
- I couldn't remember
the words,
and Leonard and the cameraman,
Jerry Finnerman,
just stood by me
the whole time-it was wild.
And the other vivid memory
is the sound of the Earth
hitting the casket,
I can hear now
as loud as thunder.
Boom.
Oh, I won't forget that.
And...
and that was my dad.
And he died before I achieved
any real success.
I mean, I was living
hand to mouth for many years.
My father I knew loved me,
but my mother wasn't
demonstrably loving
in that way.
I would watch sometimes
these athletes,
they get chosen
to be on the team
and they're
surrounded by their family,
and the mother hugs the boy,
and the boy hugs the mother
before the father.
Wow.
That's something.
I marvel at it all the time.
Oh, Johnny, you made the team.
I'm so proud.
Mom! I did it, Mom!
Wow.
I never said "Mom."
I don't say "my mom."
"I love my mom."
Mom?
What the hell is mom?
It's "my mother."
When children talk
about their female parent
and they say "my mom"-
like, wow.
That's so warm and loving,
and I never had that.
I never had that with her.
She never offered
a motherly thing.
Oh, it's all right,
sweetheart.
We grieve all the time
for things that we lose.
We're in grief
a great deal of our life.
And we have to learn
to live with grief.
And then you learn to grieve
for the end of life,
like I'm losing life.
I'm losing my life.
I'm in-
What was that line
from Chekhov?
- Why do you always
wear black?
- I'm in mourning...
for my life.
- I'm in mourning
for my youth.
Why are you wearing black?
I'm in mourning for my youth.
Are atoms lonely?
Is an electron lonely when it
doesn't go around the nucleus?
Are scientists
as lonely as that
when they look
through a telescope
out into the space
and they see how far and
how enormous everything is?
How dictatorial...
the laws of nature are?
There's no bending there.
You can go around in a circle,
and you enter
into a black hole,
and you're gone forever.
There seems
no escape from any of that.
We're aware of the...
imponderable mysteries
out there.
We don't know anything.
I mean, the Earth-
the Earth is alone.
There's nothing like it
in our solar system,
and for us to get beyond the
solar system is monumental.
- We are leaving that vast
cloud of stars and planets
which we call our galaxy.
Behind us, Earth, Mars, Venus,
even our sun
are specks of dust.
A question...
what is out there
in the black void beyond?
- The planet is all we have.
And it is so...
ephemerally small.
We don't grasp how small it is
until you look at it.
My God.
So you talk about loneliness.
This is loneliness, man.
The whole planet is alone.
Human beings walking around
are alone.
And I think that,
and I feel that.
So it's more than Mommy.
It's...
it's huge.
- Science fiction became
science fact
for actor
William Shatner today.
At 90 years old,
"Star Trek's" Captain Kirk
became the oldest person
to travel to space.
- I'm lying in the seat...
and the engines
are fulminating.
- Our astronauts
can feel that.
They are sitting at the top
of a 60-foot rocket.
- And I hear, all right,
we're starting our countdown.
But before we start
a countdown-
This is almost verbatim.
Before we start
the countdown,
we're going to remove
the gantry.
So, if anybody decides
that they don't want to go,
now's the time to get off.
Huh?
I could go.
No, I can't go.
I can't go.
I'm Captain Kirk.
Now it's a go.
Countdown.
Hold on. There's an anomaly
in the engine.
An anomaly.
That's a great English word.
- There's something different
about this engine.
And all those thoughts
were flooding my brain.
I could've got off.
The "Hindenburg."
All right,
the anomaly's solved.
And we continue the countdown.
And now we're into liftoff,
and I'm looking out
the window,
and I see clouds of-
Oh, shit, I hope
this thing takes off.
My heart skipped a beat.
And on the brink of an eye,
it all happened so fast.
A thunderous blast shot up
as clouds passed.
Punched a hole in the sky!
And...
And it starts to go.
Holy cow.
And we're up in the-
And I'm looking
at the disappearing-
it's on my right-hand side-
disappearing Earth.
And we're up.
And the Gs are enormous.
Oh, God.
And then, bom!
Weightlessness.
- God.
- Weightlessness.
Oh, Jesus.
During the heyday
of the "Star Trek" I was on,
there was the activity
to get to the moon.
So they invited me
to come to Kennedy.
And I came to Kennedy.
And at that point,
"Star Trek" was-
my "Star Trek" was on the air.
And I got there,
and they literally rolled out
the red carpet
and took me
into this giant space
where they assembled
the rockets.
Now, I don't know,
two years later,
Star Trek has been canceled.
I've been divorced.
I'm broke.
I'm-
That word is really weird,
isn't it?
"I'm broke."
No, I'm not broken.
I don't have any money.
I was in a pasture.
In order to save motel
expenses and eating expenses,
I had bought a wrecked truck.
And I'm lying on the bed
in that little cab,
and I've got a 4-inch
black-and-white television set
on my chest.
And I'm looking through
the window at the moon.
It was a clear night
that night.
And I'm looking
at Armstrong...
stepping down from the...
I'm at my nadir.
I have no money.
I'm living like a bum.
I've got my dog.
I mean, at one point,
I couldn't cash a $15 check
after "Star Trek."
- One giant leap for mankind.
- And I'm looking at the...
incredible feat...
F-E-A-T,
and his feet, F-E-E-T,
as he placed it
for one small step for man,
one giant step for mankind.
I hear him say those things,
and I'm thinking,
my God, that's fantastic.
And only a short while ago,
I was a part of it.
I mean, they used to say
that when the "Star Trek's"
ratings went up,
the government
voted more money.
It was like
a self-energizing loop.
And so I was a teeny, teeny,
infinitesimally small part
of him landing on the moon.
And I'm here, and he's there.
And as I went to sleep,
I thought of the irony of it.
I subsequently recovered,
but that was a moment.
There I was
in a giant lifetime
coincidence...
of symmetry...
of chance.
Yeah.
I had seen...
footage of the interior
of the "Blue Origin" spaceship
on the first trip,
which had Jeff Bezos,
his brother, some young kid,
and this older astronaut.
And when I saw the footage,
I was like, my God.
I mean, that's fun.
That's funny.
To tell it, it's funny.
But is that
what you want to do
in the three minutes
you have in space?
Once beyond gravity,
we unlocked the key
and set ourselves free,
floating around the inside.
While some tumbled and danced
in that weightless trance,
I had to take my chance
to the window
to witness the ride.
I needed to see
what was out there
for me, in the endless sea,
to meet my fate,
I could never anticipate
what I saw.
Filled me with awe.
But also something cold
and pitiless and raw-
an instinct to withdraw,
a hot coal to be dropped.
Relentless blackness
was all I could see,
like a depthless eternity,
a benevolent mystery
that could never be stopped.
Endless darkness.
No twinkling stars, no magic
lights that call from afar,
no breathable air,
nothing to care,
no message to send,
no beginnings or ends,
no life could sustain,
no dreams could remain,
nearly drove me insane,
and I felt a deep pain.
What I saw stopped me cold,
collapsed all my breath.
All I could see...
was death.
I thought, my God,
that's probably the darkness
you see when you die.
Boom.
There's no light.
It's all over.
And then I referred
back to Earth.
And I saw the white clouds.
I saw the beige of the...
Texas desert.
I saw all of it filtered
through the blue air,
the refraction of sunlight
through the water vapor
in the air.
And I saw the curvature
of the Earth.
I could delineate the Earth.
It is this little, tiny thing.
We're a moat of dust
in the universe.
We are living on debris
from the solar system.
Our brains aren't made
to encompass
the vastness of the things
we're talking about.
I stumbled and said,
I can't believe it.
But we can't imagine
what it is.
Einstein said,
it's a spooky place.
And it's a spooky place.
And I realized that
little tiny rock...
is all we have to live on.
So we land,
and I go to get off,
and I suddenly feel myself
crying uncontrollably.
What you have given me
is the most profound
experience I can have.
I'm so filled with emotion
about what just happened,
I just-
It's extraordinary,
extraordinary.
What the heck?
What am I crying about?
What am I crying about?
I did an interview with a guy
the day before yesterday,
a well-known interviewer.
He said, I don't believe
in global warming.
What do you mean you don't
believe in global warming?
Do you believe in a
red light saying-
stopping you?
Or do you say, that's-
I know it's a red light,
but I don't believe in it,
and you go right through?
I mean, what do you mean
you don't believe in-
it's, like, insane.
Frankly, I hope
this planet survives.
I really do.
But I am getting
sick of you smug,
hybrid-driving socialists
telling the rest of us
how to live our lives.
I'm rich, okay?
I like to guzzle a
little gas now and then.
I keep my thermostat at
72 during the winter.
And I prefer night games
in football.
And I am fed up with you
global warming wusses
raining on my electric parade!
- Earth is our home.
Space has no people,
passion, or love.
An endless question
hangs from above
we know almost nothing of.
We are...approaching...
A very, to put it mildly,
a very tough time for the
people who come after us.
And we've got our heads
in the sand, mostly.
It's total denial
on a global scale.
Because what is reality
is so painful that it-
you'd better not face it.
Lieutenant, how
would you handle this?
- We could try
ignoring it, sir.
- I see.
Pretend nothing has happened
and hope everything turns
out all right in the morning.
- Just a thought, sir.
- I've considered that.
There's got to be
a better angle.
I heard an author
some years ago say,
well, it doesn't bother
me because I'm out of here
very soon.
But what about your
loved ones?
What are you going
to do about that?
That's-really bothers me.
I can understand
the violence of a storm.
It's a natural thing not
meant to harm anyone.
But the violence of men,
that cruelty and
savageness to one another,
to themselves-
And I thought of all
those things as I came down.
And I was-
I realize now it took me hours
to come to the conclusion,
I was in grief for the Earth.
I hope I never recover
from what I discovered.
Like a long-lost lover, I had
left to neglect mountains,
trees, birds, beasts.
Life-giving water,
magnificent feasts.
North, South, West, East.
All human reactions,
from terror to fun.
All that breathes,
swims, flies, or runs.
Literally everything
under the sun!
We all have our loves.
And what a miracle
that is on this planet.
Snails, lions, sand-
You know?
And everything loves.
Every living thing loves.
...touching the skies.
The percentages of the
degradation of wildlife
on Earth is enormous.
We don't realize it,
but it's like-
it's like having termites,
you know?
I'm dancing on the floor,
and one day,
you fall through the floor.
How did that happen?
It's all there-
it's all being eaten away.
It's all so fragile.
What can we do?
What can we do?
It's so fragile.
So blue.
What can we do?
What can we do?
When my time has come,
don't put me in a box.
And skip the fancy shiva.
No platters of bagels and lox.
Lay down that spike
and chisel.
No headstone will I need.
Yeah, when I die,
my wish is clear.
Just plant me like a seed.
'Cause I want to be a tree.
Yeah, I want to be a tree
with plenty of leaves
and bark to spare.
For everyone to see.
I want to be a tree.
Yeah, I want to be a tree.
You can sit right
down under my shade.
That'll be enough for me.
How much of our lives are
spent not doing anything?
You know?
You're in a waiting room
of your life
waiting for something that
you hope will happen,
that you try to make
happen, that you
think is going to happen,
and you wait.
So making-
the fullness of your life
is really fraught
with a lot of waiting.
A full life is a life
that's lived with awareness.
You see,
I read it and it's true.
Make a pod from my remains
and stick me in the ground
and pray for sun and rain.
The richness from my body
will supercharge the Earth.
And like a natural
maternity ward,
to a sapling I'll give birth.
I haven't changed the world.
I mean, if you talk about
fame, my heroes of the screen
have now been dead
for many years.
Of course,
they were great artists.
But they no longer are.
They're gone.
The nitrate
on the film is oxidized.
The billboards are burned.
The statues are torn down.
But what does remain,
what is a legacy,
are the good deeds.
Yeah, I want to be a tree.
You can sit right
down under my shade.
That'll be enough for me.
And helping an old
lady across the street,
that deed reverberates
like the butterfly wings
which disturbs the air
and changes fate.
You've just changed somebody's
or something's fate
by your contribution,
and that will be- that
will stand the test of time.
Everything else, you, me,
everything,
fades into oblivion
very quickly.
But that good deed
reverberates.
And I feel that.
If humankind were to
disappear tomorrow,
the world would come
back very quickly.
The trees would grow back.
The lungs of the Earth
would come back.
So don't stick me in an urn
for some relative to keep.
And please,
don't throw me overboard
to the bottom of the deep.
No 21-gun salute.
So just put those guns to bed.
I've got a much
more peaceful wish.
Bring the garden tools
instead!
And so I have
made arrangements
that my body will be cremated.
I'll be put in a bag
as an open sack.
A tree, a Redwood-
I wanted a Sequoia, but a
Redwood will be placed on-
over the bag.
The bag will nourish the tree.
I have this kind
of raw land where
I know where I want to do it.
The idea of still
being part of nature,
and flowering and there
and the tree grows,
and we know the
tree communicates-
and there's such a
mystique about trees,
and these wonderful,
large trees
that live for 1,000,
5,000 years.
There's a windswept Cypress
on the edge of a cliff
in Western California
on the coast.
The Lone Cypress.
And it's like an old,
gnarled grandfather.
It's, I'm here, and
I'm going to stay here!
What a thing.
What a thing to look at.
And those Sequoias, they're
1,000, 1,500 years old.
And they've lived
all that time,
enduring everything
that nature threw at them.
And fires of this year
killed Sequoia trees.
Where they are built
to survive any fire
because of their bark,
these fires were so bad that
Sequoias died as a result.
That's how bad it is.
Yeah, I want to be a tree
with plenty of leaves
and bark to spare,
for everyone to see.
Yes, I want to be a tree.
I want to be a tree standing,
swaying, firm and tall.
Glorious and free.
I want to be a tree.
Can you imagine?
So you think,
what's your legacy?
What are you leaving behind?
Good deeds?
Also a tree.
But that one's for you.
You can
sit under the shade.
And that'll be enough for me.
That'll be enough for me.
- One, two, three, four...
- I have saved the world
in the movies.
So naturally,
there's folks who think
I must know what to do.
And just because you've
seen me on your TV...
doesn't mean I'm any more
enlightened than you.
- And while
there's a part of me
in that guy you've seen
up there on that screen
I am so much more.
And I wish I knew
the things you think I do
I would change this world
for sure.
But I eat and sleep and
breathe and bleed and feel.
Sorry to disappoint you
but I'm real
- I'd love to help the world
and all its problems.
But I'm an entertainer
and that's all.
So the next time
there's an asteroid
or a natural disaster,
I'm flattered
that you thought of me,
but I'm not the one to call.
- And while there's
a part of me
in that guy you see
up there on that screen
I am so much more.
And I wish I knew the things
you think I knew
I would change this world
for sure.
But I eat and sleep and
breathe and bleed and feel.
Sorry to disappoint you,
but I'm real.
- And while
there's a part of me
in that guy you've seen
up there on that screen...
I am so much more.
- And I wish I knew
- And I wish I knew...
- the things you think I do
- the things you think I do.
- I would change this world
- I would change this world...
- for sure
- for sure.
- But I eat
- But I eat...
- and sleep and breathe
- and sleep and breathe...
- and bleed and feel
- and bleed and feel.
Sorry to disappoint you...
...but I'm real.