The penultimate scene took place in front of the local courthouse, where I was trying to convince the townspeople to resist government meddling, to make the outsiders pay. I had a long speech that ended with me urging them to lynch the black leaders. It was an angry, vicious speech; I was spewing hatred.
Corman did not let local people read the script. That was a wise decision. But we needed a crowd for that scene, so we invited townspeople to be extras, offering food and fun. That scene was scheduled to be shot in the town square on Friday night. Fortunately, because we had a limited budget, we shot practically around the clock Monday through Thursday, and by Friday my voice was completely gone. The best I could manage was a whispered rasp. There was no way I could make that speech.
Roger Corman devised a solution. He shot the crowd over my shoulder as I said basically nothing, directing them when to cheer. He told these people, “Bill has lost his voice. I’m asking him not to talk while we are shooting this scene.” We spent four hours shooting it without the slightest problem. After the crowd had dissipated I managed to make that speech. By that time there were only a few people still there.
It was not an easy speech for me to make. My personal beliefs were the exact opposite of those of my character. Had I met him in real life I would have had nothing to do with him. And yet I had to say those words in a convincing manner. For those moments I had to feel that emotion. I had to put myself in the guise of a man who wanted to lynch another human being. And as I started saying those words I actually felt his hatred, his feeling of impotence as the world was passing by. It built inside me. As I made my speech I was filled with anger. I don’t know where it came from, it certainly had nothing to do with this scene, but I was able to infuse the screenwriter’s words with real anger and frustration.
* * *
One of those people who had stayed till the end was the editor of the local newspaper. Roger and I were walking through the square the following morning when he stopped us. “You guys are so smart,” he said. Roger and I looked at each other; we knew that, but what had we done to bring it to his attention? About what? we wondered. Fifteen years earlier, he explained, a black man had been lynched in that square. He had been hanged from the tree we were using in the scene. Some of the people in the crowd had been there that night, and if they had heard my speech there is no telling what might have happened. By shooting the scene the way we did we had diffused any potential problems. That’s why we were so smart.
For me, for those brief moments, the emotion, my anger, was genuine—but I never became that character. Yet the intensity of those moments lingered for a few days. You don’t just walk away from those feelings. The emotion had physically roiled my body. It took me some time to come down from it, to come back to normal. Being able to display emotions was central to Star Trek. What made the character created by Leonard Nimoy, the Vulcan Mr. Spock, so unique was that his race had successfully suppressed emotions from their lives. In one of our shows, DeForest Kelley’s Dr. McCoy explained the basis of humanity to Spock, telling him, “The release of emotions, Mr. Spock, is what keeps us healthy—emotionally healthy, that is.”
To which Spock responded, “That may be, Doctor; however, I have noted that the healthy release of emotion is frequently very unhealthy for those closest to you.”
Several years later Leonard Nimoy and I spoke about working together on Star Trek. While we were filming, Leonard had remained distant, aloof. I said, “You were not exactly a fountain of fun on the set.” He explained that he found it necessary to remain in character the entire day. That was surprising to me. “You spent twelve hours a day being Spock?”
He did. Leonard taught acting, so he knew what worked for him. The irony of that, of course, was that he spent all that time preparing to portray a character who suppressed emotions.
My work has forced me to understand the range of emotions, although many times I have been no different from anyone else in trying to keep my emotions in public in check. That’s what we are taught. Other people don’t want to have to respond to your emotional outbursts. So we learn that lesson and we repress those feelings, letting bits of them leak out when it’s safe. But the reality is that the more you allow yourself access to your real emotions the richer your life will be. It took me a long time to understand and accept that.
Many of the actors I see today don’t really express emotions; they imitate emotions. Please, don’t think I am criticizing any actor. Not only wouldn’t I do that, but I would be wrong if I did. The quality of work I see on television and in the movies these days is very good. But few of these people have been trained on the stage, and there is a difference. They have learned their craft in many instances by watching other actors portray emotions, and then they imitate that. So in some cases they actually are imitating an imitation of real emotion; they are that far removed from real feeling.
I was taught not to portray emotion but rather to create a full-bodied character and allow that character to experience the emotion. The truth is that at times I have been as surprised as anyone else by the reactions of my character. I have never tried to inject an appropriate emotion into a character. When my character reacts, I never think, I didn’t know my character would do that; instead I might think, Whoa, isn’t that an interesting aspect to that character. Unplanned unplanning.
There was a TV show in which I played a man whose grandchild has been found after being missing for several weeks. The writer was worried that I wouldn’t know what to do. The director suggested a response. But I have felt the loss of children. I’ve felt that pain. As I began the scene I choked back sobs and used some of the author’s words. But the emotion of that scene was real.
I hosted a TV interview show, which I called Raw Nerve. The title came from the fact that I wanted my guests to expose their real feelings. Sometimes I managed to make that happen, but equally often those lifelong layers of protection made it impossible for me to get to those real emotions.
I do remember the most inappropriate public display of emotion in my life. I was on the Star Trek set when my mother called to inform me that my father had died suddenly of a massive heart attack. I was devastated, devastated. Truly grief stricken. This man had been my foundation. I flew to Miami and arranged for his body to be shipped to Montreal. When we got to Montreal, I had to pick out his coffin. The funeral director took me into a showroom where the different coffins were lined up like TV sets. They ranged from a simple pine box to a lead-lined gold-embossed coffin. There were numerous variations of different quality, at different prices. I had to choose the box in which this man I loved so dearly would be buried.
As I was making this decision, I could not help but think about him. He had immigrated to Canada as a young boy. He had shined shoes and delivered newspapers and struggled to save enough money to bring his siblings to the Americas. His was a heroic story. He had become a successful manufacturer and salesman of inexpensive suits. He taught me how to fold a jacket, how to work hard, and how to save money. And as I stood in that showroom staring at these coffins I heard his voice telling me distinctly: “Spend the money on the living.”
I bought him a nice pine box.
During his funeral the next day, that coffin was wheeled into the chapel. It was among the most difficult moments of my life. I was standing next to my sister Joy, and as our father was being eulogized I whispered to her, “Dad would have been very proud.”
“Why?” she asked.
I said, “I got a great deal on the coffin.”
“Why?” she asked again. “Is it used?” I couldn’t help myself; I started laughing. I covered my mouth, but it was of little use. That so perfectly described our father. Of course Joy started laughing, too. Other people heard what we said and suddenly ripples of laughter moved like a wave through the chapel.
It was a glorious experience; that change of emotion from sadness to laughter made it memorable. It was the furthest thing from a lack of respect; it was, in fact, a celebratio
n of his life in those few words.
After that service we went to the cemetery. The rabbi was a Cohen, a high priest, and for some reason he was not allowed to go to the burial. I remember thinking how odd that was, that a rabbi couldn’t go to pray over dead people.
What I remember most about that day is the sound of the first shovelful of earth landing on the wooden coffin. That sound of permanent loss surged through my body. It was such an instant and overwhelming feeling of grief. By the time we left the cemetery that day it had subsided, but I have never forgotten it. A year later we returned to dedicate his headstone, and I have not been back there since.
Like just about everyone else, for much of my life I kept my emotions inside. But among the few real benefits of age is that you finally reach the point where you don’t have to do that anymore. You realize, as I did, that it is not only okay but also healthy to be honest about your feelings.
In March 2017 my family gathered to celebrate a birthday. During the night my beautiful fourteen-year-old granddaughter, a smart and wise young woman, asked me a very difficult question. Her grandmother, my first wife and the mother of our three children, was in a hospital suffering from dementia. “Papa,” she said, “why can’t you go see her?”
The entire table quieted. It was an uncomfortable moment. There were people sitting there who loved her and did not know or understand what had happened between us. I could have ignored the question or made some glib remark. That’s what people generally do rather than avoid admitting to their emotions. Especially unpleasant emotions. Instead I said honestly, “Because I still have the rage.”
And after a moment to consider that, she said to me, “I have the rage, too.”
The truth is that I never got over being angry about our divorce and I couldn’t pretend that I did. I know what I did to cause that divorce; I long ago accepted responsibility for my actions. So I explained, “I am still angry that I let her father, who had the money, force me to use all of my resources to buy the house that your mother and your two aunts lived in, in Beverly Hills, when I didn’t have fifteen dollars in my pocket after Star Trek. I understood her anger, too, but it wasn’t necessary to punish me like that for years.”
Incredibly, as I said those words, I could feel the anger surging through me. All these years later, after so many people and experiences, that anger was still there. And it was still just as intense. It is amazing that after all these years it still had such a strong impact on me. All those years it was still inside me, still capable of moving me. That’s the power of emotions to shape us.
We may think we have outgrown certain events, certain feelings, that they no longer have power over us. That’s just not true, at least not for me. In fact, it reminded me of similar anger I had felt toward my mother, who offended me so often in so many ways for so long that our relationship colored every relationship I had with women for much of my life.
Calling Dr. Freud. Dr. Freud. Bill Shatner on line one for you.
There is a distinct advantage in suffering through overwhelming grief and desperate pain. My wife Nerine was an alcoholic. I was certain I could save her. I believed that my love for her, and her love for me for loving her unconditionally, would be stronger than her addiction. Leonard Nimoy, who understood addiction, who knew all about alcoholism, warned me that it was more powerful than I possibly could understand. I didn’t listen. I married Nerine and eventually she drowned in our swimming pool. I found her floating there.
I’ve described the pain of that, but it’s just words; there is no way to accurately convey that level of pain to anyone else. My grief was overwhelming. This was the type of pain that makes you think either I’m simply going to die or I’m going to kill myself. The intensity was so strong that for a time I told myself that rather than living with that pain, it is much better to feel nothing. It dwarfed all my other emotions.
For most of us, most of the time, our emotions are the background music of our life. I saw a demonstration once that I loved: It was a short film clip of a man walking across a room to answer the ringing phone. But each time the clip was played it was accompanied by different music. With the music the scene changed entirely: When it was light and jaunty we knew this was not a serious phone call; when it was deep and dramatic we knew that call might be life changing. In most of our lives the music is always playing in the background. We’re happy, we’re sad, we’re bored, we’re excited, but our emotions are subdued. The music is playing softly. And then, and then, the timpani thunder, the horn section begins blasting, and the emotion we are feeling takes complete control of our life. That was the grief I was feeling. The emotion was overwhelming. It took complete control of me both mentally and physically. My mind and my body were responding to it: I couldn’t think of anything else other than my loss, and my body resonated with pain.
That is the power of emotion.
I didn’t die and I didn’t kill myself. In fact, eventually I was able to experience extraordinary happiness and joy. For me, I learned, grief hovered over me for a period of time. It was more than a year before that weight lifted from my heart. Then the cloud gradually begin to lift. I’ve never forgotten that pain, I can summon up an echo of it if I choose to, but eventually the beauty of life filtered in and the pain receded.
I carry that emotional memory with me: When I experience sadness or grief I draw on it. The pain is familiar, and I am reminded: Didn’t I recover from this before? It provides the perspective that any emotion, every emotion, is temporary in nature and we will survive it.
Conversely, I have never forgotten the emotional joys of childhood. Several years ago I was invited to participate in the biggest paintball fight ever conducted. Every child has played some version of good guys and bad guys; this was good guys versus the other team using guns that fired half-inch balls of paint. It was scheduled to take place in a 175-acre paintball facility in Joliet, Illinois, which has houses and forts and castles in which to hide, seek, and shoot. In other words, it was a big kid’s fantasy come true.
Not only did I immediately accept, I also decided to film a documentary about it. The biggest paintball fight in history? I’m in. My wife, Elizabeth, immediately decided, “I don’t want to get involved with this.” It turned out she is a paintball sharpshooter, so she was in.
Five thousand people were participating. The rules are simple: If you got hit by a paintball, you had to sit out for fifteen minutes; then you got another life and could continue. I was appointed leader of one army. In a paintball war points are given for many different things. By far the most points are awarded for painting, for “killing,” the leader of the opposition in their headquarters. Accomplishing that is worth almost enough points to win the entire event. But to prevent that, the leaders are very well guarded.
With that many players, lunchtimes are staggered. When our turn came, Liz and I were standing on line for a burger when the man standing behind me started weeping. We turned and asked if he was okay. “I’m so sorry, Bill,” he said. The man had his paintball gun in his hand. Then he explained, “The head of the other team is a paintball manufacturer and he offered me a new gun if I snuck into your camp and assassinated you. But I like you so much I can’t do it.”
Being Bill Shatner pays off once again! “I have an idea,” I said. We went through my strategy. I slipped several paintballs in my sleeve and said to him, “Point your gun at me. I’m your prisoner. Take me to the guy who sent you.” We walked across the field into the enemy camp. As we got closer I saw their commander. When I was about twenty feet away I suddenly put my hands over my chest, screamed, “Oh, my God!” and fell down. I am an actor and I was portraying a heart attack victim.
Apparently my scene was believable. Their commander ran over to me and leaned down. At which time I smashed the paintballs on him. Then I did a Captain Kirk on him; I grabbed his pistol and pushed him down. “Don’t move,” I said, in my toughest tough-guy voice. We had captured the enemy commander.
The joy
I was experiencing at that moment was no different than I had as a child seventy years earlier. I still had access to that emotion and I was able to experience it fully.
Another thing I have experienced in my life is the power of love to create emotions. By itself love isn’t an emotion; instead it is a launching pad for emotions. Love is ecstasy, joy, happiness, comfort, sorrow, sadness, pain, and grief. It is thrilling, and it is chilling. It often is as difficult to live with it as it is to live without it. I sometimes think about the popular song “What I Did for Love.” In my life the answer is simple: everything. Love is that thing so many of us spend great periods of our lives questing after, only to discover when we find it that it often doesn’t live up to our expectations.
In my eighty-plus years I have experienced just about every type of love: I have enjoyed passionate, romantic, and unexpected love; I have found joy in parental love; it would literally be impossible to accurately describe the love I’ve had for my dogs and for my horses. I have loved certain characters whom I’ve played and casts that I’ve been fortunate enough to be part of! I have loved cars, motorcycles, food, and the occasional item of clothing. I love my house that I’ve lived in for more than four decades. I’ve loved singing and writing. I’ve loved being onstage and hearing the laughter and the applause from an audience. I’ve loved being part of an audience in the thrall of a great entertainer. I’ve loved the feeling of being alive. I’ve loved; oh, how I have loved.
And I’ve learned that each different type of love can create an entirely different emotional climate. Loving a relative or a child or a pet or a friend often is relatively easy and carries with it little emotional risk. Exposing yourself to loving another person carries with it tremendous risk.
The search for love can expose emotions that have been tucked away for a lifetime. We’ve all seen extremely successful and respected people suddenly lose control over their actions and end up destroying their reputations and sometimes their careers. A female astronaut puts on a diaper and drives halfway across the country to confront her lover. The chief judge of New York’s Court of Appeals gets caught sending a condom and threatening messages to a woman who has ended their affair. In many cases these people have met someone who exposed them to new experiences, someone who has forced them out of their safety zone. Suddenly they are feeling things they have never felt before. Love can be addictive.
Live Long and . . . Page 6