Up Till Now

by William Shatner

  “There’s nothing to talk about.” I knew he was there to put my behind behind us. As Leonard had responded when I threw his photographer out of the makeup room, James insisted we talk about it. “What was the big deal? I leaned over.”

  “Yes, and when you did your ass was in my face.” “Well, why didn’t you play off it?” There, another great straight line for him.

  “I couldn’t,” he began, and explained why.

  I listened, and then I said, “You know, James. What you just did is something I can’t do. Face a person. You got a problem, deal with it directly. I don’t do that, I let it fester for a day and then it’s gone.” James had opened it up, aired it out, smoothed it over. “That’s a quality I admire in someone. And I wish I could do more of it.” And in fact, I have learned that from James, and that honesty is a huge part of our relationship. “But what I get from you, James. People walk around today calling everyone their best friend...”

  Candice Bergen plays my partner and former lover. The really interesting thing about Candice is that the qualities she projects through the character of Shirley Schmidt are her own qualities. She is a beautiful woman of great style and intelligence. She has more class than almost anyone I know, and has become a good buddy. But then there is that famous sex-doll scene.

  Denny Crane has never lost his deep lust for Shirley Schmidt. In one episode, Alan Shore caught him in a storage closet humping a blow-up sex doll made up to resemble her. I remember reading that script for the first time, and thinking, “Well. Well. This could be... interesting.” On Boston Legal perhaps the most important point on which we’ve all agreed is that no matter how absurd the scene, how ridiculous you have to act, we will play it like it is absolutely real. Truth matters.

  Fifty years as an actor and I had to hump a blow-up sex doll.

  Me. Oh, believe me, I could play sex scenes. I definitely could play sex scenes. I’d done a classic sex scene with Angie Dickinson, I’d worked with some of the most beautiful actresses in the business. But this was the first time I had to make love to a blow-up sex doll. As with all the other absurdities we are directed to do on Boston Legal, I knew that the only way I could make this work was to make it absolutely real. I remembered being a kid more than seventy years ago and watching a boy masturbating. I’d never seen anything like that before; his eyes were turned inward and he was totally self-absorbed. I can’t remember that kid’s name or the circumstances, but I’ve never forgotten that look. And so I tried to do that with the doll. I became totally absorbed in that doll, and anything else—the closet door opening and the one of us being discovered together— came as a shock.

  What makes Denny Crane such a wonderful character to play at this point in my life is that we share so much. When Denny Crane talks about his own mortality and his recognition that he is older now and has lost some of his powers, there might be some of my life sneaking in. I do think about those things, I wonder about them. I’m never far from the fear of old age or senility or being incapacitated by a stroke. I’ve tried to bring the realities of my life into my performance. Fortunately, my ability to focus allows me to learn my lines as easily now as I did when I was twenty. So I don’t have any problem memorizing lines—although I do wish the producers would use cards or a prompter. For some of the other actors, of course.

  There is a scene I had with Candice Bergen during which this once legal lion showed... well, at least hinted at his vulnerability. Denny Crane and Shirley Schmidt were in her office, sitting on her couch. Shirley just happened to ask me about the fishing waders I was wearing. “I may not be the lawyer I once was,” I explained. “But I can still fish circles around all of you. Sometimes I just like to wear them to—”

  She interrupted me, interrupted Denny Crane! “When I was in high school I was captain of the debate team... and miserable over being cut from the cheerleading team. I went out and bought my own outfit, complete with pom-poms. Sometimes I’d dress up, look at myself in the mirror...it somehow made me feel better.

  “Years later, after I became a lawyer, even a partner, every once in a while if I was feeling particularly low, I’d pull out that costume. And put it on.”

  “I did exactly the same. Not with a pom-pom, but—”

  Shirley shook her head. “You’re just determined not to let me have a vulnerable moment, aren’t you? You want to hog them all for yourself.” She paused, maybe even sighed. “Denny, we’re getting older, we can no longer fit into our outfits. But we’re not over. Not by a long shot. You’re not over.”

  With each line another layer of Denny Crane gets peeled away. “You know what used to make me feel better than anything?...It was back when we were... us. And you’d put your head on my—”

  “Denny!”

  “I was going to say shoulder. That felt better than anything.”

  “Oh. I remember you’d sing, ‘You Are My Sunshine.’ “

  Sing? There are sentimental sides of Denny Crane that get revealed at the oddest times. Perhaps that’s one reason he’s become so popular. “Could you do that for just a minute? Put your head on my shoulder?”

  “Denny.”

  “I just want...to remember.” She pauses, and then lays her head gently on my shoulder. It’s a beautiful moment. And then I say softly, “This feels... can you put on the cheerleader...”

  “Don’t push it.”

  And the ending, of course, is perfect. I get to sing. “You are my sunshine, my only sunshine. . . .” Fade to black.

  There was no specific direction for that moment, just a suggestion in the script that it be meaningful. But as we did it I realized it was coming from the longing the character had for Shirley, for their past together, as he held her. And at that moment, without meaning to, I had slipped into not the suit, but the skin of the character.

  There is one trait I’ve given Denny Crane that no one has recognized. Many years earlier, when I was having dinner with Edward G. Robinson, I asked him, “Are you aware that you go... nyeh?”

  He wasn’t. “I go nyeh?”

  “Yes, you go nyeh.”

  So every so often, as a paean to my hero Edward G. Robinson, Denny Crane will throw in a little, “Nyeh.”

  I love the thought that David E. Kelley had decided to write the character for me after seeing me doing a Priceline.com commercial. Remember, one of the primary reasons I was hired to do those commercials was because a copywriter remembered—and loved—my 1968 album, The Transformed Man. And now, probably because of the attention I was getting from playing Denny Crane, after thirty-five years I was asked to record a second album. My career had made a full, singing circle.

  Several years ago I listened to The Transformed Man and I had to admit that parts of it aren’t very good. In my memory it was much better than it actually was, but at least it was an attempt to do something interesting. It was a concept album. For it to work you had to listen to the entire six-minute cut, which consisted of a piece of literature tied to a song; on radio they played the three-minute song and it sounded mostly like me screaming and yelling. What I had intended to be drama had emerged as comedy. People mocked it and it was somewhat humiliating. I had smiled and tried to carry it off with some sort of grace, but I felt bad about it.

  But had it been even slightly better it probably would have been quickly forgotten. Instead it has lived on in legend. Some people believe my version of “Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds” is the worst musical rendition of all time. Apparently George Clooney picked it as one of the few things he would want to have with him if he were marooned on a deserted island. As he explained, “If you listen to this song, you will hollow out your own leg and make a canoe out of it to get off the island.”

  Comments like that kept the album alive by creating curiosity. How could anything be that bad? So people wanted to hear it. And because of it, I’ve been given the opportunity to talk-song in movies, on television, and on other records. On the 1992 MTV Movie Awards I performed all of the Best Movie Song nominees. O
n the animated science-fiction show Futurama, for example, I talk-sang Eminem’s “The Real Slim Shady,” proving it was possible to do a spoken-word version of a rap song.

  Surprisingly, some of the people who took the time to listen to the long versions of the songs actually appreciated it. One of them was the well-respected musician Ben Folds. “I got The Transformed Man at a yard sale as a kid, and that’s how I got a little Shakespeare burned into my head. And hearing that next to Bob Dylan, that was pretty interesting. Maybe it was laughable to older people or people who thought they had it all figured out, but I just locked onto his voice and his timing.”

  In 1997 he wrote and asked me to participate in an experimental album he was making, Fear of Pop. One of my daughters loved his music and convinced me to do it. As a result Ben and I became friends and worked together on several other projects.

  The company that made the most money from Transformed Man was Rhino Records, who used several cuts from that album on a series of very popular albums called Golden Throats: The Great Celebrity Sing Off. Not to take all the credit for the great success of that album, several of Leonard’s songs were also used, including his version of “Proud Mary.”

  In 2003 the Foos brothers, who had produced Golden Throats, came to my office and sat on my couch and asked me to record another album. And they did it with straight faces. They had sold Rhino Records and were starting a new label, Shout! Factory. Now, I knew they were hoping to produce another album that people would mock. I probably would have turned them down, but as they were sitting there my phone rang. Ben Folds was calling from Nashville, a coincidence too amazing to ignore. Literally, Ben called me while they were in my office. He was coming to L.A. to do a live show, he explained, and wanted me to perform with him.

  Boy oh boy, did I have a great idea. I put my hand over the speaker and asked the Foos brothers, “Can I do anything?” Anything I wanted to do, they said.

  Although I’m quite certain the last thing that they expected me to do was a good album.

  I asked them, “Would you take Ben Folds as my producer?” They agreed instantly. “Ben,” I said, “the two guys who used to own Rhino Records are in my office right now. They want me to do another record. Would you produce it?” Ben agreed. It was amazing, I was going to do another album!

  Only after the Foos brothers had left my office did I realize I didn’t have the slightest idea how to do an album. I called Ben back. “Now what am I gonna do?”

  Ben had a simple answer. “Tell the truth. You write it down, I’ll make the music.”

  With Ben’s advice I sat down and started writing songs about my life. I tried to distill the important events of my life into a few songs, focusing on those things I wanted my loved ones to understand. I managed to get it down to only about one hundred different songs. Then Ben and I went to work rewriting and editing them.

  I flew to Nashville to record the album. Ben had bought the studio in which Elvis Presley had recorded some of his music and we were going to work there. As I was getting on the plane I saw my name on the cover of one of the tabloids and picked it up. And then I hid it until all the passengers were seated so no one would see me reading it. It is sort of embarrassing. The story quoted an actress who was complaining about working with “that has-been.” Has-been? What? I’d always resented that phrase. It’s an oxymoron. How can you be a has-been unless you’ve been something? Big deal, you’re not that now. The fact is you’re not what you were a split second ago. People are constantly changing. I never understood why it is considered a derogatory term to have been something. Is it better to never be than to be and eventually become a has-been? The only people who stay the same are minuscule talents who earn their livings writing about other people who are busy living real lives, people who think “has-been” is an insult.

  I got it! That’s the title! Has Been. We were searching for a title and there it was, right in front of me, on the front page of a tabloid. I loved it, it was turning a phrase in upon itself. It was the last thing anybody could have expected, which is why it was my first choice.

  Ben recruited great musicians for the album; Joe Jackson, the British group Lemon Jelly, punk star Henry Rollins, Aimee Mann, and country icon Brad Paisley. Novelist Nick Hornby wrote a song for us. We worked every day and night for two weeks and eventually put down—that’s music industry insider talk—eleven cuts, the story of my life from It Hasn’t Happened Yet to Has Been.

  Has Been received wonderful reviews. Absolutely wonderful. Modesty, and my editor’s instructions, prohibit me from including the top fifty or sixty. So please Google Has Been, read them for yourself. Then order it—and I’ll just bet you can figure out where you can find it!

  After the album was released Ben and I did a live show in Los Angeles. I had to relearn the songs and then, in front of several thousand people, for fifteen minutes I was a rock ‘n’ roll star. Without the tattoos, of course. At the end of the concert all the lights in the hall were turned off. And then the band started playing “Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds.” When the song started I raised my arm high into the air—and stuck out my middle finger. Just that one finger. The spotlight caught it and remained focused on it. And I kept it there as I sang “Lucy in the Sky” exactly as I’d done it decades earlier on The Transformed Man. That young audience, Ben’s audience, got it immediately. They started screaming—and laughing. I performed the song almost exactly as I had done it so many years earlier. This time though, instead of being mocked, we got a long, long standing ovation. The audience stood cheering for a half hour. Literally, a half hour. We would have done an encore, but we had nothing else to play. They got it. Maybe it took thirty-five years, but they got it.

  A few nights later Ben, Joe Jackson, and I appeared on the Tonight Show and did a song from the album titled Common People. Again we got an enormous response. I was flying! I was pumped! When I got in my car to drive home I turned the radio to a local music station. Suddenly I heard the male host say to his female co-host, “We’ve got William Shatner’s new record here.” They’re going to play my record on the radio! This was thrilling; within hours I’d sung on the Tonight Show and I was about to hear my record being played on the radio for the very first time!

  “Yeah,” the female host responded. “What an asshole.”

  “You’re right,” the male host said. “He really is an asshole.”

  Here’s what I did not think: I’ve got the title for my next album. Instead I got my cell phone and called them. “This is William Shatner,” I said. “And I am not an asshole!” Then we started arguing about whether or not I was an asshole. Finally I asked them, “Listen, would an asshole call a radio station to complain that he is not an asshole?” I stumped them with that one.

  We spoke for about five minutes and then hung up. The female asked, “Was that really Shatner?”

  And her partner responded, “Yeah, it was. And he’s still an ass-hole.”

  Well, that started a whole discussion. People kept calling the station to state their opinions. “I don’t think he is an asshole.” “Well, sometimes he can be an asshole.” “It depends on your definition of the word ‘asshole.’ “ For the entire segment the topic of discussion was, is William Shatner an asshole?

  Has Been eventually rose to number twenty-two on Billboard’s Top Heatseekers chart.

  A few weeks later a woman named Margo Sappington called me from the Milwaukee Ballet. She loved the album, she told me, and wanted to create a ballet around six cuts. As a man who takes pride in supporting the arts I asked her what I perceived to be the key question, “Any money in it?”

  “This is ballet,” she explained. “Ballet depends on the kindness of strangers.”

  Of course I gave them the rights for free—but then I made a documentary on the making of a ballet, titled Gonzo Ballet. I have to admit that when I told certain members of my family—and they know who they are—that I’d decided to record another album they were a bit dubious. More than anything
, they didn’t want to see my feelings hurt again. So you can just imagine how they responded when I gave them the news, “Guess what? They’re doing a ballet from the album.”

  Knowing me so well, one of my daughters felt compelled to remind me, “Dad. You can’t dance.”

  I can’t? Of course not, but just the thought that this idea would be interpreted into an entirely different art form was exciting to me. And I’d never previously been involved with a ballet. It’s new to my life, and I like that a lot. I believe new challenges are essential in life.

  At this point in my life it’s amazing that my career is growing. Go figure that one out. I don’t believe I’ve ever been busier. Or, thank you very much, more popular.

  I now wonder if I’m working too much. Perhaps I should experience other things? But I’m having such a good time it’s difficult to say no to anything. In fact, my daughter Lisbeth and her husband play a game: Can they get through an ordinary day without hearing my name mentioned or hearing my voice on the radio or television? Mostly they lose.

  Ironically, the one part I might have enjoyed playing I wasn’t even offered. The producers of the movie Star Trek XI—which apparently focuses on the early life of our characters—did not ask me to appear in that film. Spock lives in that film, but I guess that because Kirk had been killed they felt they couldn’t find a place for him. Many people wondered if I was upset or angry not to be offered a role. I wasn’t; I was sad, though, and I was slightly mystified. It just seems like a poor business decision not to bring back Jim Kirk one last time.

  I recognize that I’m getting older. And I do think about my own mortality. And what I now know is that there are so many questions to which I’m never going to know the answer. We are born into mystery and we leave life in mystery. We don’t know what transpired before and we don’t know what’s coming ahead. We don’t know what life is. We don’t even know the truth behind the assassination of JFK. Is there a God? What is time? There’s everything we don’t know.