Why Bill Shatner speaks the way he does
- Thread starter Trekfan12
- Start date
As I recall, the episode with the most Shatnerisms was "Amok Time." Several examples from just a couple scenes:
"Why.............. must..... he die!?!?!" Why within eight days?!?!? Explain!!!
"You............ keep saying that, are you a doctor or aren't you?"
"Well.... there's no.. need to be embarrassed about it, Mister Spock. It happens to the birds and the bees."
"I guess the rest of us assumed it's done...... quite logically."
"Why.............. must..... he die!?!?!" Why within eight days?!?!? Explain!!!
"You............ keep saying that, are you a doctor or aren't you?"
"Well.... there's no.. need to be embarrassed about it, Mister Spock. It happens to the birds and the bees."
"I guess the rest of us assumed it's done...... quite logically."
Listen to Al Gore give a speech sometime. People made fun of his pauses as much as they did Shatner's. And as I said, Scott Bakula's delivery is enormously more pause-laden than Shatner's, so why am I the only one who ever complains about him?
And is it really more realistic to rattle off a memorized speech flawlessly? Do you know anyone who actually talks like that, who never has to pause mid-sentence to decide what they want to say? It's not like real people have their lines memorized in advance. We hesitate, we stumble, we stutter. Heck, when I was a kid -- and, I dunno, maybe still as an adult to an extent -- I tended to talk too fast and was constantly stammering and restarting and tripping over my own words because I rethought what I wanted to say midway through a sentence. By contrast, I remember my father being a very slow, deliberate talker, often pausing for quite a while to think about what he wanted to say.
Anyway, the "stilted" thing is based more on caricatures than the real thing. Yes, in his bigger moments, Shatner could get that way, but at other times, especially early in his career, he talked in a very relaxed, naturalistic manner. Look at his Twilight Zone episodes sometimes, or a lot of the first season of TOS. I think his acting style changed after the on-set explosion that gave him tinnitus (in "Arena," I think, though some versions say "The Apple"). It seemed to get bigger and less natural after that; I suppose it's hard to modulate one's performance if there's a constant loud ringing in one's ears. And ever since Airplane 2, he's pretty much built his career on making fun of his own caricature, so that delivery has become a consciously adopted conceit.
In the most dramatic moments, he can't afford to stumble over his words. It's hard to take Kirk seriously if he were to collapse in a fit of giggles because he pronounced something wrong.
"Kirk to sickboy- BAY!"
"Kirk to sickboy- BAY!"
Like in that famous blooper reel moment where Kirk says, "Mr. Spack...", and then Shatner breaks up.
When I did my recent binge-rewatch of Supergirl's first season, I noticed that Jeremy Jordan as Winn Schott had a habit of, of constantly stammering and, and repeat, repeating his, his, his words. And I didn't even register that the first time around, because it's the way a lot of people talk and we just adjust for it when we listen.
A trend in modern TV writing, particularly from people like Joss Whedon and Aaron Sorkin, is deliberately writing characters who stumble or struggle with words, or to metatextually have characters fail to think of a clever bon mot and have to fall back on vagueness, like "Do you want to call down the wrath of the whatever from high atop the thing?" or "That's as awful as... some really awful thing!" So both in acting and writing these days, you have things being done deliberately that would once have been strictly the stuff of blown takes and blooper reels.
A trend in modern TV writing, particularly from people like Joss Whedon and Aaron Sorkin, is deliberately writing characters who stumble or struggle with words, or to metatextually have characters fail to think of a clever bon mot and have to fall back on vagueness, like "Do you want to call down the wrath of the whatever from high atop the thing?" or "That's as awful as... some really awful thing!" So both in acting and writing these days, you have things being done deliberately that would once have been strictly the stuff of blown takes and blooper reels.
Are you really the only person who complains about Scott Bakula? There's a reason his gazelle speech is a thing of mockery, and it's not just the writing.
As far as I'm aware, at least.
I think Scott Bakula's speeches as Archer are consistently terrible. The stilted delivery of "Starfleet seems to think we're ready to begin our mission" that turned up in early Enterprise trailers was a recurring joke in my house. (I was really disappointed when one of them was used as a scene in Star Trek: The Ultimate Voyage.) I guess I don't complain about him a lot, though, because I don't have much reason to mention Enterprise at all.
I definitely notice it, more on the show than in the films. It wasn't constant, or how he speaks in real life from what I've seen, but it was there. As Christopher said, impressions are usually a caricature and they pick out mannerisms which they lean on. Just doing an impression of a voice isn't as funny as leaning on stranger things. Christopher Walken is another great example, but in his case I think he (especially in comedy) has a tendency to do an impression of comedians doing a Walken impression. Though there are examples of Walken being Walken before his famous impression, I'm thinking of the "I'm happiest...IN the saddle" from A View To A Kill. Something is rarely just made up out of nothing, or else it probably wouldn't be that funny or recognizable as an impression. And the Shatner impression does come from real examples, especially in TOS. Though, as Christopher again pointed out, the Gerald Ford character from SNL was kind of a reach. I think he tripped once, and Chevy seized on that as an opportunity to do pratfalls. Otherwise it was a terrible "impression" as there was seemingly no attempt to look or sound like him. Just fall down.
I remember seeing a compendium of Ford's falls, though it was a very long time ago. There were several of them, maybe five or six. You really got the impression that he was a klutz.
Oh, my bad, I was only aware of him falling down once but maybe he'd done it multiple times.
Edit: I found a compilation of Gerald Ford falls, but almost all of them were Chevy Chase. There were two that were Ford, one was the most famous one where he slips on the wet stairs of Air Force One and falls down, the other was a slip going up the steps but it looked like he caught himself on the rail and didn't actually fall down. There may be more though.
Last edited:
President Obama is another one who pauses while speaking. Impersonators key in on that.
When you make a speech you are supposed to pause at times, especially if you are explaining something ( the same goes for teachers) and are waiting for your ideas to sink in. It's different when you are giving orders to professionals who are supposed to understand exactly what you are talking about and would even understand shorthand for that matter.
There were a couple of public stumbles that got latched onto and exaggerated by SNL/Chase. However, I read recently that part of it was that Ford embraced and encouraged the caricature, feeling it humanized him in the public's eyes or something. So he played along with the gag to an extent -- kinda like how Shatner and Adam West play along with their own caricatures.
That's partly the speech-giving thing exocomp mentions, but more generally, as in the case of my father, I think it's a habit of intelligent people who take the time to think about what to say rather than just blurting out the first thing that pops into their heads.
Spock did say he tried to teach him. I guess it's not easy for a human to apply the pinch.Kirk should have studied more on how to apply a Vulcan Death Grip.
He's pausing to think carefully of his next words. I do that sometimes too
Sorry that you're surrounded by bad over-actors, Chris. That's gotta be tough. Most people I know don't spout memorized speeches, but. They don't. Dramatically stop. After two or. Three words. Most of the time. They are. Speaking. Mostly people ramble till they get to their point. But I've never met a real person who randomly adds several seconds between words. And realism is a lame attempt at a defense. It's Star Trek. There's almost literally nothing that's realistic about it. In theory it's about making good dramatic TV entertainment. And as per that clip, it's about an actor who can't completely remember their lines adding time to recall them. Certainly not something people tend to do in the real world. I get that Shatner is the Old Man of the franchise and that he's a personal hero to a lot of people. I'm not attacking that. But to try to explain away his over-acting is more than a bit disingenuous.
Maybe the script writer's typewriter was defective and it accidentally added extra spaces and letters to Shatner's lines....
"I'mmmmmm......Cappppp....tainnnn.....Kirrrrrk!!!
That's cute.It isn't just about the pauses; it's also the seemingly random speeding up and slowing down (which Shatner's imitators also exaggerate, of course). My own pet theory is that the Shat studied acting by playing classical drama recordings on a wowing record player.
Back in the 1950s and '60s there were plenty of jokes about Method actors, disdainfully referred to as "mumbling, scratching" actors by performers of the old school.
"But I can't understand a word he says."
"Shut up -- he feels it!"
And it's annoying as hell. I don't watch TV or movies to hear people stumbling and groping for words. I prefer the more traditional styles of screenwriting and acting. Give me crisp, literate dialogue with characters speaking in complete and cogent sentences.
And also in cinematography. Can anyone say "lens flare"?
Last edited:
How often did Kirk/Shatner talk like that in the first season?
It clearly became more a part of the character as the series moved on.
He was much more sympathetic and vulnerable in season one. Frankly I'm boggled by anyone who pretends his stilted, pausing altering of volume in any way resembles reality.
Of course, comedians exagerate it -- they exagerate it brcause it IS a thing and it's NOT normal.
I wish Roddenberry and/or the directors would have gotten him to dial that crap back.
Did he ever do that in the movies?
And yeah, the Enemy Within" was a weird performance, but I always figure he gets a pass as he's playing this deranged version of himself.
It clearly became more a part of the character as the series moved on.
He was much more sympathetic and vulnerable in season one. Frankly I'm boggled by anyone who pretends his stilted, pausing altering of volume in any way resembles reality.
Of course, comedians exagerate it -- they exagerate it brcause it IS a thing and it's NOT normal.
I wish Roddenberry and/or the directors would have gotten him to dial that crap back.
Did he ever do that in the movies?
And yeah, the Enemy Within" was a weird performance, but I always figure he gets a pass as he's playing this deranged version of himself.
Similar threads
