William Shatner Knows He Doesn't Have Long To Live
William Shatner is aware of his mortality.
The 91-year-old actor’s documentary, You Can Call Me Bill, reflects on his long career.
“I’ve turned down a lot of offers to do documentaries before. But I don’t have long to live,” he said.
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“Whether I keel over as I’m speaking to you or 10 years from now, my time is limited, so that’s very much a factor. I’ve got grandchildren. This documentary is a way of reaching out after I die,” Bill told Variety.
Bill also explained his absence at his Star Trek costar Leonard Nimoy‘s funeral in 2015.
“His death was very sudden, and I had obligated myself to go to Mar-a-Lago for a Red Cross fundraiser,” he explained. “I was one of the celebrities raising money. That event was on Saturday night. I chose to keep my promise and go to Mar-a-Lago instead of the funeral, and I said to the audience, ‘People ask about a legacy. There’s no legacy. Statues are torn down. Graveyards are ransacked. Headstones are knocked over. No one remembers anyone. Who remembers Danny Kaye or Cary Grant? They were great stars. But they’re gone and no one cares.’”
“But what does live on are good deeds. If you do a good deed, it reverberates to the end of time. It’s the butterfly effect thing. That’s why I have done this film,” he said of his upcoming documentary You Can Call Me Bill.
In 2021, he went on Jeff Bezos’ Blue Origin space shuttle.
“When I came out of the space ship I was crying, just sobbing, and I thought why am I crying? What’s going on? I’m in grief. What am I grieving about? Oh s—, I’m grieving about the world, because I now know so much about what’s happening,” Bill said.
“I saw the Earth and its beauty and its destruction,” he said of his perspective from space. “It’s going extinct. Billions of years of evolution may vanish. It’s sacred, it’s holy, it’s life and it’s gone. It’s beyond tragic. We stupid fucking animals are destroying this gorgeous thing called the Earth. Doesn’t that make you angry? Don’t you want to do something about it?”
Bill‘s Star Trek co-star George Takei made some disparaging comments about the actor’s trip to space with Blue Origin.