The feud between Star Trek co-stars George Takei and William Shatner has become the stuff of legend, with neither actor willing to give an inch to the other. While Shatner recently commented about his “embittered” co-star who never misses an opportunity to “blacken” his name, Takei has now had his chance to respond during an interview with The Guardian. Responding to Shatner’s comments, Takei said:
The pair have seemingly never seen eye to eye, and their war of words has frequently spilled onto social media on a number of occasions. This included Takei ridiculing Shatner’s recent flight into space, when he called him a “specimen that’s unfit” after saying his trip was turning him into a guinea pig. At the time Takei said:
“I know he came to London to promote his book and talked about me wanting publicity by using his name. So I decided I don’t need his name to get publicity. I have much more substantial subject matter that I want to get publicity for, so I’m not going to refer to [Shatner] in this interview at all. Although I just did. He’s just a cantankerous old man and I’m going to leave him to his devices. I’m not going to play his game.”
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“He’s boldly going where other people have gone before. He’s a guinea pig, 90 years old and it’s important to find out what happens. So 90 years old is going to show a great deal more on the wear and tear on the human body, so he’ll be a good specimen to study. Although he’s not the fittest specimen of 90 years old, so he’ll be a specimen that’s unfit!”
How Did William Shatner and George Takei Become So Opposing To Each Other?
According to George Takei, the problems with Shatner all stemmed from the star’s jealousy over how much attention Leonard Nimoy’s Spock used to get over his Captain Kirk. While discussing the subject previously, Takei said:
After sniping and warring with each other at various points over the last few decades, it seems unlikely that the two stars of the classic sci-fi franchise are ever going to completely bury the hatchet. Who will end up having the final word is anyone’s guess, but it seems that as long as there is still a platform for them to air their opinions of each other, they will not miss the opportunity to take it.
“It got more and more intense. How do I put it? It began from the TV series. There was one character whose charisma and whose mystery was like a magnet. It was Spock, the strange alien with pointy ears. That intrigued the audience and women thought ‘I’m the one who can arouse him.’ His fan letters were this many, and Leonard’s were that many, and that created a tension, that insecurity [within Shatner]. It’s all coming from Bill. Whenever he needs a little publicity for a project, he pumps up the so-called controversy between us.”
