There are key geek moments in life where everything just seems to crystallize. Where it all seems to just be perfect. When it plays out magically.

About 2 weeks ago, I got contacted by a publicity firm out of Houston that usually represents fairly high quality films, that had been hired to help open an Indie flick called SHOOT OR BE SHOT. They were having a world premiere here in Austin for it and they wondered if I would like to sit down and chat with William Shatner and Harry Hamlin.

There was, of course, only one correct answer… YES!

In 1974, at the age of 3 years old I set up at my own table at conventions from Austin to Dallas to Oklahoma City to Detroit to Chicago to San Diego to Berkeley and so forth selling stills and posters of STAR TREK and BRUCE LEE and Superhero Stickers with funny sayings.

At conventions, I sat behind the table, chin upon it saying “50 cents for black and whites, One dollar for color ones,” all day long. Images of Mudd’s Women, the City on the Edge of Forever, Kirk and his numerous women, Spock and Jeffrey Hunter from THE CAGE, McCoy and Nurse Chapel, Kirk vs Gorn and on and on and on.

On my breaks I would go into the 24 hour film rooms, and between each feature they showed an episode of STAR TREK in 16mm about 25 feet by 25 feet. It was glorious.

My first Geek Conversations with geeks other than my parents and their friends concerned… STAR TREK, BRUCE LEE and Superheroes. This was in the period when Star Trek was an ember of a long dead series kept smoldering in the coals of syndication.

It was at these conventions where Bjo Trimble gathered her famous list of fans lobbying Paramount to bring Star Trek back, lobbying NASA to name the first Space Shuttle ENTERPRISE. It was a time when the two biggest loves of geek culture were STAR TREK and RAY HARRYHAUSEN.

All fans could talk about was the next Harryhausen film, what if scenarios with Star Trek… and the odd fans would be heralding DAMNATION ALLEY or LOGAN’S RUN as the NEXT BIG THING. STAR WARS didn’t exist, nor did it ever seem likely that something like it would.

Science Fiction was trying to be heady, Kubrick’s 2001 made others want to abandon the typical shoot-outs in space. Movies like SILENT RUNNING were par for the course.

STAR TREK was that one ‘fun’ science fiction thing that fans had. It made space travel an adventure. It made the unknown conquerable. And Shatner’s KIRK was the embodiment of ACTION and DECISION and PASSION. He’d clutch alien chicks to his bare chest and kiss them till their knees were jelly. He’d beat an enemy to near death and give them reprieve at the last minute to embody compassion at the end of things.

Shatner was a space hero borne out the world of Clark Gable and Kirk Douglas and John Wayne. However, there was a tad of Gregory Peck in him too… that willingness to use a team. To work with others, to know one’s own limitations. Shatner was… quite honestly the BOMB!

I had a six foot door poster of Shatner standing on a transporter pad on one wall next to my books in my bedroom as a kid. I had the whole set of MEGO dolls. Kirk fought not only the various Trek aliens, but also Spider-Man’s THE LIZARD, Conan The Barbarian, and the Hulk. Kirk almost always won, and he ended up making out with ISIS in her oh so lovely outfit.

As the pre-gargantuan Harry, I wanted to meet two people in my life. BRUCE LEE and WILLIAM SHATNER. They embodied COOL. Today, today I just met William Shatner. And folks… I’m so fricking happy about it that I could careless that my cable modem isn’t working. Well… I’ll explain later.

Now adding to this, the fact that I was also going to be meeting Harry Hamlin today… Well, Hamlin is no Captain Kirk, but he did cut the head from the Gorgon and kill the Kraken. He is freaking PERSEUS, and when I was nine years old, and my sister was freshly unleashed from my mother’s womb… We all went to see it… about a good two dozen times. That was the geek Summer of my Youth! There was RAIDERS OF THE LOST ARK then SUPERMAN 2 then STRIPES then FOR YOUR EYES ONLY then CANNONBALL RUN then CHEECH & CHONG’S NICE DREAMS then HEAVY METAL then a re-release of EMPIRE STRIKES BACK then AMERICAN WEREWOLF IN LONDON and BODY HEAT. Somewhere in there… Around HEAVY METAL period if memory serves was CLASH OF THE TITANS. It was the same year as ROAD WARRIOR, DAS BOOT, EXCALIBUR, TIME BANDITS and ESCAPE FROM NEW YORK. It was… Simply BLISS! Harry Hamlin was there… He was amongst the toys I played with that year and beyond.

So I went to the FOUR SEASONS down by Town Lake here in Austin, Texas on a muggy humid clear day. El Cosmico was on DV, Patch was Sound-Girl and I… Well I was going to try my best not to drool.

I was going to be meeting a life long cinematic hero and one of my prime Harryhausen heroes… Perseus And James Tiberius Kirk.

I was the first to arrive of my group. Rav was there to do a separate interview before my time with the two, and we took a seat in the bar area of the FOUR SEASONS.

We would only have 20 minutes to talk, but I knew how to milk that a little bit longer. I had a plan! I had brought my CLASH OF THE TITANS one-sheet which Ray Harryhausen had signed to me years ago in Atlanta. I also had my STAR TREK II: WRATH OF KHAN poster that I had had Ricardo Montalban sign to me. I decided that I would sit in front of the fire place beneath an enormous stuffed ELK head.

Patch next arrived. She looked to be on some prime euphoric drugs… Slightly trembling… orgasmic smile and in her one glazed eye a ‘not worthy’ glimmer. She too had a poster.

Father Geek was there with me, then El Cosmico came… He had that most excellent STAR TREK: THE MOTION PICTURE: DIRECTOR’S EDITION DVD for Shatner to sign. He said, “I’ve only asked for one other autograph in my life… Neil Armstrong.”

That really says a lot about what Shatner represents to geeks. He is beyond mere Icon status, he is mythic… a persona of legend. He has managed throughout his career to be bigger than life. Charming, humorous and personable. His rhythm of Speech is one of the most recognizable voices ever. He is the eternal winner. He is invincible good. He is Kirk.

I was here to talk with him about this low budget film though. I wasn’t here to talk Trek. I wasn’t hear to talk about his brilliant performance on my personal favorite TWILIGHT ZONE episode… I can never look out a plane window at a wing at night and not giggle my little thought of… “There’s a gremlin on the wing of the plane!!!” Hell I liked him in both THE BROTHERS KARAMAZOV and JUDGEMENT AT NUREMBERG well before Trek came along. I LOVE HIM in BIG BAD MAMA… He is the MAN in that film! Hell, he got to DO Angie Dickinson in that flick and wield a mean Tommy-Gun! And KINGDOM OF THE SPIDERS rocked my world as a 6 year old. I thought that it was a wonderful killer bug flick. Hell Shatner picked up a Best Actor nomination from the Academy of Science Fiction, Fantasy and Horror films for that one! I dig it.

Oh, the restraint I’m going to have to show here. Don’t SPAZ out… Be cool… Don’t SPAZ out… Suddenly El Cosmico says, “There he is…” (not so helpless as we were led to believe) STOP THAT BRAIN, STOP IT!!! I FORBID YOU!

Now, my legs are not the best right now. They are helluvalot better than when I met Ricardo… But I just can not imagine meeting Shatner on crutches… I had Dad remove them far from me. Out of the frame, as you will. As Harry Hamlin came over to shake my hand I arose from my seat as though I were healed. Shatner comes over saying something along the lines of, “You certainly have made an impression, I’ve heard quite a bit about you.” At this point my euphoria is at an all time high. I have utterly no idea of what my mouth said, but I shook Shatner’s hand. The one he always held the phaser in… the one that always had the communicator. One of the two hands that ground the potassium nitrate, sulfur and coal into gun powder to defeat the mighty Gorn! The hand that always went to the small of the alien chicks’ backs. The one that cradled his chin, that brought the glasses to his face to punch the override numbers into the Enterprise to lower Reliant’s shields. The man that didn’t believe in the no-win-scenario, because “I don’t like to lose!” SHATNER!

However, due to years of Buddhist monastery training in breathing and self-meditation I was able to outwardly only look like a trembling foaming at the mouth fan boy. Patch was very near ripping her shirt off and mating with Kirk. It was the piano wire that we used to restrain her that kept her from doing so. And El Cosmico… Usually so calm, so cool, so collected. El Cosmico was on this day a full-blown geek.

We have the entire 20 minute interview with Hamlin and Shatner on DV, and hopefully El Cosmico will be putting something together for you good folks to watch. Patch may even do a bit of transcribing of the deal so that we have a good solid report for you. What I’m going to do is give you my memory of the time spent with Shatner and Hamlin.

First off, Shatner was the man. He was cool and calm. I looked dead at him the entire time he spoke, he is very engaging. Those brief pauses… accenting his thoughts… to show exactly… how he stops to think… about what he’s about… to say. Honestly though, he didn’t do much of that.

Hamlin was softer spoken, more willing to let Shatner take the lead.

SHOOT OR BE SHOT was a ‘microscule’ budgeted film. They started by saying it was minuscule, but then made it even smaller.

Basically the film is about a technical writer, who was tired of his manuals on VCR operation going widely unread. His writing was too important to be ignored. He wants to write scripts, but is sent to an insane asylum. He escapes to head to Hollywood to make his script, of which there is only one copy. The loony is played by William Shatner.

Meanwhile on the other side of things, Harry Hamlin plays a lowrent producer of movies (not unlike those Lorenzo Lame-ass video shit) who had decided to go INDIE, hires a narrative free pretentious dork wannabe director and sets off into the desert to make an important exploitive film.

Shatner hijacks the production at Gun point and hijinx ensue.

It is a satire/comedy thing on the whole grade z straight to video filmmaking world. The film is high on the cheese factor, and done with multiple tongues in cheek. Think of Shatner’s turn in AIRPLANE 2 as HAMLET and this as his MEATBALLS 2. Go into it like that and there is some fun to be had.

Shatner was brought to this film by big shot producer Ralph Winter (producer of X-MEN, PLANET OF THE APES, MIGHTY JOE YOUNG, STAR TREK 4 & 6). Now this production ran on a budget about equal or even less than the Craft Services budget on most of his regular films, so as a result the film is played very broad and loose.

Shatner and Hamlin both relished the freedoms of low budget filmmaking, as well as bemoaned the desire for more time to get a few things right… better. They both had a genuine good time on this project.

Hamlin talked about how he liked being able to completly mold his character’s look and habits. From his cigars to the type of sunglasses to his hair and clothes. Harry was in control of the character.

Shatner enjoyed playing the broad comedy aspects and had fun with the whole production it seemed.

Next I asked Hamlin about the resurgence of Fantasy, given his first huge role was as Perseus in CLASH OF THE TITANS and he seemed quite pleased. He began talking about working with Harryhausen and said that it wasn’t always smooth sailing.

He remembered one time on set, Ray was telling him how he would be fighting the Scorpions. Apparently it was going to all be Perseus vs the claws, but Hamlin suggested that he reach and arm up, grab ahold of the tail and then slice it off with his sword. Ray told him no. However, Harry did it anyway… and ultimately Ray had to react to it. AWESOME! I love stories like that.

I’ll never look at that scene the same way again.

Next I asked Shatner about the insanity and desperation of a filmmaker as shown in SHOOT OR BE SHOT, if he ever felt that way when Paramount sliced about half the budget away from his Directorial Debut with STAR TREK 5, a mere 2 weeks before shooting.

I can’t wait to get the transcription of this sequence as he said, “It is absolutely soul-crushing…” and then went on into a beautiful short monologue that I will not butcher here, about what you pour into a film as a director… that is so much of yourself. One thing I can assure you about Shatner is this… the man is genuinely passionate about his work. He has fun with it, but he also loves the form. Loves working.

I talked a bit with Harry Hamlin about his upcoming L.A. LAW tv movie which focuses on his Michael Kuzak having his own firm and coming back into active practice to try a last minute defense for an old client, who is about to be executed. He seemed very enthusiastic about revisiting the character.

Shatner talked a brief bit about his excitement for GROOM LAKE, his first theatrical feature since that brutal studio experience on STAR TREK 5, which he so diplomatically doesn’t talk about, but where the finks at Paramount were so blatant in showing their disrespect to their greatest franchise. Heathens.

The twenty minutes went by too quick. My Spidey sense picked up upon the publicist encroaching from behind, so that’s when I brought out the posters to get autographed. Hamlin seemed out and out surprised when I brought something for him to sign. My “tech staff” each got their own items signed, and as Shatner was signing he was asking about my father’s leatherwork, so Father Geek came over and started chatting with Shatner about his styles. I think Shatner wanted him to make a saddle for him, he’s big into horses. When I mentioned that my father’s most direct influences were our trips to the Yucatan and the immersing into the Mayan culture down there… Shatner’s eyes went wide and said that he has a Mayan themed Horror film he’s writing. And then Hamlin started chatting about how he spent a couple of years in the Yucatan in 1973, where he ran a scuba diving operation and even found a lost Mayan cave underwater.

Literally at this point, the interview was over, but the publicist had to drag them away as we were really getting into a new conversation back and forth. AHHH the agony of short interviews.

When it was over, I picked up the bill on Shatner’s Cappacino expreso decaf. Relished my posters, Patch relished her poster that she had signed by Shatner to her mother. And El Cosmico had his holy dvd and… an item of such amazing importance that I dare not mention it, lest… hordes of Shatner lovers descend upon him to acquire it. Simply put, EL COSMICO now has the coolest Shatner item ever.

It is currently sitting in El Cosmico’s Cryo-Vault. In case reproduction of Shatner is ever needed. Just… think about it.

Too Cool. This is a helluva cool day. Helluva Cool Day indeed!

Instantly we rushed out of the 4 SEASONS, beating it back to Geek Headquarter’s Screening Room to behold the glory of Shatner in the great Trek episode, ARENA (aka Kirk Vs Gorn) and the animated Star Trek episode TIME TRAP… both of which I have in 16mm film.

When all was said and done, El Cosmico, Patch, Father Geek and myself were completely and totally sated! Captain Kirk and Perseus rule. Shatner and Hamlin do too!