William Shatner Open To Playing An Older Captain Kirk

It seems even death can't hold back the indomitable spirit of Captain James T. Kirk. Actor Williams Shatner says that he'd be happy to reprise his role as the captain of the U.S.S. Enterprise in a future Star Trek movie, if the story is right.

"When we finished our movies — the six movies I made — we were putting Kirk into glasses, graying hair, a little old. I wrote a series of novels [in which] they allowed me to tell my story of Captain Kirk. So in a series of Star Trek novels, half a dozen of them, I — taking from my own life, of life and death and love and loss — I created this whole world of Star Trek for Captain Kirk," Shatner said on THR's Awards Chatter podcast. The "Shatnerverse" series of non-canonical novels, beginning with 1995's The Ashes of Eden, resurrected Kirk in the era of Star Trek: The Next Generation.

"I would have loved to have done them [as movies]," he added.

Shatner acknowledged the rumors of his return to the franchise in Star Trek Beyond, and admitted that he had been contacted about the idea. In the end they couldn't figure out a way to make sense of Kirk's presence now that Shatner appears older than he did during his death scene in Star Trek: Generations, but if the writers ever figure a way around the problem, he'd be happy to played an aged Captain Kirk.

"I would play an old Captain Kirk, absolutely," he said. "You would have [to have] an interesting character, not a cameo, like 'Here I am, aren't I interesting?' It's the ongoing world, it's the world within science-fiction. Yes, you age within the universe. Time goes on, but time bends, as well. There's so many things you could do."

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