Shatner Gold... Olympic Gold

Quite frankly, I wasn't surprised to see William Shatner in the Olympic closing ceremonies in Vancouver on Sunday.  Shatner is Canadian, born in Montreal, and pretty much every living celebrity in or from Canada had appeared in the Olympic ceremonies up until that point (with the exception of the two to follow, Catherine O'Hara and Michael J. Fox, and also Bullwinkle. To be fair though, Mr. Winkle is only half-Canadian).

Still, it didn't completely feel like a Shatner appearance.  The dialogue was remeniscent of an awards show, somewhere between stilted advertisement and Stepford Wife banter. Sure, there were a few irreverent, even slightly off color jokes (Juan de Fuca?) but where was the outspoken, celebrity rebel attitude we've all known and come to love (and to avoid asking for autographs, because he'd kill us with a stare)? Where was the syncopated vocal cadence, the one that reminds one of a bi-polar drummer, perididdling while dodging frisbees? Where was the sneer of a smile, the one that says, "I despise and love you at the same time and by the way, where's my check?" Where was the chutzpah, raw and direct enough to shock a roomful of hard-core rappers into embarrassed silence? It was lost in the dry, semi-frozen, pallid officiousness that is Olympics' style entertainment.

Here are a few things I think Shatner, in his most recognizeable rougishness, should have said instead:

• (As the preceding entertainers leave) And they're gone... gone... gone!
• Can anybody get me a scotch? A Molsons? a cigarette? C'mon people, I'm working here.  The air is cold, I'm getting drymouth, I need some comfort. If the Canadian women's hockey team can have cigars and beer ready after their win, surely I could get a pitcher of Lebatt's, a stocked humidor, and an ashtray up here.
• If Leonard Nimoy were here, I think he'd find all this Olympics crap pretty %$#& illogical.
• This whole ceremony is gaudier and tackier than George Takei's wedding.
• I can't believe the Canadian Women's curling team was beaten by a woman named Norberg. Wasn't that O.J. Simpson's character in Police Squad?
• This Olympics has always been about ...truth ...and ...beauty!
• Don't try to tell me that you can do the Olympics better in Sochi.  It sickens me.
• I wanted to be in the opening ceremony, but IOC President Jacque Rogge vetoed that idea. He vetoed me! Rogge! Roooogggggeeee!!!!!!!!!!!!
• I'll stack my two Emmys against your gold medals any day of the week, you punks!
• (To audience) You drove all the way here to watch biathlon? Get a life!
• If the IOC had been better negotiators, they could have gotten the Olympics in Winnepeg for half the price