TORONTO — We all know William Shatner is weird, and clearly he does, too.
Why else would he have been tapped to host a show called William Shatner’s Weird or What? quips the Star Trek icon-turned-Priceline pitchman.
“Some people think that I — as a performer — am weird or what,” the amiable Shatner says in a recent conference call from Los Angeles.
“Unbelievable. What’s the explanation for that?”
The Canadian screen legend has no qualms about poking fun at himself and his cornball reputation, even embracing it as host of the History Television series with his own tongue-in-cheek take on real-life mystifying events.
Debuting on Wednesday, each episode of William Shatner’s Weird or What? attempts to explain the seemingly inexplicable.
In the first episode, a whimsical Shatner reveals that a nine-kilogram chunk of ice one day crashed through the roof of a woman’s house, landing on her kitchen floor.
“Oh no, this ice was not nice,” Shatner intones as he dons oven mitts to pick up a frozen, bowling ball-sized lump for the camera.
The 79-year-old Montreal native is clearly enjoying himself, and just happens to be embarking on one of the busiest periods of his lengthy career.
In addition to serving as host and executive producer of William Shatner’s Weird or What?” he’s gearing up for a return to network prime time as the star of the upcoming CBS sitcom $! My Dad Says. Then there’s his upcoming behind-the-headlines series, Aftermath with William Shatner, and his ongoing celebrity-interview series, Shatner’s Raw Nerve.