William Shatner’s Shocking Story on Being Homeless

Star Trek V: The Final Frontier William Shatner, 1989 — Bruce Birmelin/Paramount/Everett Collection

What To Know

After Star Trek ended in 1969, William Shatner struggled financially, living in his truck due to low pay.
Despite early hardships, Shatner continued acting in various TV movies and roles, which helped him get through difficult times before Star Trek became a major cultural phenomenon.

William Shatner will always be Captain James T. Kirk to generations of Star Trek fans, but his life after the original series ended did not exactly make him a millionaire. Star Trek became a huge pop culture franchise, with movies, spinoffs, conventions, and endless fan devotion. But when the original NBC series ended in 1969, it was not quite a fan favorite yet. In fact, Shatner said he lived in his truck after Star Trek wrapped.

During a 2015 interview with Parade, he was asked if that story was true, and he answered, “Yeah.” He explained, “They didn’t pay very well, and I got a divorce at that same time, and I had three children, so it was a little rocky.”

Star Trek aired from 1966 to 1969, but the show did not become the massive phenomenon we know today until later. It found a bigger audience through reruns, fan conventions, and the loyalty of viewers who kept the Enterprise alive long after NBC canceled the series.

Everett Collection

At the time, Shatner was dealing with major changes in his personal life. His first marriage, to Gloria Rand, ended in divorce in 1969. The couple had three daughters together: Leslie, Lisabeth, and Melanie. Shatner kept working wherever he could. In the years after Star Trek, he appeared in TV movies, guest roles, and lower-budget films, including The Andersonville Trial, The Horror at 37,000 Feet, Barbary Coast, The Devil’s Rain, and Kingdom of the Spiders. They kept him going during a difficult stretch.

Of course, Star Trek eventually worked out quite well for Shatner. Shatner returned as Kirk in Star Trek: The Animated Series and later in the film series, beginning with Star Trek: The Motion Picture in 1979. By then, the original show had become much more than a canceled ’60s sci-fi series. It had turned into a devoted fandom and, eventually, one of the most recognizable franchises in television history. Shatner also built a career far beyond Kirk. He starred as Sgt. T.J. Hooker in the ’80s, hosted Rescue 911, and later won new acclaim as Denny Crane on The Practice and Boston Legal. That role earned him two Emmy Awards. Then, in 2021, Shatner made another kind of history when he flew aboard Blue Origin’s New Shepard at age 90. At the time, he became the oldest person to travel to space, a record that was later surpassed.