Double poll result and a double-sized toup-less video shocker.

Two poll results? Where the hell have we been? Summer slumbers - not quite. A few months ago, our team received a desperate and urgent call. The equipment used by the scientists at CERN looking for the Higgs boson was just not powerful enough - they were stumped:


Could our touposcopes help?


Yes, they did! It was an electrifying moment, all the more so as the boson so closely appeared to resemble strands of Bill Shatner's "TJ Curly" toupee. What are the cosmological implications?


In our second most recent poll, we asked readers whether Bill Shatner was actively trying to morph his "Denny Katz" into a retro "Jim Kirk lace". 43% said yes, he wants to go full circle; 56% said no, he's just having fin with the versatility of his current toup. The remaining 1% (also in the poll below) was, alas, lost in toupospace!


And in our most recent poll, we asked readers whether they thought Bill Shatner had ever turned down a role that required on-screen baldness. Another close one: 46% said no, but only because such roles had never been offered to him; 53% said yes, he simply was not prepared to appear on-screen without hair!

Thanks for voting! We couldn't help but bring you this random Blofeld-esque Touposhop that recently appeared on the Internet:


And speaking of Touposhop, reader Paul recently sent us some ongoing "Jimifications" of Bill Shatner. Here's a selection of what he kindly sent us:


Recently, a 1998 Biography Channel documentary about Bill Shatner appeared on YouTube (we think that brings the number of biographical docs on Bill Shatner to three). It featured numerous pictures of the actor, which are, of course, of interest to any toupologist...

Before the "TJ Curly - Phase One" and "Phase Two", there was the "Phase, this is real!"

Late-era toup-lessness in The World of Suzie Wong.

Bill Shatner and Christopher Plummer.

What exactly is going on here?

Little Richard? William Shatner in Barbary Coast.

But it also featured something else - something that we had never seen before. Detailed motion pictures of Bill Shatner's father Joseph. We've previously brought you some stills of Bill's bald dad. But here, for the first time, we are offered a tantalizing longer glimpse of the son through the father. If you squint a little, it is just possible to imagine...

Poll result and a major new Bill Shatner project...

In our last poll before we took a break, we asked our readers for their thoughts on when other actors and production staff were restricted from easily seeing Bill Shatner toup-less in the makeup rooms of his film and TV show appearances. 4% said that the 24/7 permanence of the "Denny Katz" is what ended such scenarios; 6% said that Bill Shatner has always been happy to be openly bald behind-the-scenes, so long at it isn't a public occasion; 8% said during the 1970s as Bill Shatner struggled with his "Lost Years"; 27% said during the 1980s as Bill Shatner's career was revived and a narrow majority, 52%, said that 1960s Star Trek was the last era of such free access. Thanks for voting!

Our current poll examines this issue:


Considerable buzz recently surrounded Bill Shatner's rather epic guest hosting stint on the British topical satire show Have I Got News for You. The 81-year-old "pensioneer" served as the swing vote between two bald and two non-bald panelists, including regular captains "Paul Morton" and "Ian Hilsop". Must see TV, with Bill Shatner's toup evidently sprayed a little browner than normal for the event - the episode be seen here and here.


And on the subject of Touposhopping, during our break, reader "Touposhopper Wannabe" submitted this Jim-ification of the TJ:


While reader Paul sent us this transition...


...which for some reason reminded us of this:


Come to think of it, there could have been - and still could be - an awesome TV series based on Bill Shatner's toupee. It would have an intro similar to MacGyver...

William Shatner: an ordinary man with an extraordinary toupee that can get him out of many a tight spot.

It can defeat any enemy...


...in any situation

It can be used as a toboggan in the snow...


...or an individual filament of this amazing toup can trip up bad guys...


Is there anything it can't do?


An ordinary man with an extraordinary secret identity! Touperman?


Imagine this nail-biting scene: Our hero jumps off a cliff, apparently with nothing to break his fall. In a dazzling and spectacular moment, the toupee again comes to the rescue turning into a life saving parachute!

Any other film or TV references that might help further illustrate this potential series, please let us know!

One of the greatest stunts involving a toupee ever performed in The Toup Who Loved Me (1977).

UPDATE:


Hanging by toupee filaments?

Poll result and toupee art.

In our most recent poll, we asked readers how years of toupee-wearing have affected Bill Shatner's personality. 9% said that it hasn't had any notable effect; 13% said that the effect was more chemical (toupee glue) than anything else; 33% said that it has made him more confident and vigorous; the greatest number, 43%, said that it's made Bill Shatner more guarded and defensive.


Thanks for voting!

Recently, a member of our relatively small (only a few thousand permanent staff) Department of Toupological Artistry and Abstract Expressionism approached us with a composite image they had created. Our response was one of unanimous excitement (coupled with: "can we get that on a T-shirt?!?!"). Here is what this staff member showed us:


Is this a lost fifth version of Munch's "The Scream"? It perhaps so perfectly captures the ultimate Bill Shatner nightmare scenario - public touplessness! Was Bill Shatner the anonymous $120 million bidder at the recent Sotheby's auction?

The duality of the man-toupee that is Bill Shatner has inspired some rather interesting real artworks. One piece we came across (sourced here) was by artist Andrea Lam:


We don't know the story behind this image, but the younger visage on top of the older head, carefully controlled by Bill Shatner - if this isn't toupological symbolism, then what is?

Perhaps it was partially based on this image of another person wearing Bill Shatner's toupee!


We'll have more on Halloween in the future - speaking of which, Shatner's Toupee is undertaking its annual spring cleaning so we're taking a three week break! Thanks, as always to our devoted readers for your continued interest, insights and information...

Oh, and if anyone really wants to make a T-shirt or print out a Shatner-Munch poster, then click to here to download this high resolution image:

Poll result and trying to Jim-up the TJ.

Our most recent poll asked for your views on why there are no publicly available toup-less pictures of Bill Shatner from after the 1950s. Anecdotal evidence from several Star Trek actors suggests that Bill Shatner was still only wearing the toupee in professional and public situations (rather than in private situations too) at least up until part way through the second season of the show. So why no casual bald photographs from that era?

Behind-the-scenes images from Star Trek always showed the toupee in place.

15% said that whomever else may possess such pictures fears the consequences of releasing them; 38% said that such pictures have been actively suppressed by Bill Shatner (perhaps through threats of legal action, or they were quietly bought up by a private investigator hired by the actor); the greatest number of votes, 45%, suggested that such photographs simply do not exist. This means that even in private social gatherings, photography of a toup-less Bill Shatner was strictly forbidden.

Even family photos showed the toupee in place. Are there others without the toupee that haven't been released?

Thanks for voting!

Finally, we also have a couple of history-themed educational videos from a series called This Was America, which have been made available by the Peabody Awards Collection Archives. While the documentaries themselves are a little on the dry side, they do offer some valuable toupological insight.

The first, from 1979, shows Bill Shatner effectively trying to add a touch of the former "Jim Kirk lace" side-parting to his still relatively new "TJ Curly". Does it work? Not quite. Perhaps here we see the seeds of why the "TJ Curly" had to be the way it was.


By 1980, the experiment was over and the toup became decisively round. A new decade had begun and the toupee was evidently reflecting the changing times...


It's pretty rare to see the such drastic toupee changes within programs of the same series...


UPDATE:

18th century composer Johann Sebastian Bach. Is there a slight resemblance?

Poll result and a roundup of other toup news...

Our most recent poll asked for your take on what goes through Bill Shatner's mind when he sees himself without his toupee. 6% said "That is the real me"; 15% suggested that he doesn't really emote on the matter at all; 31% said "That's not the real me" and 46%, the greatest number, suggested that he simply can't bear to look.


Thanks for voting! Now for a quick roundup of other toupee-related news:

We wanted to bring to our readers' attention a recent appearance by Bill Shatner on The Howard Stern Show, notable for two key reasons: firstly, Bill Shatner came on with his wife Elizabeth - a very rare occurrence indeed. Secondly, the level to which this married couple good-naturedly subjected themselves to some of the most intimate, explicit and incredibly personal questions was really something to behold.


Here's a video clip from the show's YouTube channel:

After listening to the Shatners answering an endless stream of questions about their sex lives, one can't help but think "This is OK, but the toupee is off limits?" How can that be? Perhaps offering the public more in this arena (the couple would certainly have known beforehand to expect such deeply intimate questions - that is, after all, what Howard Stern does) is a way to compensate for the lack of discourse on the toupee.

Or was this a subtle signal by Elizabeth to her husband that if he decides to open up about the toup, she will stand by her man? Is she perhaps even pushing behind-the-scenes for more disclosure?

The people must hear the truth about the toupee.

The entire audio is currently up on YouTube in three parts and we certainly recommend this fascinating and very funny exchange to our readers.

Next, the good folks at My Star Trek Scrapbook have posted an interesting snippet from a 1987 issue of the spoof magazine Cracked (which as of 2007 exists only as an on-line publication). Here's the crucial image...

Notice the detail of the toupee - the overlapping lace at the front is perfectly rendered.

...click over to My Star Trek Scrapbook for more context.

And finally, a trailer for the 1974 William Shatner TV movie Indict and Convict recently appeared on YouTube:

This is a movie our staff (and other Bill Shatner fansites) have long sought to locate in order to conduct a thorough toupological analysis. The following quote from an IMDb user review may help to explain our enthusiasm for tracking down this particular title:

A lost classic? William Shatner in the 1974 TV movie Indict and Convict.

"Without divulging anymore than the title of the movie does, I can tell you this: ABSOLUTELY, SPECTACULAR, TOTALLY OVER THE TOP PERFORMANCE BY WILLIAM SHATNER. Completely out of control with his searching looks, pauses (extended) during dialogue, made every effort to steal every single scene in the move. (I wouldn't have respected him if he hadn't) But wait... there's MORE. He's wearing those Gow-Awful Choclote [sic] Brown double knit suits complete with matching vest, plaid collared shirt with no button down collars... but worst of all... It was the dreaded and feared 1970's Necktie."

Need we say more?

Image sourced here.

Add to all of the above, the movie also has a soundtrack scored by none other than Jerry Goldsmith - there's a clip of the score here ("Perhaps my #1 unreleased Goldsmith grail!" notes a commenter at Film Score Monthly's board).

If any of our readers can help us track down a copy, we would certainly be very grateful!

And that's it for this post!