Friday, October 16, 2009

The environmental toupee.


Long before the problems of global warming were being seriously tackled by this planet's governments, Bill Shatner was subtly lobbying for climate change to recognized as a serious problem. A crucial example of this is Shats' 1978 demonstration of an energy-saving "hybrid toupee". The toupee he wears in his appearance on The Mike Douglas Show is a rare outlier, which combines the traits of both the "Jim Kirk" lace as well as the prevailing Shatner style of the time, the "T.J. weave".

Not only did it get twice as much toupage to the gallon of hair, but it also reduced Bill Shatner's heating bills by providing increased insulation. Al Gore would have been very proud!

The full episode can be watched at this website - you have to sign up to find the clip.

3 comments:

  1. In reality, it is kinda sad. Bill should be at the bottom of the barrel at this time. This (very) cheap toupee must have costed some seven bucks.

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  2. I think it's not as bad as some of his other ones in the 70's and 80's -- at least it's a lighter colour. The dark brown/almost black toupees really aged him.

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  3. The darker color matched his own hair color during the 60's.

    It didn't work so well in the 70's because as people age, darker hair color suggests that one dyes their hair. For me it's no so much the color as the texture and thickness of it. That coupled with the curly look/Film/TJ look made it look obviously fake.

    Also, that fact that we (and pretty much everyone else) remembers how he used to look - such radical changes make it more clear that it's not real.

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