Here's How William Shatner Reacted To Michael Myers Wearing His Face
Michael Myers is up there with the likes of Jason Voorhees and Freddy Krueger as one of the scariest horror movie villains ever created. Since 1978, he has terrorized the big screen with a butcher knife in hand, donning a monochrome jumpsuit and his now-famous pale, expressionless mask. Over the past four decades, Michael Myers' mask has become so prevalent in pop culture that even those who've never seen "Halloween" or any of its sequels recognize it on sight. Although, the origin of the ghoulish portrait is far less well-known, despite the fascinating story behind it.
As the original "Halloween" entered pre-production, nailing down Michael Myers' look soon proved quite the daunting task. The costume department tried out a handful of masks, but none captured the simple yet menacing aesthetic they were aiming for. According to Entertainment Weekly, art director Tommy Lee Wallace eventually turned to a cheap Captain James T. Kirk mask made from a mold of William Shatner's face. He altered it, painted it white, and added a different wig, and the rest is history.
This is certainly a fun piece of film trivia to bring up during the Halloween season, but it's time to address the elephant in the room: How does William Shatner feel about sharing a face with prolific fictional murder Michael Myers? Here's what the "Star Trek" mainstay had to say on the matter.
Shatner has made the most of it
In late September of 2021, William Shatner sat down for a brief interview with Jake Hamilton to discuss a handful of topics. The Michael Myers mask situation crept its way into the conversation, and the space explorer detailed his initial reaction to learning director John Carpenter used his face for it. "I thought, 'Is that a joke? Are they kidding?'" he recalled, mentioning that he recognized it in a photograph at the time as a reproduction of the one used on "Star Trek." "Somewhere along the line, someone got that mask and made a mask of it for [the holiday] Halloween."
Though he seemed confused over the entire situation initially, not long after he learned that he shared a face with Michael Myers, Shatner decided to have some fun with it. Per a March of 2009 interview on his official YouTube channel, he reveals that he took advantage of the odd coincidence while taking his kids trick-or-treating some years ago. "I bought one," Shatner said, explaining through laughs that he wore it around throughout the evening. "I thought that was funny."
As the latest in a trilogy of "Halloween" films – "Halloween Kills" – begins its cinematic run, interest in securing a William Shatner cameo down the road has renewed. Perhaps it'll finally happen in 2022's "Halloween Ends," but even if it doesn't, at least his likeness has had a pretty good run in the franchise.