The Captains


The Captains is a Canadian Star Trek documentary which was written, co-produced, and directed by William Shatner. Its premiere screening was held on  in New York and Los Angeles.

Shatner traveled to Canada, the UK, and the US to interview each of the actors who had helmed their own incarnation of the Star Trek franchise as its central Starfleet captain. While recounting many of his own Star Trek experiences, Shatner interviewed: 
Patrick Stewart
Avery Brooks
Kate Mulgrew
Scott Bakula
Chris Pine

Clips from their respective episodes and/or films were interwoven throughout the interviews and combined with other archival footage and stills. Shatner also interacted with fans and fellow Star Trek actors at the  Las Vegas Creation convention.

The Captains included a humorous feature interview with Christopher Plummer on-stage at the Festival Theatre in Stratford, Ontario. It was also notable for its footage of a "Kirk vs Kirk" arm-wrestling match between Shatner and Pine on the sidewalk adjacent to Paramount Studios.

The 97-minute documentary also featured appearances by: 
Rene Auberjonois 
Jeri Ryan
John de Lancie
Jonathan Frakes
Sally Kellerman
Walter Koenig
Robert Picardo
Connor Trinneer
Nana Visitor
Grace Lee Whitney

Production credits
William Shatner, J. Craig Thompson, and David Zappone acted as the film's executive producers and Kevin Layne as creative consultant. It was produced by Le Big Boss Productions in association with Epix, Ballinran Productions, 455 Films, and Melis Productions.

The music was composed by Andy Milne, who commented: "For many years, I had been performing with the actor Avery Brooks, who's also a singer and pianist. And when William Shatner was making this documentary that he made that I scored for him – it was called 'The Captains' – he was doing interviews with all the actors that succeeded him in captain roles in all the Star Trek franchises. And his interview with Avery was very much built around music, it was very improvisational, the two of them sitting at a piano, talking, singing, joking, thinking about similar experiences. And so as a result of that exchange and relationship, I guess Shatner had a conversation with Avery about the music, and Avery just said, 'I've got your guy.'''" 

The Captains Close Up
In 2013, the documentary was repackaged as The Captains Close Up, using previously unused footage from the original documentary, focusing on each captain in their own segment.

See also
 The Captains of The Final Frontier – a 2010 A&E Biography Channel documentary
 Star Trek: The Captains' Summit – a 2009 Paramount documentary
 Star Trek documentaries – a list of Star Trek'' documentaries

External links 
 
 
 EpixHD official film site
Captains