When I had to record the opening [“Space, the final frontier…”] monologue — imagine the pressure. It is the single most famous piece of dialogue in the history of television, and I was being asked to record it. We were working on it, and I said, “Guys, can we take a moment to acknowledge that we’re all gonna remember this moment for the rest of our lives?” And then I realized William Shatner was [in space] at that exact moment. You can’t make that up. Later, I told [Shatner] the story, and he said, “I don’t think I ever got it right.” He meant the monologue! He was never sure what it was — was it a monologue, was it a captain’s log? And that was an incredible lesson: You have to keep searching. It’s never done.

How do you get this lesson from that conversation?