The actor also said he tried to keep his Kellogg’s Raisin Bran commercial distinct from “Star Trek”: “I don’t like the idea of referring to it. I try and edit it out.”

William Shatner worried Super Bowl ad using his name for poop puns was crappy idea after childhood bullying

The actor also said he tried to keep his Kellogg's Raisin Bran commercial distinct from "Star Trek": "I don't like the idea of referring to it. I try and edit it out."

By Wesley Stenzel

Wesley Stenzel is a news writer at **. He began writing for EW in 2022.

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February 8, 2026 8:11 p.m. ET

William Shatner in a Kellogg's Raisin Bran commercial. Credit:

- William Shatner stars in a new commercial campaign for Kellogg's Raisin Bran that repeatedly refers to him as "Will Shat."

- The actor says he had "tremendous" apprehensions about the pun since he "used to get into fights" with bullies who mocked his name.

- Shatner also says he tried to create a distance between the commercial and *Star Trek*: "I don't like the idea of referring to it."

William Shatner knows what his name sounds like.

The *Star Trek* alum headlines a new ad campaign for Kellogg's Raisin Bran, which recently beamed into the Super Bowl 2026 broadcast. The commercial revolves around Shatner distributing the high-fiber cereal as he teleports into various scenes, and throughout the ad, the actor is repeatedly called "Will Shat" — a play on his surname sounding like the past-tense version of a certain fecal expletive, which ties into the potential digestive benefits of the cereal.

William Shatner in New Orleans on Jan. 11, 2025.

Erika Goldring/Getty

In an interview with **, Shatner says that he had "tremendous" apprehensions about leaning into his name's nastier side.

"I haven't lost those apprehensions," the *Twilight Zone* star says. "I mean, I used to get into fights when I was a kid in the locker room. They'd kid me about that. I'd say, 'Don't call me that!' and I'd fight them. It was a sore spot as a child. And then adults stopped doing it. But it lurks, and for them to find it was, in itself, a kind of discovery."

Shatner wasn't sure how a pun-based commercial about pooping could ever work.

"Kellogg's wanted to do a Super Bowl commercial talking about fiber, which makes you crap really well — you s--- really well with fiber. And the problem was: how do you make that amusing? How do you get a laugh on that? And that's what they worked on," he says.

He elaborates, "To their benefit, the advertising company started off with my name, and I kept saying, 'Can you do that? Does that mean it's me sitting on a toilet?' So we worked on refining what was in decent taste, if not good taste, about what is amusing about going to the bathroom."

Shatner's home base at the beginning of the ad is a futuristic control room that evokes his most iconic project, *Star Trek*. The actor says that he tries to create some distance between himself and the sci-fi franchise whenever the possibility of *Trek* parallels arise.

William Shatner in 'Star Trek'.

"I don't like the idea of referring to it," he says of the series. "I try and edit it out of anything they write for me to say, as much as possible. But visually, it looks good. And I chose clothing that didn't reflect the [*Star Trek*] uniform, although they had originally planned that way. So I think it's a reasonable homage to *Star Trek* without making it *Star Trek*."

He continues, "I tried to be tongue-in-cheek about it all. I hope that there's a subtext of my knowing — that I'm kidding myself."

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******In the ad's final scene, Shatner leaps off the top of a large SUV and body slams into a table that collapses under his weight — and he transforms into a pile of Raisin Bran boxes. As you might expect, Shatner himself didn't actually perform the jump himself.

"Well, the dishonest thing would be to say I've done a lot of stunts and that was an easy one. I just tucked my shoulder in. I've wrecked my left shoulder anyway from doing stunts," he laughs. "No, they cut before I jumped off, put a stunt man in there and looked vaguely like me, and then cut rapidly to me on the table. Movie magic. It was seamless."

William Shatner in a Kellogg's Raisin Bran commercial.

Shatner hopes to see the Kellogg's ad for the first time along with the rest of the Super Bowl's audience. "I haven't seen it," he says. "I generally avoid watching myself. And I thought it'd be fun 'cause I'm having a Super Bowl party. And I've overloaded my room, which seats about 20 people, and I got a large screen and we're gonna watch the Super Bowl. And there's a lot of food and it's gonna be joyful with friends. And then this commercial, presumably, will come on."

Watch Shatner's Kellogg's Raisin Bran commercial above, and check out our roundup of the best and worst star-studded commercials at this year's Super Bowl.

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