George Takei: What do you fear most? — FLAPSS

The question

What do you fear most?

Originally asked

Vanity Fair, to its interview subject, The Proust Questionnaire

The exact prompt is fixed in Vanity Fair's Proust Questionnaire and independently sustained in The Guardian's The Q&A over multiple decades.

You answer as yourself. Nobody on FLAPSS answers as anybody else.

GT

George Takei

Recorded said elsewhere, not written here

There’s no point living at my age with many ingrained great fears. Though I do have that dream that I walk out onto the stage nude. Does that count?

Vanity Fair, The Proust Questionnaire, Vanity Fair, October 2015 source ↗

Others on this question

View all 256 →

Andrew O’Hagan

I can’t say it.

Recorded The Q&A, The Guardian, 25 July 2026 source ↗

Whoopi Goldberg

I’m most afraid that someday I’m going to be on an airplane and it’s going to be acting the way I don’t want it to.

Recorded Vanity Fair, The Proust Questionnaire, Vanity Fair, September 2015 source ↗

Losing track (see above).

Recorded The Q&A, The Guardian, 10 January 2026 source ↗

Tim Peake British Army Air Corps officer and astronaut

Running out of options.

Recorded The Guardian, The Q&A, The Guardian, 15 October 2022 source ↗

More from George Takei

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Question What one change would most improve the quality of your daily life? Daily life

One great big artistic challenge.

Recorded The Guardian, The Q&A, The Guardian, 16 November 2019 source ↗

Question What song would you want played at your funeral? Death & what remains

Barbra Streisand’s Evergreen from A Star Is Born or You’ll Never Walk Alone from Rodgers and Hammerstein’s Carousel.

Recorded The Guardian, The Q&A, The Guardian, 16 November 2019 source ↗

Question How close have you come to dying? Death & what remains

After the war, when I was about nine, we were held up in our home. The robbers grabbed my father and had a gun at his throat. It was terrifying. My mother got a wad of money and gave it to the people, and they ran away.

Recorded The Guardian, The Q&A, The Guardian, 16 November 2019 source ↗

Question Who deserves an apology from you, and for what? Failure & regret

As a teenager I told my father, “You led us into the camp like sheep to slaughter.” I knew I had hurt him, this man that I loved so much. That’s haunted me all my life.

Recorded The Guardian, The Q&A, The Guardian, 16 November 2019 source ↗

Question What trait do you most dislike in other people? Values & belief

Impatience and temper. Enough already!

Recorded Vanity Fair, The Proust Questionnaire, Vanity Fair, October 2015 source ↗

Question Excluding property, what is the most expensive thing you have ever bought? Money & investment

I went overboard on the money I invested in the production of Allegiance. It did not return, but it was fulfilling that I was able to tell a story that’s dear.

Recorded The Guardian, The Q&A, The Guardian, 16 November 2019 source ↗

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