Fact checking These Are The Voyages....
- Thread starter Warped9
- Start date
Cushman simply should have elaborated on this. It would have actually bolstered his argument because it would have explained it more fully. It isn't what he's saying is totally false, but that without a fuller explanation one could come to an incorrect interpretation or conclusion.
Mind you we don't yet know what the content of Volume 2 is so it's possible he might explain this more fully. But for myself I could see putting at least some of this in Volume 1.
I was curious about this Tammy Grimes whose show was on opposite TOS.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tammy_Grimes
Small world -- turns out she was formerly married to Christopher Plummer. Amanda Plummer is her daughter. And she was the original choice to play Samantha on Bewitched, but got out of her contract to do a Noel Coward musical on Broadway.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tammy_Grimes
Small world -- turns out she was formerly married to Christopher Plummer. Amanda Plummer is her daughter. And she was the original choice to play Samantha on Bewitched, but got out of her contract to do a Noel Coward musical on Broadway.
trevanian
Rear Admiral
The situation with LOU GRANT and TAXI kind of bears this out. LOU GRANT was a little ahead of TAXI in the ratings (and probably doing better in terms of Emmys as well), but when CBS killed GRANT (presumably because of Asner's politics as much as the mediocre ratings), nobody rushed to pick the show up, whereas another network grabbed up TAXI right away for another season (this is all according to stuff I remember from Ellison's AN EDGE IN MY VOICE.)
And for a 60s era example of arbitrariness, one of Ellison's GLASS TEAT volumes mentions that CBS had to decide between keeping HE & SHE and some BLONDIE/DAGWOOD abomination, and that the network prez was saying his job was on the line about whether he would choose correctly (fat chance of that, he didn't turn into Julian Glover in Indy 3 after making the horrendous choice to kill HE & SHE, a classy show I can remember loving, even though I was only 8 or so.) A lot of this stuff might just be guesswork or even faith ... I mean, CHEERS did lousy at first too.
Another of my favorite series (it's a crime they've only released the first two seasons on DVD). I clearly recall the critics LOVED HSB and NBC would have had barrels of bad ink spent on them had they cancelled it before it wound down after season seven.
I quote Wikipedia: "Hill Street Blues received rave reviews from critics initially in general alongside dismal Nielsen ratings."
.... as well as this great news: "On December 5, 2013, it was announced that Shout! Factory had acquired the rights to the series and will be releasing Hill Street Blues- The Complete Series on DVD in Region 1 on March 25, 2014."
Thanks, Warped9, for restarting the thread. I've enjoyed reading these posts. The seeming misleading assertions of the author are definitely going to keep me from reading the book. Star Trek deserves a truly in-depth journalistic chronicle, and, sadly, it doesn't sound like this is it.
You're welcome. I simply felt there was more to discuss.
That said my general feeling isn't that the author is flat out wrong in some of his assertions, but rather they should be more clearly explained. Some things he said strike me as incorrect out of ignorance---he didn't double check to make certain of his facts. The two examples that come to mind are his idea that TOS introduced the miniskirt (it had already been established) and that NBC had no previous experience with science fiction (which Harvey has illustrated they had in the 1950s).
The main assertion he makes in regard to Star Trek's ratings being better than many of us have been led to believe all these decades is not off base because he's not claiming the show was a runaway hit. But he simply should have elaborated further. And, in fairness, he might just do that in the next volumes, but we don't see any indication of that in Volume 1.
Regarding all the other materiel in the book particularly the bulk of it which is the detailed story-behind-the-story of each episode. I find that materiel very interesting and it would be worth a book all on its own.
I still think this is a worthwhile read and I look forward to the next volumes even knowing about some of the flubs. There's still fascinating materiel to get out of this work.
How about we just call it "stuff?"Materiel is military materials and equipment.
I'm up to "The Enemy Within" and I already don't enjoy Cushman injecting his views. Just give me the details about making the shows. I can form my own opinions, thank you very much.
Also, in "Mudd's Women" it states, "On June 31, Roddenberry's request was denied."
Neil
Also, in "Mudd's Women" it states, "On June 31, Roddenberry's request was denied."
Neil
trevanian
Rear Admiral
For me, that has got to be right up there with the press release about Clarke's 2001: a space odyssey novel that claims, "the year 1002 is only a short time away." (but to be fair, the 2001 goof was a computer error, not a human error.)
Regarding the fan art creeping into the revised edition, Marc Cushman posted this to facebook, after I pointed out that it was fan art, and even provided the link to "The Lensman's" page.
"I dug and dug for those answers, too, Neil. Have yet to turn up a copy, other than the artwork. My guess is it was planned but cancelled before release in the U.S. in the early 1970s. If there are any copies of this, they would be very, very rare. And I'd sure love to have one. I'm hoping that presenting that image will stir up some conversation and we can solve the mystery."
Neil
"I dug and dug for those answers, too, Neil. Have yet to turn up a copy, other than the artwork. My guess is it was planned but cancelled before release in the U.S. in the early 1970s. If there are any copies of this, they would be very, very rare. And I'd sure love to have one. I'm hoping that presenting that image will stir up some conversation and we can solve the mystery."
Neil
Going back to the subject of budgets, I found out what the budgets were for one of NBC's powerhouse shows, Bonanza:
Season Eight
Number #1 in the ratings (overall)
Airdate: September 1966 to September 1967
Day/Time: Sunday, 9:00-10:00 PM
Production Cost Per Episode: $163,000
Season Nine
Number #4 in the ratings
Airdate: September 1967 to September 1968
Day/Time: Sunday, 9:00-10:00 PM
Production Cost Per Episode: $181,600
Season Ten
Number #3 in the ratings
Airdate: September 1968 to September 1969
Day/Time: Sunday, 9:00-10:00 PM
Production Cost Per Episode: $188,900
So Star Trek was in the same ballpark budget-wise as NBC's top-rated series.Number #1 in the ratings (overall)
Airdate: September 1966 to September 1967
Day/Time: Sunday, 9:00-10:00 PM
Production Cost Per Episode: $163,000
Season Nine
Number #4 in the ratings
Airdate: September 1967 to September 1968
Day/Time: Sunday, 9:00-10:00 PM
Production Cost Per Episode: $181,600
Season Ten
Number #3 in the ratings
Airdate: September 1968 to September 1969
Day/Time: Sunday, 9:00-10:00 PM
Production Cost Per Episode: $188,900
Having read the book, I think the author's prose style could most politely be described as "Breathless", to the point of being so enthusiastic it's like haing an eager young puppy dry humping your leg at times.
But all the behind the scenes memos are genuinely interesting. I had been under the impression that, generally speaking, the idea The Cage was rejected for being "Too cerebral" was now regarded as being a myth, a myth mainly spread by Rodenberry. So it was surprisingly to see during the early episodes that very phrase pop up multiple times in memos from NBC's man, all of which make it sound as if the "Too cerebral" thing was something that had already been discussed as a thing to avoid at all costs.
I wonder if perhaps it was Robertson who first made that comment about The Cage when he was shown it after he was brought onboard as the series proper started, and the constant repetition of the phrase just made it sink in Gene's mind as the overall objection to the first pilot over time?
What is also interesting about the NBC memos is how much they contrast with the stereotypical idea of "The suits" (espeically in relation to Star Trek), Robertson is constantly pushing for more episodes set off the Enterprise despite the fact the cliché would be him loving the cheap ship set episodes, because NBC signed up for a series exploring strange new worlds and that's exactly what it wanted even if it were budget busting. He's also very good at spotting when the series reused plot devices as well.
But all the behind the scenes memos are genuinely interesting. I had been under the impression that, generally speaking, the idea The Cage was rejected for being "Too cerebral" was now regarded as being a myth, a myth mainly spread by Rodenberry. So it was surprisingly to see during the early episodes that very phrase pop up multiple times in memos from NBC's man, all of which make it sound as if the "Too cerebral" thing was something that had already been discussed as a thing to avoid at all costs.
I wonder if perhaps it was Robertson who first made that comment about The Cage when he was shown it after he was brought onboard as the series proper started, and the constant repetition of the phrase just made it sink in Gene's mind as the overall objection to the first pilot over time?
What is also interesting about the NBC memos is how much they contrast with the stereotypical idea of "The suits" (espeically in relation to Star Trek), Robertson is constantly pushing for more episodes set off the Enterprise despite the fact the cliché would be him loving the cheap ship set episodes, because NBC signed up for a series exploring strange new worlds and that's exactly what it wanted even if it were budget busting. He's also very good at spotting when the series reused plot devices as well.
According to Inside Star Trek, the "too cerebral" reaction was NBC's "party line," but beneath the surface of the memos and such, they were really saying it was too sexual. So if it was a myth, it was one instigated by NBC rather than Roddenberry. What GR did was to take that party line and run with it, to paint the suits as too lowbrow and unable to appreciate smart TV.
It apparently worked. Fans are still using the "cerebral" thing as a benchmark for what they want to see, one way or the other.
Good or bad, I'll leave that to others to debate.
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