fred freiberger : hack or hapless?
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I think Freiberger did a credible job given the constraints he was under:
1. NBC was seemingly hostile to the show because of it's low ratings and GR's anti-network attitude.
2. Paramount was hostile to the show as it lost money on the show.
3. The show's budget was slashed repeatedly.
4. Gene Roddenberry (in the words of Jimmy Doohan) "abandoned the show" after NBC went back on their word on the time slot Star Trek would have for season three, and didn't provide the creative input he had in the past.
Could another producer have done better? Yes, but another producer could have done worse, too. If I were to give a grade, I'd give him a C+/B-.
1. NBC was seemingly hostile to the show because of it's low ratings and GR's anti-network attitude.
2. Paramount was hostile to the show as it lost money on the show.
3. The show's budget was slashed repeatedly.
4. Gene Roddenberry (in the words of Jimmy Doohan) "abandoned the show" after NBC went back on their word on the time slot Star Trek would have for season three, and didn't provide the creative input he had in the past.
Could another producer have done better? Yes, but another producer could have done worse, too. If I were to give a grade, I'd give him a C+/B-.
Roddenberry liked to paint NBC that way, but Solow & Justman's Inside Star Trek says NBC execs were quite proud to have the show on their network, because it was smart and classy and innovative and visually striking and got annual Emmy nominations for Leonard Nimoy and the visual effects team. The low ratings made it difficult -- and eventually impossible -- to keep the show, but they didn't actively want to get rid of it. The main reason they moved it to the Friday night "death slot" in season 3 was because George Schlatter, the producer of the far more successful Laugh-In, objected strenuously to NBC's plan to move ST into Laugh-In's time slot. And since his show was far more profitable, he got his way and ST paid the price.
These seem to be true, as far as I know. At least, Paramount had reason not to be supportive of the show, though "hostile" might be too strong a word. That implies an emotional motive, an active animosity, but most TV cancellation decisions are more about business and bean-counting.
I've gone back and forth on how I feel about Roddenberry's decision. On the one hand, I feel it was irresponsible, that he should've stuck with his guns and tried to make the best third season he could, even knowing it would be the last. But I can see his point of view, that ST was just one show out of what he saw as a larger career. It was the second series he'd produced, plus he'd also produced several failed series pilots and had plans for other series. He didn't realize at the time that ST would be his only real success. So he felt it was more important to focus his energies on developing the next series than on providing life support to a dying one.
Still, he didn't have to abandon ST so completely. He could've asked John Meredyth Lucas to stay on as producer, or promoted Bob Justman into the role. His reasons for not doing either of those things are a mystery.
I think another producer would've been laboring under a lot of the same problems -- having to take over an unfamiliar show with hardly any old hands to show them the ropes, having to cope with a slashed budget and a poor time slot. But let's face it, a lot of season 3's problems just come down to sloppy writing and silly concepts. Another producer couldn't have saved the show, but they could've made the final season better-written and smarter.
It keeps sounding like Fred Freiberger wasn't so much a bad producer as he was a producer with a very specific idea about what science fiction should be, and was trying to mold Star Trek into that vision, regardless of whether or not it Star Trek could fit into it. And that much of what we all condemn about his efforts aren't not knowing what he's doing, but rather that he's attempting to hammer Star Trek's square peg into the round hole of his definition of science fiction.
No, I think he was just a new producer who was brought in and wasn't given adequate guidance in what the show was supposed to be, since there was nobody really sticking around from before except Justman. So he didn't really have much to go by except his own approach. And I would say that he didn't have a very good handle on science fiction, since he seemed to think it meant just throwing in whatever random weirdness struck one's fancy.
At the time, Star Trek was just another TV show. If it wasn't working, wasn't bringing in the revenue, wasn't performing to the required standard, it was bound to be canceled. It happens all the time.
No one could have predicted that the show would have a life beyond cancellation. If Gene moved on to other things, well, that happens all the time, too. Like my dad told me, "If a man don't cook, a man don't eat."
No one could have predicted that the show would have a life beyond cancellation. If Gene moved on to other things, well, that happens all the time, too. Like my dad told me, "If a man don't cook, a man don't eat."
Save for your first sentence, that's not exactly a 'no' to what I said. More like a rewording. Not having a good handle on the nature of science fiction doesn't mean he doesn't have a firm grasp on his misunderstanding, just that he thinks it's a catchall for stuff he doesn't get. That's pretty firm, even if it's just wrong.
I recently read an interview with Freiberger, who stated that he sat in on one meeting between Roddenberry and NBC executives during season three, and he (Freiberger) was shocked at the level of open disdain Roddenberry and the execs had for one another... quite different than what Frieberger had ever experienced on other shows that he produced.
It's more than a rewording. You said you felt he had a "specific vision" of science fiction and was trying to "mold" ST to fit it. My point is that he didn't have to "mold" anything, didn't have to be "firm" to impose his will over other people's resistance, because he was essentially just handed the wheel of a moving vehicle whose former drivers had already bailed out. If the vehicle changed direction after that, that's not a conscious hijacking, it's just getting lost because nobody told him where he was heading.
But that wasn't about the show, it was about Roddenberry and how difficult he was to work with. The myth that Roddenberry himself propagated was that NBC hated the show. They didn't. They liked and respected the show. They just didn't like working with its creator. Probably their best-case scenario would've been to see ST taken over by a different producer who was easier to work with and could make the show a big hit so they could keep it on the air but not have to contend with Roddenberry. But Freiberger did not turn out to be that producer.
Of course, but I just said what their ideal scenario hypothetically would've been, as a way of making the point that their problem was with Roddenberry, not with Star Trek itself.
I've gone back and forth on how I feel about Roddenberry's decision. On the one hand, I feel it was irresponsible, that he should've stuck with his guns and tried to make the best third season he could, even knowing it would be the last. But I can see his point of view, that ST was just one show out of what he saw as a larger career. It was the second series he'd produced, plus he'd also produced several failed series pilots and had plans for other series. He didn't realize at the time that ST would be his only real success. So he felt it was more important to focus his energies on developing the next series than on providing life support to a dying one.
At the time, I think his ambitions were to produce theatrical films. When his Pretty Maids All in a Row bombed at the box office, he went back to TV pilots (and talking up a Star Trek revival).
At the time, I think his ambitions were to produce theatrical films. When his Pretty Maids All in a Row bombed at the box office, he went back to TV pilots (and talking up a Star Trek revival).
As I remarked elsewhere, Pretty Maids wasn't really "his," since MGM brought him in to replace the original writer and producer for the movie (which was adapted from a novel), as well as replacing the original director with Roger Vadim and the original star with Rock Hudson. Although you're right that it was his stab at moving into features (after the Tarzan feature he tried to develop fell through), and it certainly meshed well with his sensibilities in certain ways.
When this topic comes up, I always think Majel Barrett's quote in Shatner's "Star Trek Memories" book: (paraphrasing) 'The only people sitting home on Friday at ten watching TV is your Aunt Maude, and the Aunt Maudes of the world wouldn't have watched Star Trek if it had been performed live for them in their own living rooms.'
@Harvey recently posted a quote from Variety in this thread saying it was an ad buy from R.J. Reynolds that prompted the shift to Fridays at 10 PM. They could advertise cigarettes at that hour.
Neil
And yet, more than 30 years later, Law & Order: SVU aired in the Friday 10 PM slot on NBC and was a top-20 show for most of its tenure there. The slot doesn't seem to have the same stigma it used to. Perhaps because of home video and timeshifting.
Must have been a new rule, as the 8:30 pm summer '67 re-run of "Space Seed" has a commercial for Viceroy cigarettes.
Tobacco advertising on television changed dramatically over the course of the 1960s. In mid-1968, the FTC recomended banning tobacco advertisements entirely, or in the very least, limiting the hours in which they could be run. By 1969, legislation was introduced to ban them entirely, which took effect in 1971.
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