On Sun, 06 May 2001, "Sally Manton" wrote:
>
> Leslie wrote:
> <From what I know about production-line television, a read through with the
> cast would involve the camera ready script. Not a script typed up by Chris's
> wife!>
>
> Again, fair enough, I concede to your experience. I only suggested GT
> because [a] it's on record that he changed a line and *very* much for the
> better in 'Horizon'
What was the line? (This is becoming my catchphrase:))
>it was fun imagining someone *trying* to say the l>ine and cracking up till it was dumped.
Is this a reference to Horizon or Blake? If Blake, then I think people are making the mistake here of trying to the map the first draft lines onto what we saw on screen. Unless someone comes forward and tells us what the whole of the original scene was, we can't really make a judgement on how it would have been staged. Certainly the idea of Avon shooting Blake three times and then Blake grabbing hold of Avon and saying all that, before dropping down dead, does sound a bit ridiculous. But what if the scene was more in the style of Anna Grant's death, which really is a typical western "death bed confession" theme.
> <Certainly, leaving my professional experience aside, from my involvement
> with Fanderson, when actors start getting script approval, disaster ensues.>
>
> But it did happen occasionally on B7 - on the 'Blake's back' tapes, Stephen
> Grief and Chris Boucher himself confirm it (the latter, not surprisingly,
> with disapproval :-))
There is a difference between an actor suggesting a line and an actor having script approval. Script approval means exactly what it says. An actor has it written into their contract that they can veto stuff and rewrite stuff they don't like. On Space 1999 this resulted in Barbara Bain insisting that she was always shot in soft focus, and that both she and her husband, Martin Landau, got a certain number of close-ups per episode, and always got the last scene together. Basically, lots of ego stuff...
> Personally, though I think RoD is chock-full of great writing, it IMO
> contains one of his other rare duds, in the last three lines, which strain
> too hard for effect. *Those* ones not only got into the filmed version, they
> were used for the title (obviously, a lot of people disagree with me on this point).
This is one instance where Boucher did slip up by actually misquoting Mark Twain. The original quote was "reports of my death have been greatly exaggerated." Unless, that is, someone out there knows better:)
Leslie