Re: [B7L] scripts and other ephemera - Blakes7

4 May 2001


      Can I suggest we just drop this whole matter, as the unpleasant tone is 
getting out of hand.
Sally
----Original Message Follows----
From: "Jenny Kaye" jennycat55@hotmail.com
To: blakes7@lists.lysator.liu.se
Subject: Re: [B7L] scripts and other ephemera
Date: Fri, 04 May 2001 06:47:50 -0000
Snipping together two e-mails here....
Julia writes:
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Yes, I am. Longer term residents of this list have seen a
good few
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members turn up who had not seen all of the series; had seen
none
of
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it on arrival but had heard it talked about elsewhere and wanted
to
learn
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more about a show that didn't have neat tidy endings
performed by
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shiny happy people;
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And they come here?
I believe that's what I just said.
Then they must have been severely disappointed.
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Several of them have spoken for
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themselves now.
Yes, by saying, "I didn't know who Chris Boucher was." Only one has
said
whether or not having this information would have influenced her to
buy the
script, and the answer was pretty negative.
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I note that you've snipped one of the categories - a
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large one, and the one I'm (almost) in.
How can you be "almost" in a category? You either are, or you aren't.
I'd only just got hold of the videos and worked my way through them
when I
got net access, and at that
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point I could *not* cite chapter and verse on the production crew.
I
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would have still been extremely interested in a script with the
personal
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notes of any of the production crew,
So you'll be bidding for this script then will you? BTW, where does it
say
in Judith's email that the script has "personal
notes from production crews" on it?
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partly for the thrill of owning a
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little bit of B7, but mostly because I'm one of those people who
isn't
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just content to watch the silk handkerchiefs but wants to know how
the
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trick was done. This is one of the many reasons I go wandering
around
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the country to theatres where Gareth is performing. It's wonderful
to
be
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able to sit in the bar with one of the actors afterwards and pick
apart
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how the play was put together, to compare what I saw during the
performance with what the production crew were trying to achieve.
So that fact that Gareth Thomas, or Paul Darrow is appearing in these
productions is pure co-incidence then, is it?
Having read your reply to Leslie, I can see that you are obviously a
great
fan of the theatre, and particularly in the detail of how plays are put
together. And having such a great interest in the background of such
productions and being such a dedicated and diligent fan of Blake's 7,
then I
am sure that you will also able to furnish me with extensive details
about
the workings of a television studio in the last 1970's, early 1980's.
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It can be very interesting to know what was intended.
A good example of this for me is Blade Runner. I happened to read an
SF-orientated review
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before I saw the film.
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The reviewer had seen the original preview cut,
was thoroughly impressed, and was horrified when he went back to
see
the
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release version. He described what had been done to the preview. I
went
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to see the film knowing something about what Ridley Scott had
intended,
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and came away much more impressed by the remaining traces of "Do
Androids Dream of Electric Sheep" than by the "Raiders of the Lost
Androids" studio cut. The messing about had completely changed the
feel
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of the film, for the poorer in my opinion.
Now, a cynic, like Avon for instance (funny how life sometime imitates
B7)
would read the above, which states that you  believe the alterations to
Ridley Scott's film turned it into "Raiders of the Lost Androids", and
may
very well come to the conclusion that you don't know what the hell you
are
talking about. Of course I'm not that cynical. I believe you have a
particular interest in this film, and therefore, I would like to
discuss it
with you.
Now. In your email to Leslie you went even further in your analysis.
Leslie said:
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Same notation, actually. I think your reviewer got it right, but I
also
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think >that if you really want to know what the production crew were
up
to, you'd
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be better off reading what they themselves had to say.
And you replied:
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In this case a lot of it was already a matter of public record - the
review was useful because it was by someone who had seen the original
cut and could say how it had been changed.
See what I mean? This again supports my view that you have taken a
great
interest in this film and therefore, know a great deal about the issues
it
covers, the characters, the locations used, the reasons why the film
was
changed etc, and most importantly of all, the pivotal character
and
the hidden subtext relating to them.
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The messing about had completely changed the feel
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of the film, for the poorer in my opinion.
Much as I like big explosions
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and neat special effects, I'm primarily a litfan. Ridley Scott wanted
to
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make _Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep_, I wanted to see it.
So what you are saying is that Ridley Scott wanted to make the book,
but
because of the "butchering", the film turned into an action adventure
similar to the Indiana Jones trilogy.
I knew
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from interviews what Ridley Scott thought about the butchering of his
vision, although I think he was being a little less blunt about it at
that time than later on when the Director's Cut came out. (I have
seen
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the Director's Cut. I think it's actually *better* than the book.)
Right. So how did the 1992 Director's Cut vary from the original put
out in
1982?
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on the script for _Blake_,
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highlighting what I think is one of Boucher's rare duds.
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Such changes are known to have happened in B7. There was a good
example
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of this given in the analysis of Gambit script changes in an
article in
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Horizon 39. Another example is Vere Lorrimer's infamous habit of
shoving
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in action sequences and then cutting exposition to bring the
episode
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back to length, occasionally leaving out critical plot points in
the
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process.
Is that right? Okay, give me an example then of a Vere Lorrimer story
that
happened to, and
what the "critical plot points" cut out of it were?
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And then there's Mary Ridge's notes on the script for _Blake_,
highlighting what I think is one of Boucher's rare duds.
In your other email Leslie writes:
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What? The most powerful, dramatic, grim and bleak ending to a series
ever
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on television? Oh well, tastes differ.
And you reply:
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No, one bad line:-) From the description I've heard of the notes on
the
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script (I haven't seen it myself), Ridge was responsible for dropping
a
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few words from the script, which action IMO heightened the impact of
that last scene.
What were these "dud" words?
Jenny
Ps. Have you got any scripts from the show? What colour are they? And
yes, there is a sensible reason for asking...
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