SubscribeI flew up to Vancouver, gathered the whole cast and crew together in the CIC [set] and said, “OK, this is where we are. There’s a strike. I’m on strike. The other writers are on a picket line right now, I’m flying back to join them. There’s not going to be any more script pages. The show is entrusted to you. Just make the very best one that you can. I hope you get as much overtime as you can.” My producer almost had a heart attack.I love to imagine Moore actually using the CIC intercom to announce this. Awesome.
I said, “I wish you all the best,” and they all kind of laughed. I said, “This is like when when Admiral Cain took that blind jump in ‘Pegasus,’ she didn’t know where she was going or what was going to be on the other side. She just knew she had to go. And that’s where we are. None of us know what’s going to happen at the end of the strike, I think we’re going to be back, just make a good show, make the best ‘Battlestar Galactica’ any of you have ever seen.” I walked out of CIC, got on a plane and flew back to L.A.
Another important impact of Dickens's episodic writing style resulted from his exposure to the opinions of his readers. Since Dickens did not write the chapters very far ahead of their publication, he was allowed to witness the public reaction and alter the story depending on those public reactions. A fine example of this process can be seen in his weekly serial The Old Curiosity Shop, which is a chase story. In this novel, Little Nell and her Grandfather are fleeing the villain Quilp. The progress of the novel follows the gradual success of that pursuit. As Dickens wrote and published the weekly instalments, his friend John Forster pointed out: "You know you're going to have to kill her, don't you." Why this end was necessary can be explained by a brief analysis of the difference between the structure of a comedy versus a tragedy. In a comedy, the action covers a sequence "You think they're going to lose, you think they're going to lose, they win". In tragedy, it is: "You think they're going to win, you think they're going to win, they lose". The dramatic conclusion of the story is implicit throughout the novel. So, as Dickens wrote the novel in the form of a tragedy, the sad outcome of the novel was a foregone conclusion. If he had not caused his heroine to lose, he would not have completed his dramatic structure. Dickens admitted that his friend Forster was right and, in the end, Little Nell died.
« Older "Because competent mating did not occur,"... | The End of the Affair.... Newer »
This thread has been archived and is closed to new comments
posted by yhbc at 8:42 PM on January 18 [5 favorites]