brennen
/
lurkers-guide


								From: flixman@news.dorsai.org (Robt_Martin)

								Subject: JMS in SF Entertainment 10/95

								Date: Wed, 30 Aug 1995 07:50:58 GMT


								This text is copyright 1995 by Robert Martin. License for free

								distribution of this text, in complete or edited form, is granted

								providing the full text of this notice is included. Distribution

								of this text as part of a commercially available compilation,

								outside of the context of the Usenet distributed network, is

								expressly forbidden, which stricture includes the distribution of

								this text in any form of commercial archive (i.e., this is NOT to

								be included on CD-ROM Usenet compilations).


								Let There Be Light

								Let There Be Shadows


								Pay no attention to that man behind the curtain...

								Joe Straczynski on creating the universe of Babylon-5


								By Robert Martin


								The collaborative nature of television often defeats the attempt

								to bring the distilled vision of a single individual to the small

								screen. But on the rare occasion when that attempt works, the

								product is often something built to last--Rod Serling's <I>The

								Twilight Zone</I>, for instance, or Gene Rodenberry's <I>Star

								Trek</I>.


								The phrase "Joseph Straczynski's <I>Babylon-5</I>" may not come

								so trippingly off the tongue, but as that show continues to

								unfold its five-year saga of war and destiny among the stars, it

								has become clear to an increasing number of viewers that this is

								not "television as usual." Every episode in the series, though

								plotted to stand as a single narrative, simultaneously advances a

								broader story--which is not simply a timeline, but a sprawling

								novelistic saga with a variety of themes, subplots, and points of

								view.


								This broader narrative will reach its midpoint in the coming

								season, and currently things are heating up considerably on

								<I>B-5</I>. Most notably, the episode "The Coming of Shadows"

								marked the beginning of what seems likely to become a war between

								all the mortal races of the galaxy versus an ancient species of

								awesome power known only as the Shadows. Our last, best hope is

								that our alliance with the Vorlon species will help to pull us

								through...but we don't even know what a Vorlon is, though the

								Vorlon character Kosh has been a presence on the series since its

								inception.


								There's much more to be said about the show, its cast, its crew

								and its fans, but this time we need all the space we've got for

								the following lengthy interview. Those with access to any on-line

								service, to the World Wide Web, or to the Internet can find a

								wealth of background on the series; <I>Babylon-5</I> data files

								are available via file transfer protocol from ftp.hyperion.com;

								Mr. Straczynski's on-line communications can be monitored on a

								daily basis via the Usenet newsgroup rec.arts.sf.tv.babylon-5. And

								a vast trove of information can be explored in <I>The Lurker's

								Guide To Babylon-5</I> on the World Wide Web at

								http://www.hyperion.com/lurk/lurker.html.


								<B>Sci-Fi Entertainment:</B> In 1986, when this concept was first

								hatched, how did you figure the odds of getting this far with it?


								<B>Joseph M. Straczynski: </B>You have to understand the way my

								brain works, which is a dark and scary thing on the best of

								days.... When I came up with this in 1986, I said at that time, I

								will write the screenplay, I will get that screenplay produced as

								a pilot, I will get the series, the series will run for five

								years, and I will get off the stage. I never considered the

								odds.... I said this is going to happen; I didn't know it was

								going to take five years for it to happen. This show has been,

								really, an exercise in sheer force of will. I decided it was

								going to happen and nothing got between me and that. I don't even

								allow any other possibilities in my head. It's like standing in

								front of a long train with a chain on your back, pulling for five

								years, until it starts to move. For one brief period, you and the

								train are moving at the same speed...and then the train starts

								chasing you. That's about where I am right now with the story

								line.


								<B>SFE:</B> Your method of weaving story-threads through the

								series so that an episode in season two might play like the

								conclusion of a season one story, and the various resonances that

								creates--was that part of the initial seed?


								<B>JMS:</B> Foreshadowing is a technique that's not much used in

								series television--there's a lot of retro-continuity, where you

								write episode sixteen to conform to facts established in episode

								fourteen. But to write something for episode nine that won't be

								referred to again for a year is pretty much unheard of.


								Usually you structure a show around an hour--you don't structure

								it around two years--or five years. There's stuff in the first

								season of <I>Babylon-5<I> that serves its own narrative purpose,

								but will become far more relevant four years from now--as you go

								along, it gains more depth. And that was always at the core of

								the concept.


								I grew up a science fiction fan--reading Ray Bradbury's <I>The

								Martian Chronicles</I>, a series of individual stories which,

								together, create a large tapestry. E.E. "Doc" Smith's

								<I>Lensman</I> books, <I>Childhood's End</I>, the <I>Foundation

								</I>novels, <I>Lord of the Rings</I>, <I>Dune</I>, <I>Stranger in a

								Strange Land</I> are all sagas of that nature.


								Looking at the SF shows that were done, I asked, why hasn't

								anyone in American television--the British have done it--created an

								honest-to-god, literary-structured saga? And the only reason is

								that no one has ever done it.


								So as a thought experiment, I asked myself, if I were going to do

								that, how would I do it? What would it be, and how would I

								structure it? I began putting together the pieces, and that

								melded into another thought-experiment I had, which had to do

								with the way television is made--about 30 percent of the budget of

								any television show is wasted. So this came out of those two

								ideas, to find a means to marry these two concepts.


								<B>SFE:</B> It strikes me that the show might be more valued when

								it exists as a set of laserdiscs on a fan's shelf, than in its

								current form as a TV show; it seems a viewer might get more out

								of it that way....


								<B>JMS:</B> To some extent they might. The guy who is putting

								together the collector cards for Fleer sat down and watched two

								or three episodes per night, watching the whole thing through. He

								wrote me back and was just wog-boggled, because when you see it

								that way, the tightness of the structure just jumps out at you;

								and, while he'd been following the show, he really hadn't glommed

								onto what we were doing.


								<B>SFE:</B> It's my understanding that renewal came more easily

								this year, thanks to improved ratings....


								<B>JMS:</B> The ratings have improved, and the demographics are

								amazing, which makes the advertisers and the network very happy.


								<B>SFE:</B> When the show was still struggling to establish an

								audience, I imagine the TV-heads saying, "Joe, why don't you do a

								nice little space show with bad bad guys and good good guys, so

								the audience can have a reasonable expectation of what they're

								going to see?"


								<B>JMS:</B> I will tell you a true thing; during both renewal

								periods, first season and second, no one ever broached that to

								us--no one ever said, "Listen, we think you should pull back on

								this arc nonsense and just give us regular stories."


								That is why it took so long to get this series started in the

								first place; it took us five years to find people who understood

								exactly what it was we were trying to accomplish in the first

								place, and would sign on for that task of telling this larger

								story, in the way it needed to be told. Dick Robertson at Warner

								Brothers and David Thompson at Chris-Craft Television together

								are the brains behind the PTEN network. They backed this show for

								the purpose of telling this story, and our contact at Warner

								Brothers, Greg Mayday, who is terrific, also understands what it

								is we're trying to accomplish--which is the reason we're doing the

								show in the first place. So that has never even come up.


								<B>SFE:</B> In that case, your experience stands in sharp contrast

								to Harlan Ellison's well-known battles with TV executives. Have

								things changed that much in television?


								<B>JMS:</B> Not really. Remember, it took five years to find these

								guys.


								<B>SFE:</B> Speaking of Mr. Ellison, he is credited as "Conceptual

								Consultant." What exactly does that mean?


								<B>JMS:</B> Harlan's involvement is as peripatetic as Harlan

								himself is; he is allowed to insert himself into the process

								wherever he chooses. He's advised on costumes, on sets, he's come

								in on the meetings with writers like Peter David and David

								Gerrold. His description of the job is that he's the mad dog

								nipping at my heels; I think of him as my Jiminy Cricket,

								perhaps, a free-floating agent of chaos who, having been through

								such experiences as <I>The Starlost</I>, can help me avoid the

								pitfalls. And his job is to be honest with me, because when you

								are a television producer, people are very seldom about to tell

								you, "Joe, it sucks." You need someone around you who will do

								that, as in the old Roman tradition--when the conquering hero

								returns to Rome as garlands are being lain upon you, you have

								someone at your shoulder to say, "Fame is fleeting. You, too,

								will die." That's Harlan's job, to be the honest opinion that I

								need, because he's never pulled his punches and never will. As

								such, he is a valuable resource to me. He created the character

								of the ombudsman, helped to write the opening narration. He's

								contributed in many ways, but always around the corners, because

								he knows the story is my story; but his contributions have been

								very helpful in making that story much richer and deeper.


								<B>SFE:</B> You have an extremely varied background as a writer; I

								assume that is at least partly because you like doing a variety

								of things. Now you have this massive commitment to a television

								series.


								<B>JMS:</B> I am single-minded in some ways--when I'm of a mind to

								do something, I'll stick with it. I knew what the job consisted

								of when I took it, so it's never been a problem. The only problem

								was when, after five years of development--at a time when I could

								have gotten any number of mainstream shows going--people around me

								were saying, "Joe, it ain't gonna happen." Even my agent was

								saying, "Joe, it's not happening, give it up." But I couldn't do

								that. And then, of course, it did happen, and things have been

								great since.


								And the show is not the same; the show of the second year is not

								the same show we were doing the first year, and the

								<I>Babylon-5</I> we'll be doing three years from now won't be at

								all like the first-year show. As well, each episode is very

								different from every other episode--some are very dark, some very

								character-oriented, some have huge action set-pieces. What's

								great is that I come from a background where I've done comedy,

								I've done action, I've done drama, and I can take that diverse

								background and apply it all to this one, very diverse series.

								You'll get a very strong idea of one of the major changes by the

								end of this season.


								<B>SFE:</B> I understand that the final four episodes of season

								two are being held back to open your third season. Why is that?

								Isn't it a pain in the butt? <B>JMS:<B> A major pain in the butt.

								We and <I>Voyager <I>are doing the same thing, as it turns out.

								The new season begins, traditionally, in November. What happens

								usually is that we, and the <I>Trek <I>shows, only show four to

								six new episodes, then go back into reruns--so that, while we

								build ratings through that early part of the season, the reruns

								come in and you get cut off at the legs.


								So they figured, let's back this up a little bit, let's start

								showing episodes in October, get the momentum going, hit bigger

								with the first third-season episodes, and build, presumably, to a

								larger rating. From the numbers point of view it does make sense.

								From a creative point of view, I was on the roof with a

								high-powered gun...but what are ya gonna do?


								<B>SFE:</B> I'd think that would play havoc with the way you

								orchestrate the series' movement, judging from last year's season

								ending.


								<B>JMS:</B> It wasn't as big a cliffhanger this year, but I did

								reveal Kosh, which was enough to keep people talking for a couple

								of months.


								<B>SFE:</B> Will the shift alter your approach to the third

								season?


								<B>JMS:</B> Since it's airing a week after the last episode of

								season two, I changed the first third-season show to take place

								one week after the events of the previous season--I moved the

								dateline of the story up a little bit and changed some

								references. The actual plot line remains pretty much the same.


								<B>SFE:</B> The extent of your commitment to this show seems

								unprecedented--writing fifteen out of twenty-two scripts this

								season, and I know you take an active hand in a lot of aspects of

								the show...


								<B>JMS:</B> I'm involved in every aspect--costuming, prosthetics,

								computer design, casting, everything.


								<B>SFE:</B> And you're also deeply involved in the<I> B-5 </I>

								comics and novels. Where does it stop? This isn't how TV is

								usually done.


								<B>JMS:</B> You have to understand that this is my story and my

								baby, and whatever precedent has been set by how things are done

								in television, you have to keep in mind that I am a pain in the

								ass--very stubborn--and like to have my own way.


								Insofar as being involved in the comics and the novels is

								concerned, my sense is that very often, when a franchise is

								created, stuff is approved and just tossed out there to make

								money. The stuff just isn't part of the show; it's just

								tossed-off media crap. When I talked to the guys at DC, I said

								that I wanted to do something that would really feed into the

								show, and would be part and parcel of it. That way, the fans know

								that this stuff has passed through my hands, and know that it's

								been approved at the highest possible level of the show's

								creative staff, and not by some flunky in an office who stamps it

								"authorized."


								That's why we haven't done a whole lot of merchandising. I'd much

								rather keep a "boutique" approach to merchandising, than start

								cranking stuff out willy-nilly. I don't want to create a huge

								empire, I want to tell my story, and create a few ancillary

								things here and there because they are the particular things that

								I want.


								As for where it stops, there are a number of places where it has

								stopped, where I just didn't think it was worth my time to do

								certain things, and I've just said "pass" on those.


								Currently, I'm writing a four-issue story for the comic to tie

								directly into the first part of the third season, introducing a

								character who will be prominent through the season--providing that

								character's back-story and so on. The character will go from

								Minbar to Narn to Earth to Babylon-5. You'll see the entire B-5

								universe through this guy's eyes. It's a wonderful opportunity to

								do something we can't do in the show, because it would cost $10

								billion.


								<B>SFE:</B> How is the comic doing?


								<B>JMS:</B> We're trying to work out  a resolution to a situation

								now, in that DC is cutting back on all their non-superhero

								titles, rather strongly, and <I>B-5</I> may come under that axe.

								Our own feeling is that DC didn't handle it as well as they might

								have; they didn't promote it very much, and they didn't ship very

								much--while, whenever it reached the stores, it sold out in a day,

								which we know by all the re-order requests that came in. But the

								decision hasn't been made yet, and the feeling is that if there's

								just a slight increase in sales, say about 3 percent, it won't be

								a problem. If it does happen, it shouldn't be too difficult to

								place the comic elsewhere, as two other comics companies were

								interested in a <I>B-5 </I>comic at the outset; we went with DC,

								to keep it "in-house," in a sense [Time-Warner owns both Warner

								Television and DC Comics].


								<B>SFE:</B> You seem to prefer those things that will supplement

								the story, literary things...


								<BI>JMS:</B> Absolutely.


								<B>SFE:</B> ...as opposed to things like toys and models...


								<B>JMS:</B> Oh, I want there to be models...there's a model of

								<I>Babylon-5</I> in Sheridan's office, which he bought in the

								"<I>Babylon-5</I> Emporium" [a satiric jibe at SF merchandising,

								in the episode "There All Honor the Lies"], and when the show

								hits the end, everyone knows that it's going into the other

								"captain's" office--mine.


								I want the model to exist, so eventually it will.


								<B>SFE:</B> Earlier you mentioned literary antecedents to

								<I>B-5</I>. I had three I wanted to bring up; you mentioned

								Tolkien and Bradbury. The third, related particularly to the

								coming of the Shadows, is Lovecraft.


								<B>JMS:</B> Well, there's a certain Gothic tradition that we're

								drawing upon. Writers like Lovecraft, August Derleth, Lord

								Dunsany, Clark Ashton Smith--they're all writers who worked in the

								area of the outre, dealing with dark areas that we can never

								quite wrap our minds around--a great tradition going back to the

								1930s, the '20s, and earlier. I would say that there are areas of

								the Shadow mythos that are of that school, and in that general

								area, though not particularly tied in to any one writer.


								<B>SFE:</B> So may we expect that tone to rise in the third

								season?


								<B>JMS:</B> I like creepy stuff. I like walking down the hall, the

								doors close, and there's a scratching from the other side...so,

								yes.


								<B>SFE:</B> You count yourself as an atheist, yet spiritual

								matters often set the theme for episodes of the show, and seem to

								be a large part of the arc. Some would see that as a

								contradiction.


								<B>JMS:</B> You have to understand that the writer's job is to be

								as honest as he humanly can in his characterizations and his

								storytelling. And, as I look at the long parade of human history,

								religion has not gone away in the past 4,000 years of recorded

								history, nor does it show any sign of going away any time soon.


								If I have to be honest in looking at the world 250 years from

								now, I have to say that people will still believe at that time,

								and I must treat that with respect--the same way I'd deal with

								scientific concepts. Because, truthfully, science and religion

								are two sides of the same coin. The methodology is vastly

								different--one relies on faith while the other relies on

								scientific method--both are endeavors to understand who we are,

								how we got here, where we are going, and what we are here to do.

								I feel that one must approach both of those endeavors with equal

								respect.


								I have a background of religious studies, a minor in philosophy

								from Northern California State, and majors in psychology,

								sociology and literature. I have always been intrigued by

								humanity's relationship to the mirror, its effort to come to

								grips with itself, as the only known species that asks, "Who am

								I?" My job is to explore that on every level, whether it's the

								religious side, the spiritual side, the scientific side, or

								within the aspect of each individual character. It all informs

								the core theme of <I>Babylon-5</I>, which, like everything else in

								the show, if you want to get it down to one sentence, is a

								question: "Will you lead or will you be led by others?'


								<B>SFE:</B> Beyond that level of recording future history, the

								show engages spiritual matters--matters of self-knowledge, which I

								guess is the atheist's best possible definition of

								"spirit"--directly.<I>


								<BI>JMS: </B>It comes down to the examined life versus the

								unexamined life, and so much of contemporary society is bent on

								distracting us from our own lives, with television, or the latest

								movie craze or something else. There's always that opportunity to

								be distracted each moment of your life, "I've gotta read the

								paper, I've gotta get the laundry, I've gotta see this movie,

								I've gotta..." on and on. And you never stop and just ask

								yourself the questions that matter. What this show tries to do is

								ask questions. We don't provide answers--my job is to ask

								questions, start discussions, start arguments, and start bar

								fights. If I do that, I've done my job.


								<B>SFE:</B> You mentioned that there will be changes occurring in

								the show with those last four episodes, that will be opening the

								third season. Will the first third-season shows continue that

								pace?


								<B>JMS:</B> No, because you have to do these things by degrees.

								The stuff that we do in the last four is pretty major stuff;

								we're going to take a breather from that with several more

								character-oriented episodes. And then, about mid-season, we're

								going to pull a biggie; there's a structural change in the entire

								core of the <I>Babylon-5</I> universe. The closest equivalent I

								can imagine--and this is not a one-to-one correspondence, but just

								to convey the magnitude of the change--suppose, when you turned on

								<I>Star Trek</I>, you found out that Starfleet has just been

								bought by the Klingons, and the <I>Enterprise </I>must now serve

								the Klingon Empire. Not just for an episode--that's what the show

								<I>is</I>, from that point on. It's a change of that magnitude,

								and I'm going to lead up to that with several nice, quiet, polite

								episodes; get up behind 'em and whap 'em real hard.


								<B>SFE:</B> You told Warner Brothers you're going to turn

								<I>Babylon-5 </I>upside down--they said, "Joe, that sounds great,"

								and clapped you on the back?


								<B>JMS:</B> Well, yeah. Their jaws dropped. They said, "You're

								really gonna do that?" And they started to get excited about it.

								They knew what the first three-year structure was supposed to be;

								the first year was sort of galloping around the galaxy, the

								second year was our guys take it on the chin--they did a lot to

								our guys, things didn't go too well for them at all--and the third

								year is our guys fight back. That's the first three years, and

								they knew that. And when I said, "bah-de-bah..." the room went

								wild. Greg Mayday in particular was very excited, and really

								taken for a loop by it.


								<B>SFE:</B> You've said that characters will die long before the

								show completes its run--unexpectedly, as in real life. Is anyone's

								fate coming up soon?


								<B>JMS:</B> Perhaps.


								<B>SFE:</B> That's better than a "no comment."


								<B>JMS:</B> When does this hit the newsstand?


								<B>SFE:</B> In early September...


								<B>JMS:</B> Then I can't tell you. [pause] But some stuff will

								happen even before this season's up.... We could lose a couple of

								characters. In a really permanent way.


								<B>SFE:</B> That's a shame. I hope not, 'cause I love all the

								characters.... I hope they all live long and, well, not prosper

								exactly....[laughter]


								<B>JMS:</B> If you recall <I>The Shining</I>, and the character

								played by Scatman Crothers, the only one who understood what the

								"shining" was, and understood the kid; he was the good guy, the

								guy everyone could rely on, and was set up throughout the movie

								to be the guy who would save everybody at the end. Then in the

								last half hour of the film, he realizes, omigod, something's gone

								wrong at the hotel--he gets in the snowcrawler, travels through

								ten miles of ice and snow and blizzard, negotiates this hostile

								terrain, nothin's gonna stop him, he's chuggin' along. He gets to

								the door, flings it open, gets an axe in his chest, and dies. And

								it hits you--here's the guy who was going to be the resolution,

								and he ain't it, he's lyin' on the floor in his own blood. I've

								done something similar, and you'll understand when you see the

								episode.


								<B>SFE:</B> Will we see any more of Michael O'Hare [Commander

								Sinclair in <I>Babylon-5'</I>s first season] in the foreseeable

								future?


								<B>JMS:</B> I've discussed this with Michael, and with Warner, and

								it's all set up to bring Michael back for a two-parter, about

								one-third into the third season.


								<B>SFE:</B> And that will clear everything up? Like the matter of

								his being "The One"?


								<B>JMS:</B> It'll clear up everything--that thread will not be

								abandoned, there will be some surprises there, and for everyone

								who was wondering, "Gee, I don't see how this fits in," it will

								suddenly make sense. The question of who is "The One," and

								questions surrounding Babylon-4, will all be dealt with--it's

								gonna be a corker of a two-parter.


								<B>SFE:</B> When you are not up to your ears in production--and

								even when you are--you communicate with fans, through GEnie,

								CompuServe and the Internet. Why?


								<B>JMS:</B> Bear in mind that I come from a background as a fan.

								My sense as a SF fan is that they tend to be the most exploited

								group around, told to watch the show, buy the toys, and shut the

								hell up. Whenever I used to come to conventions, where producers

								would show up with new shows, they'd say, "It's the best thing

								since sliced bread. You'll see. We'll come back and we'll talk."

								Then you see it, it ain't what they promised, and you can't find

								them to talk about it afterward. You want to hit them with a

								nerf-bat, but they're gone.


								Also, I've been on-line since 1984; I was one of the first guys

								on CompuServe. When this show got going, I said, "Should I change

								this part of my life?" The answer was <I>no</I>, why not keep that

								communication going? A lot of television producers are insulated,

								they don't get to hear from guys in Iowa or Dubuque, about what

								they think of their shows. And I think they would profit

								tremendously from hearing that information. So my decision was to

								keep that open, to respect the fans, to keep myself honest, to

								keep me humble, because it's hard not to be humble with some of

								the things that come flyin' through there, and because, for the

								last fifteen or twenty years, I've been working to de-mystify the

								whole area of television production.


								I did a column for ten years for <I>Writer's Digest </I>on

								television writing and what is involved with it, written columns

								and articles and parts of books about this. So here we have the

								opportunity, through this on-line exchange, to create a document,

								which will ultimately be thousands of pages long, tracking this

								series from the first development, to the pilot, through the

								series, things that go right, things that go wrong--which no one's

								ever done before to this extent. When we're done, there will be

								this extensive document, a snapshot of the entire process,

								available to anyone who is interested in the inner workings of a

								television series. It's all there, available for download, and

								people have been drawing upon it--I've gotten calls from

								university television and film department guys, saying they

								distributed it among their students. I heard from one producer

								who said that he borrowed our ideas on structuring the use of

								sets for a television project. That opportunity to educate and

								inform is an excellent reason to continue.