ATTN JMS:IGN (Filmforce) Interview

[B5JMS Poster]

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From: "Mac Breck" <macbreck at access995.com>
Date: 10 Sep 2000 18:41:58 -0700
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Thanks for the heads-up about the interview.

Mac

----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Tammy Smith" <gkarfan at webtv.net>
Newsgroups: rec.arts.sf.tv.babylon5.moderated
Sent: Sunday, September 10, 2000 11:24 AM
Subject: ATTN JMS:IGN (Filmforce) Interview


> I have some comments about the recent ign.com interview you did (it's at
> http://filmforce.ign.com/interviews/65.html for anyone who wants to read
> it).




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From: jmsatb5 at aol.com (Jms at B5)
Date: 10 Sep 2000 20:02:37 -0700
Lines: 46

Reposting since this got bounced back....

>So, TNT Atlanta wanted to get rid of Crusade because we B5 fans weren't
>watching their other shows, huh?  Instead of sabotaging Crusade, they
>could've said "It's not working out, so we'll give up the rights & let
>you take B5 & Crusade somewhere else".  Instead, they drive you & the
>fans nuts with their behavior! 

The problem was that apparently, as reported to them by a year-long survey
they'd commissioned, TNT viewers didn't much care for SF.  When B5 came along,
the hardcore TNT viewers would tune out, and the B5 viewers would come in.  But
the average B5 viewer wasn't much interested in what TNT had to offer
otherwise, so they tuned out at the end and the TNT viewers came back.  So no,
it wasn't adding to their viewers by making folks stick around after B5 was
over. I don't see that as being our real responsibility, we're too busy making
our own show to look at what comes after we're gone.

>You said that whenever you can't write what you want to write, you get
>out.  You were the only one who had to suffer when you quit
>newspaper-jobs, but now that you have people working under you, is it
>harder to make the decision to get out?  I would think it would be.

It does become progressively harder.  What's not generally known is that at one
point, I walked off Crusade.  It was when the worst of the notes came in, and I
told Doug, and I told WB...I'm gone.  I can't do what they're asking me to do,
it's wrong, find somebody who will.

They prevailed on me to come back, and the main tool for this was "What about
the crew and the cast?  If you walk, what happens to them?"  Reluctantly, after
several days, I came back...and this led to the big notes meeting with TNT
where I told them I couldn't/wouldn't do what they were asking on moral,
ethical and creative grounds.

 jms

(jmsatb5 at aol.com)
B5 Official Fan Club at:
http://www.thestation.com
(all message content (c) 2000 by
synthetic worlds, ltd., permission
to reprint specifically denied to
SFX Magazine)




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