WEBVTT

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Well, as I recall

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filmation had the idea of possibly doing Star Trek

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and they approached NBC

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and then the two of them

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Lucia armor and an NBC representative

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came to Gene Roddenberry

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and Roddenberry thought it was a very good idea.

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Actually the show has been off the air for

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some

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you see five years at that point for years

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and it was a way to do Star Trek

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again

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in a different way

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and bring it to another audience.

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So

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Jean was

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Thick he called me and had me come out

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and talk with Lou shimer

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and

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how Sutherland who is director of most of the

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episodes

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and I like the idea because of all the

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things we could do in animation.

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So

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I felt that you know,

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in terms of Staff it was well-received Mark Richards

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was the animation producer

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and

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he was a very experienced animation man,

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and

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then we approach the actors and

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they were quite enthusiastic about it was an opportunity.

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You to work and

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it didn't

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have all the stresses and strains of being on

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the set and makeup and costume and all of

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that you came in and recorded voices, so

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they were pretty happy about it.

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I love the way the stories came about

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was

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that

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we began early 1973.

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I would say approximately April

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and

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we did ask writers who had written an original

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episodes for Star Trek to come in

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and Pitch ideas.

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And we also had some outside writers who were

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animation writers who wanted to give it a try.

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So we did have a series of Writers come

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in

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the staff was myself as story editor associate producer

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Mark Richards is producer and

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Roddenberry is executive producer

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Mark and I were on

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site all the time

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and Gene came in for story conferences and so

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on.

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He did not come in

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every day.

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We had

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an interesting situation

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because in 1973 the Writers Guild went on strike

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and none of the writers could write for normal

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Film Production.

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However, they could write for animation

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do at least one episode without having to join

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that particular Union

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and that's how we got a lot of Star

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Trek.

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The writers

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who were happy to be working and they could

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work legally on the animation series.

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We had

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Gene

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we did have Dean Koontz.

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We had Sam people's we had David Gerald

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I wrote one.

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We have Margaret Armand

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Joy story was a new writer to us, but

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she came in very good job Eid Steve Kendall,

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Larry Brody came in he was a new writer

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for us, but did an excellent job.

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So we had a lot of

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people who were

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very familiar with the show and some new faces

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as well.

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But we couldn't be too

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cerebral

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with the stories in that in the sense that

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we still had a kid audience to think about

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but we tried to tell Star Trek stories

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with a moral

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with

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with a point

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and to do it in that half hour, which

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was

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kind of interesting to take me to learn how

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to do

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scripts around about 26 Pages.

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It was ultimately 22 minutes of film

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and we packed a lot of story into those

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22 minutes.

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We did a lot of

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Star Trek story

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our stories

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were not simple.

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They were complex.

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They do have subplots

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much more so than most animated scripts,

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you know cartoon scripts as we weren't doing the

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cartoon.

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We were doing Star Trek

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and that's why when you look at one you

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see

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an awful lot of story

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in those 22 minutes.

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I looked at yesteryear not too long ago

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and I was amazed myself having not seen it

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for a while and not read my own script

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for a while

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how much story we got into that

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and how complex the store?

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Three was

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and the one thing about that that

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was interesting was I

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had a Healer euthanize an animal on screen

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and

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NBC was very nervous about that.

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But Gene Roddenberry said trust our Fe

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thank God Gene because that I think was the

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power of that particular story to say that

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it is Kinder

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to let an animal in pain die with dignity

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and to keep them alive just for your sake,

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you know, it was a nice message was a

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moral Tale

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But

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NBC was

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We did not get one letter of complaint.

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So apparently we did it, right

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it has been too long.

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No antidote known will save his life.

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Is there nothing you

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could I can prolong his life,

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but he will be in pain

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or I can release him from life.

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I will need your decision.

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He is your pet.

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Release him.

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It is fitting.

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He dies with peace and dignity.

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To produce an episode

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it took approximately four months following her than it

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does to do a live television show obviously and

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we're only doing half an hour.

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Everything was done in the United States.

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That was one of the few Studios then that

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did not ship their art overseas.

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They did everything in house in Sherman Oaks filmation

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was very good about that.

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What would happen is you could do a half

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an hour episode as a writer from story to

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story.

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Script

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in approximately three weeks

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but then it took three months to do all

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the animation for it

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the

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broadcast of the

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recording of the voices had to be done first.

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So you get the mouth movements

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and then they started in with the

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background cells with ink and pen and with color

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and so on

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the one

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new technology in 1973 for animation

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was you could Xerox

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Static cells

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that things that didn't change so

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like

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some of the facial expressions which given be animated

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further

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like a backgrounds

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that sort of thing

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and that was the one Speedy thing.

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They could do everything else was done by hand

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in the old-fashioned animated way.