My aunt was fan of Bewitched. But she didn't care for either York or Sargent because they were both Dicks.
News Introducing Fact Trek
- Thread starter Harvey
- Start date
Fans have this thing about making the series more than it was. Even by having Lucy come in a save it made Trek so special that Lucille Ball herself stood up for it. Maybe it’s a way to justify their devotion, but really it wasn’t really more then an above average, even excellent at its best, SF series which tried to be a little more substantial than what usually passed for a weekly SF adventure series. Roddenberry wanted to be another Rod Serling but he was a far lesser talent.
I love that people see things to inspire them but man, this obsession with making it the most important series ever gets crazy.
I love that people see things to inspire them but man, this obsession with making it the most important series ever gets crazy.
The fact that Star Trek went on to be seen as more than just a slightly better than average TV show means it was significant in some ways and more than the sum of its parts. By the standards of the day it should have died and been largely forgotten shortly after it ended production. But it was the right show at the right time and reaching the right audience even if it wasn’t recognized at the time.
Its success in the long run is remarkable in itself and doesn’t really need to be embellished.
Its success in the long run is remarkable in itself and doesn’t really need to be embellished.
To be fair, I never said “slightly.” And it is my all time favorite series. I completely agree that embellishments are unnecessary. After 50+ years there’s so little new left to say, I guess padding the truth brings more clicks.
Oh, I don't know. We're still here discussing!
Shoot, part of the appeal of this magical series is that it has so many dimensions that we're STILL talking about it. 
Oh, I don't know. We're still here discussing!
Well, I meant discoveries of note. They are few and far between and I’m sure a lot of the stuff we riff on has been covered over the years.
The best part of getting old is my memory sucks so it’s all new to me!
Cushman's math is even wrong and exaggerated. deficit of 15k in 1967 woukd be about 116k now, not like half a mil or whatever he said.
That Lucy puppet creeped me out as a kid and still does. I Love Lucy is hilarious and her later work so not. Like early MASH to late MASH.
Edit: cool behind the scenes Here's Lucy stuff:
That Lucy puppet creeped me out as a kid and still does. I Love Lucy is hilarious and her later work so not. Like early MASH to late MASH.
Edit: cool behind the scenes Here's Lucy stuff:
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From the superb Fact Trek blog piece:
I would have mentioned that, adjusting for inflation, "The Cage" cost nearly $5 million in today's money. But I think people will get the point. It was pretty lavish for television.
I would have mentioned that, adjusting for inflation, "The Cage" cost nearly $5 million in today's money. But I think people will get the point. It was pretty lavish for television.
Um, we said that he was off by a factor of 5.
I always liked it. When I was discussing with @Harvey the other night I said it looked like Jim Danforth's work, and when I searched for it, I was right.
Cool.
Lucy had a rough morning...I believe the character's name was "Derwood".
This pic Maurice posted really points out both the differences, and the simiilarities, between Dick York and Dick Sargent. Watching this show as a small child, I really thought the character had just changed his hairstyle or something. It never occurred to me at the time that the role had been recast.
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Impressive maybe 20-25 years ago. Discovery and Picard have both spent far more than that per episode.
Thanks for posting this one, Maurice and Harvey. I was trying to look up information on this exact topic recently, inspired by seeing some of those clickbaity things you cite. Another thing I've sometimes seen attributed to her personally was the foresight to start shooting The Lucy Show in color in its second season (even though it aired in B&W), so that it would be more marketable for later reruns/syndication (which is seemingly the actual reason for doing so, but I'm not sure what her involvement was).
Speaking of Bewitched (which I realize I brought up on page 4 too), in the 1968 episode "Samantha's Secret Saucer," Tabitha is flying a toy spaceship and befuddled Aunt Clara tells her, "You're a better spaceman than Dr. Spock."
Speaking of Bewitched (which I realize I brought up on page 4 too), in the 1968 episode "Samantha's Secret Saucer," Tabitha is flying a toy spaceship and befuddled Aunt Clara tells her, "You're a better spaceman than Dr. Spock."
Where is rhat alternate history of the 70s online where Lucy gets visions from her dead actress friend and doesn't sell the studio, and they make more Trek? I think I read that about when I started here in the oughts.
Edit: found it, though I thought there was a more polished version: https://www.alternatehistory.com/forum/threads/that-wacky-redhead.220395/
Edit: found it, though I thought there was a more polished version: https://www.alternatehistory.com/forum/threads/that-wacky-redhead.220395/
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Production budgets are larger now, even in constant dollars, for several of reasons:
- Investment for American TV projects comes in from overseas now, because the international TV markets are larger, more prosperous, and more involved than they were half a century ago.
- Technology has made the capital markets themselves much more efficient today, allowing money to flow around the globe with ease.
- The U.S. economy and overall world economy are both a great deal larger now, due to decades of growth, capital investment, and higher productivity generated by technology. Thus the world can afford bigger productions.
- Television has distribution channels today that didn't exist for "The Cage." The expected revenues from cable TV, home video, and streaming services mean that more money can be confidently invested at the outset, with those extra returns in mind.
That's why dreck like Picard and Discovery are so well-funded. They're playing with technology-driven prosperity that Desilu couldn't dream of in 1964. Objectively speaking, "The Cage" had a big damn budget for the world it was made in. And back then, ten costly hours of Picard with two hours of content would never have been serioulsy considered for production.
