Bread and Circuses--Outline Review

[Sir Rhosis]

After a goodly absence, I have another Story Outline review up at Orion Press. This is for John Kneubuhl's "Bread and Circuses." I look forward to your thoughts on the outline, especially the fact that Kneubuhl was not credited for his work. Should he have gotten a story or premise by credit? Did they give a "Premise by" credit in those days?

Enjoy,

Sir Rhosis

http://www.orionpressfanzines.com/articles/bread_and_circuses.htm

 

[Timofnine]

I can’t wait to get up to this episode in my rewatch. I always enjoyed it as a child. I used to *love* the Roman’s.

 

[Christopher]

Wow, that was a pretty weak premise. The final episode is implausible and problematical in a number of ways, but that early version was just lifeless and unfocused. It's not even about the modern-Rome society -- that's just a backdrop for a story about a bitter Vulcan out for revenge on Spock. And "Kirk and Spock forced to fight each other in an arena and fake one of their deaths" being the climax... well, I can see why they decided to change that. Was Kneubuhl unaware when he submitted this that "Amok Time" had already done that?

Also, while the idea of using Spock's inhuman anatomy to fake his death is a bit clever, how did his fellow Vulcan not see through the ruse immediately?

The most disturbing bit is the throwaway mention of Roman slaves being happy with slavery. I thought that would set up some twist where they're secretly rebelling, or are mind-controlled, or something, but it's just a passing assertion that isn't disproven in any way. The slaves just love being slaves, period. What the hell.

Basically all they kept was 20th-century Rome, a Federation citizen going native, and the televised gladiator contests.

 

[Maurice]

Looking in the GR papers, what @Sir Rhosis posted was the second outline, which is marked as having arrived in the Star Trek offices on March 17, 1967. There's an earlier outline, marked up by Bird, which Cash sez was submitted March 5, and @Harvey has marked as March 10, 1967, but I don't see a date. Both were around the time writers were pitching stories for the second season. The author would only have had first season episodes as reference, and would likely be unaware of other stories being considered/developed.

A 3/23 letter from NBC's Stan Robertson to Roddenberry includes "[...]we are both in agreement this should be our final episode story of the forthcoming season in which we update, or attempt to go back and examine a society, system, or civilization of the past.[...]"

A 3/27 memo from sts (Star Trek Staff) nixes both the wolves and the Vulcan proconsul fighting Spock, suggesting they save the latter for a future story.

EDIT:

The DeForest Research reports indicate the credit changes:

1. May 10: “BREAD AND CIRCUSES” BY JOHN KNEUBUHL
2. Sept. 7: “BREAD AND CIRCUSES” BY JOHN KNEUBUHL AND GENE COON
3. Sept 15: “BREAD AND CIRCUSES” BY GENE RODDENBERRY AND GENE L.COON (REVISED 9/12/67)

A Sept. 19, 1967 letter from Coon to the WGAw's Mary Dofman re the credits includes the following, which indicates the story springboard began at the Trek offices and was assigned to Kneubuhl:

[...]Gene Roddenberry and I sat down and developed the story idea, which you have in your possession at this time, included among other pertinent material. We then called in John Kneubuhl, gave him the story, which, while not completely developed, was considerably developed. John added a few pages to the story, we had it approved and then he went into First Draft; then into Second Draft. But he had many personal problems and his health failed him, and one day John called me and told me that he simply could not finish the screenplay and requested that he be withdrawn from the project.

This was granted. At this time, I went back to the original story, the one written by Roddenberry and me, and wrote a brand new First Draft, with different structure, dialogue, character development, and so on, which you will see in the first mimeographed copy of the script. When I had finished with a First Draft, Re-Write and a Polish, Gene Roddenberry stepped in and contributed a complete Re-Write, with new structure and character, based upon NOT THE KNEUBUHL SCRIPT, but upon my script, which was, in its turn, a complete original and not a simple Re-Write of the Kneubuhl effort.

Ordinarily, I would not go to such lengths, but since John Kneubuhl gave up completely on the script and returned the job to us, not only unfinished, but, in fact, unstarted-upon, since he had done no writing at all on his Re-Write as far as I know, I want to be sure the arbitration panel knows the full story.[...]​

 

[Maurice]

I can’t wait to get up to this episode in my rewatch. I always enjoyed it as a child. I used to *love* the Roman’s.

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[Sir Rhosis]

Many thanks for the added information, Maurice. I suspected that the Coon/Dofman letter I recalled came from one of the two Fact Trekkers.

Sir Rhosis

 

[Christopher]

Both were around the time writers were pitching stories for the second season. The author would only have had first season episodes as reference, and would likely be unaware of other stories being considered/developed.

Ah, that explains it. I was thinking it came late in the season, but that was just its airdate. It was produced about midway through the season. And even late episodes are often developed early (e.g. "The Omega Glory," a candidate for the second pilot finally made late in season 2).

A 3/27 memo from sts (Star Trek Staff) nixes both the wolves and the Vulcan proconsul fighting Spock, suggesting they save the latter for a future story.

The idea of a Vulcan rival resenting Spock's success could have been interesting, just not in this story. Given how much self-doubt Spock had about his own ability to fit in among humans, it would've surprised him to see another Vulcan resenting him as a success in that regard.

Although the premise raises questions. Why would Jeroth resent Spock for being able to fit in on Earth? Why not just live on Vulcan? I suspect that at the time, after season 1 had portrayed the society as very Earth-centric and only belatedly established it as a multispecies Federation, the initial thinking may have been that it was more like the British Empire, with Earth dominant and alien worlds being subordinate, as in the Campbellian science fiction that was common in prose in the era. (Which could explain the throwaway line in "The Conscience of the King" about Vulcan being conquered.) If so, it could have led to some interesting comparisons with the Roman planet and Jeroth's status as an elevated slave, though that wouldn't have fit at all with our modern perception of the Federation and Vulcans in particular.

A Sept. 19, 1967 letter from Coon to the WGAw's Mary Dofman re the credits includes the following, which indicates the story springboard began at the Trek offices and was assigned to Kneubuhl:

[...]Gene Roddenberry and I sat down and developed the story idea, which you have in your possession at this time, included among other pertinent material. We then called in John Kneubuhl, gave him the story, which, while not completely developed, was considerably developed. John added a few pages to the story, we had it approved and then he went into First Draft; then into Second Draft. But he had many personal problems and his health failed him, and one day John called me and told me that he simply could not finish the screenplay and requested that he be withdrawn from the project.
​

Hmm, I guess that explains it. The parallel-Earth ideas did tend to originate with Roddenberry.

 

[Joanna McCoy-Kirk]

Did the Romans specifically speak English in this original outline? That is one thing that has always bothered me about the finished episode (wouldn't Romans speak some form of Latin, even in their 20th century?).

 

[Christopher]

Did the Romans specifically speak English in this original outline?

The posted outline doesn't specify, but that seems like a detail that would be worked out at the script stage. An outline is more for broad strokes.

That is one thing that has always bothered me about the finished episode (wouldn't Romans speak some form of Latin, even in their 20th century?).

That's essentially what Romance languages are. They might speak something more like modern Italian.

I would presume the bit about them speaking English was thrown in for the sake of the "Sun/Son" confusion, which wouldn't have worked in Latin. Also maybe it was done so they could justify using existing TV-studio equipment with English signage, and so the landing party could read the magazine ads. (Although they didn't bother trying to justify the Arabic-numeral 12-hour clock face on Beta III in "Return of the Archons.")

 

[Commishsleer]

I think the fight scene with Kirk and McCoy was one of the highlights of the episode rather than any repeat of the Kirk-Spock fight scene from Amok Time.
I think Kirk had enough murderous exes and ex-friends and ex-girlfriends. No need to add some more for Spock.

While there were many flaws in the episode it was still forgive me an exciting episode. And yes Romans and Gladiators are fun if you ignore the slavery aspects and murdering stuff...

 

[alchemist]

(Although they didn't bother trying to justify the Arabic-numeral 12-hour clock face on Beta III in "Return of the Archons.")

In the first draft script of B&C dated May 2, 1967, Kneubuhl (or one of the ghost writers) went out of the way to specify that all the clocks had Roman numerals ("old-fashioned," according to Sulu).

This draft is very different from both the outline and what was ultimately shot for the episode.

 

[Maurice]

In the first draft script of B&C dated May 2, 1967, Kneubuhl (or one of the ghost writers) went out of the way to specify that all the clocks had Roman numerals ("old-fashioned," according to Sulu).

This draft is very different from both the outline and what was ultimately shot for the episode.

Ghost writers?

 

[alchemist]

Oops, I meant ghostwriter (with a bit of facetiousness). Based on the Sept.19, 1967 letter from Coon that you quoted, it's hard to know how much of the first draft was original to Kneubuhl.

 

[Christopher]

Oops, I meant ghostwriter (with a bit of facetiousness). Based on the Sept.19, 1967 letter from Coon that you quoted, it's hard to know how much of the first draft was original to Kneubuhl.

Coon's letter seems to state unambiguously that Kneubuhl was the sole writer of the first draft script, based on the outline he'd developed along with the Genes.

 

[Sir Rhosis]

This outline does not say anything about the language used, so I can only assume it is English. And also, lest anyone think otherwise, this is my synopsis of the outline. What you're reading is not the actual outline.

The clocks in this outline do have Roman numerals.

Sir Rhosis

 

[Maurice]

People on practically every planet the Enterprise visits speak what Kirk and Co. do. I'm surprised anyone would single this episode out for that.

 

[Sir Rhosis]

There's an "Et tu" joke in here somewhere...

 

[Joanna McCoy-Kirk]

People on practically every planet the Enterprise visits speak what Kirk and Co. do. I'm surprised anyone would single this episode out for that.

But this planet's people explicitly speak English, which is (to coin a phrase) quite illogical. They should be speaking a derivative of Latin. Or Italian. Or Greek. Just not English.

 

[Christopher]

People on practically every planet the Enterprise visits speak what Kirk and Co. do. I'm surprised anyone would single this episode out for that.

Except that, in addition to Joanna's point, Kirk et al. are surprised that the Space Romans speak English, implying that aliens normally don't speak English, despite how it sounds to us. In other cases, we can presume the universal translator is interpreting it (as was retroactively established in later productions), but here, it explicitly is English, and that explicitly isn't normal.

 

[Maurice]

But this planet's people explicitly speak English, which is (to coin a phrase) quite illogical. They should be speaking a derivative of Latin. Or Italian. Or Greek. Just not English.

That's only because, for once, they hung a lantern on it.

SPOCK: Colloquial twentieth-century English. An amazing parallel.