liz_marcs | Best! Quotes! About! Writing! Evah! and an interview with NB and BC

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Best! Quotes! About! Writing! Evah! and an interview with NB and BC

I've not been online that much. Due to circumstance beyond my control, I've been mainlining Babylon 5 like a speed junkie.

I think it's because work for the past few days has been mega busy.

I give JMS much-o props for admitting what worked and didn't work on his baby during the commentaries.

Although, I'm with a lot of other people on his strengths and weaknesses. Great storyteller. Fabulous plotting. Amazing world-building for the aliens. Really worked hard to research the "real world" stuff he could, like physics or how a typical uniform patch would look in the military.

Stilted dialogue (at times) for the humans.

I'm still trying to wrap my head around the fact that he could write gorgeous dialogue for all of the aliens (Delenn excepted...shut up Delenn!), yet in the same episode would put real clunkers in the mouths of the humans (Garibaldi and Zak excepted...usually). *shakes head*

Still, JMS, I *flove* you. You are the Original Master of genre television and Ron Moore is seriously the Dark Prince. Ain't no one knocking either one of you off the moutain, babe.

I mean, seriously, there are two reasons to love JMS:

When asked about how fast the Starfuries can fly, his typical answer:

"They move as fast as the speed of plot."

*squeeee* Hi-larious. Because, so true. It's nice to have someone admit that.

But here's why JMS is the freakin' master genre television. It's the second quote.

From the commentary for 'Fall of Night:'

"Drama is when you make your characters climb a tree and then you throw big rocks at them while they're up there."

BWAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!

I want to see that on one of TNT "We Know Drama" ads. Because that is dead on.

Anyway, I had to post my JMS love, because, duuuuude, it's JMS and I love his B5 commentaries.

*squees like sad little fangurl I am*

On another note

This article is already making the rounds (and making not-so-happy waves) on various BtVS lists, so I figure I might as well post it here with no comment.

Bradley Cooper and Nicholas Brendon talk about Kitchen Confidential and discuss experiences with Alias and BtVS

And yes, I kept thinking, "Hmmmmm, and if JMS were in charge..." while reading it, because you sooooo know that Vir = Xander.

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Why not so happy waves?

*cough*

Let's just say that NB says some less-than-glow-y things about his time on BtVS indicating that the last two years wasn't a terribly happy time for him either personally or professionally.

shut up Delenn!

Amen. *giggles*

Ah. I guess I already knew about that, so it doesn't bother me so much. Actually, I really liked his candor -- it took him a while before he'd admit that.

Being a fan of Anthony Bourdain (Whose book the show is based on) and Nicholas Brendon, I'm very excited to see how Nicholas fits in with the "Kitchen Confidential" universe.

If you haven't read the book, I highly recommend it. The book itself is a expose on what happens behind the scenes in the kitchens of the restaurant industry in New York City. If "Seth" is the character I think he is, Nicholas should have a very plumb role as Tony Bourdain's second banana.

The book itself talks about Bourdain's life, how he became a chef and some of the scary things that happen in the kitchen you DON'T want to know about.

After reading the book, I swore I'd never ordered a steak well done again. Or eat fish on Monday.

That pretty much describes my relationship with Delenn from about mid-S3 on. *heh*

Delenn's last great shining moment as a character when she tried to conjugate the word "butt."

Delenn: "I butt, you butt, he she it butts. Butt butt? Butt butt butt?"

Sheridan: "You sound like a motorboat."

Delenn: "A motorbutt? I don't think I like the sound of that."

She never reached those heights of dialogue again. And the scary thing is, MF could do Delenn's (rarely seen) dippy side really well, but she never got to do it. (sighs happily with her beautifully acted reactions to Delenn watching Duck Dodgers for the first time with Garibaldi) I mean, the woman could've pulled it off, but because this...*gah!*

In short: me like MF, me not like Delenn. I'm very good at separating the actor from the character.

One of my favorite nonfiction books as well. *grins*

I will not go to buffets because of that book. And NO BRUNCHES!

Sadly, a friend of mine has it (want it back).

I think Owain is actually playing Stephen (book Stephen). I think NB's character Seth is a conglomeration of different characters or possibly a whole new one like Teddy (John Cho's character).

Brendon: That really is admirable. Because after about Season Five on [Buffy], or the end of Season Four, I was that guy. [Buffy creator] Joss [Whedon] actually said Xander was done--that there was no more. I was just kind of relegated to the background. It was one of those things that, where I was at in my life, the money was more important than my pride or taking care of myself. [Leaving], especially as the show's just starting to take off...

((wince)) Ow. Jesus, poor guy. And if you ask me, it really showed, too. Man....and poor actors, they're always so obsessed with their reviews, now they have message boards and blogs and ghod knows what all else to be obsessed with, too....I remember reading some ASH interviews where he said he and NB would always be at the local bar after shooting and be doing this If I Made BTVS or Making BTVS Right or something like that, and they always both complained they wanted to go dark/evil, and ASH sort of got that a little bit in S7 with is-he-the-First thing, but NB didn't get that at all. I've heard rumors that Xander was supposed to die, not just get his eye poked out, and then be the First thru the latter half of S7 instead of Buffy, which would've been great -- the "heart" turned inside out and undermining everyone, with huge great walloping guilt.

It wouldn't have been Buffy if he had been in charge.

The universe would have made more sense, things would have been better researched, plots for all the characters, things to do, no accidentally mixed messages, fewer "Doesn't this contradict the past?" but the dialogue and the characters personalities would've been very different, and IMO, that's what made Buffy work.

And it couldn't have been fun, going from pretty important with things to do guy to ... no plot, no reason, wait for the 2 maybe 3 episodes where you matter dude.

Can ya feel the love?

Don't forget the never ordering eggs Benedict during a weekend brunch special, either.

Yes yes yes to all the JMS love....I saw a little bit of it the first season it was on, thought "What is this DS9 ripoff?" (yes, really), and then kept catching bits of the second season, and about by the end of S2 was hooked and had to catch up and got T hooked on it and then after that we were junkies and watched the whole thing and then all the reruns on TNT. That show was when I started to understand the serious nature of fandom because while I had loved XF, B5 gave me this emotional support during a really nasty time in my life. Also, that was the first time ever I saw even a bit of online fandom (mainly alt.whatever.moderated.jms, which was fun).

And yeah, B5 influenced even episodic network TV to a huge amount -- before that you had the XF "mytharc" but that was basically Chris Carter on ganja, plus it was so inconsistent....and now you see lots of shows, not just genre ones, with season-long arcs and plots and the genre shows are really picking up on it.

Also, I love Ivanova madly. I wanted to be Ivanova.

Delenn is a big problem cause by the end she nearly comes across as this superhuman....or superMinbari....force who knows everything and is Queen of the Universe and wins every argument and....yeah. Not Mary Suedom, quite, in terms of not a self-insert but a too-perfect character, but awfully damned close. Still, she got great moments like: "He is behind me. You are in front of me. If you value your lives -- be somewhere else." WHOO!

See? I knew it, too, but it's more the result of other cast members saying things (like SMG saying she wants Xander to have a big role in any revival) and just vague things NB has said in various interviews before now.

I think, though, it's the first time he's bald-faced said anything definitive that really can't be misinterpreted or ignored.

I mean, even before know you didn't exactly have to read between the lines to know this was the case, but there are some people with rose-colored glasses, methinks, and really want to believe that BtVS/AtS sets were nothing more than one big happy family; that working for JW wasn't really work but one big party; and that the actors count themselves as blessed for ever having been in the presence of JW.

To actually have a BtVS actor come out and say, "I wasn't happy after S4, I stayed only for the money because I needed the job even though it was slowly killing me to stay, and I knew that it wasn't going to get better because my character was being turned into wallpaper" kind of pops the balloon for some people.

Although it's really fun to see people on Whedonesque spinning this for all it's worth, ranging from, "Well, he didn't mean it" to "He was joking" to "He never said Joss told him directly" (ummmm, what part of "Joss said" are you missing on that last one?)

The hairsplitting and wanking going on on some boards of this interview with NB is kind of amusing to watch.

I heard that a long while ago as "If you want a good story, get your character up a tree and throw rocks at him." I think that's still good advice.

I want to see that on one of TNT "We Know Drama" ads

OH GHOD THOSE ARE SO BAD. Who MADE those? Seriously, I want to smack them. Esp when they do Elisabeth Rohm and she's like "DRAMA! IS...." and there's this huge pause and then they just cut away from her, like, man, she got nothing, yo. Wait a minute, that's actually rather awesome now I think about it....

Ahhhhhh, okay, it's on Whedonesque that it's being wanked. I'd missed that. And yeah, it hurts -- hell, it still hurts. But, you know, I can look at the show and then look at the dynamics behind it and separate the two... which has taken me far too long to accomplish, I might add.

Word to the writing quotes.

I hadn't seen the article before, so thanks for posting the link.

Because after about Season Five on [Buffy], or the end of Season Four, I was that guy. [Buffy creator] Joss [Whedon] actually said Xander was done--that there was no more. I was just kind of relegated to the background.

Well, that just pissed me off!

But I'm definitely looking forward to KC.

Aww. *hugs NB*

The thought of Nick goofing off with Bradley Cooper makes me smile like you wouldn't believe.

Wait, am I supposed to believe that people didn't notice that after S4-5, Xander was relegated to the background? Everyone noticed this. People who didn't like Xander were pleased, people who did were annoyed, but everyone noticed. Did they expect that the actor didn't notice? Or to be pleased about it once he did?

Sigh. Yeah. Xander was wasted. Nicholas Brendon wasn't happy about that, and wanted more to do. Strangely enough, nothing in his comments in this interview even raised an eyebrow on me, 'cause, well, exactly.

Hadn't heard about SMG being vocal in support of Xander getting more to do in any revival. Nice to hear.

A few other boards, too.

For example, I know the Webmistress over at NB.com is working like hell to keep a lid on things over there. They have a strict "no bash, no discuss personal lives" rule, which, can't blame them sinceit's NB's official site. Mixed results so far.

I can't wait until this hits Slayerverse. There's a quite a few people over there that have a field day bashing NB at the best times. If you want wank? There will be wank there that will splooge like it's never splooged before.

I was annoyed that Xander was somewhat sidelined from mid-S5 on and I was always somewhat mystified for the reasons for that. But at the end of the day, Xander was probably the only character that still had any connection whatsoever to the character he was in the pilot. I swear that's why there seems to be growing number of people who really are seeing Xander as a good character: He was the only one still recognizable as the character he used to be. Everyone else? Not so much.

The really sad thing about the behind-the-scenes dynamics was just that NB got screwed, but Emma Caufield got screwed, too, since her character was tied to a character that was all-but-abandoned by the writing staff (it appears). How much does that suck?

The only thing that surprises me in NB's BtVS-related comments is that this is the first time someone's actually pointed the finger directly at Joss. Everyone else has worded things so that other people could be blammed (i.e., FOX, Marti Noxon, the network, etc.).

NB is literally the second actor to step over the line and point directly at the boy genius himself.

SMG was actually the firast actor on the cast to express unhappiness with Joss (in her Entertainment interview) on two counts: he abandoned BtVS for Firefly was her first charge and her second charge was that she was so unhapy with S6 that she went to him to discuss her issues and he refused to listen to her because she couldn't understand what Buffy was going through since she (SMG) was always knew what she wanted.

Thanks for sharing the article, I hadn't seen it yet. I've never watched Alias, but I've enjoyed what I've seen of BC in clips of "Kitchen Confidential."

NB's quote about BtVS wasn't shocking. Although it was something that, as a Xander writer and fan, I more than well aware of, it was really brought home the other day when I was doing NB screencaps from S5. "Background" was a generous statement.

One of the difficult things I've discovered about writing Xander is that while canon gives him moments of growth ("The Zeppo," "Into the Woods," etc.) just an episode later it relegates him back to inappropriate joke guy. It makes it difficult (for me) in writing a Xander-centric story because it can feel you're making him OOC if he's not just spouting non sequiturs in a serious moment. (A lot of S7 comes to mind there.)

But he sounds upbeat and engaged with this new project, and it sounds like he's personally happy with it as well. And I loved the Emma "you should see this guy!" anecdote.

It's sad to get confirmation that Xander was deliberately sidelined. I'm not surprised based on visual evidence, but I am saddened none the less.

I said in another LJ, they took my viewpoint character away, the bastards.
Or all the viewpoint characters actually, since Willow got replaced by Dark Phoenix. :(

And it's funny that SMG's OTP ;) is B/X. Must be because SMG wanted to play happy Buffy.

It's bad of me to feel vindicated by Nick's comments about Buffy post-4, right? People who are pissed at him, or madly trying to spin it so that it sounds like he wasn't unhappy... confuse and annoy me.

I love Xander; in my perfect world the choice would have been to improve the storylineand Nick's unhappiness by making a place and path for him, rather than writing him out completely, or the shadow-Xander that we got from S5 on. But I feel backed up by what Nick said, that I wasn't imagining things when it felt like there was nothing for Xander to do, and it showed.

It showed in the character; he seemed to me as unhappy and uncomfortable as Nick seems to have really felt. I always thought that Xander comes off as sad and lost pretty much as soon as they try to play him happy, content, gowing into his job, yadda yadda - because it feels like a role he's been slotted into (as it is, because it's the place Joss stuck him, hoping that would work and he wouldn't have to do anything with the character anymore) that is too... something. Not saying that Xander is only happy (or only a good character) when he's fucked up; just that the place they put him in was some artificial adult world that no one that age is ready for. It came off to me like him desperately trying to be a success in the same arena where his parents had failed, without necessarily actually wanting that.

I was always somewhat mystified for the reasons for that.

Pretty much, Joss lost interest in the character and his story. And Joss does not do a good job with things when he's not really interested in them. (See S6-7 BtVS... if you dare.)

The SMG anecdote painted latter season Joss as having some of his ideas and not being open to discuss anything if it wasn't where he was looking to go. Whether that's personality, burnout, or a factor of having so many shows to focus on is anyone's guess. You get the periodic Joss interviews gushing over his Firefly cast, or JM, or Alyson, or Any Acker, but he doesn't really talk as much about the other actors, so who knows if personalities or favorites played into it or something else.

Interesting. It could be. It's sort of a parallel with some of what happened with other characters. After Shawn Ryan left to do the Shield, ME writers had no idea what to do with Gunn's character and no place for him, so they made his story about not having a place or any idea what to do.

Which, after S4, isn't what they did with Xander - basically just putting him into a box. If NB's dissatisfaction leaked a little into the performance, then for me it adds to the character and your explanation of the character post-S5 works for me...

What kind of annoys me about that is that it would totally have worked for me in reverse -- if they'd made (or rather, kept) Xander's character as not knowing where to go or what to do. Because 19 year olds don't for the most part suddenly find their perfect career, domestic bliss, and splendiferous apartment just because the uncollegiate-townie-storyline was so last season. There are a number of other places that could've gone, without it having to continue to be a string of fast-food jokes.

Whereas the Gunn storyline, making the meta literal by giving him a crisis-of-existence, never worked for me. It felt inorganic. If what Angel was doing meant so much to him that it caused huge issues with choosing between that and his mission among the street kids, there had to have been something there , or there would've been no contest between the options. To turn around and have him looking for purpose, a season later, made no sense to me.

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Best! Quotes! About! Writing! Evah! and an interview with NB and BC

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Kitchen Confidential

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Re: Kitchen Confidential

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Re: Kitchen Confidential

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other bitty part

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