Eureka: We wrote the script as we went along!

'Back to editing my short film 'After Party Babies' today...(see pic).

It's been a mellow-high, no drama. Just structurally doing the final arranging of the order of things, working towards a rough cut...'hope to get our music guy, DJ Quentin Harris on the same page with us. To have everything ready for shipping out to the various film festivals mid-Oct '08.

This week I've also been gearing up for my screenwriting group (that starts in a few days); 'hate to admit how I love-reading about on-set-drama ('course on other peoples shows)...

'this caught my eye, from the set of one of my fav Sci-fi shows, Eureka -- 'where network directives forced the season finale to be rewritten from scratch during shooting.'

As this writer points out, most people that watch TV shows assume -- 'Wow, they're making it up as they go along, there's probably a voice in the back of your head that reminds you that TV shows are scripted well in advance so that the actors can learn lines, prop- and costume-people can get prepared and directors can start blocking out shots.'

In a nutshell, after -- 'several actual script drafts. A week before shooting, we were in great shape. Then the Network told us that while our script was good, it wasn’t appropriate for a season finale. It was thrown out.'

Leading to a total rewrite: 'One Wednesday before shooting, the entire writing staff convened and re-broke 308 [the episode's production number] from the ground up in one, marathon late-night session. Then, we divided the script up and everyone wrote an act.'

'Problem solved, right?'

'Wrong.'

'Two days before production began… the Powers That Be pulled the plug AGAIN on the script. Major elements were deemed inappropriate for a season finale. There was an especially large disagreement about the final fate of Eva Thorne – what should happen, and how it should be handled...'

'Well, for better or for worse… the decision was made to have us all rewrite 308 YET AGAIN at the eleventh hour...So what did we end up doing? -- We wrote the script as we went along.'

I'm really also curious why the SciFi Channel suits were so picky about the scripts submitted...I'm sure that rewriting is such a major part of any screenplay, but, really...'as someone that has done it on a short film, I think going off the fly is not the best way to go.

'Doubtful anything like that would never happen of the set of J.J. Abrams Fringe: