Comment Re:On one hand... (Score 1) 483
You are correct sir! I forgot about Roddenberry rewriting the script. He even talked about it at conventions and wrote up an account of it somewhere. Roddenberry and Ellison were friends at the time, and according to one version of the story, Roddenberry would go over to Ellison's house and pester him about the screenplay. Ellison would prevaricate, and Roddenberry would then "borrow" some of the records from Ellison's music collection. Ellison had to turn in the script to get his records back. Only trouble was, Ellison didn't quite get the idea of writing for a budgeted TV show, he had all sorts of crowd scenes in it, huge FX shots, etc. It was also MUCH longer, almost too long even for a two-hour movie. So Roddenberry had to rewrite it, taking all the impossible or over-budget stuff out. The result is essentially a collaborative effort between two writers, Ellison and Roddenberry. And I forgot all this. OMG, am I getting old? I blame it on the rock music and all them violent video games I play.