Bread And Circuses

Filmed September 1967

It would be four months, four busy months, before I returned to Desilu Studio for another voyage of STAR TREK. When I returned, I discovered it had been a busy time at Desilu as well. Gulf Western, owner of Paramount Studio right next door, had purchased Desilu. The wall separating the two studios had been torn down, and it was now just one big unhappy family.

It was not unusual to use buildings on the studio lot as locations. If the film being shot was a Hollywood story, there was no problem; the locations merely represented the studio in the story. The newsreel sequence of dissidents being arrested was very short, a mere two sequences, only three shots. That hardly justified the time it would take to film at a location off the lot. Therefore, for budgetary reasons, we had to shoot buildings on the lot, even though they were less than perfect choices.

When I first came to STAR TREK, Gene Coon told me that although the shows were scheduled to be filmed in six days, in reality they were averaging out to six and a half days per episode. The edict from the new owners was that ALL SHOWS MUST BE COMPLETED IN SIX DAYS. But there was more. A normal shooting day had a crew call of 7:30 am for an 8:00 am shoot. Actors’ calls were based on the amount of time needed for makeup and hair to have them ready for the 8:00 am shoot. The day ended at 7:00 pm. Another order from the new management was that filming must end at 6:12 pm. That was 48 minutes less per day; 48 minutes times 6 is 288 minutes; 288 minutes divided by 60 is 4.8 hours, which is twelve minutes less than a half day’s shooting time. In other words it was now being demanded that STAR TREK be filmed in five and a half days. I was now challenged with completing a SPARTACUS-like saga on a schedule that would have satisfied the executives at Ziv Studio in the fifties.

To start this impossible mission we returned to Bronson Canyon, where I had filmed the idyllic THIS SIDE OF PARADISE. But it was a part of Bronson Canyon new to me. I had previously filmed in the pristine forest section of the canyon. The area of the cave, although much used for filming by Hollywood studios, was a new location for me.

Septimus was portrayed by the highly respected character actor, Ian Wolfe. Ian at this time was seventy-one years old. He had come to Hollywood in 1934 after a successful career on Broadway. I collect old movies (my library at the present time includes around 2500 titles), and there are times when I wonder if any movie filmed in the thirties and forties was produced without Ian in the cast. His final screen appearance (and there were over three hundred of them) was in Warren Beatty’s DICK TRACY in 1990.

The interior of the cave was shot at the location in Bronson Canyon. And again Jerry Finnerman has to be commended. When filming an interior away from the studio, everything had to be lit from the floor. There wasn’t the advantage of hanging lamps and lighting from above. Filming within the restricted confines of the cave added to the difficulty, plus which all the heavy lighting equipment had to be CARRIED to the cave over very rocky terrain, and cable from the generator to light had to be laid over the same terrain.  With all of this Jerry still managed to do more than just get it photographed. In the cave as in his work back at the studio, there was an artist at work.

I had a major concern with the script; I felt it telegraphed the ending of the story. I wanted to be sure the sun the slaves spoke of was the one in the sky. I had TWO Genes working this time. Both Roddenberry and Coon divided up the scenes to be revised so as to establish the slaves’ religious belief in the Solar Sun.

STAR TREK was Jerry Finnerman’s first assignment as a director of photography. He had been Harry Stradling’s operator for several years, a great training ground; Stradling was one of the giants of the profession. He was the one who urged Jerry to take the STAR TREK assignment. Jerry, like so many gifted artists, was not the most confident human being on the planet. In fact at the beginning of the first season of STAR TREK his insecurity led him to request being let out of his contract. Fortunately wiser heads at the studio prevailed. I think he was told that if he quit, he would never work in Hollywood again. That persuaded him to stay on, and I believe he is due the major credit for the visual look of the show. Again, as in the cave, he didn’t settle for the drab gray of the jail cell walls. Jerry, although he had a fine crew of gaffers, set all of the lights. He painted with light. The amazing thing was how fast he was.

Television scenes at that time rarely ran longer than three minutes. The first conversation between the Enterprise trio and the two Romans was more than twice that. The page count for the sequence was eight and one-eighth pages. The scene was cerebral exposition and did not call for any movement once the five people entered and were seated. (Plus which any movement would have required additional camera setups and time to light them.) It was on days like this that I was appreciative of the five talented actors who comprised the cast. I must put in a word here about leading actors in episodic television. Bill Shatner, Leonard Nimoy and DeForest Kelley, after a long twelve hour day such as the one including this sequence (and there were three additional short scenes in this same set that only involved Shatner and guest stars), they would then go home with the requirement to memorize the scenes for the following day. To do it at all was an accomplishment. To do it with such skill — I bow my head in admiration.

Two of the three additional scenes in the set where the Pro-consul had spoken to KIrk and his companions involved the servant slave girl, redressed in a costume that I thought would have been more appropriate on Maria Montez when she portrayed Scheherazade in ARABIAN NIGHTS a quarter of a century earlier for Universal Studio.

The scenes in the arena are the part of BREAD AND CIRCUSES most harmed by the time restrictions imposed by the new management. The sequences were literally shot on the run. The satiric look at live television was there, but the spectacle of the Roman arena was far less than it should have been. The second gladiator with Flavius was a very fine stunt man, Max Klevin, with whom I had worked in New York on NAKED CITY. I knew what he was capable of, both in choreographing and performing the action. There was so much more that could have been done that would have been exciting and entertaining, but it required the time to stage and rehearse, with necessary care taken to avoid injury to the actors involved. That set piece should have been the highlight of the production; but those bloodhounds in black suits were nipping at our heels.

The role of Spock was both a starmaker and potential cage for Leonard Nimoy. The unemotional character was an unusual creation that added substance, even comedy, to the series. But most of the time, for an actor with Leonard’s capabilities, it was limiting. Whenever there was a way to release him from these strictures (as in THIS SIDE OF PARADISE) it was edifying and entertaining. I’m not sure which Gene was responsible for the jail cell scene between Spock and Doc after the arena (although I have my suspicions), but I felt it gave Leonard (and DeForest too) a chance to break away from the usual comic bickering relationship of their characters.

Gene Roddenberry was doing a rewrite on the final climactic scene before the trio beam back up to the Enterprise. It was so last minute that I left the studio the evening before filming it without the rewritten pages. Gene promised it would be waiting for me at the studio early the next morning, and when I arrived at the studio at 6:00 am, as he had promised, the script was there. While I was in the jail cell set planning my day’s work, Ted Cassidy (Lurch on THE ADDAMS FAMILY television series) came into the set. He was guest starring on MISSION: IMPOSSIBLE on an adjoining sound stage. I didn’t know him, but either Leonard or DeForest was on the set and did. We planned a little prank to get the day off to a happy start. When we filmed it, everyone knew what was going to happen except Bill Shatner. You may have seen it on one of the blooper reels that has been around for a long time.

And here’s the climactic ending including the rewritten sequence that Bill thought we were doing before he was abducted.

As I wrote before, my early concern about the script was my fear the ending was being telegraphed, so both Genes worked, rewriting various scenes to establish the Roman slaves’ religious belief centered on the planet Sun, setting up the farewell scene to that week’s planet.

Some time near the end of filming BREAD AND CIRCUSES, Herb Solow, executive in charge of production for Desilu Studios, and John Meredyth Lucas, the incoming new producer of STAR TREK (replacing the soon-to-be-departing Gene Coon), came to me to check my availability to stay on and direct another STAR TREK. My preparation period would begin the day following completion of the current show. I regrettably had to decline. I never worked on the Jewish High Holy Days (Rosh Hashannah and Yom Kippur), and they were going to fall right in the middle of the next show’s schedule. Not to be deterred, Herb got out a calendar to see whether the conflict could be resolved. Rosh Hashannah would fall on the last two days of preparation. No problem, he said. I could have my preparation completed by then, so that it would not be necessary for me to come to the studio on those two days. The fifth day of filming would be on Friday, October 13. Yom Kippur began at sundown on that day. Again no problem, he said. I could leave the studio late afternoon, and John, also a member of the Directors Guild of America, would finish directing the day’s work. And that’s the way it worked out, and John from then on always referred to himself as my Yom Kippur director.

The journey continues