Editing Podcast:Lay Down Your Burdens, Part I

{{Podcast Data

|download link= http://media.scifi.com/battlestar/downloads/podcast/mp3/219/bsg_ep219_FULL.mp3

|posted date=

|transcribed by= [[User:Steelviper|Steelviper]]

|wordoftheweek=

|rdm= Y

|mrsron= Y

}}

RDM: Hello, and welcome to the podcast for episode 19, "[[Lay Down Your Burdens, Part I|Lay Down Your Burdens, Part One]]". I'm [[Ronald D. Moore]], executive producer and developer of the [[Battlestar Galactica (RDM)|new Battlestar Galactica]], and this is the podcast, so, as always, no whining. We're joined this week by my- by- back by popular demand, my wife, who made a guest shot appearance not too long ago, [[Terry Dresbach]] is here. Say "Hello" Terry.

Terry: We just bought this house in August. And we just moved in so we have boxes all over the place, still. And there's a rug, and a desk, and two leather armchairs, and a couple of French doors, and the d- the porch where Ron paces and smokes all those cigarettes. Which he can't do while I'm in the room.

Terry: But see I read all [http://mboard.scifi.com/postlist.php?Cat=&Board=BattlestarGalactica the boards] every single day.

RDM: The other major plotline, of course, that's getting established in the tease is [[Kara Thrace|Kara]] returning to [[The Twelve Colonies of Kobol#Caprica|Caprica]]. This was something that essentially since "[[The Farm]]" was something we had promised. I mean, once Kara laid down that mark and gave [[Samuel Anders|Anders]] the dog tag, she has to go back for him, and it was a question of how and when and under what circumstances, and how we could justify it, and make it plausible, and what would be the outcome of it. And the key idea in that sequence is that they found a way to link up the [[Heavy Raider|Cylon Heavy Raider]]'s computer system into a [[Raptor]], and that we had established- sort of established that the Raiders had abilities to jump f- a lot farther than any [[:Category:Colonial Craft|Colonial ship]] did, and could get back to Caprica in just a few discreet jumps, and by slaving that computer... blah blah blah [[technobabble]] technobabble to the Raptor technobabble technobabble they had a way of making it happen, especially if [[Sharon Valerii (Caprica copy)|Sharon]] was working with them. In initial drafts, in fact, right up until we were shooting it was going to be that they were going to take the Heavy Raider itself, and that the other Raptors would be slaved to the Heavy Raider, and we were going to build a Heavy Raider interior, and put the characters piloting the Heavy Raider back to Caprica. At the last minute we had to- we were way over budget on this episode, on thes- this two-parter, just monstrously over budget and then som- we had to make some hard decisions and started cutting sets, and visual efffects, and the interior of the Heavy Raider was something that I cut at the last minute. Said "Okay, you know what? Let's just lose this- this set. It's not that important. We'll put 'em all in Raptors and we'll just move the computer off the Heavy Raider onto the Raptor and just go with it." And you know what? You don't miss it in the story at all. So it was actually a good decision.

RDM: But there was something really interesting about writing the priest who didn't believe in [[God (RDM)|God]]. There was something just fascinating about it. I just kinda liked that idea, and start- and I wrote this scene- these scenes with that in mind. Here's the priest who comes to aid you on a [[Religion in the Twelve Colonies|spiritual matter]] who thinks that prayer is a waste of time and that praying to the gods isn't going to do a damn thing for you and the real problem is that your just screwed up, kid. And I thought that was a fun, interesting character. To put that character and pair him with [[Galen Tyrol|Tyrol]], the one guy that's the son of a priest that has the religious beliefs, one of many people that has the religious believes, seemed like an interesting idea. And then we started looking for an actor, and [http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0001777/ Dean Stockwell]'s name came up, and it was immediately we all went, "Well, that'd be great, but you're never going to get Dean Stockwell." And, sure as shit, we got Dean Stockwell. And he was...

The [[Raptor]] mission back to [[The Twelve Colonies of Kobol#Caprica|Caprica]] was something that I thought would be a primary cord going through "Part One", sort of provide- there's very little action in part one, as you might have known by now. The only really action you have in part one is at the end, 'bout when they do get to Caprica. But I like the laying this bit of pipe in here of the mission back to Caprica, gives you that military tension and impending conflict all the way through the show, because part one is very talky. "Part One" is a lot of setup. And I typically like "Part One"'s better than "Part Two"'s because they're- they are more setup and they are more character and they are more dealing with where people are, where they're going. And "Part Two"'s are usually all about resolution and getting things tied up in neat little bows and they're not usually as interesting, to me personally as a writer, as the beginnings. I'm interested with how things began, how one thing leads to another, seeing how the threads are interwoven.  

There's a lot- and we're following up here with [[Hera|the baby]]. The rammifications and the fallout of the baby between [[Karl Agathon|Helo]] and [[Sharon Valerii (Caprica copy)|Sharon]]. All these issues I wanted to- I wanted to bring as many things to the table for the finale as we could. All the little plotlines that you've been following, and maybe thinking that we had dropped and weren't thinking about anymore, everything from [[Gina]], and the nuke, and the baby, and Caprica, and the election, and Tom Zarek, and [[Cally]], and Tyrol and their relationship, and just really the whole- the whole nine yards. I want to just play as many of the continuing plotlines as we possibly could into the finale, 'cause I think those are the times when the show really lives best for me, when the show is really touching on all the different lives of all the different people, and showing how they're all intertwined and how they all are involved in a single overarching story. Like this. It's really- it was really fun to be able to leave [[Margaret Edmondson|Racetrack]] behind in a complete accident. There's nothing underhanded here. So whatever conspiracy theorists there may be out there, there's really no other explanation for this except an accident. They are going off on a mission, and the Raptors all jump, and one jumps into the wrong place. And shit happens. Sometimes there's just a software glitch. And this happens all the time. In the real world, carrier strikes are sent out, and ofttimes a plane has to go back to base because something's gone wrong or they went the wrong way, and this is just one of those times when they're- they just had a hiccup in their software and so these guys are stuck in this nebula and it's just it's- just sheer blind luck that they blunder into [[New Caprica|this planet]]. And the great thing, though, is that I had another ch- I had a character like Racetrack that I could play that with. Here's a character you've sort of been following intermittantly over the last year or so and she becomes your window into that storyline instead of just inventing a whole new redshirt-type character who's just going to come in, do one function, and leave and never be seen again. Here's somebody that you've had some- spent some time with. And so you're invested- you're a little bit more invested in her story that you are with just a faceless- or a nameless guest star of the week.

Surprising how- how much use we get out of the wardroom set. This is the wardroom and wardroom is such a multipurpose, generic room that we use it over and over again and you never quite feel like you're in the same space because [[Stephen McNutt|Steve McNutt]] lights it slightly differently each time and [[Richard Hudolin]] and his team decorate slightly differently each time, but it's still the same basic space that you've seen over and over again.

Meanwhile, back in the nebula... There was a point where this was an act-out. I think it was scripted as an act-out, actually. When they find [[New Caprica|the planet]] was supposed to be the "Duh, duh, duuuh" sort of act-out of act 2, or even act 1, it could have been, I'd have to go back and look at the script, and Mike Rymer made the observation that "Well, we've had this act-out. We've done this same act-out last season." And indeed we did. "[[Kobol's Last Gleaming, Part I|Kobol's Last Gleaming]]" has exact same moment, where [[Crashdown]]- Crashdown and Sharon find [[Kobol (RDM)|Kobol]]. And it's a similar, "Hey, is that a planet? Oh my god! Hey, it can support human life! Oh my god! Isn't that cool?"  And it was- it was hard to come up with a diff- a way to spin this differently because they're still going to have some of the somewhat same basic reactions, and I took several passes through, and the closest I could come to making it truly different was just that they felt that they were fuck-ups and that they had completely screwed up their mission, and then they find this plan, they kind of feel like, "Oh, hey! Maybe we aren't such frak-ups, after all." But once you went that direction, it ends with a whimper and not a bang. It didn't really feel like an act-out any more. And as we were restructuring this in the editing room, I was also realizing that the multiple storylines and plot-threads in this episode were a blessing and a curse. They were a blessing because they were exploring all these different things that I was in love with and they were providing energy, 'cause whenever you're intercutting different storylines it provides just a different dynamic and more energy and you're just caught up in things more, but you als- the other side is that- is that you run the risk of losing audience and getting confused, like trying to remember wh- where we are in different storylines and what's going on. So when we- I was restructuring this in editing, I decided to marry up all these scenes in a row, that you go from [[Margaret Edmondson|her]] finding the planet, straight into the [[Galactica (RDM)|''Galactica'']] scene, straight into the [[Pegasus (RDM)|''Pegasus'']] scene, straight into the next one and so on, and make this like a run of scenes, instead of interspersing these in and among other storylines. This is always intended to kind of, like, telescope the time frame and get them down to exploring this new planet and getting some initial reports back because the important thing was to quickly get a sense of that everyone in the fleet is excited about the planet, and everyone is starting to go, "Hey, I can't wait to get down there. I'm looking forward to shore leave." And everybody's starting to have dreams of what it is to stand on- on solid ground again, and have blue sky above your head, and get out in the open air, because up until now the only people who've really been down on a planet are the people who were either back on [[The Twelve Colonies of Kobol#Caprica|Caprica]], no fun, or the people who were on Kobol, no fun, for the most part. And everyone else in [[The Fleet (RDM)|the fleet]], the vast majority of people, have been cooped up and stuck in these metal cans ever since the miniseries. And the thought that, "Here's a planet, hidden in a nebula, that the Cylons haven't found, that can support human life," would prove to be an irresistable pull, so I wanted to telescope all that very quickly and get to the place that they are in this scene. Word has gotten out, everyone is excited about the planet, and what do you do with it? That [[Tom Zarek|Zarek]] comes up with this notion that permanent settlement on the planet- well actually it's not even really Zarek who comes up with it, truth to tell, it's really something [[Number Six|Six]] says to [[Gaius Baltar|Baltar]], then Baltar offhandedly says, "Oh, I was just thinking about what it'd be like to live here," that then makes Zarek come up with the idea. So one could say it's the angel of [[God (RDM)|God]] at- at- at- at work again. But I like that it's Zarek's political acumen that does actually, like, give Baltar this campaign. That he realizes that this has touch- that the thought of this world has touched a chord out there, and that if you could give voice to that in the campaign, if you could actually, like, grab onto that issue and put yourself in opposition to [[Laura Roslin]] that maybe, just maybe, you would turn enough people to- to come down on your side.

RDM: Yes my wife is a f- an ex-costume designer, as you might have guessed. [[Terry Dresbach]] won the [[Wikipedia:Emmy_Awards|Emmy]]-

RDM: Ok. Now it's kinda interesting that [[Laura Roslin|Laura]], the experienced politician, doesn't quite see how serious this is at first. That she dismisses the issue out of hand. And like so many presidents, she's not real- she does live in a certain amount of a bubble, in that she doesn't really see right away that this is a powerful issue that [[Gaius Baltar|Baltar]] has just laid on the table. And [[Tory Foster|Tory]] has to kind of give her a reality check here. Laura's still kind of living in the- the world that was there, not twenty-four hours ago. Before [[New Caprica|this planet]] was found, all these arguments could have been made in the theoretical basis, "Oh, sure. We're not going to settle on just some planet. We're going to [[Earth (RDM)|Earth]]." But when the reality of that hits, and people really do start thinking about this, and there's a man out there saying, putting voice to the very thing that they all want, it really does turn the election into s- it goes from a runaway to a real- to a real race.

RDM: Now then this debate was actually, as scripted, this was an intercut. We- [[Cavil]] and [[Galen Tyrol|Tyrol]] were continuing their discussion throughout all this and I had scripted, I think, in the original version, part- Tyrol and Cavil were walking through the ship, and it was a "walk and talk", and while they were walking and talking and doing some of that earlier dialogue, we were cutting into the debate and the debate was being played over the PA system and over the wireless sets throughout the fleet. You were hearing the debate on in the background and then going to it periodically, and [[Michael Rymer]] just never liked that, it didn't- didn't think it worked. I think his comment was that it just felt like it was distracting, and he wanted to hear the debate, and I was worried that the debate was boring, I thought that the debate was not going to carry anybody's attention. He really wanted to play it, so he talked me out of playing- actually it was a production issue, too, they were running out of time to shoot on all those sets and the "walk and talk" was going to eat up too much time, and what if we just- could we just put all the scenes in the wardroom and he said, "Ok, don't wor- (Australian accent) don't worry, we'll still intercut them and we'll still do them the same way. We'll intercut them." And of course-

RDM: I do imitate- I do imitate everybody. And that was a lie, of course. When he cut it together he just put all the- all the wardroom scenes together and this stood as its own piece. And, you know, I have to say it's a better- it's a better instinct. Michael's a very smart, intuitive director and he has a keen understanding of story and structure and you have to listen to him. It's why Michael comes back over and over again. He's very good. So, this sequence now plays as its own sequence, as the second of two presidential debates. To give you a sense of how they handle themselves and what the issues are.

[[Gaius Baltar|Baltar]] just milking it mercilessly, they way he plays the mock humility to the camera, the fact that [[Laura Roslin|Laura]] is not quite as good as he is, she's a little stiffer, she speaks with passion, she believes in what she's saying, but Baltar has that telegenic, "I'm sexy and (British accent) I'll demand more time to say what I've got to say-"

Terry: He's [[Wikipedia:Bill Clinton|Bill Clinton]].

RDM: Bill takes these podcasts with him, on the road. [[Wikipedia:Hillary Rodham Clinton|Hillary]] doesn't like them.

RDM: And that. I love that, that Laura, in that look, when she's looking at Baltar, in that moment, she knows she's lost. She knows she's lost. She knows she's lost the debate. You can see it on her face. She knows she's lost the debate and possibly the election. And then there's this lovely bit. "Why don't you go frak yourself." And how would- why would- a president would never say that! Maybe a vice president would say that, on the Senate floor. But you know a president would never say that. Yes, they would.

RDM: It was a [[Wikipedia:Dick Cheney|Cheney]] reference.

And then of course I like this little bit, of the spin afterward, and [[Tom Zarek|Zarek]] is spinning the debate but Laura knows the truth of it. And then back to [[Cylons (RDM)|Cylon-occupied]] [[The Twelve Colonies of Kobol#Caprica|Caprica]].

RDM: [[Terry Dresbach|Terry]] will not be here for that. [[David Eick]] and I are going to do that podcast together.

RDM: Yes. There- the finale is a risk. We are placing a large bet on the finale, and I'll tell you right now it was- I pushed for it, it was my idea, I stand by it, but is a risk. We're betting a lot on the finale and where it's going and some of you are gonna hate it.

RDM: Yeah, am I an arrogant, obnoxiou- that's what I keep reading on [http://mboard.scifi.com/postlist.php?Cat=&Board=BattlestarGalactica the boards], how arrogant I am.

RDM: Oh yeah, you'll be- you'll have your own, like, [http://mboard.scifi.com/showflat.php?Cat=0&Number=1681899&an=0&page=0#1681899 "Terry- We Hate Terry"] thread on the boards then.

Terry: I don't think we have to worry so much about them. I think you should worry about the people who are listening to it right now.

RDM: (unintelligble cursing.) Terry does not read the boards. My wife is not [http://mboard.scifi.com/showflat.php?Cat=0&Number=1775765&an=0&page=0#1775765 reading the boards] every day. She's not.

Terry: No, [http://mboard.scifi.com/showprofile.php?Cat=0&User=2926296&Number=1681899&Board=BattlestarGalactica&what=showflat&page=0&fpart=1&vc=1 Mrs. Ron].

RDM: Like [[Ellen Tigh|Mrs. Tigh]].

Terry: I'm more like [[Wikipedia:Stevie Nicks|Stevie Nicks]].

RDM: Thank you for listening, and I will talk to you next week on [[Podcast:Lay Down Your Burdens, Part II|"Lay Down Your Burdens, Part Two"]]. Goodnight.