I'm going to post my thoughts on certain snippets of Lauren's interview with Ausiello.
Oh, god, I'm sorry this is so long! No, I'm not sorry that Lauren's saying so long because, well, there's still almost 11 days left until the upfronts and, like, the 7th Heaven peeps had already said their farewells to the show by this time last year and we all know how that turned out. I'm just sorry that this
post is so frickin' long! D'OH! I guess it's the
that made me do it.
It's Here: Lauren Graham's Final Gilmore Girls InterviewBy Michael Ausiello
May 6th, 2007
Credit: http://community.tvguide.com/blog-entry/TVGuide-Editors-Blog/Ausiello-Report/Lauren-Grahams-Final/800014383
Comments Guide:
AuseilloLaurenMe, Rob
All indications were that it was coming back for 13 episodes. What happened?Graham: Well, you know, there was a lot that went back and forth by the time the [13 episode thing] came out. I had sort of said to them a couple of months ago that I didn't see it coming back, and they had asked to just give them some time to figure something out that would make it work. Both Alexis and I have felt tired, and also creatively like the show was in a place where we were either at the end or very close to it, and so we really couldn't imagine another season. I think they were trying to tempt us with 13, which was tempting, but ultimately just wasn't going to work for them. We needed the situation to be so ideal, and I think it just wasn't meant to be. I do want to say that the studio and the network were very generous, and very respectful in this whole process. It was things like… We didn't want to work the schedule we'd been working, but if we're working a lesser schedule, what is the show? The way we'd like to have done it would not have necessarily been good for the show. And while there are many wonderful actors on the show, right now you have me working six to seven days an episode, and Alexis doing about the same. To do anything less than that just wasn't going to be the same show. They tried to make it appealing for us, and we tried to be imaginative, and then at the end of the day it just felt like we were trying to do something impossible.Did you and Alexis band together during negotiations?Graham: Not in a formal way, but we certainly discussed what our hopes were. We were very open with each other. Most of our conversations were, "Can we imagine coming back."Is it true that Alexis was the harder sell?Graham: I don't think that's true. I did formally say at one point, "I'm not coming back." Then they thought, "Well, can we do it with just Alexis?" I don't want to speak for her, but we both went back and forth. Ultimately, neither of us wanted to do it without the other one.Well, the show could have worked as a 13-episode epilogue (or even more seasons) *without* Alexis, but there's no way in heck that it would ever have worked without Lauren. But also, it confirms for me that that reporter Kronke's letter posted a few pages back was total horse hockey in perpetuating the rumor that Alexis was the problem. He was just repeating the rumor mill echo machine and not doing any actual interviewing. :
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Was that possibility [of doing the show without Graham] ever discussed?Graham: If she was in a place where she wanted, like, her own show or her own spin-off… They were trying to think of everything. There was a time when we thought maybe I would produce and not be on the show in the same capacity. You know, I've been at this for a long time, and I feel ready to move on, but they were trying to find a way to make it work. There were a lot of scenarios. I had very open conversations with Dawn Ostroff. We tried, but they ultimately said, "You know what? This is just too complicated." And I felt SO glad, because I don't think it would've been the same show for another 13. We were trying to find a way we could have a slightly easier schedule, and there was really no way to do that and still have it be Gilmore Girls.I think it's very telling here that she says that it's the network that in Lauren's terms, said, "This is just too complicated." You look at the rest of the interview where Lauren confirms that they were doing it more as a season finale than a series finale, wrapping it more as a season finale than a series finale, that no matter how positive a spin she puts on it, it's the network that backed away.
That just gives us all the more reason to send flowers and letters and stuff to Ostroff *specifically.*
Also, I think with the situation with actors starting to burn out on the 12-16 hour days that they have to go through to do one-hour shows has just gotten to the breaking point -- Vincent D'Onofrio's exhaustion on L&O: Criminal Intent -- which I now actually believe -- Mark Harmon essentially ousting Don Bellisario from NCIS due to the latter's chaotic production practices that had already pushed Sasha Alexander off the show two years ago (Wow, I bet Alexander is feeling vindicated right about now.), the many complaints that actors on one-hour shows have that generally include comments where they wish they were doing a sitcom instead due to the shorter hours. It's practically a cliche now. (And note: I hadn't actually read what Lauren says about maybe wanting to do a half-hour sitcom in the future later in the interview as I was writing this, I had to come back and add this parenthetical). The system that's in place now, where, really, the cinematography/lighting takes hours and hours to set up, leaving a lot of hurry-up and wait time isn't a realistic practice in the first place, but add to that the breakneck speed at which Gg dialogue has to be spoken (which means a lot of retakes) and frankly, IMO, the gals' demands were absolutely on-target. It's a system of making television that is breaking down in slow motion and Gg is now one of the casualties of it.
Seems to me like there's no reason why The CW couldn't work with Lauren and Alexis on a more relaxed schedule. I mean, geez, how hard could it be to take 2 to 2 1/2 weeks of 8-10 hour days to film an episode rather than 7-8 days of 12-16-hour days that just kills the actors? Do the show at an actual human pace, bank 'em and start airing them in late January, air them straight through, no repeats and give the show a proper send-off. Perhaps the only reason that they wouldn't want to do something like that is that they'd want it to start airing in the fall rather than in January.
Seems to me that reading between the lines, Graham might be saying, "You still want us, you've got to give us that more relaxed schedule we need." And that doesn't seem to be an unreasonable demand to me.
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Were you happy with the show creatively this season?Graham: I was happy with the PROCESS. I really enjoyed the writers. I felt every year, even under Amy's leadership, that the show evolved. For the last episode, we tried to match the final shot with the first scene from the pilot, . . .Oh, I do so hate to interrupt Lauren, but I suspected that when Ausiello had said a few weeks back that the season finale was going to bring it back full circle to the pilot that it was going to be to the first scene of the pilot and not the last scene of the pilot (as many others had predicted.) Oh, yay, it's the return of the "you look like you could be sisters" jokes. I do want to compain about that because, well, from where I'm standing, it's predictible (I won't say whether I think it's predictable in a trite way until I see it.)
... so we went back and watched the pilot — which I haven't seen for so long. And the show is really different from that pilot, which was more dramatic at the time than your typical WB show. And I think it evolved and got more comedic over the years; every year was an evolution. This year was strange sometimes because I had a lot less to say, and that was really weird. For some people I'm sure that was great, but I would find myself in long scenes where I was not rattling on, and it was just really weird to me. And so I did sort of question, "Are we keeping this character consistent?" And they were responsive to me.--------------------------
I heard that you requested some changes to the finale script…Graham: How do you hear these things Mike!? Where will all your moles go now that the show is over! (Laughs)Well, I know an inside joke when I see one! This pretty much confirms for me a suspicion that I've had for the past couple of years that
Lauren is/was Michael's mole.
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Do you think Luke and Lorelai fans will be satisfied with how things end?Graham: Yeah. You know, the other thing I felt strongly about is that this is a show that is ultimately about these girls. It started with this mother-daughter relationship, and we haven't been a show where big events happen, so I always worried that there would be some pressure to… (Laughs) My extreme example was always, "Double wedding! If the show ends with a double ending I don't know what I'm going to do!" I just didn't want there to be a big event, but there's definitely a DIRECTION that I think will be satisfying.I take it that Lauren hasn't seen Spider-Man 3 yet.
Without spoiling anything about SM3 (those who have seen it will know what I mean), a satisfying "direction" without a satisfying *ending* isn't a series ending, it's an unresolved cliffhanger. It's an incomplete story, no matter how much, as with SM3, I liked it. I agree that a double wedding would have been far more ridiculously predictible than even mirroring the opening scene of the pilot could ever be, but speaking as someone who is NOT an LL Shipper, 4 episodes of the start of a tentative reconciliation does NOT balance out 14 episodes of the Lor-Chris storyline (which I nevertheless liked).
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Are you going to try and get her (Amy) to divulge the final four words she had planned to end the series with?Graham: Oh, right — I forgot about that. I think she would've given it up to me had we known this was the end. That was the other weird thing about ending the show like this. When we finished, there was a 50/50 chance we'd be returning. So when we left the wrap party, we were like, "Bye! See ya next season!" I mean it was emotional, but it would've been much more emotional. But HAD she known, I think she would've given it up and we would've worked it in.I'm reading between the lines right here and IMO Lauren is definitely being a trooper and spin-doctoring her tremendous heart out in her answer above (as welll as throughout this interview), but it's clear in those words above that it was the network's unwillingness to make the working days a lighter schedule that took her and everybody else by surprise. I know that she said that she was going back and forth about whether or not she wanted to continue doing the show all year, but if she really *were* planning on ending it this season, to be prepared for it, she would have gotten those words out of Amy somewhere around, oh, January or so, when the first rumors of the rewrite of the season finale to a quieter ending had surfaced. It's not as if it wasn't forseeable that this could have been the final season.
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Favorite memories?Graham: Oh, gosh. There was a real kind of HIGH — that's the only way I can describe it — when we'd get these big athletic speeches and then nail it after 35 takes. (Laughs) And that is a feeling that I really haven't had with another part. Just this… I can't explain it. The closest I can come is sort of in musical theater. To do that language all systems have to be go; you have to really have a lot of concentration. And THAT feeling was really exhilarating. I'll miss that experience as an actor. There's just a specific kind of sense of humor and music to the way [Amy] would write these speeches that I'll really miss. And these are people that I loved, whether I see them every day or not. Alexis and I fell over laughing man, many times — partially out of exhaustion. (Laughs) We really bonded in a very unique way. And I'll miss the feeling of [being around] a crew, all of whom I know and feel really at home with and really supported by. That was not an easy show to do and that crew was really great.That's why they really needed to start limiting the days to 8-10 hour workdays. 12-16 (often expressed at Gg as 12-14, but on average for one-hour shows, it's 12-16) is just ridonkulously brutal. And I say that as someone who did 16-hour days six days per week for four months in a summer stock program. You cannot maintain that pace (even five days a week) without burning out. It's flat-out slavery hours.
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So, when's the Gilmore Girls reunion?Graham: (Laughs) We're totally doing the Gilmore Girls movie. I'm never, ever going to do anything else. There's Gilmore Girls: The Musical. The line of clothing called Lorelai. And the perfume called Stars Hollow... You know, I'm promoting Evan Almighty, which comes out in June. And I have been reading a lot. And sleeping. (Laughs) But I'm auditioning for things, and I'm going to try and do another movie soon.If I were her, I wouldn't necessarily want to joke about doing a Gilmore Girls movie. I think they need to do at the very least a 2-hour movie "special event" thing to cap the series, either on the network as a sweeps stunt next November or to do it straight to DVD. Yes, no double wedding, but geez, at least
a wedding. Lor and Luke. Rory pregnant and single. Stuff like that. Again, all the more reason to keep on dead ahead with the campaign. Not giving up resulted in a Farscape miniseries and a Serenity movie to wrap up those series satisfactorily even when the fan campaigns demanded another season. See, fans can meet the network and the actors in the middle, too, y'know.
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Would you do another TV series?Graham: I would do another TV series, but not right away. I love TV. I think I'd do a half-hour single camera. ... The laughing you're hearing is from me, Rob. She's *got* to really mean a three-camera half-hour -- ie: a sitcom -- here. One-camera half-hours such as The Office, Scrubs, 30 Rock and even Malcolm in the Middle actually take nearly as much time to film as one-hour shows like Gg due to the lighting set-ups, the number of takes and stylistic demands of the format, such as Scrubs's surrealism and 30 Rock's Gilmore-ish, machine-gun-speed dialogue.
... But I'm going to really just enjoy this time and make sure I'm ready to do something new. If I had the best thing in front of me right now I don't know that I'd be able to be excited about it 'cause I think [you have to make room] to let the other thing pass. So, yeah, I'd love to take a year and see what else I can do.--------------------------
Anything you'd like to say to the fans?Graham: Just that I've been truly thankful for their support and for their fanaticism (laughs) and their investment in these characters through all the ups and downs of a seven year process. I can't tell you what a kick I get out of [hearing from the fans], especially the younger people over the years who have grown up with the show and have [developed] a bond with a family member from a different generation while watching it together. I hope when I'm 55 and I've been out of a job for a long time and those girls are running the studios that they remember Lorelai Gilmore.The show will be much better remembered with 13 more episodes that end on a series resolution rather than on a season resolution. (Was that too Emily-like of me?) Lauren gave us several openings to keep continuing to press The CW for 13 more episodes. Again, these are the people that uncancelled 7th Heaven just hours before the Upfronts last year, so Lauren's just given us all the more reason to campaign the CW to go back to the negotiating table and, among other things offer Lauren and Alexis a schedule that lets them have a life and maintains their health and gives the show the epilogue that the viewers deserve to have. "Full Circle" moments actually tend to happen in literature and movies *before* the epilogue and aren't the epilogue themselves. Except in really confusing time-travel storylines.
-- Rob
PS: I
did cut out half of the interview, y'know.
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Season 8: Because it's still a week and a half until the Upfronts and weirder and
LATER things have happened to bring a show back after actors have given their supposedly final interviews.
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