"David Gerrold - The Trouble with Tribbles - The birth, sale, and final production of one episode" - читать интересную книгу автора (Gerrold David)

The difference between myself and all those other hopefuls
is simple—I was the one who made it. (Hey, who’s that gawky
kid rubbing shoulders with the Vulcan?)
And the reason I made it is that I was training to write
for STAR TREK long before there ever was a STAR TREK to write
for. I had always been a reader of science fiction, I had always
wanted to write it; I had wanted to make movies and work in
television as well. And that’s what I studied to do. STAR TREK
provided the opportunity. And this is the story of it.
24 The Trouble With Tribbles

Some of these incidents are fun, some are funny—and several
of them are very special. (And there’s one in particular which
makes me feel very, very good every time I think of it—but I’m
saving the telling of that one for the end.)
So, this book exists for a lot of reasons, but mostly for fun—I
want to answer all of the questions that STAR TREK fans keep
asking me. I want to tell the story of my very first sale as a
professional writer. And I hope to bring back some of the sense
of wonder that we all felt the first time we saw the Enterprise
hurtling through space.
 CHAPT ER ONE
From Winnie the Pooh to Aristotle
or
Getting Ready for Opportunity’s Knock
In 1966, I was a rabbit.
I mention that fact in passing, only to explain why I
missed most of STAR TREK’S first season.
I was in my last year as a Theatre Arts student at San
Fernando Valley State College (now Cal State at Northridge),
and we were doing a children’s show called Winnie the Pooh.
I was the rabbit. Uncle Rabbit, that is; I wore a flowered
waistcoat, wire-rimmed glasses, and a watch-chain with a little
carrot-shaped fob. Under that, I also wore a six-foot rabbit
costume and about twenty pounds of padding, tights and make-
up.


25
26 The Trouble With Tribbles

STAR TREK’S first episode was telecast on Sept. 8, 1966. It
was “Man Trap,” written by George Clayton Johnson. (My
private name for that episode is “The Incredible Salt Vampire.”
I’m not being flippant; it just makes for quick mental
identification.) I watched that episode eagerly—and also
schizophrenically. Half of me was delighted that at last there
was going to be another good science fiction show on television
(there hadn’t been one since the demise of “Twilight Zone”)—
and half of me was nit-picking, looking for things wrong with