Post by fe_mcphee on Sept 23, 2006 6:44:15 GMT 10
From observateur at AEB
Greetings ER Fans -
First, let me thank you for your loyalty over the years. Secondly, thanks for joining me for premiere night. I'm excited to hear what you think. I'll return after the broadcast to answer your questions about this season, past seasons and anything else you might be wondering about (and, no, George Clooney will not be back this year!).
Talk to you soon,
David
I'm at my computer and ready for your questions
Ask away!
My Role as an Executive Producer
Let me explain what my job is on the show. As the EP and showrunner on the show, I first and foremost am in charge of all scripts and stories. That means I run the writers room and write a lot of scripts, though I have other writers who also work on scripts.
I'm also invovled in casting, choosing music, location scouting. I'm involved in all the creative aspects of the show. Every creative element of the show I'm somehow involved in.
Ensemble Drama
Over the course of the 13 years, it's always been an ensemble drama but there's always been someone at the center of the drama. At the beginning it was Tony Edwards and then Noah Wyle. Now it's more Maura Tierney. SHe's a fantastic actress who is willing to explore any facet of human behavior, which makes it really exciting for the audience to watch her.
As for the baby, the baby is still in jeopardy at the end of the episode and epsiode 2 is really an incredible episode that explores how a lot of the relationships in the ER are worked through as everyone is waiting to see the baby through to health.
About the music on the show
The music is a key element in the show. Marty Davitch is our composer and he does beautiful score for us. Ann Kline helps us find and choose good songs for the show. Often in the case on the show, a song that makes it way in will be something I may have been listening to while I was writing it, cause I like to listen to get in the right place. So the David Grey song you heard tonight was something that was in my CD player while I was writing it.
In terms of composed music, Marty and I and some of the others involved will talk about the type of music we want in various scenes. Last year, we tried to go for a sound that was a little bit fresh, something that was different than we had done in ER over the years.
The New Opening Music
There are a lot of challenges to programming and we felt that the opening titles were a little long and we wanted to take that time and use it for story, which is why this year's theme music is shorter than previous seasons.
General changes/plans for this season
My goal as the showrunner is to make the show feel like a new show and to fight repetition or complacency in terms of the stories we're telling or the characters we're portraying. The show has been blessed by having great actors and also great new actors, which keeps the show alive and vibrant and is a big reason for its longevity.
This year, we're excited by a number of things, including the addition of John Stamos, whose character will bring a shot of adrenaline to season. His story, in terms of the workplace and butting heads with other characters - and romantic storylines -- I think audiences will find him exciting and entertaining.
We also have a long, multiple episode arc that I think fans will find exciting and incredible. It's a great arc that will allow an actor to create a character that is very powerful and that actor is Forest Whitaker. His character begins in a few episodes and his arc will be a very strong one, focusing on Kovac and Abby.
Stylistically, we think the show is great in and of itself but we always want to try and mix it up a little bit so we're not resting on our laurels, which is why we sometimes try different music, editing styles, or kinds of stories that we haven't done before. Things like this contribute to our efforts to keep the show vital.
Noah Wyle
NBC is committed to two more seasons of ER and we will certainly see Noah Wyle in that time. We will at some point see him in Chicago with our other characters
John Stamos
Last season when John Stamos was on the show there was a suggestion of some chemistry behind him and Neela and that will indeed continue. There is a mutual attraction between those characters.
Stamos’s character is a very charming, confident guy who tends to overstep his position as an intern in the hospital when he comes on to work at the ER. He has a fair amount of baggage connected with his service in the Persian Gulf and has some backstory that’s connected to that. And he will be butting heads with some of the other characters in the ER. And one other thing, the character has a full romantic life that you need to tune in for!
Length of Shooting Time
Normal episodes take 8 days to fill. On a more complicated episode it might take 9 or 10.
Arcing out Storylines
Some elements of the storylines are planned for the whole season. For example last season, I knew before we started that the season finale was going to end with Abby pregnant and in jeopardy in the floor in the trauma room. So in cases of certain big storylines we will know that over a year in advance.
Right now, we do know elements of the entire season but there are places where there are gaps, but we have fully worked out the first 13 episodes.
The realistic look of ER
I think that tonight’s episode was a very good example of how well made an episode of ER is. It was exceptionally well directed by Stephen Cragg. It was a complicated show with lots of element sand Stephen got them all, including the POV shot of the car during the chase, which we shot outside of Chicago.
For the visual scopt and realism of the show, we make four trips a year to Chicago and we really try to use that city as a character in the show and try to enhance the filmmaking and the storytelling by going on location there. We have a great relationship with Chicago.
Show Research
The writers and actors periodically visit real ERs to observe and do research. It’s become harder because of recent privacy laws, but we also do various events where we have real ER doctors and nurses come in to tell about their experiences. We’ll have a nurses night, a doctors night, an attendings night. It really helps the actors and writers.
A few years after coming on the show, I went to a real ER that was a little grittier – in New Orleans, actually – and I was there for about five days to try and come up with storylines and characters to help us maintain the realism of the show as much as we can.
Reuniting Goran and Maura
It was the chemistry between Goran and Maura cause it felt like a real relationship between two people who were both damaged and looking for happiness. I felt and the show felt that we needed to have a couple that you could root for and that hasn’t happened for a while. So that seemed like a dramatic and compelling story to tell after having had a very problematic and conflicted relationship.
Chemistry is one of those things you can never count on – it just happens. If you’re smart and you’re writing for a TV show, you find a way to take advantage of that and with Goran and Maura that’s what we decided to do.
Michael Crichton's Involvement
Michael Crichton created the show but John Wells developed the show and managed it day-to-day and seen it through 13 years.
Two Seperate Threads in a Single Show
There are two separate elements to the show… more than two, but two main ones.
One is the personal storyline and what’s going on in the characters’ lives. And the other is the medical storylines on the show. The first evolves out of the writers’ own personal/family experiences and things we’ve observed that we can use to find new and interesting, and sometimes comedic, things for the characters.
On the medical side, we try to keep abreast of what’s new in the medical world and what are some new interesting medical issues that the show can shed some light on.
Sometimes when I’m writing an episode I want to tell particular kinds of stories. I’ll sit down with the two doctors who write on the show and ask them to help me build the medical story around the character story.
A clear example of that would be the Ray Liotta episode. I knew I wanted to tell a story about a character dying in real-time in the ER and tell the entire life story of a character over a single episode and I knew what kind of guy that he would be. Once I knew that, I sat down with the doctors and asked them to help me figure out what the medical plotline would be to help tell that personal story.
The personal side of the story was very close to me cause it came out of my own personal stories and something I felt very deeply. The medical side was more of how to form the plot.
Dr. Weaver
We did an arc toward the end of last season about Weaver having surgery correcting her congenital hip injury. In episode 19, I think, of last season we saw her put the cane in her locker and walk in the ER unimpeded.
There’s only 22 a year and shame on you for missing any of them! Seriously, I hope you get to check it out in reruns cause it was a really good episode.
Snow Globes
In the Christmas episode four years ago, which I wrote, you could tell that Kovac missed Abby and he was her secret Santa and gave her a snowglobe, so that's where the snowglobe thing began between them. It was in an episode called "Hindsight."
Goodnight everyone
It’s been really fun and interesting to read here what you guys have to say and I appreciate your watching and your intelligent response to what you’re seeing. We’re going to keep trying to do a great show and I hope you stay tuned cause this season is going to be one of the best seasons ever. I look forward to reading more of your responses in the future, and get ready for a wild ride!
Greetings ER Fans -
First, let me thank you for your loyalty over the years. Secondly, thanks for joining me for premiere night. I'm excited to hear what you think. I'll return after the broadcast to answer your questions about this season, past seasons and anything else you might be wondering about (and, no, George Clooney will not be back this year!).
Talk to you soon,
David
I'm at my computer and ready for your questions
Ask away!
My Role as an Executive Producer
Let me explain what my job is on the show. As the EP and showrunner on the show, I first and foremost am in charge of all scripts and stories. That means I run the writers room and write a lot of scripts, though I have other writers who also work on scripts.
I'm also invovled in casting, choosing music, location scouting. I'm involved in all the creative aspects of the show. Every creative element of the show I'm somehow involved in.
Ensemble Drama
Over the course of the 13 years, it's always been an ensemble drama but there's always been someone at the center of the drama. At the beginning it was Tony Edwards and then Noah Wyle. Now it's more Maura Tierney. SHe's a fantastic actress who is willing to explore any facet of human behavior, which makes it really exciting for the audience to watch her.
As for the baby, the baby is still in jeopardy at the end of the episode and epsiode 2 is really an incredible episode that explores how a lot of the relationships in the ER are worked through as everyone is waiting to see the baby through to health.
About the music on the show
The music is a key element in the show. Marty Davitch is our composer and he does beautiful score for us. Ann Kline helps us find and choose good songs for the show. Often in the case on the show, a song that makes it way in will be something I may have been listening to while I was writing it, cause I like to listen to get in the right place. So the David Grey song you heard tonight was something that was in my CD player while I was writing it.
In terms of composed music, Marty and I and some of the others involved will talk about the type of music we want in various scenes. Last year, we tried to go for a sound that was a little bit fresh, something that was different than we had done in ER over the years.
The New Opening Music
There are a lot of challenges to programming and we felt that the opening titles were a little long and we wanted to take that time and use it for story, which is why this year's theme music is shorter than previous seasons.
General changes/plans for this season
My goal as the showrunner is to make the show feel like a new show and to fight repetition or complacency in terms of the stories we're telling or the characters we're portraying. The show has been blessed by having great actors and also great new actors, which keeps the show alive and vibrant and is a big reason for its longevity.
This year, we're excited by a number of things, including the addition of John Stamos, whose character will bring a shot of adrenaline to season. His story, in terms of the workplace and butting heads with other characters - and romantic storylines -- I think audiences will find him exciting and entertaining.
We also have a long, multiple episode arc that I think fans will find exciting and incredible. It's a great arc that will allow an actor to create a character that is very powerful and that actor is Forest Whitaker. His character begins in a few episodes and his arc will be a very strong one, focusing on Kovac and Abby.
Stylistically, we think the show is great in and of itself but we always want to try and mix it up a little bit so we're not resting on our laurels, which is why we sometimes try different music, editing styles, or kinds of stories that we haven't done before. Things like this contribute to our efforts to keep the show vital.
Noah Wyle
NBC is committed to two more seasons of ER and we will certainly see Noah Wyle in that time. We will at some point see him in Chicago with our other characters
John Stamos
Last season when John Stamos was on the show there was a suggestion of some chemistry behind him and Neela and that will indeed continue. There is a mutual attraction between those characters.
Stamos’s character is a very charming, confident guy who tends to overstep his position as an intern in the hospital when he comes on to work at the ER. He has a fair amount of baggage connected with his service in the Persian Gulf and has some backstory that’s connected to that. And he will be butting heads with some of the other characters in the ER. And one other thing, the character has a full romantic life that you need to tune in for!
Length of Shooting Time
Normal episodes take 8 days to fill. On a more complicated episode it might take 9 or 10.
Arcing out Storylines
Some elements of the storylines are planned for the whole season. For example last season, I knew before we started that the season finale was going to end with Abby pregnant and in jeopardy in the floor in the trauma room. So in cases of certain big storylines we will know that over a year in advance.
Right now, we do know elements of the entire season but there are places where there are gaps, but we have fully worked out the first 13 episodes.
The realistic look of ER
I think that tonight’s episode was a very good example of how well made an episode of ER is. It was exceptionally well directed by Stephen Cragg. It was a complicated show with lots of element sand Stephen got them all, including the POV shot of the car during the chase, which we shot outside of Chicago.
For the visual scopt and realism of the show, we make four trips a year to Chicago and we really try to use that city as a character in the show and try to enhance the filmmaking and the storytelling by going on location there. We have a great relationship with Chicago.
Show Research
The writers and actors periodically visit real ERs to observe and do research. It’s become harder because of recent privacy laws, but we also do various events where we have real ER doctors and nurses come in to tell about their experiences. We’ll have a nurses night, a doctors night, an attendings night. It really helps the actors and writers.
A few years after coming on the show, I went to a real ER that was a little grittier – in New Orleans, actually – and I was there for about five days to try and come up with storylines and characters to help us maintain the realism of the show as much as we can.
Reuniting Goran and Maura
It was the chemistry between Goran and Maura cause it felt like a real relationship between two people who were both damaged and looking for happiness. I felt and the show felt that we needed to have a couple that you could root for and that hasn’t happened for a while. So that seemed like a dramatic and compelling story to tell after having had a very problematic and conflicted relationship.
Chemistry is one of those things you can never count on – it just happens. If you’re smart and you’re writing for a TV show, you find a way to take advantage of that and with Goran and Maura that’s what we decided to do.
Michael Crichton's Involvement
Michael Crichton created the show but John Wells developed the show and managed it day-to-day and seen it through 13 years.
Two Seperate Threads in a Single Show
There are two separate elements to the show… more than two, but two main ones.
One is the personal storyline and what’s going on in the characters’ lives. And the other is the medical storylines on the show. The first evolves out of the writers’ own personal/family experiences and things we’ve observed that we can use to find new and interesting, and sometimes comedic, things for the characters.
On the medical side, we try to keep abreast of what’s new in the medical world and what are some new interesting medical issues that the show can shed some light on.
Sometimes when I’m writing an episode I want to tell particular kinds of stories. I’ll sit down with the two doctors who write on the show and ask them to help me build the medical story around the character story.
A clear example of that would be the Ray Liotta episode. I knew I wanted to tell a story about a character dying in real-time in the ER and tell the entire life story of a character over a single episode and I knew what kind of guy that he would be. Once I knew that, I sat down with the doctors and asked them to help me figure out what the medical plotline would be to help tell that personal story.
The personal side of the story was very close to me cause it came out of my own personal stories and something I felt very deeply. The medical side was more of how to form the plot.
Dr. Weaver
We did an arc toward the end of last season about Weaver having surgery correcting her congenital hip injury. In episode 19, I think, of last season we saw her put the cane in her locker and walk in the ER unimpeded.
There’s only 22 a year and shame on you for missing any of them! Seriously, I hope you get to check it out in reruns cause it was a really good episode.
Snow Globes
In the Christmas episode four years ago, which I wrote, you could tell that Kovac missed Abby and he was her secret Santa and gave her a snowglobe, so that's where the snowglobe thing began between them. It was in an episode called "Hindsight."
Goodnight everyone
It’s been really fun and interesting to read here what you guys have to say and I appreciate your watching and your intelligent response to what you’re seeing. We’re going to keep trying to do a great show and I hope you stay tuned cause this season is going to be one of the best seasons ever. I look forward to reading more of your responses in the future, and get ready for a wild ride!
