(On a soundstage representing an open field filled with fake flora, fake fauna, fake water, and a monorail, a television show’s cast and crew members move about purposefully in preparing for the scene they are about to film)
Cast Member 1: (To Makeup Artist applying touch-ups) I agree it adds to the mood and tension of a set piece, but when there’s that little ambient lighting for a night scene, then no one watching will be able to figure out what on Earth is going on, and all that mood and tension’ll mean absolutely nothing!
Makeup Artist: (Gives several final pats on the face with an applicator) Mm-hm – please stop talking.
Cast Member 1: Got it.
Cast Member 2: (Walks over to Cast Member 1 as Makeup Artist finishes and leaves) Hey – you ready for our scene later today or you want to go over it one more time?
Cast Member 1: Eh, I think we’ve prepped enough. It’s gonna be a lot of yelling so I don’t want to wear out my vocal cords beforehand, know what I mean?
Cast Member 2: I guess. Still think it might be more effective if you don’t yell.
Cast Member 1: And still agree to disagree. Don’t yell all you want; I’m ramping it up all the notches.
Cast Member 2: You do you. Kind of looking forward to it, actually: we’ve been building up to this all season, and I think the writers did a good job with our ultimate showdown. Should be fun to finally act it out for reals.
Cast Member 1: And to watch. I think the fans’ll be extremely satisfied the way this plays out – can’t wait to hear the buzz the day after it airs, that’s always a thrill.
Cast Member 2: When’ll that be do you think, six months from now?
Cast Member 1: Your guess is as good as mine with the way the network schedule’s been lately. (Sighs while surveying the fake sunnily-lit scene) I still have to pinch myself every day that we get to do this for a living.
Cast Member 2: (Surveys the fake landscape as well) Definitely. And the fans’ve been so supportive, and there’s been so much momentum with the show, for the first time in my career I can almost take a deep breath with the promise of job security.
Cast Member 1: Sweet. (Showrunner enters the soundstage, surrounded by staff) Whelp, here comes the maestro to give us our monthly pep talk.
Cast Member 2: Hope it’s shorter than the last one; I almost forgot my lines for the day by the time it was over.
Showrunner: All right everybody, huddle up! Got some news.
(Cast and crew members gather in a large circle)
Cast Member 3: (Mutters to Cast Member 4) Let me guess: we’re all fired.
Cast Member 4: (Laughs) Paranoia.
Cast Member 5: (To Showrunner) Are we getting out early today for the holiday?
Showrunner: Oh, today’s a holiday?
Cast Member 5: Yes, but clearly never mind about that.
Showrunner: Good, `cause it’s about to be ruined. Just got the word from the studio that after the season finale airs on whenever date, that’s… well… no easy way to say this… I was told that that’s it. As in, it.
(Stunned silence)
Cast Member 1: “It” being… the season finale? We know that.
Cast Member 2: I think our leader’s trying to tell us that it’s going to be the series finale.
Cast Member 3: (To Cast Member 4) Called it.
Cast Member 4: (Eyes still wide with shock) That you did.
Cast Member 1: (Shakes head in disbelief) Wait a minute, are you saying that the show got cancelled? Permanently?!
Showrunner: Yes.
Cast Member 1: …After one season?!
Showrunner: Shocking, I know. But not unprecedented.
Cast Member 1: “Shocking”?! It is MIND-BOGGLING. We were voted the #1 Crime Procedural/Sci-Fi/Sit-Com/Western/Family Drama just last week!
Cast Member 2: And you know the fans really love the show, and even the critics are giving it good reviews – what happened?!
Showrunner: Well –
Cast Member 3: I’ll tell you what happened. (Everyone turns to Cast Member 3, who starts counting off fingers) We got pre-empted too many times by live sports; the times we are on the air, the episodes get shuffled around so much that some storylines make no sense whatsoever; the studio didn’t know how to market a multi-genre series; and you – (Points to Showrunner) overplayed the long game.
Showrunner: Me?! What’re you talking about: I fought tooth-and-nail every day to get this show the love it deserved!
Cast Member 3: You also wrote in too many storylines with too many characters and too many open-ended arcs that promise to pay off in five years but deep down we all know they never will! We may have a core group of dedicated fans, but everyone else lost interest!
Showrunner: Nah-uh! I perfected the magic formula to get people obsessed!
Cast Member 4: You’re certainly right about that: I’ve gotten the weirdest fan mail asking me if I secretly know where my true father is and why I’m hiding that from my friends on the show. Do I? Am I?
Showrunner: Yes and yes, but that was gonna be the big reveal in Season 3.
Cast Member 3: You see! That’s exactly what I’m talking about – you planned so far ahead that you gave the audience nothing now. You’re a big tease!
Showrunner: Am not!
Cast Member 3: Oh yeah? (Gestures to Cast Member 1 and Cast Member 2) What about these two?
Showrunner: What about them?
Cast Member 2: Yes, why am I being dragged into this?
Cast Member 3: As far back as Episode – Freakin’ – 1 – scratch that, as far back as the Pilot – you started right out of the gate with the “will-they-won’t-they” shenanigans, and the only outcomes from doing that super-early are that they break up by the end of Season 2 because everyone’s tired of them, or it’s dragged out so long that they wind up never hooking up at all and one or both of them go off with someone else, and the fans hate it either way!
Cast Member 1: I would like to point out that while that angle may have been introduced a tad early in the series, I think the relationship is being developed tastefully and with mutual respect –
Cast Member 5: (Scrolling through a phone) It says here there were over 5,000 fanfiction stories shipping you two immediately after the Pilot aired.
Cast Member 1: Hm. (To Cast Member 2) Guess I should’ve toned down the smoldering stares a bit.
Cast Member 2: I’ll say – after every episode airs I keep getting messages: “Why haven’t you two gotten together yet?” “What are you waiting for?” “Now kiss!” “Stop denying you’re made for each other!”
Cast Member 1: Wow. People sure are impatient.
Cast Member 2: I would be too if a couple with our regrettably intense chemistry got dangled in front of me at the outset, and then the brakes were applied almost immediately. You gotta give the fans something to daydream about during their tedious work hours.
Cast Member 1: It’s called a SLOW BURN – if you rush it, you ruin it!
Cast Member 4: I thought the issue was it’s moving too fast?
Cast Member 5: I thought our show was about crime and sci-fi and family drama and all those other things; I didn’t think it was a romance.
Cast Member 2: Lotta people latched onto the one romance part.
Cast Member 1: Which is fine, in small doses! We actually should’ve put the brakes on it even harder and not even held eye contact for longer than three seconds until at least the Season 2 premier!
Showrunner: Which is all a moot point since there now is no Season 2.
Cast Member 4: Aw, and you’d promised I was going to have my very own me-centric episode that had to get pushed back to next season since the studio cut down the number of episodes they’re airing `cause of all the live sports stuff.
Showrunner: Yeah, glad I never did get around to writing that ep.
Cast Member 4: What?!
Showrunner: Which reminds me: five of the episodes we actually did film are going to get cut, too.
Cast Members 1-5: WHAT?!
Showrunner: The only time slots they could give me for the rest of the season this year were after 2 a.m. Maybe. If the post-game recap ended early.
Cast Member 1: And whose bright idea was it to air our show after a game every single week?!
Showrunner: There’s some game on every single night, and we’re the newbie on the block so we get the expendable time slots. Maybe by Season 5 we would’ve been eligible for prime time Sunday night.
Cast Members 1-5: (Stare into space in reverie) Prime time Sunday night….
Cast Member 2: Hold on – is one of the episodes that got cut the one where I did the stunt it took me three months to train for?
Showrunner: (Twitchily) Yes.
Cast Member 2: (Stares coldly at Showrunner) There are no words.
Cast Member 5: And another thing –
Showrunner: Arrrrggghhh, what?!
Cast Member 5: We’re still filming. If our season finale is now our series finale, no storylines are wrapped up and the script left it on a cliffhanger. Are you going to rewrite any of it?
Cast Member 1: (To self as eyes widen in horror) Oh no, more lines I’ve gotta memorize….
Showrunner: There’s no time to rewrite; we’re getting shut down as soon as we wrap. (Waves arms around at the set) This whole soundstage’s getting taken over by a game show next week.
Cast Member 4: You mean they’re not even going to keep all this pretty fake nature around? Don’t let the crew who built it find that out.
Crew Member 1: Too late, but we’re used to it.
Cast Member 1: Back up a moment – next week? You scheduled us for another month to finish the two-parter!
Showrunner: Two-parter’s now a one-parter.
Cast Members 1-5: Ohhhhh....
Showrunner: Yeah: I’ve got no time to rewrite, yet I’m expected to chop, chop, chop it all up anyway!
Cast Member 2: So I’m guessing the emotional reunion with our long-lost comrade is one of the scenes on the chopping block.
Showrunner: Yep – I told that actor a little while ago not to bother coming back in; wasn’t happy that their final scene on the show is now being knocked unconscious like a wimp.
Cast Member 3: Don’t tell me the huge scene showing that my character’s had amnesia this whole time without knowing it is now, what, gone too?!
Showrunner: Yeah, that plotline seems rather pointless now.
Cast Member 4: Will we still get to film the big chase scene with all the cars and the trucks and the spaceships and the horses and… (Trails off as the other stare back) Answered my own question.
Cast Member 1: (To Showrunner) Bottom line: what’s the actual last scene to the series now? Are we at least keeping the whole epic conclusion where we sail off into the supernova while singing “Happy Birthday”?
Showrunner: Our special effects budget was reallocated to the game show, so everything going forward has to be practical effects or reused footage.
Cast Member 1: We’ve been reduced to black box theater; I get it.
Cast Member 2: Speaking of theater, I think now’s the perfect time for me to return to Broadway – it seems that’s where I really belong after all.
Cast Member 1: Oh come on, everyone leaves Broadway to do TV and movies! You only go back when you’re an actual star so the audience claps for your entrances and no one else’s!
Cast Member 2: Well at least I have something to fall back on – this was supposed to be your big break, and now the proverbial rug’s been proverbially pulled out from under your proverbial unprepared feet.
Cast Member 1: Don’t I know it! (To Showrunner) Do you realize how many gigs I turned down because this show was supposed to be The One?!
Showrunner: You’re telling me! This – (Waves arms around at the set again) was my show! All of it, every last piece of fakery, was my baby!
Cast Member 1: Oh please: you’ve got five other shows and two movies going on as we speak!
Showrunner: Well….
Cast Member 1: (Gasps in horror) You probably wanted this one to fail, so you could concentrate on the others that’ll make more money, and meanwhile this show will be forever enshrined in “Cult Classic” status and everyone will feel sorry for you for how it all went down – DIABOLICAL!
Crew Member 2: Excuse me – (The others turn to listen) if we’re not actually going to work today, can we call it quits and start prepping for the game show?
Showrunner: No-no, everyone’s still working on this show until the bitter end; we owe it to the fans if nothing else! And all your contracts say so.
Others: Aw, yeah, right, union, guild….
Showrunner: So! Much shorter scripts will be sent to you this afternoon; get your belongings out of your cubby holes before next Friday; let’s finish this beautiful thing we created together on the highest note that will resound throughout the halls of classic TV-dom forever; don’t let the fans down! (Exits the soundstage, surrounded by staff)
Cast Member 1: (To Cast Members 2-5) I don’t know about you, but whatever character motivation I had is all gone now.
Cast Member 2: Same. I think the wind’s been taken out of our sails for that scene we’re maybe doing later: it’ll be hard to get all emotional about characters whose arcs got cut extremely short.
Cast Member 5: Well, it was fun while it lasted, right?
Cast Member 3: Yeah, I did have a blast even knowing the whole time we’d never make it past Season 1. I’m honestly surprised we made it past Episode 1.
Cast Member 4: You think the fans’ll still like the show in 20-something years as much as they do now?
Cast Member 1: I think so. The only good thing to come out of all this is that it got cancelled before it got bad.
