Grace, what a poignant story...and yes, if Three Rivers helps raise awareness about organ donation and gives more people a chance at life, it will have succeeded in my eyes.
I wanted to post about the Donate Life Film Festival, which was held this weekend at the Directors Guild of America on Sunset Blvd. Lunalux and I went on Saturday, June 13th, and met up with a bunch of the SoCal Freshies group there. It was great to see them and I wish we could have spent more time, but my hubby and I had a gig last night and we had to go home soon after the panel ended, in order to get ready. We had a delicious buffet lunch before the panel, and had the opportunity to speak with one of the panelists, Krystal Houghton of CSI: Miami, who was sitting at our table.
After lunch we attended the panel, called "Make 'Em Laugh, Make 'Em Cry: How Organ Donation Storylines Cut Deep." The panel discussion was oriented toward the depiction of organ donation in the media, and how TV shows can do a better job of portraying transplantation accurately. The man who led the panel was from an organization called Donate Life Hollywood, which promotes awareness about organ donation, dispelling myths about organ donation and transplantation, and offering resources to film and TV productions.
The guests were Carol Barbee (executive producer of Three Rivers), Krystal Houghton (a writer-producer for CSI: Miami), and Lyla Oliver (a former writer and producer for Judging Amy and now a writer for Bones). Carol Barbee is Donate Life Hollywood's darling at the moment, since she worked with them closely and got most of the stuff right in their view...
After doing an episode of CSI: Miami on the subject of transplantation, Krystal Houghton received a letter from Donate Life Hollywood, explaining that the show had perpetuated misinformation about the subject. She was asked to participate in the panel and agreed to do so in order to help find ways that writers and producers could do a better job in future shows on the subject. Lyla Oliver wrote an episode of Judging Amy that dealt with transplantation as well, and agreed to be part of the panel in order to help raise awareness of the issue and to give another perspective on the subject. (I think she's a friend of the panel moderator, too.)
We had been expecting to see the entire Three Rivers pilot, but unfortunately, they showed just a 4-minute preview. It showed some more footage than other previews we've seen, but not much more...sigh. It's hard to make any kind of judgment based on the short clips, but it looked pretty gripping to me. I have to say that I was extremely impressed with Carol Barbee's intelligence and thoughtfulness, and after hearing her speak, I have a lot of hope for the show. CBS certainly seems to have faith in it, as they are building hospital sets on the Paramount lot for the show. This was confirmed by Ms. Barbee during the Q&A. She also mentioned that, although the show is being reshot using the new sets and incorporating different actors, they are going to use the same script as before. (My impression: that doesn't mean that they won't tweak the script...I tend to believe the stuff that came out in the LA Times blog about them "warming up" the show by adding more characters and focusing more on the doctors' personal lives.) She said that the main reason they're reshooting is that since they had to use an actual hospital, the action, camera angles, etc., were constrained by space issues. The new sets will allow them more room, higher ceilings, etc. Carol Barbee mentioned that they had worked closely with Donate Life Hollywood and had also spent time at the Cleveland Clinic (where Dr. Gonzalo Gonzalez-Stawinski works) and with a Dr. Gorman at a clinic in Pittsburgh. Dr. Gorman is a consultant for the show and was in the audience. His hands were used as Alex's "stunt hands" for surgery scenes. (I have to say that I cringed when Carol Barbee pronounced Alex's last name "O'Lofflin"!!!! YEEKS! But Alex wasn't the focus of this panel, and I was proud of his fans for not standing up and yelling at her for her gaffe. Another time, she won't get off so easy, though....)
Most of the Q&A was related to the issue of organ donation and transplantation, since that was the subject of the panel. Another question regarded how to find a balance between accuracy and making a good story. Obviously, one-shots such as the episode of CSI: Miami can't put as much time into showing the true process of organ transplantation. That's why Three Rivers is so important to this organization--they see it as a way of bringing more accurate information to the public and also making it easier for people to choose to become donors (for example, by having their license marked). But even Three Rivers has to condense the process in order to make it work within the context of a story. It was interesting to hear the three panelists talk about how to fit the subject into different genres, such as cop shows or shows like Judging Amy, which had an episode that touched on the subject. Also, there is a long process going from story idea to script to producer to studio to network--and at every step changes can be made to the story that takes it away from the original focus that the writer had in mind. So there's only so much a writer can do to keep a story "on point" with the goals of an organization like Donate Life. All three writers agreed that sometimes, when you have a story you really love, you hesitate to bring it to a studio--because you know they are going to mess with it and it may very well turn out nearly unrecognizable. That was very interesting for me to hear...I hadn't really thought about it before. At least as a fanfic writer, I "own" my stories. Script writers? Not so much.
They talked about the fact that when you create a show, you have to create a world for the show to exist in. So you do a lot of research on that world. For the CSI shows, they work with police and work very hard to create labs, etc. For a show like Judging Amy, they visited many courts and also worked with social workers in order to get the feel right for the world they created. In Three Rivers, that world is the world of organ transplantation, so the producers have consulted with experts to help them portray the world believably, accurately, and still make a compelling show.
Another question involved possible future storylines for Three Rivers, as well as the other shows. One idea was that a donor's family might become unhealthily interested in the recipient, possibly going so far as to stalk them to make sure they "took care" of the donor's organ. (That one made the Donate Life people a little leery!) Another idea is to take the recent news stories about face transplants, and do a multi-episode arc about a person going through that long process.
Alex was nowhere to be seen, unfortunately. Oh well. It was fun anyway.
to you, grace.
pick up... 
to you, Sweetie.
)
