JMS' Fairy Tale:

Q: "I'd like to know how many episodes are sold and what plans you have..."

JMS: "For?"

Q: "Crusade."

JMS: "Thank you. It's a very long story. There's stuff I can say, and there's stuff that I can't say. So, I'll tell you what I can say and lie about what I can't say.

"We shot 13 episodes. And TNT will be airing those on June 9 at 10:00, starting then and going straight through, more or less. And we had... they had said they weren't going to do more beyond that, beyond the 13. We tried at that point to take it to the SciFi Channel, but it was so late in the game.... It takes a lot of money to be able support an entire season of a show. The SciFi Channel had already allocated their funds for the year, so they couldn't pick it up. If the show does well, the first 13, then it will be considered for a season, beginning with the second season, on the SciFi Channel. If the show does well, it will go on.

"As for more what happened... let me tell you a fairy tale. And every fairy tale begins with Once Upon A Time...

"...There was writer of songs in a kingdom. And he wasn't the best writer of songs on the entire planet. There were others who were as good or better. And he had written 110 really good songs… and four or five long odes. And they said, 'Do some more songs for us.' And he said, 'Sure.' And he began writing more songs. And those were for this little kingdom which was great. As were the ministers, who had always before worked with him.

"Then the King heard about the new songs that were being commissioned. Not the Emperor. Not the Emperor Theodore and his wife Lady Jane. I ain't talking about them. I'm talking about the lower king of a particular land, all right. I don't want the Emperor getting pissed at me. And he (the King) said, 'Well, I should be involved creatively.'

"And thus there came... runners would come with scrolls, which the singer/songwriter would look at and burn.

"Now this is just a fairy tale. Okay? This is nothing but a fairy tale. This is not about Crusade. Okay? I'm just telling you a story here.

"And the King became wroth. He waxed Wroth, and Wroth wasn't very happy about it. Old joke, I'm sorry.

"So they called for a grand meeting at which, along one long table were ministers, and emissaries, and ambassadors, and functionaries and assistants, and programming - uh,... a whole lot of guys. Now on the other side of the table was the writer of songs. And they had plenty of these huge scrolls in front of them. And they began to open the first one.

"And the writer of songs said, 'no.'

"And they brought someone in with a book to explain to them what the word 'no' meant, because they had never heard it before. And they said, 'no to what?'

"I said... The writer of songs said, in this imaginary story, 'no to all of it. No to all of it in all its parts and pieces, from page 1 to page 20. No to all of it.' The writer of songs felt that what they wanted was, in modern terms, for a moment, sort of Baywatch meets wrestling in space. Which was not applicable, exactly, to our fairy tale scenario. (aside: If I ever work again, it'll be a miracle)

"It became clear that if the King's emissaries were not properly responded to, that they may say, 'you can only write 13 songs.' And the writer of songs said, 'better 13 songs that I can believe in than 22 that I do not.

"So there were 13 songs, and the writer of songs has moved to a different kingdom knowing that the 13 songs were songs that he wanted to hear. And in the 13th song there was a sub-thread in the song about people who come in with suggestions, which is rather similar to the King's situation. Astonishingly, the King saw the 13th song and didn't realize what it was.

"And the writer of songs moved to another kingdom and lived happily ever after.

"And this has nothing to do with Crusade or your question, but I thought I'd tell you that story because it amuses me."

Thanks to Kat for writing this report and thanks to Ranger for sending it in.