Exclusive Chris Boucher Interview

CHRIS BOUCHER
EXCLUSIVE INTERVIEW

Summer 2002

I found this a difficult first interview. Chris Boucher has been interviewed so many times before it was difficult to come up with different questions. Understandably Chris had also forgotten many particulars over the long period of time since it was filmed. Chris was very patient and this is cobbled together from 3 sets of questions with almost all the ones he was unable to help with left out. So if you do find it a bit patchy my apologies.

To help me with the technology/physics of the series is there any books you particularly used in reference for the series?

Regarding the books - nothing really that comes to mind - I used to read New Scientist regularly (the easy non-mathmatical bits) - there was the Illustrated Encyclopedia of Space Technology (Kenneth Gatland) - and anything not too technical from the astronomy/planetary guides/gee-wizzery sections of the library and/or remaindered bookshops. Just general reader stuff.

What does E.S.L. stand for?

I'm ashamed to say I don't remember - European Space Launcher possibly (Lifter? Lab?)

How do you think the series would have differed if you had written all of the scripts?

There would have been no Japanese character but apart from that I don't know. In practical terms I might have been a bit more confident (less angrily strident) in my dealings with the producer. He didn't like me and I didn't like him so it was in his interest to bring in other writers. As it turned out it seems he managed to offend them as well so maybe it wasn't all my fault. And I would have made more money than I did of course.

How do you think the series has aged?

Badly I expect. I haven't watched it for a while but almost nothing ages faster than science fiction, except possibly science fiction writers... Last time I watched I enjoyed listening to my dialogue but that's just a personal quirk.

You have previously mentioned the possibility of continuing the Star Cops novels. What is the likelihood of this occurring?

It's unlikely I think. Writing's hard and I'm basically lazy. I only work well (or pretty much at all) when somebody commissions me and pays me part of the fee up front. I'm not quite sure why but I actually enjoy writing then. Work without payment is a hobby or a vocation and for me writing has never been either.

I understand in the star cops setting there were just under 3000 people in space and 20 odd ISPF. Where were they all?

Off camera.

Moonbase 3 is often described as a predecessor of Star Cops. Were any influences drawn from this or any other fictional work?

Not consciously but everything you read, hear and watch will affect what you think, write, and say. Like the man said: take from one source and it's plagiarism, take from more than one and it's research.

A crew member has stated that the BBC intended 3 series of ten episodes of Star Cops. On another occasion it was reported that the BBC had approved a second series being made. Is there any truth in these comments?

Not that I'm aware of though I would probably have been the last to know.

I understand that there were differences of opinion in casting for the characters you created. Which actors did you have in mind for the five main characters?

I did originally intend Spring to be markedly younger than Devis but apart from that I can't remember having specific actors in mind. In the event I thought the performances were fine.

What is your opinion on the merits and deficiencies of each of the nine episodes?

I would have to watch them all again to be able even to attempt to answer that. And to be honest I don't think I really want to go there.

What is the answer to the question in the final episode "anyone for Mars?"? my money has always been on David Theroux.

Until I sat down and began to write I genuinely don't know. Since that's not going to happen now your bet is as good as anyone's, including mine.

With the big ring project/s, a full time commander and the ordering of a large number of lasers it appeared that the ISPF was in for a time of great change. How did you envisage the ISPF developing?

There would have been at least two - maybe three - separate bases of operation each with its own personnel. That would have been the basic framework. The detail and the stories would have come if and when they paid me to sit down and think.

I am interested in how you actually come up with the ideas and construct your stories, getting the clues, location and suspect all to mesh together in an interesting plotline. What's your method?

I don't think I actually have a method. I have a plot idea - a variation on a news story I've heard or an idea I've found interesting, something like that, and then given a series framework or production limits I set out to write it. It sounds a bit haphazard but I just sort of follow my nose and hope it all works out in the end. I'm not above going back and correcting something that doesn't quite fit but as far as I remember that didn't seem to happen all that often. I do work carefully scene by scene though and try to make each one complete and right (and hopefully entertaining) before I move on to the next one - maybe that gives my brain time to work out how to get where I want to go.

As you mentioned in one of your answers the dialogue on the show is a particular strong point. How do you get into the mindset of the different characters and write all those witty lines?

All characters have to come from inside yourself and anyone who says differently is even less sane than the rest of us. I'm glad you find the lines witty - I've been accused of being glib, but then I think glib is fine. I began by writing three line quickies (basically a comedy sketch told in three lines of dialogue). Funny is quick but quick takes time to work out. And witty is what you wish you'd said at the time but didn't think of till much later. Like the man said - brevity is the soul of wit. All of which waffle means I have no idea...

Having read old versions of an instinct for murder and comparing them with the TV version it was fascinating watching it evolve from the starting version to the one we know. I was a bit surprised from what you had said in interviews that the novel did not more closely follow the early version.

The novelisation was closer to the later version because it was a novelisation that I thought I might be able to sell and tv is what's broadcast not what you wish had been broadcast. I elaborated and corrected what I saw as some of the more irritating failures and mistakes in the final production but that was all really. Plus when you've worked a thing over and over you tend to forget and discount the first version. Plus I'm lazy of course...