Bob Daly, CBS entertainment president, was particularly upset by the decision to restructure the scripts. He was concerned over the ordered rewrites because he could foresee serious problems with the show meeting its airdate deadlines and difficulty in the networks fall promotion campaign.

    Universal Studios took and hard line and finally CBS came through with more money. "But less than last year for total production," says Nick Corea, supervising producer for The Incredible Hulk. "We're striving to keep quality," he adds, "by combining scenes and doing other things to cut costs."

    But the dramatic cost cutting initially demanded by Universal Studios will not be required. There will be the usual two scenes with the Hulk in each show, says executive producer Kenneth Johnson, rather than the single appearance the clipped budget would have demanded.

    Another change contemplated was to add a character who would have a traveling motor home. His task would have been to find a cure for David Banner's drastic metamorphosis, while the two of them traveled around the country. A set could have been built for the motor home interior, and The Hulk would have had at least one stock set that could be used in each show. In the past, there had not been any permanent sets -- new sets had to be built for each weekly episode. With the infusion of additional CBS money, it was not necessary to add this character and his convenient motor home.

More SFX $ than "Buck"

    According to Corea, Universal's squawks about the budget for The Hulk were legitimate: "We have the biggest special effects budget on the Universal lot -- bigger than Buck Rogers!" He declined to state a figure, but assured us that he stood behind this statement.

    As he explains it, Buck Rogers has a lot of stock footage that can be used over and over. And the sets are frequently recyclable as well. "But when Banner 'Hulks out,' he does it in a different place every time. One time it's a bar, another time a ship. It keeps changing, and we have to deal with that. We can't fall back on stock shots."

    Despite the curtailment of the budget for the coming TV season, the producers are pulling out all the stops for the premiere fall program. It will be a two-part episode entitled "Prometheus." In this show the Hulk is mistaken for an extraterrestrial. And to compound the problem, a meteorite shower affects the radiation levels and allows the Hulk to revert only partially to Banner.

    In later shows, Banner will be involved in such diverse activities as skydiving, baseball and a beauty contest. Corea is particularly proud of the show in which Banner skydives. In this story, he falls out of an airplane -- minus  a parachute. His heart starts pulsating as he is handed a parachute in mid-air. Although he receives the parachute, the fear has been strong enough to cause him to "Hulk out." And, of course, as he grows, the harness straps on the parachute break. He has to float to Earth holding onto the broken straps.

    Corea admits there will be difficulty filming this sequence, but he is determined that it will be done.

    "What he try to do," says Corea, "is run situations where the audience expects the situation go one way, and we look at it from a different angle. Actually, there would be no story if we didn't reverse situations."

    But a change in situations does not mean a change in character, according to Corea. "I think it is more important to make the character more dramatically involved in the stories than to change him. It gives the actor more opportunity to expand as an actor."

    "For example, there is the story in which Banner is paralyzed from the waist down. He's a paraplegic. And I think that gives a lot of opportunity to the actor."

    "And we'll continue to do psychological stories. There is the Dr. Jekyll/Mr. Hyde story in which Banner represses the right side of his brain -- the primal side -- so that the left side can take over. But he suffers from seizures, and there is a serious change in Banner's attitude. He prefers bold adventures and becomes more sexually oriented. And when he 'Hulks out,' the Hulk is more vicious and destructive. Instead of throwing [an object] across the room, he throws people."

    In the new season, when Banner changes, Lou Ferrigno, who portrays the Hulk, will be more exposed. "We have ripped Lou Ferrigno's trousers all the way up to the thigh this year," says Corea.

Hulk Headhunting

    As far as other characters in the show, the only recurring character will be Jack McGee, the snoopy, tenacious reporter who is determined to discover the identity of the Hulk.

    Mark Roberts, McGee's editor, will be brought back this season for one or more shows as well. He will order McGee to "Bring me the head of the Hulk."

    Banner will manage to avoid lasting romantic entanglements again this year, although, according to Corea, there will be one or two intense, brief encounters with women as there have been in past seasons.

    The development of the show as a whole, says Corea, is a joint project. "This show is mostly team written," he explains. "We have big story sessions and it doesn't really matter who does the actual writing. We're all writers first, and then producers or whatever."

    The Hulk team includes: Executive Producer Kenneth Johnson; three other producers, Jill Sherman, Karen Harris and Robert Steinhauer; Executive Storyteller Andrew Schneider; Story Editor Robin Leder, and two associate producers, Alan Cassidy and Steve Caldwell.
 

     "The Hulk," says Corea, "was successful from the beginning. We've never had trouble. I think it's a show that will hold -- the good ole Hulk."

    How long The Hulk will continue to be a weekly fare on CBS will most likely be determined by Universal Studios rather than the actors or producers. As Corea puts it: "There is no deadline set on the show to end it. It's a personal thing. Bixby's contract runs through this year. We don't know what he'll decide. I think we would all like to see it go a couple of more years. But the CBS may have something to say about that because of the cost.

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