Mike: my first, truest and only possible reaction to your note was to
instantly look around and wonder who the heck you were talking about.

"...you're starting to become an SF superstar, perhaps the biggest since
Gene Roddenberry."

I wish I could take this as having anything whatsoever to do with me, as
far as B5 goes, but I can't. I don't see myself or my position any different
now than 5 or 10 years ago. I look in the mirror and half the time I see a
doofus. The other half of the time I see someone trying desperately not to
*be* a doofus.

The other day, I was interviwed by a reporter with a major newspaper
syndicate, and kind of the same question was asked. What I told her, and I'll
say here, is...I just can't apply it to me. When I go up on stage at a
convention, and there's this mass of applause...the terrible thing is, I don't
hear it. I'm worrying about what the first thing I should say ought to be,
will it be entertaining, why on earth do these people want to see *me* fer
chrissakes...one feels like a fraud. Because the story kinda lives outside me
somehow...it's like the sculpter who look at a block of stone and knows
there's a sculpture of a horse in there somewhere, that it was *always* there,
he just has to get a hammer and chisel and *find* it.

There's a difference between the talent, the story, and the vessel;
sometimes the vessel thinks it *is* the talent, that it *is* the story, and
that way, I think, lies madness and an ego of monstrous proportion. I can't
think in those terms. I wouldn't mind, I'd probably enjoy it, I just *can't*.
When I hear applause -- and on one level, like I said, I really can't -- it's
not for me, it's for the story, for the show, for the performances, for
Christopher's terrific music. I'm sitting here on a writing break, in a torn
up pair of jeans, a superman t-shirt, with a barely adequate cafe mocha in a
Daffy Duck mug in front of me; how seriously can I take this person?

The guys at the local comic store know who I am -- I come in every
Wednesnday night for my weekly fix -- and it ain't no big thing. I'm just one
more customer. The only perk is that they set aside the comics about to sell
out so I don't miss one. But when I walk in the door, those who might
recognize me don't seem to pay much notice, and the majority just *don't*
recognize me, because my face isn't plastered all over the place. Which is as
it should be; the actors deserve that honor. (This is something else the
reporter bugged me about, "The ST creators have their faces all over the
place, where in the press kit are your photos, why aren't *you* out there
visibley?" To which the only answer is, "That ain't why I'm here." As
Meatloaf said, "I ain't in it for the power, and I ain't in it for the wealth,
I ain't in it for the glory of anything at all, and I sure ain't in it for my
health. But I'm in it till it's over.")

So there's no need for any awkwardness or hesitancy, Mike. I'm a fan,
same as you and most of the other folks around here. Ain't nothing around
here to be intimidated by; it's just me.

jms