jvs@iwu1d.UUCP (John V. Smith) (02/06/84)
The way I heard it, the "The Menagerie" episode came to be because NBC had originally spent a lot of money on the original Startrek pilot before they decided that they didn't want to make a series out of it. Later, Roddenberry and company tried again with a new pilot and NBC went ahead with the series. Once the show was a hit, NBC exec's saw an opportunity to cut some of their previous losses and had "The Cage" incorporated into into the new show. According to Nimoy, the original plot was very expensive. Since "The Menagerie" was so well done, and with a fair amount of additional new footage, I find it difficult to belive that "The Cage" was used just because program production was falling behind.