Friday, January 4, 2008

P.S.

I am told that the rumor about the Top Screenwriters who were pledging to force the WGA to accept whatever the hell the DGA gets...that report has been exposed as a hoax. Like I said: Do not believe any story of that sort that doesn't have names attached and some confirmation from those names. And even then, it could be bogus or a bluff.

And to clarify: I think Jay Leno ought to do whatever is humanly possible to comply with WGA strike rules. I'm not 100% certain what that is, what he can do to fulfill his contractual responsibility as a performer on The Tonight Show and not be in violation of his union's rules. But whatever it is, that's what he ought to do. It's a little difficult for any of us to say what that is from afar and, as I was trying to explain, the line of demarcation between Jay writing and Jay ad-libbing can get a bit smokey. It's one of those "glad I don't have to figure that one out" problems.

• Posted at 4:30 PM · LINK

Strike Stuff

Lots of e-mails asking me about this situation where the WGA is saying that Jay Leno is not allowed under its rules to do his monologue and he's saying he got permission and they're saying he didn't and NBC is saying he doesn't need permission, yadda yadda yadda. Nikki Finke, your one-stop shopping link for Strike News, has all the back-and-forth. I don't know much about it that isn't there.

I do know that there can be a murky area in which it's hard to distinguish which words a performer speaks on air are "written." A lot of what is uttered on talk shows is arguable and some of the best hosts are quite facile at taking what someone writes and then paraphrasing or turning it into an approximate ad-lib. If a performer knows what he's going to say before he goes out on stage, is he writing for himself? If he actually writes it down, has someone put key words (or even the whole thing) on cue-cards and then he goes out and says roughly what he'd say if it wasn't on the cards...is that writing? Leno can write all he wants for his stand-up act. If he uses some of those jokes on The Tonight Show, is he writing?

Sort of, sometimes...but you can see where this can get messy. If I ever felt sorry for people in his income bracket, I'd feel sorry for the guy now. He's always been an honorable man and that seems to be the consensus of those who've had a lot more contact with him than I have. Because he's a writer-performer and only one of those professions is on strike, he's caught in an awkward position. He ought to do what the WGA says is Kosher but that may be at odds with what he feels he must do to keep his ratings up.

They weren't so wonderful last night. He beat Letterman but not by a wide margin...this, despite the fact that NBC had a powerhouse prime-time line-up with all new shows, whereas CBS had all reruns. Someone's got to be a little worried and it ain't Dave.

Ms. Finke has also posted the rumor that a bunch of "A-List" Screenwriters and possibly top TV Showrunners as well are going to press the WGA to accept whatever deal the DGA makes. I find it hard to believe that someone could become a wealthy writer in this town if they were willing to accept someone else's deal before it was even negotiated. You don't do that if you're writing a movie and the other guy is writing a similar movie. You especially don't do that when the other guy's deal may involve cash points (i.e., ways of figuring how much he gets paid) that don't apply to you.

The DGA has sometimes been very clever about agreeing to some deal that puts money in the pocket of the guy who directs a film or TV show but doesn't yield revenue to anyone else who takes those terms. It would be like if we were both negotiating to write comic books and you said, "I'll take whatever deal Evanier makes." And then I made a deal where the writer works for free but gets a huge cash bonus if he's had Gastric Bypass Surgery in the last two years, is Jewish but has a last name people think is French, and once got punched in the arm by Jack LaLanne. (I was going to add in "...keeps having his luggage lost by Southwest Airlines but that could apply to just about anybody.)

In any case, here's a general rule of thumb: Don't put much stock in any rumor that involved unnamed people. It may turn out to be true but most of them don't.

I'll write more when there's more.

• Posted at 1:53 PM · LINK

Today's Video Link

From the 1992 Broadway revival of Guys and Dolls, here's Faith Prince as Miss Adelaide with the Hot Box Dancers. They're doing "A Bushel and a Peck," which was one of the best songs in the show and which was replaced with an inferior tune in the movie version.

• Posted at 11:50 AM · LINK

Final Notice

It's on tonight...and I really hope I haven't oversold this thing and that none of you feel any obligation to sit through it. Skidoo is the movie of which Jackie Gleason, its star, once said: "The picture turned out to be the greatest meatball that was ever made!" He did not mean that as a compliment even though he probably loved meatballs.

John M. Miller reminds me that they have a lot of info and downloads of Skidoo over at the Turner Classic Movies website. Here's the link...but if you haven't seen the film, I'd suggest going there after your first viewing. You'll enjoy it ever so much more if you don't know what's coming...and yes, I'm using the word "enjoy" in the broadest sense.

Years ago, I was going to write a book called something like Fascinating Movies, and my definition was not that they were necessarily good or bad. It would have contained some of each...a concept which seemed to baffle a company that thought they wanted to publish it but couldn't grasp that I wouldn't just be writing about movies that were fun to watch because they were such utter disasters. I think some films just transcend being thought of as good or bad. The sheer fact that they were made and that they exist is far more significant than whether you can have a good time watching them or why you might enjoy the ones in the Hindenburg category. In some upcoming post, I'll try to list some of the ones I'd cover if I were writing that book today. In the meantime, here's our last posting of the banner for perhaps the most transcendent of them all...

• Posted at 10:56 AM · LINK

Friday Morning

Someone from Southwest Airlines woke me up at 8 AM this morning to tell me they were still looking for my suitcase. She hung up before I could tell her that I'd found my suitcase last night. In fact, I have a copy here of their final report that says I'd found my suitcase. They will probably lose others while they're busy searching for mine.

• Posted at 10:19 AM · LINK

Where I Am

In a Vegas hotel room and yes, I have my suitcase. It came in on the next plane with no explanation. So did about a half-dozen pieces of luggage for others who were on my flight. A nice gentleman at the Southwest Your-Baggage-Is-Lost-And-We-Don't-Know-Where-The-Hell-It-Is Department apologized profusely and gave each of us a voucher for $50 off on future air travel. Unfortunately, you have to use it on Southwest.

This was a sudden trip...my first to the town in something like six years. I used to come here twice a month on average but things change. The town has changed, too...old hotels gone, new ones in their places. I've changed, too. Since my gastric bypass surgery, going to the buffets will not be cost-effective. The only things that haven't changed are that people drink, people smoke, people gamble and Southwest loses your luggage.

There will be more Vegas Blogging to come. And other things.

• Posted at 12:53 AM · LINK