Well the season of Yule is finally starting to take its toll. I'm running low on small talk, and waking up less rested than I should. Plus it's not even the fifteenth and I'm running low on Advil.
So that being said, I should attend to some screenwriting things. Oh, and marking papers, too. But no one likes to be left high and dry. I mean, TV's in reruns already, how much does that suck?
I decided a while ago to try and run down some of the common types one finds in the writing room-- an important service designed so that you, the writer-reader, can decide where you fit. I'll do these piecemeal over the next couple of weeks. Here we go.
TYPES YOU FIND IN THE ROOM
#1 SILENT BUT DEADLY aka "CHARLIE"
They sit and they wait. They don't have much to say: most of the time. They just sit there. Quietly. Sometimes they creep you out. You may get the idea that they're judging you. Then you become convinced that's what's going on. Otherwise, why didn't they laugh when you made that crack that broke everybody else up? They don't pitch a lot of lines. They don't offer a lot of story advice. They don't even give off a lot of body heat. But just at the moment when you think you're safe from Charlie, they open their mouths and out comes a) the funniest thing anyone has said all day, or b) The absolutely brilliant answer to the story point that's eluded you since 10:30 this morning -- the story point that allows you all to get out and go home. Charlie may have supernatural powers. Do not look directly at Charlie. Just let Charlie wait. That's what Charlie does best.
*point of Clarification -- a word of caution. Unlike the Charlie one may have met in Apocalypse Now, this Charlie, armed with web-enabled cell phone or Blackberry, may indeed surf.
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