Corner Gas: The Writers Speak!

SEASON FIVE of Corner Gas, which begins tonight on CTV in Canada (9:30 pm -- new time, following Dancing With the Stars) brings a few important behind the scenes changes to Dog River.

But first of all, let's give credit where credit is due: a Canadian sitcom is entering its fifth season, as a broad based popular hit.

As many as two million people watch every week, out of a nation of about thirty million. Subtract the seven million people who speak French as a first language and you're talking two million from a possible audience of 23 million. That's like 26 million people tuning into a comedy show in the USA. Math may be hard, but it doesn't lie.

If you're trying to make the argument that Canadians don't want to watch Canadian TV, Corner Gas is a most inconvenient truth. (People darker than me, for instance, might wonder why, if you go to CTV's site today, you'd be hard pressed to find any banner headlines, or well-publicized links to promote the fact that their most popular homegrown show premieres tonight. Not on the Etalk daily page, not on the main CTV page. I'm sure that's just an oversight, right?)

Corner Gas also managed, earlier this year, to spark a very un-Canadian showbiz bit of news: a talent raid. Two writers from Corner Gas, Showrunner Paul Mather, and 4th Season Story Editor Rob Sheridan, were lured to rival network CBC's Little Mosque on the Prairie, a show that posted an average of a million viewers a week.

This fall, Canadians will be in the strange position of being able to choose between two hit homegrown sitcoms that take place in Saskatchewan.

Corner Gas ended its fourth season with its highest seasonal ratings ever, and with an appearance by Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper. In a whimsical episode, the writers teased the end of the series, for a moment suggesting that maybe Brent was selling the station, and Lacey was moving back to Toronto.

Luckily that turned out all to be a bad daydream of Hank's.

The following interview with two of the show's writers, new Showrunner Kevin White, and Producer and O.S. (Original Showrunner) Mark Farrell, is a combo of two conversations. You can hear the full conversation with Mark as part of the current TV, Eh? podcast. The interview with Kevin was conducted via email, from the Corner Gas set in Rouleau, Sask.

DTOS: You now have something on Corner Gas you haven’t had for awhile – turnover, with two of your writers going to Little Mosque. Are there any other changes we should expect from the show this fall?

MARK FARRELL: Well to be fair I was heavily involved in April through June, but Kevin White really was the Showrunner this year. I think it’s a good thing, actually, I know you’ve blogged about this too. We had a chance to bring in Norm Hiscock, who’s a great writer, and Gary Pearson, another really good writer, and shake things up, change some of the dynamics of the writing.

KEVIN WHITE: Obviously new writers bring different tastes and experiences to the show and that helps generate stories we haven't done before. For example, Norm knew this guy his own age who knit. And he would sit around knitting in social situations, just nodding, saying 'uh-huh' as others talked. Norm thought it'd be funny if Hank did that and it became an episode.

MF: Kevin brought a different style to the room than Paul had, to meetings and stuff.

KW: Mostly it means I get called Paul a lot. Also I have more meetings. As show runner, you run the story department, and work with all other departments to make sure what's in the script gets shot the way the writer intended - that includes checking out all the props, wardrobe, new sets being built, etc. Basically you're around to answer questions like, "Is that hat yellow enough?", "Does this rubber hammer look real?" and "When's Paul coming back?"

DTOS: Is there any opportunity to put your own stamp on the show at this point, Kevin, or is it pretty much already established?

KW: The universe of Corner Gas is well established. Which is good. It's a good universe. So as far as stamps go, I'm not out to change it. But we (the writers) did consciously try to explore sides of characters wehadn't seen as much - Emma being unsure of herself, or Oscar not hating everything, or Lacey asserting herself more as a local. And we avoided any new stories concerning hair.

MF: I’m actually looking forward to seeing Mosque, to see what Paul and Rob and Greg Eckler and the other writers bring to that.

DTOS: So we don’t have some kind of big Canadian Saskatchewan-set series smackdown coming? There’s no Biggie-Tupac rivalry coming here?

MF: We might do that more on 22 [This Hour Has 22 Minutes, Farrell's other show, which competes with fellow CBC topical comedy show The Rick Mercer Report] than on Gas.

KW: I don't think there'll be a throw down. Mostly because I don't know what that means. I'm very square. But the two shows seem very different to me. The muslim characters we've added are different. The mosque Brent joins is different. So I think audiences can enjoy both without thinking oh, one show is copying the other.

MF: It is odd how Regina has become the promised land of Canadian comedy. It’s one of those weird things. Gosh, if people are just going to watch Canadian TV and not say it’s crappy, that’s good.

DTOS: Kevin, can you tease us with any other plot elements from the new season?

The one where Brent works in the gas station is pretty funny. And there's another one where Oscar gets cranky. Other than that the season opener involves everyone trying to make a cable access show. In other episodes Oscar and Emma buy a craftmatic bed which affects Emma romantically. Hank starts using his dirty truck as a notepad. Brent dares Oscar to stop using the word jackass. And Lacey gets naked.

DTOS: The other big change this year, I guess, is that Gas goes to syndication in the U.S. this fall, on WGN. Do you approach that with any kind of trepidation? Are you excited? Do you think they're going to get it?

KW: I'm excited about it. The U.S. press has been positive and it's quite different than other shows on American TV. Just watching WGN promos for it, you see grain elevators and prairie stretching forever, and you think, that's kind of cool. In Canada it's easy to take Saskatchewan for granted but when you see it like that in the middle of all this American programming, it stands out. I hope they like it. Especially Season 5.

MF: Anecdotally, I’ve got some relatives in Wisconsin and, I think it’s going to play well, especially in the flyovers. I don’t know how it’s going to go over in NY or Los Angeles and stuff, but I don’t think Dog River is that different than places in Indiana or Wisconsin or Michigan…WGN is great.

It seems like it’s a good fit. There haven’t been a lot of [hit] half hour comedies in the States.[lately] And even though this is a single camera, it kind of has a three-camera feel in terms of tone. So I think it could do okay, actually. How’s that for a vague answer? “I think it could do okay, actually.”

DTOS: A very Canadian answer.

MF: There you go.

Podcast, Ho! Features Corner Gas' Mark Farrell

DIANE OF Unifed Theory of Nothing Much and TV, Eh? has produced her 2nd Canadian TV Podcast. This one's chock full of Fall Preview goodness, and in honour of tonight's fifth season premiere of Corner Gas, it also features my interview with Corner Gas and This Hour Has 22 Minutes Producer/Writer Mark Farrell.

Later today I hope to get a transcript up of part of that interview, along with questions I asked of new Corner Gas showrunner Kevin White.

Gas returns to CTV tonight at 9:30 pm (new time!) Earlier seasons are running in the USA on the WGN Superstation at the following times:

• Monday - Thursday 12a ET
• 2 episodes - Wednesdays 8p ET
• Friday 2:30a ET
• 2 episodes - Sundays 11:30p ET

It's Not That the Grass Is Greener, It's That No One Seems To Know How To Make a Decent Lawnmower on a Budget Anymore.

FOR GREAT insider buzz on the anxieties fueling the-just-underway TV season, check out this Slate article by Kim Masters. Crazy budgets are making everyone, well, crazy.

Now, here's one of those rare cases where I can frame something for two totally different audiences: the fifteen or so American readers I haven't yet alienated with all the Canadian TV talk, (Q: Who the fuck is Jim Shaw? A: He's a gay porn star in Canada. Note: Not really) and those Canadians who look down to L.A. as the Yellow Brick Road.

As she riffs off the current climate and picks up the baton of the Kim Masters article, Kay Reindl at Seriocity says something that almost knocked me off my chair:

Why is it such a struggle to adhere to a budget?

I have no fucking idea. But I think part of the problem is in the selling of the show. When networks and studios open for the development season, it's sort of like shopping. You've already bought stuff but you're tired of that stuff now. You've seen he limitations of last year's iPod. You're looking for the next generation. So that's sort of the mindset of these executives. NOW they're gonna make their names, with a show that YOU are going to pitch! It's SO exciting! Can't you just feel it??? So people come in to pitch. And the only way to distinguish your pitch from the eight zillion other pitches is to, well, distinguish it. Make it splashy. Cool. EXPENSIVE. This is an EVENT, network and studio peoples!! So they buy said expensive, splashy shows. And then the studios, in their effort to distinguish their shows to the networks, give pilots enormous budgets. Like, ten million dollars worth of budget. Two weeks to shoot. It's nirvana.

So you've gotten two weeks to make your pilot and ten million dollars with which to make it. Naturally, your show looks HOT. It's slick. It's wonderful. And the test audiences are absolutely floored. Why, it's like watching a MOVIE! I love this! So your show gets picked up.

Now, you have seven or eight days to make each episode. And around two and a half million bucks, if you're lucky. How the hell can you make your show for less than a THIRD the budget? Welcome to this year's fall schedule. This seems to be what's happening, what's going wrong with all of these shows. They're simply not constructed to be made for these budgets. And this is making the networks very, very cranky. They want their action bionic show. They want their TweeVee pie maker show. They want their vampire detective show. But the studios can't pay for them.

Obviously, something needs to change. I hope this year makes everyone realize that but based on what they're buying, it probably won't. It'll still be about pilot as sales tool. What they SHOULD do, if they had any balls, is order shows to series instead of to pilot. When they've got the scripts they want to consider for series, order five scripts. Then they'll see if the show is sustainable. Based on that (which will cost FAR less than a ten million dollar pilot), they can order shows to series. That way, you'll get a realistic series budget. Your pilot won't feel like an entirely different show. You will already have to adhere to a series budget in order to make your pilot.

They can still have upfronts, too. Just move everything up. Have the scripts in by February. Order your shows. Make the pilots, for reasonable budgets, and then go off to New York and prance around for the advertisers. It would also make life easier for showrunners and executives trying to staff these shows. Because the staffing would already be done by the time the pilots are greenlit.

They will NEVER do this, but it's something to think about.

Okay, my fellow Canadian creatives...get off the floor.

I KNOW!

We've just started making Pilots, and she's saying the problem is the American TV industry should be doing things more like...um...they've usually been done in Canada! Ordering shows to series based on script alone?

AAAAaaaaaaaAAAAAAaaaAAAGh!


Goldmannnnnnn!

Damn you and your Nobody Knows Anything!!

I'm going to go rock foetally now.

What "Your Stories" Say About You.

ALLESSANDRA STANLEY has a lovely essay in Today's NYTimes about TV. I think her point about TV usurping Music is dead on. The whole article's worth reading.

It’s a rich television age and a demanding one. The selection is now so plentiful and fragmented and good. And deciding among hundreds of channels, on-demand options, DVR, Internet streaming and iPhones requires so much research, planning and commitment that viewers have become proprietary about their choices. Alliances are formed, and so are antipathies. Snobbery takes root. Preferences turn totemic. The mass audience splintered long ago; now viewers are divided into tribes with their own rituals and rites of passage.

A favorite show is a tip-off to personality, taste and sophistication the way music was before it became virtually free and consumed as much by individual song as artist.

Before the Internet, iPhones and flash drives, people jousted over who was into the Pixies when they were still a garage band or who could most lengthily argue the merits of Oasis versus Blur. Now, for all but hardcore rock aficionados, one-upmanship is more likely to center around a television series — like metaphysical clues buried in “Lost,” whether the current “Battlestar Galactica” is an affront to the 1978 original (some bloggers sneeringly refer to the current incarnation as Gino, short for “Galactica in name only” ) or who discovered “Flight of the Conchords” when it was a comedy team performing in concerts, not an HBO series.

Television used to be dismissed by elitists as the idiot box, a sea of mediocrity that drowns thought and intelligent debate. Now people who ignore its pools and eddies of excellence do so at their own peril. They are missing out on the main topic of conversation at their own table.

OH and look. mmm. Tina Fey.

Oedipus Rex: Or Where a Simple Toy Teaches Our Hero About Drama and Fridge Logic and the Perils of the Internet

MEET REX. Rex is an I-Dog : an electronic device with LED lights on its nose. A tiny microphone inside, and a headphone jack mean that Rex reacts to music you play to him. That's how you feed him. In return for a bit of music, Rex will display patterns of lights, move his ears, and bark. Occasionally he'll play a jaunty little tune. Like the long-ago Tamagotchi craze, Rex is interactive, in the sense that he demands attention, "learns" and has different moods depending on how you interact with him.

Someone very cool who clearly has my number sent me Rex for my birthday. I opened up his box this morning, expecting it to be the HDMI cable I ordered from Best Buy. Imagine my surprise.

I've been playing with Rex all morning, as I read the paper and drink coffee. I've got the XM Radio on, and I've been switching between singer songwriter stuff, hip hop, blues, alt country, jazz, and punk to see the different ways Rex reacts. And he does react differently to different types of music. Sometimes he even dances.

Clearly, Rex is a good boy.

What's that?

Oh, I know.

Rex actually has a computer chip inside, and a microphone that reacts to sound waves and converts those sound waves to trigger certain sequences of LED's because of some algorhythm. Rex's barks are a recording. And his motions are motor-driven.

Now, that being said, if you diss my dog again, I'll fucking kill you.

See, I've wanted a dog for a while now. Dogs and writers just seem to go together. Sadly, I don't feel like getting a dog that looks more like a rat, and the condo I live in is too small and cluttered for a satisfyingly- sized doggie. So I've put off the dog until the next time I move.

I know all this, and the stuff about Rex being an electronic device from Hasbro, and yet within a few minutes, I'm reacting to this toy like, you know, it really is a dog. Like its mood is a mood, and not a program.

See, we humans are programmed to react to things. And pretend, and buy into things that we know in our hearts aren't real. In school, one of the first literary techniques you learn about is the concept of personification.

But it goes beyond that. Way beyond. We take steps to buy into things that we know are not true every single day.

On Facebook, I've added this dumb zombies application. I have a zombie army. Recently they introduced fighting. Now, I know that the fighting is just mathematically determined, that there's no skill and nothing going on there. But yet, I have a complex series of moves I do when I lose a fight. I fight weaker opponents in order to amass a few wins before I can take on the next, stronger opponent. (By the way, in this context, "taking on the next opponent" really means clicking the mouse twice.) I know this helps me win more, even though I know it has nothing to do with me winning more.

Confused?

Okay, what about this? Steve Jobs constantly fields queries from people who insist that the Ipod has some super secret proprietary algorhythm that somehow knows exactly the right song to play next when you shuffle. Seriously, otherwise, how would it know to follow up "I Wish it Would Rain?" with "Aint No Sunshine?" I mean, come on.

The idea of randomness, true randomness, is so scary to us in most contexts that we will jump through all manner of hoops in order NOT to face it. I've sat through many dates where I got to hear all about horoscopes -- and people (okay, sorry about this, but it's mostly true) women -- explain why this and that means this and that and the other, and besides the fact that maybe being born at a certain time in the year influences your behavior slightly -- come on, deep down, you know it's all bullshit. But try saying that to a believer.

(And yes, yes, I know my atheist friends will insist this applies equally to all manner of religious faith too, but I'm not going there, a) because I'm a once and, let's face it, probably future Catholic boy, and b) because I think so long as faith is kept personal and not put out in the world in an attempt to codify or judge the behavior of others, hey, it's nobody's damn business but your own.)

The net result of our incredible fear of randomness is that we look for patterns in everything. We try to make sense of things. Our minds fill in the blanks. So we see shapes and animals in clouds of water vapor. So we look at multicolored dots in the newspaper and see them as an image.

It's a good thing we do this, because if we didn't, I wouldn't have a job. And storytelling for film and TV wouldn't exist.

When you watch a TV show, you intuit a lot. You follow narrative, you fill in blanks. You follow clues, and search for the pattern. If it's a hero journey, you identify with the quest. If it's a mystery, you try to figure it out.

Your audience will work with you to understand the story. They're desperate to do it, they're looking to be entertained, to learn something, to distract themselves from the randomness.

So as storytellers, we do a little dance. Our job, whichever crafty technique we use, is to give enough detail, to provide enough information or imagery or character or data so that our audience deciphers our pattern. They work to fill in the blanks we've left and get to the end.

Now, I've said before -- there's all sorts of stuff we have to do to make that work within the frame of the restrictions of the medium: whether that me a limited number of sets, or the 43 minute running time, or a small budget.

Stories use coincidence, they use shorthand to hide exposition, they use recognizable tropes to signal things to the audience that you don't want to take the time to explain because the meat of the story -- the thing that people are going to enjoy -- lies elsewhere.

"Fridge logic" is a much maligned and misunderstood term outside the TV writing community. Technically, it's those small details that won't bother the audience until later, the ones that if they think about them at all -- it's a half hour later when you're at the fridge making a sandwich and you go, "hey, wait a minute."

Arguably, the most famous example of "fridge logic" are the Letters of Transit in Casablanca. Think about it. If they get those letters, Ilsa and Lazlo are free -- the letters can't be rescinded, they can't even be questioned!

That's actually said in the movie.

They can't be questioned. By the Nazis. In WWII.

Riiiight.

There's a moment in the construction of every drama script where you have to decide, and discuss, whether you need to explain or justify something, or whether you can just let it slide. The problem is that every thing you explain takes time. And if you take the time to explain, you have less time for story, and emotion -- which is what people buy into. If you err on the side of explaining too much, your story becomes like a hull with lots and lots of crusty barnacles clinging to it. You can't slide through the water gracefully anymore -- you're this big, ungainly, crusty thing.

I'm not trying to excuse bumps here -- bumps are things that take your audience out of the story...and woe betide someone who tries to excuse something that's actually a bump as fridge logic." If you jar your audience out of their state of willing disbelief, they stop filling in the patterns you want them to fill in. And they start looking for fault.

But the thing you must keep in mind is this: People want to believe things. They want you to fool them. They WANT to see patterns -- they're programmed for it. In a very real sense, they are more on your side than you (or even they) think they are.

But...

(Man, if you didn't know that was coming then I'm afraid you've missed the DTOS pattern.)

The social ramifications of some of the TV discussion sites, like Television Without Pity can be serious for a writer who's just starting out, or even for those of us who've been doing it for awhile.

Because TWOP and some of these other sites reverse the dynamic that's at play in the wider audience.

See, rather than doing what the majority of people do when they watch -- try to buy in, try to see the pattern, try to fill in the blanks -- a lot of the posters on these sites watch to find fault, so that they have something to snark about.

It's the difference between meeting your friend's new girl or boyfriend, and your ex's new love. In the case of the former, you're going to do whatever you can to find the parts of that person you like. You want to buy in because you want your friend to be happy. In the latter case, you're looking for any fault you can possibly find because hating that person is going to make you feel better about yourself.

Yes, I'm aware that I just called the posters on TWOP bitter exes.

Give me a minute to coil out some more rope --

The peculiar socialization rituals of online messageboards mean you can earn bonafides for being critical. Or even overly critical. You saw something first. You're building yourself up and tearing them down. So, yeah, those LOST writers sure are stupid, because they completely missed this inconsistency...

...now, some of the time whatever they point to will be apt. It may indeed be a flaw in the writing. Or it may be one of those things that happen in production. The director didn't direct the scene the right way, or the actor didn't bring it or any one of a number of things.

But more often than not the thing that they're pointing to is either an absolutely concrete case of fridge logic -- ie: if you weren't watching to LOOK for a fault, it wouldn't bother you -- or it's not a fault at all.

Come on, it wouldn't be the first time somebody found fault when one wasn't there.

I'm amused and amazed when I read a post from someone pointing out a "fault" that shows a complete lack of understanding of a) history, b) society, c) science, d) logic, e) human nature, f) relationships (I could keep going to zz but I'm already bored.)

So why do I read these posts? Why do they fascinate me? Well, because I'm hooked. Hooked by how the way people critique things always reveals more about their character than the work they're critiquing. I think you probably get a pretty good, if not complete, picture of me and how I think from the entries on this blog. Roger Ebert is pretty knowable through his reviews and opinions, I think. So is John Doyle. Anyone who posts regularly on any site related to TV is no different.

If you started writing after the rise of the net and these sites, then you've got to work extra hard to insulate yourself from the deleterious effects of nitpicking criticism. It's a social expression of a community way more than it's a useful learning tool. If you use the kind of dissection you see on TWOP as a baseline when you're constructing story, you are never going to get anywhere. You will spend way too much time trying to bullet proof your story, adding barnacle after barnacle of explanation that doesn't matter to the 90% of the audience that doesn't derive some self-esteem from complaining about Jack or Sawyer or that girl with the short haircut on Cold Case.

Just remember: most people want to see the dog.

Now, if you'll excuse me, Rex is geting antsy.

Q & Eh

THE PODCAST from my appearance on CBC Radio's Q, yesterday, is now up at Itunes. Thrill to Tara Thorne and I talking the new fall season, and the effect all the leaked pilots may or may not have had on it.

Swoon as Tara poo-poohs nerds, and I remind Jian that nerds playing videogames managed to create a multibillion dollar industry that's now bigger than film and TV put together.

It's the Thursday, Sept 20th podcast, and the fun with me starts at about 14:30.

Indulge Me

BECAUSE. This is probably the only way a picture of a cat could ever appear on my blog.

Am I posting the cat? No, friends, no.


I am merely shilling for the unmitigated brilliance that is Internet Sensation Cute With Chris.

It's The Little Things

I'VE HAD my name on a Call Sheet before, but for some reason, this is just cooler.
What a great crew!

Prep: Days Two and Three And Four

WELL THAT got away from me. See, that's the problem with Prep. You get busy.

Day Two of the prep of my episode had two major components for me.

The first was the Concept Meeting. This is the first big meeting where the producers, the writer of the ep, the A.D.'s and Art Dept and Locations sits down and gets their first look at the Production White Draft. The 1st A.D. walks through the script, scene by scene, basically giving a precie of what goes on in the scene. If there's things like props that will take a while to form, or stunts, that's noted. Sometimes it's unsure whether the people in the scene need to be actors or not -- they may not have a line, but are they really an extra -- or do they have to do something specific again and again (in which case, they're probably going to be upgraded to actor.) An extra really is someone just in the BG. If they do something like, oh, I don't know, dance or juggle or something, then they're a special skills extra. If the director's going to give them a specific action (ie: if they're not cued as background by the A.D.'s) then they're an actor. If they get more than five lines, then suddenly they're a principal. It all adds up.

The capable assistant to our producer Brian Dennis, Alex House, produced these notes from the meeting. This gives you a flavour for the kinds of things talked about.While, or soon after the concept meeting, the A.D.'s release their first Board of the show. The board is the idea based on the Initial Location Scout of how you're going to shoot the bastard. The trick is to get a certain percentage of the show onto your standing sets, and then to find the locations in such a way that you make up whatever your shooting days are and get it done in time.

It's math. But it's also voodoo. And here's the problem: You need to shoot a certain number of pages a day, yes. You have a certain number of days to shoot a script. And you have to fit it all in.

On a show like The Border, that can be even more challenging, because we've established a shooting style that is very fast, with a lot of cuts. A lot of cuts means more angles which means more setups which means you can shoot less in a day. But your episode has to be 43 minutes. And you only have X days. See the headache? Something's always gotta give.

We've found after a few episodes that because of our pacing, scripts need to be about 60 pages, give or take. You go too much under that and you can't make it to 43 minutes. Too much above -- too many scenes, and the board doesn't work.

On The Border, we generally shoot eight days per episode. Now, in the beginning we shot a couple of eps that shot for nine days. My first ep -- also the first show they shot post-pilot, was nine days. Then you also have to add in days for Second Unit shooting. Our show is set in various places across Canada. So we did a day of shooting in Vancouver last week. And we've been to Ottawa to shoot exteriors around the Parliament Buildings and recognizable landmarks.

That means that some of our episodes have to be seven days. My ep that's prepping now is our first one of those.

But when they did the first board -- the seven day version just looked...silly. There was no way that they were going to make those days. They worked up an eight day schedule, but the truth is that I deliberately broke, crafted the story and wrote it in such a way where there's high stakes drama but not a lot of stunts, and fewer locations.

The "production value" in the script comes from acting, and meaty scenes, and some stuff like populated scenes with extras, and Playback elements like TV and stuff.

If we couldn't get this puppy down to seven we were in trouble.

So that becomes a challenge for the Pink Draft -- cut scenes, combine others. Simplify and pare down so it becomes more manageable.

After the Concept meeting, I went with the Director to a Casting Session for our guest leads. Saw a bunch of great actors who gave great reads.

I kind of always feel bad for actors when they come in, but the more I go to casting, the more I really do appreciate the professionalism of those who really readily prepare, and the more ashamed I am of those long ago days when I went on auditions for, like, five minutes. What was I thinking?

The great thing about casting for the writer, especially when there's a time crunch, is generally they're reading off an earlier draft. Which is good and bad. Bad because it doesn't necessarily reflect where the script is now. Good, because no matter how good the actors are, when you hear a scene or two twelve or thirteen times, you start to really fucking hate it.

Anyway. Saw some good people. That was fun.

Day Three of Prep

Was my white whale.

The script is out to actors now, and the Director has given me his first thoughts, and some of those thoughts are really sharp for story. There's some stuff missing in the arcs of some of the characters through the piece. There's a few beats that were left over from the 1st draft that don't seem necessary now. And there are others that just don't work.

This is despite the fact that the feedback from the network on this script has been GREAT. Good suggestions, not too hard to implement, all in the service of making it clearer and more dramatic.

But today the story department sits down to try and come up with a direction for the pink draft.

And it's a brutal meeting.

Six hours.

There are lots of interruptions, lots of discussion about beats that may be missing, and beats that might be tried, things that might be made clearer or better. And there are also all those ideas that came out of the concept meeting the reality of trying to get that board down to seven days.

It's an interesting position to be in when you're the episode writer, when you're on staff. It requires you to be nimble. On the one hand, you know the story better than anybody else -- so some of the suggestions are going to be things you already tried and didn't work, or things that maybe screw up other parts of the story.

On the other hand, remember that "knowing the story really well" isn't necessarily an advantage. The people you're writing it for, after all, are only ever going to see it once. You can talk yourself into things -- Oh this is clear, oh no one will care about that -- and some of it is wishful thinking. You have to respect bumps -- when people don't buy something and think something is illogical, often they're right. I'd say especially when it's coming from your colleagues in the story department, they're probably more right than wrong.

Then there are other notes, the ones we call, 'different and not better.' That's the reality of the business -- no one will write things exactly the same, and there can be a great spectrum of difference on what constitutes improvement and what is just...different.

Somebody I worked for once described working for one of the legendary guys in the Canadian business (an L.A. dude, natch) and said that the secret to surviving notes sessions with him was that you had to defend your idea, or try to get it across three times -- so you didn't feel like a hack. But at the end of the day, the buck stops with the showrunner. They're going to do what they're going to do. You have to have the personality that can accept that.

I am a fierce advocate for my stuff, but at the end of the day, I know that what I write isn't exactly handed down on stone tablets. If three people are telling you something, you better do it, schmuck. Even if two have got a bee in their bonnet about something -- I suggest you take the note.

Being tired, irritable, under the gun -- all of this can increase the stress of a story meeting. And when the producers are being pulled in every direction at the same time, well...you're gonna go slow.

So it was that I sat down to pump out the pink at five pm.

I finished about six hours later, and sent the script to the story coordinator to be checked out and published in the morning.

I left on day three of prep, having worked a 14 and a half hour day. It. Happens.

I'm single. There are people -- on this show -- who do this and have wives and children. Seriously, if you're lazy or don't want to play that way -- best not to suit up.

Day Four of Prep

There's all sorts of stuff going on around me, but I take the morning to dog it a bit. When the draft's ready to go out, I get called by Sarah, my fellow writer, who's helping to get the draft out with the story coordinator. She runs a couple of mistakes by me that, in my fatigue I missed -- including one that blew a runner where a character kept getting a name wrong. The point of the last scene was that he got the name right...showing he learned.

I wrote the wrong name in. Heh heh. Fun.

I go into the office and do the best possible thing you can do when you're in this state -- think about someone else's story! In this case, Sarah and I sit down and start spitting a bit to come up with beats for her next script. It's just what I need.

The draft is out. I see the Director later in the day - he gives me thumbs up on the changes. Two of the actors call me to say they loved the script -- and they're talking about the last draft -- which in the way of the writer -- I now hate hate hate because all it does is reveal my hackery and imperfection.

Tomorrow, we see how that board's doing, and I start thinking about the Blue Draft.

So it goes, man. So it goes.

Parity in Quirkiness!

WELL, GREAT! The Canadian Dollar this morning hit parity with the U.S. Greenback for the first time since November 1976. This is, of course, great news for the Canadian Film and TV industry.

I'm kidding, of course. Like a lot of industries, our sector has leaned pretty heavily on the fact that currency made it cheaper to shoot here. So Thanks, W, you Rat Bastard! Way to Tank the Economy!

Now that we've lost our advantage, I guess the only thing we can take solace in is the fact that at least we're getting all those consumer goods cheap...

...oh wait. We're not. Right. Retailers and manufacturers haven't passed much (if any) of the savings on to me. Ah well. I guess there's always Amazon.com.

This morning Russell Smith in the Globe & Mail has an interesting column about U.S. cultural quirkiness, which riffs off an article by Michael Hirschorn in this month's Atlantic. It's interesting because, of course, quirky for quirky's sake has traditionally been a Canadian film and tv development ... uh ... quirk. From Smith's article:

The article has provoked condescending reaction, predictably, among the kind of person who spends a great deal of time arguing on Internet forums - that is, exactly the kind of contemporary hipster to whom quirk is most likely to appeal. Their objections focus mostly on Hirschorn's bathetic conclusion - that another American comic movie about urban life is the serious art to which we should aspire.

But they have also been railing against Hirschorn's job: He is a vice-president for programming of the television network VH1. That means he has overseen such reality television as Flavor of Love and The Surreal Life. He has apparently been a driving force behind a series called So NoTORIous, starring Tori Spelling. In indie culture, a guy producing Tori Spelling vehicles just has no credibility, no right to make any pronouncement on culture at all.

Interestingly, of all the movies and books Hirschorn names as examples of this trend, only one is not American (it's Mark Haddon's novel The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night Time). Clearly, this quirk thing is a trend in American art, but it's never named as such, even by Hirschorn's detractors. It's just called art.

This relentlessly narrow vision is familiar to any observer of culture: Those inside the United States tend to see its culture as culture, period. It's frustrating, but it's the way it is. (And frequently Canadian observers see the world this way too, which I find sad. Surely one of the great advantages of being Canadian is to be conscious of the rest of the world?)

That last sentence -- honestly -- is probably the prime reason why, with all the bullshit, I stay in Canada to work. Not the point of view that I currently see represented in a lot of our cultural output -- that's still a little narrow, a little too reactionist, a little too ... quirky ... but because of the potential POV we could bring to the world. Harold Innis. McLuhan. Both Canadian. Coincidence? I say, nay.

But anyway, now that we have quirky parity with our southern neighbours, I expect a Wes Anderson - Atom Egoyan Summit, where we discuss the new synergistic terms where we'll all stick it Hollywood together...in the name of the great almighty twee!

Parity for the dollar, liking a Russell Smith column -- it's truly dogs and cats sleeping together time.

Meanwhile, another article I cadged from the increasingly invaluable Tv, Eh? website goes sideways off the same riff -- with a special guest starring role from everyone's favourite screenwriting guru curmudgeon, Robert McKee:

Basically, McKee said English-Canadian film and television is currently a wasteland. Literature and theatre aren't doing so well either. Thanks to a combination of dark forces like the grant system, poetic prose, our fealty to all things French, cultural inferiority and a reflexive anti-Hollywoodism, we're making "art" instead of story.

But according to McKee, story is the highest art. And if Canadians want to express themselves, as storytellers, they must eschew the dark forces and embrace "classical design," storytelling as it has been understood since men and women gathered around the fire to entertain one another.

It's not as if Canadian screenwriters and producers have set out to make bad television and movies. It's tough to argue, for example, that Corner Gas is bad television: It's a huge commercial and popular success in a country unaccustomed to commercial and popular success. David Cronenberg, a Canadian, is one of the most interesting and successful directors in the world. "Since," McKee would argue, his finger in the air, "he said goodbye to the non-linear mumbo-jumbo and hello to classical storytelling."

If you've ever been to a McKee seminar, (and if you entertain any thought of writing film or TV professionally, you really should go see the show) you recognize all this. It's his whole bag. There are those near and dear to me who'll accuse your humble Stickster of being a bit...hyperbolic, shall we say, from time to time. Oh how I wish these people could see McKee up close. It's a show, it really is. But... though he's certainly, frequently an ass, from where I sit, he's also more right than he's wrong.

I'm thinking of changing my political affiliation to "story partisan."

Anyhow, John Doyle brings it all home by joining in the defense of the Trailer Park Boys against Jim Shaw.

Taking out newspaper ads to attack a successful Canadian production is the work of an oddball. If Jim Shaw doesn't like Trailer Park Boys, he doesn't have to watch it. If he loathes Trailer Park Boys and Kink, he can decline to offer the Showcase channel to his customers. But he doesn't, of course. Shaw Cable offers Showcase, along with a bundle of other channels, for $52.95 a month. Shaw obviously has some affection for the money generated by fans of Trailer Park Boys who want to see it on Showcase. In turn, he uses the money to condemn the show in newspaper ads and, by association, condemn everyone who enjoys the program.

Leave it alone, fella. We'll decide what we like to watch on TV. Then you deliver it on your cable service. If you're smart, and not the crank you appear to be.

Note to Doyle: "fatuous gasbag" has a nice ring to it, don't you think? Note to self: Is it just me or does McKee look a little like Jim Shaw? Ulp.

You know what? Let's let the Boys loose on the quirky. They'll sort it out right proper.

And then Bubbles will be nice to the kitties. Heartwarming ending. Roll credits.

Jack is a Dull Boy

IN A HELL HAIL OF PINKS. Hopefully I'll blog more tomorrow.

Also, tomorrow, on CBC Radio's Q, I'll be discussing the Fall TV Season -- and the role leaked pilots are playing in separating wheat from chaff.

K-Ville and The Narms!

SO ON THE whole I enjoyed K-Ville last night. I thought, like Jill Golick, that the end of act action sequences were a little overamped. (And how come these guys always have time to get to their car even when they've just been shot at by somebody going 80 mph?) And that whole "I deliberately want to kill the 9th Ward" thing was ... meh. But there was stuff that was inventive and great in it. The gag with the firehose dousing the house was undeniably creepy. That was an echo of Katrina that was freighted with dread.

But there's definitely a sense that what this show has going for it, initially, is a couple of good characters and a fantastic setting. You can't oversell those things. The charity event in the bar in the French Quarter, well, I've been in that bar. The colors were vibrant, and the cars traveling along streets that were not L.A. definitely made a difference.

Golick gets into the character breakdown pretty well, so I won't, but suffice to say that the pairing of the two men changed by Katrina -- and the plot twist at the end of the episode that gives new light to the narrative were well handled.

But what remains to be seen is whether they can leverage that wonderful setting and great characters (and the actors, too -- both Cole Hauser and especially Anthony Anderson are first rate) into a suitable narrative. Homicide started with character and setting too, but it also had the backup of David Simon's book.

With K-Ville, the central question is, "is it a cop show set in New Orleans?" Because I'm sure they could do that show and have one kind of show. But the failures of Katrina, and the continued problems that bedevil the Crescent City could also stand in for something greater: the problems of New Orleans -- poverty, neglect, infrastructure meltdown, education, stratification -- are the problems of America. The Baltimore in The Wire and Homicide is unmistakably itself. Over the course of that series, you actually saw the Waterfront revitalization happen -- you saw the City's flirtation with the CFL onscreen, for heaven's sake! For K-Ville to succeed artistically, Katrina can't just be a mint. It can't be window dressing -- an overlay of bathos on a standard cop show formula.

I'll be rooting for them to pull it off, but I'm not entirely optimistic.

K-Ville is also hard to judge by its pilot because -- Holy Gods -- that was a lot of money up there. What will they do when they have to shoot on a budget and a schedule?

Remains to be seen.

Which brings me to The Narms.

This season, it seems to me, we have a lot of shows on the networks that might just have fared better if they'd been on cable. More time to find their feet. Less restrictions on the kind of stories to be told. The ability to push it further. We're coming off one of the strongest summer cable seasons ever, and network just seems to suffer for that.

I want to see the Dirty Sexy Money where people really push it. You know, get actually dirty. Be actually sexy. Not the TeeVee version.
I want to see Gossip Girl where they do drugs and swear.
I want to see Pushing Daisies get 13 episodes.
I want to see Swingtown make it to four episodes.

Maybe I'm just catching up -- but the hangover from this great summer cable season means for the first time I'm looking at the new fall offerings and I'm much more interested in the concepts that I think could have been if they weren't restricted by network rules, and the need to hit a ratings jackpot overnight.

I mean, even Viva Laughlin might have worked, and from the sounds of it, everyone thinks that sucker's dead before it even unspools one episode.

So, I'm creating an award. Nominations are open now.

The Narms will be awarded to the show -- canceled or successful -- that is most ill-served by the network straightjacket.

We can talk about it for the next few weeks. Oh, I'll be talking about the The Narm, believe you me.

I'll offer a list of nominees once the season is underway. Then we can all vote. It'll be fun.

For those who don't remember, "Narm!" played a very, very important part in Six Feet Under. (I thought of calling the award The Krauses, but that might get one into legal trouble.)

Narm! Narm!

Now, hopefully, tonight I'll get a chance to see Gossip Girl. Depends on how my meetings go.

Now We Know

ONE OF THE THINGS I love about the internet -- and those things are dwindling -- is the ability to discover crap. Great crap. Crap you totally haven't seen.

So it was that I got sent that link to British comedians Mitchell and Webb's Notes sketch. If you haven't seen it, you can try Alex or Kung Fu Monkey. 'Tis verra funny.

I've never heard of these guys - but thanks to YouTube, you don't have to work very hard to find more. So I'll link to this one of theirs instead:






Interesting thing -- just goes to show you the other side of comedy that we sometimes forget about. Oh yeah, we're all about stoking the surprise...but sometimes we forget the kind of comedy that's a little older -- where the laughter and satisfaction comes not from seeing something that totally surprises you -- but by seeing something build to exactly the place you thought it was going to go, and the satisfaction you get from seeing it get there. Commedia Dell'Arte - where all the characters were stock and recognizable, was like that. You kind of got a hint of it in the Marx Brothers or the Stooges or Laurel and Hardy. And now, there are bits like this one from Mitchell and Webb:




It goes on to part two, but that build to the punchline....I mean, that punchline is not a surprise...but it's still funny.

In this day and age where lots of people look at something like Family Guy, with its weird, impossible to predict randomness, it's interesting to remember that anticipation can sometimes be as potent a comic weapon as surprise.

And for my fellow North Americans who'd never heard of these guys til they got that notes session clip in their inbox, this may strike you as ... odd. Yessir, it's localized Apple content!



Neat, eh?

Ah, Internet. You have pleased me.

Prep: Day One

IT STARTS with a friendly meeting. The Director of the episode, Phil Earnshaw, sits down with me in my office and we go through the script and talk about his notes.

This is a first-blush discussion, based upon the Production White Draft. This draft represents probably the 3rd or 4th full draft of the script. Of those, there was a pre-first draft of about 65 pages that was only for my eyes. The pre-first that I sent to the Story Department was about 61 pages. There were changes made on that draft which then went to the network, on a 60 page script. The Production White is about 58 pages, which is what we're finding is a good length to get us to 42 minutes and change -- we're a fast paced show. I would have liked to have maybe one more draft to tinker with it, but we were a little late on getting this one out, so there will probably be some more story rewriting at the Pink and Blue draft stages.

You can learn a lot about what your work experience is going to be from this first meeting. Some directors come in with very clear ideas off the bat of things they'd like to change, and some don't. Those who want to change a lot don't necessarily make for a bad first impression and those who don't don't necessarily make for a good impression. Because TV writing is so much a temporal art, there comes a point where you just want someone who's got a handle on your story other than you to tell you what they respond to, and what they don't.

As we talk through the script, the Director's notes are very logical and straight forward. What does so and so think of here? When he's doing this, what's the intent? Why wouldn't this happen instead of that?

There are a few questions that have to do with changes that happened to the script from the First Draft to the White Draft. Many of those changes have to do with streamlining, some have to do with network notes and a few have to do with notes from other people in the story department. There's discussion back and forth of a few moments that are missing from the current draft that might be worth going back to re-explore. And there are a couple of questions that arise from "widows." Widows are lines of action description or dialogue that are left over from an earlier draft and either duplicate something or don't make sense in the current iteration of a story. If you change the setting from, say, the ocean to an outdoor swimming pool, but still talk about a seagull landing in the surf, or someone shaking the sand out of their shoe -- that's a widow. The Director hasn't heard that term before -- but gets it immediately. Much little bits of bonding ensue.

Widows can be really, really bad if you don't catch them early enough. Because the last thing you need is the props person bringing you five pink lifelike dildos when, in story terms, that didn't make it past the first draft.

Note: there are no pink dildos in the border. Unless you count yours truly, and I'm actually probably more of a dil-weed.

But back to "Family Values." There's a mystery at the core of the story, and several characters acting in ways that conceal their true agendas, so we discuss and track these characters through the draft, pointing out what the audience is supposed to think what's going on at this moment, and what's really going on in the character's mind.

Directors are usually pretty good at this, because they're used to having actors come up and say, "what am I thinking in this scene?" And when they ask that, you better have an answer, bub. Them actors, they'll eat you alive if you don't.

There's a famous Canadian Director who was told on his last movie by the Star you've heard of, after ten minutes of cerebral reasoning about a scene, "Okay, I have no idea what the fuck you're talking about. You've given me nothing I can act. Just say 'Action' and I'll do something."

Directors and writers can talk subtext and stuff till we're blue in the face. But actors have to make it tangible...We writers can fudge that stuff. Directors can't.

In a couple of cases, there will be playback of video surveillance that's meant to repeat an earlier scene, so that you see something different this time. That requires a lot of talk of staging, how to approach the scene, and precisely what everyone's doing so it's clear. You don't want to telegraph it to the audience, but you also don't want to make it so obscure so people need a decoder ring to figure out what the hell is going on.

Canadian TV usually suffers from two scourges: either over explaining the obvious, or not explaining enough. (I realize this is perverse. But it's true.) I'm hoping we can avoid both extremes.

We get to the end of the script, and the Action takedown, and I offer that I'm really flexible on how this goes down. I'm not married to the way I've written it. I mention the three story points that need to happen. We're basically in agreement.

The Director will go away and come back with more thoughts, and that will probably generate another draft or so, before we get into changes sparked by locations and other production considerations. I'm open to good ideas -- a good idea is a good idea, and it's part of my job, as I see it, to make the Director excited about the script. At this point, my story is structurally pretty there. But there are different colours to the palate to be explored. The next 48 hours will be all about that.


Tomorrow: The Concept Meeting and Casting. My next rewrite will probably happen tomorrow night and Wednesday morning.

That Shiny New Blog Smell

MMM. NEW SEASON. All those shows smell so shiny right now. They're covered in baby powder and you just want to kiss them and love them.

And in a few weeks, some of them will be colicy and shitting everywhere, and we'll just be wishing we could get some more sleep. But for now, for glorious now, every baby is beautiful and pink and cuddly.

On the blog this week, we're going to try some different things. Later this week, in anticipation of Corner Gas' fifth season premiere Sept 24, I'll have a convo with two of the writer/producers, Mark Farrell and new showrunner Kevin White.

I'm also going to try to give you a taste of something different and more inside. (Without, you know, revealing anything privileged.)

My second episode of The Border, Ep 107, called "Family Values," starts prep today. I've written about prep before. But this time, I'm going to try to give you a blow-by-blow of some of the many, many meetings that you go through when you're prepping a script. It's one thing to be writing along in your garret, quite another to watch a talented group of professionals try to get a show on its feet. So this is gonna be a crafty wonk thing. Hope you all don't mind.

Finally, Jim Bawden in today's Toronto Star has a nice little article about the fall season from the Canadian perspective. The CAB wants you to think that no one in Canada wants to see Canadian shows, because that fits their agenda. It is indeed codswallop, and Bawden calls it as much.

Underfunded and underappreciated, Canadian TV comes tiptoeing back into view after summer's reruns. It's not that Canadians don't like watching themselves on TV. Try saying that to the million-plus fans who eagerly await each new episode of Corner Gas.

Or what about the sudden hit status of last year's Little Mosque on the Prairie, definitely a breakaway success after only seven episodes, big enough for the stars to get interviewed on CNN and written up in The New York Times?

What Canadian TV doesn't have, and never did have, is a plethora of smartly scripted hour-long dramas. This fall, CTV only has one hour of Canadian drama a week in Whistler, which is back for its second season, airing Saturdays at 9. CBC has the second season of the well-made thriller Intelligence (Oct. 1 at 9) and a new family entry, Heartland (debuting Oct. 14 at 7), to entice the Sunday suppertime audience that once doted on Wind At My Back. Citytv is back in the hour-series game with the vampire detective story Blood Ties (in November, there'll be another one titled Across The River to Motor City). Ten years ago there were 11 well-crafted hour Canadian series, but the glory days of Traders, ENG, Street Legal, Wind At My Back, Due South, and The Eleventh Hour are long gone.

It's not that they weren't popular – Global's Traders valiantly found its audience despite being smack dab against red-hot U.S. import ER. Programmers say it was the mounting cost – these days an hour of scripted drama costs at least $1 million in Canada, a top U.S. hit like CSI or Grey's Anatomy hovers at the $4.5 million (U.S.) mark...

More please! That's the reaction of viewers. But Canadian TV production is notoriously short of money.

Now, I've got to go read and give notes a script! I've got that back-to-school feeling! Who's with me!

James Spader? Really?

AND THAT'S all I'll say about that.

...okay...as one of the dozen viewers, I'll just add, 30 Rock -- yay.

But really. Really. That's it.

The Night Before Christmas...

THAT'S WHAT it feels like to a committed TV type. The fall season starts tomorrow. And thanks to Diane, I'm reminded that when it comes to TV news, the first place one always needs to check is The Futon Critic.

As she puts it:

I mentioned before that Mr. Futon Critic himself, Brian Ford Sullivan, was listing the 10 things you need to know about the new television season. He's done now, and he used statistical analysis to prove or disprove common assertions, like that Friday is the death time slot (it is), or that networks try to kill their shows (they don't). That's enough to earn my devotion -- opinion based on data, instead of the glut of trend articles that prove nothing but how cleverly writers can pick and choose details to suit their purpose.

But his last item, #10, is "Television is the best medium out there - and most of it is free!" and it's a lovely little article on how TV consistently produces "great content in a format that really isn't conducive to creating great things. "

Diane's particularly adorable when she's channelling her inner Spock, or Lisa Simpson, I guess would be the more flattering comparison...but I remind you all that here at Dead Things on Sticks, your humble host likes to engage in the messy first draft -- saying bold and occasionally stupid things about TV for your amusement and/or horror. I'm all about "choosing the details to suit my purpose."

Which doesn't mean that I too, can't also enjoy "opinions based on data." And bow down before the logic of their conclusions as presented. In any case, I for one think there are a couple of other items on Brian Ford Sullivan's list that demand your attention:

His number 2 point: Shows succeed and fail at the same rate, regardless of the genre, should be required reading at the Canadian networks. They all have a deep seeded allergic reaction to certain types of genre pitches. Many of us have grumbled that it's based on prejudice, not experience. Now Sullivan's crunched the numbers. Everything fails. Everything. Following the "hot" genre is no more a predictor of success than going it alone. You may as well try to stand out from the pack.

Then, take a look at number 6: Shows generally get canceled for one of three reasons. This is a nice, dispassionate article for the fan who's already wringing her/his hands over one show or another. When Mark Twain wrote that "a lie can get halfway around the world before the truth can get its boots on," he didn't anticipate the Internet. Now the lie's gotten all around the world, hit a bar, gotten on its cell phone in the bathroom stall doing a line of blow with a tranny hooker before the truth's feet have hit the floor. This season, as in the past, there will be all manner of vitriol directed against "suits" for making "idiot" decisions. Many blog posts will be writ, and forum theories be floated. But it's worth noting that none of this is really that voodoo. If you follow the ratings week-to-week, you'll probably know a show's going to be canceled before it is. And no, it won't be because there's a grudge against that star, or because "the suits were stupid."

Which is not to say that some of them aren't stupid. They're probably stupid in the same proportion to the rest of the population. Isn't that comforting?

Yes, you say, but Canadian networks don't generally release ratings. So how can I figure out if my favorite Canadian show is doing well?

Um.
I punt.

Then you get to other entries like number 9: Box or not you are represented in the Nielsen ratings (the tiresome argument I myself had a million times with viewers, and that I never want to have again) and number 8, Television, for better or for worse, is a business, and to me, Sullivan's true agenda is made clear:

When it comes to thinking about TeeVee, please don't be a crazy person.

Our relationship with TV is personal. I remember, years later, that Ted Harbert canceled My So Called Life. It's natural to invest in shows you love. But remember at the end of the day, you are getting it for free, or so close to it it's silly, and, really, it's still only TeeVee.

Now get out there and start your couches!

And thanks, Diane, for the Futon tip.

Taking Reality Seriously

DOWN IN the comments on one of my previous posts, commenter JH was defending the virtues of Reality TV. Interestingly enough, in that "I love my commenters and I love the internet" kind of way, Caryn James picks up that very baton in today's New York Times, pointing to two new fictional works that move beyond our culture's recent "tut-tut" or "society is crumbling" view of the genre. Has it really only been seven years since the first Survivor? That means I'm barely 1/1000th through the half life of the image of Richard Hatch's naked ass burned on my retina. Bummer.

In her article, "Imaginary Trips Beyond Reality," James writes:

But now the form has become such a fixture of cultural life that a smarter, post-reality-television generation of novels and movies is beginning to emerge. The clever little film “Great World of Sound” (which opened on Friday) and the graphic novel “The Homeless Channel” (published in May) tackle the issues behind reality television with subtlety and a true understanding of the genre’s appeal. And even movies like last year’s satire “American Dreamz” and the current fantasy “The Nines,” which don’t go far in analyzing the genre, appreciate its allure.

That acceptance is significantly new. Before reality television became a cultural force, prescient movies from the late 1990s like “‘The Truman Show” and “Edtv” sounded an Orwellian alarm, forecasting a world in which a person’s entire life might be televised. When that actually happened, books and movies continued the easy path of sneering at the trend, in smug works that deserved their obscurity...But “Great World of Sound” and “The Homeless Channel” are informed by the knowledge that reality television is popular for a reason: Viewers become emotionally invested in the players, even if they disapprove of them for playing. And these works convey the queasiness that is the essence of the genre: the voyeuristic attraction and sense of unease on the part of the audience and the complicity of the contestants themselves.

Besides plugging John August's new film, "The Nines", James also gives a shout out to one of my favorite films about TV:

Reality television has so rapidly broadened — to encompass everything from the Machiavellian deceit of “Survivor” to the bone-headed guesses about which briefcase has the money in “Deal or No Deal” — it’s a wonder that it took this long for a postmodern twist to occur, especially since one of the most accomplished films about the genre was one of the earliest.

“Series 7: The Contenders,” from 2001, takes the shape of a reality show in which contestants track down and kill their opponents. From its shot-on-video look to the stentorian announcer’s voice that says, “Real people. Real danger,” the mock film is less a satire than a shadow version of a reality show that is also a devastating comment on it. And “Series 7” effectively taps into its viewers’ emotional investment in the players: a pregnant woman, an unemployed father, a gun-toting lunatic. Daniel Minahan, the film’s writer and director, gets television so well that he has since become a top director on shows like ‘Grey’s Anatomy.”

Far from being reflexively anti-reality TV, like many of my compatriots in the scripted arena, I've always maintained a healthy interest, if not utter engagement, with the form. It helps, I guess, that once upon a time I was a TV producer, so I've got that professional appreciation for the level of craft involved.

When it comes to the shows themselves, though, I have to admit my viewership was limited to the first few series of Survivor (they lost me in Africa, and got me back, briefly, for the one with Rupert and the All-Star Edition.) I feel like I would probably like The Amazing Race if I watched it, but not enough to commit to doing so. I did have brief and dirty flings with Rock Star: INXS, and Hell's Kitchen last summer, but I think that's probably just cause watching Gordon Ramsay shout at people is so sickly entertaining. I may be a bad person.

No, though I remember thinking right away, back in that first season of Survivor, that I was humbled by how well produced and well-edited it was, the main thing I thank reality TV for is its absolutely crystal-clear commitment to defining character. I think it's sharpened all of us -- those who cast for types, and those of us who try to create our characters out of whole cloth.

Canadian Reality TV never quite goes far enough -- not enough pre-research, not enough time shooting, not enough time to cut...but, like James, I'm glad that other forms have at least let go of the reflexive reality-bash to start seriously considering how the format has changed us, and the way we think about story.

For we all think about story: whether you're a writer or not. And I think if you're writing something and your character isn't as interesting as any bloke you'd see on a reality show -- then, my friend, I would hope you'd take that as your "Come to Jesus" moment.*

*Your "Come To Jesus" moment may not actually contain Jesus.