Watching the flagellation of James Frey on Oprah today, I gotta tell you, was one of the most interesting things I've ever seen on television. It was fascinating. I can't believe he didn't explode.
The whole debate around this now has metastasized into a discussion that I think is just unreal.
I'm only about a quarter of the way through Frey's book. It's a great piece of writing. And even as I read it before I got busy, and before the Smoking Gun piece broke, I found myself thinking, "this can't all be true."
It seems to me that there's an almost naive thing working through Oprah's -- and America's -- understanding of this story, and all stories. It puts me in mind of the controversy that surrounded The Hurricane when it came out, and the desperate attempts to discredit Michael Moore's Columbine and Farenheit 9/11 by coming up with minor and ultimately unimportant distortions of time and place, and using that to try and damn the larger truths contained within.
Oprah and others can rage against Frey, I truly believe, because in the end his story really doesn't matter. It's safe to get outraged about it.
But drumming up the true rage one should have about distortions -- like, say, the distortions of a government that has lied consistently to its citizens about science, the law, foreign policy, and the conduct of a war fought in our name -- well...that's scary stuff. That's stuff that could actually tear a country apart.
Better we go after the fibber with the book on Oprah.
We live in interesting times. We surely do.
Thursday, January 26, 2006
Wednesday, January 25, 2006
Love Monkey = My New Favorite Show
Not necessarily my new favorite, more like my favorite of new...um...right. Where was I?I loved Kyle Smith's Love Monkey when it came out. I loved everything about that book. Nick Hornby with an American accent. I can't believe John Cusack didn't buy the rights.
Then comes the casting. Tom Cavanagh, so effortlessly winning in Ed. Judy Greer, who's always been so much funnier and greater than her role as the secretary -who-always- exposes-her- new-breasts in Arrested Development. "Say goodbye to these, Michael!" Give her the chance to play doe-eyed. Mmm. Ingenue. Throw in an A&R theme, (changed from the book's journo.) Throw in Larenz Tate and Jason Priestley, and Ivana Milevic (I'm not sure that's how you spell her name, but she was the best thing in the Mind of the Married Man.)
I was predisposed to like this show. But I've been so swamped the last two weeks I hadn't had a chance to check it out. Great script. Great characterizations. Beautifully shot. New York for New York -- there's a concept. Captures all my manboy-like-tendencies in one tidy package. And a cover of "Somebody Who's Cool" by Sloan as the theme song. Whoosh.
It better not be tanking. I'm falling for this little monkey hard.
Book of Daniel is Dunzo.
And you know what? I'm no longer sure that the First Amendment really means anything anymore.
Yeah, viewers didn't watch.
But still -- it all feels to me like something is steadily getting added to the gunk. The gunk is what can be said and defended. America is such a poisoned, partisan place right now that I'm starting to wonder if debate's even possible anymore. Book of Daniel was about faith and how hard it is to keep it. It was about a guy who wanted to believe in the forgiveness parts of the Bible, rather than all the smoting. And, of course, the people who run the U.S. now, but who somehow are still under constant, unending attack by ... uh ... I don't know ... ghosts? ... well, you know, they get to call the tune and the MSM follows up with dutiful stories of station boycotts and "controversy."
Better that a show came and went and people said, "wasn't our cup of tea." But no -- now it's forever linked with the "you can't possibly say anything bad about religion. Not in America." Even if you weren't really saying anything bad about religion in the first place.
In the United States, today, remember - the most important thing to do is to "watch what you say."
Gunk. I don't know how you can breathe through it anymore.
Good Night and Good Luck, I guess.
Yeah, viewers didn't watch.
But still -- it all feels to me like something is steadily getting added to the gunk. The gunk is what can be said and defended. America is such a poisoned, partisan place right now that I'm starting to wonder if debate's even possible anymore. Book of Daniel was about faith and how hard it is to keep it. It was about a guy who wanted to believe in the forgiveness parts of the Bible, rather than all the smoting. And, of course, the people who run the U.S. now, but who somehow are still under constant, unending attack by ... uh ... I don't know ... ghosts? ... well, you know, they get to call the tune and the MSM follows up with dutiful stories of station boycotts and "controversy."
Better that a show came and went and people said, "wasn't our cup of tea." But no -- now it's forever linked with the "you can't possibly say anything bad about religion. Not in America." Even if you weren't really saying anything bad about religion in the first place.
In the United States, today, remember - the most important thing to do is to "watch what you say."
Gunk. I don't know how you can breathe through it anymore.
Good Night and Good Luck, I guess.
Copyright, Shmoppyright...just one more.
Hey, I promise, this is the last Canadian-election related post.
One of the interesting results from the election is that the Liberal candidate in Parkdale-High Park, a West End Toronto riding, Sam Bulte, was thrown out by Peggy Nash's NDP.
Why is that interesting?
Well, if you've been reading Boing Boing, you probably know. Sam Bulte had some heavy-duty friends. A few days before the election, she held a fundraiser that was sponsored in large part by lobbyists who are trying to get Canada's copyright laws changed. Basically, powerful interests who want RIAA-style onerous laws that benefit multinationals and corporate interests, at the expense of citizens. (Canada's current copyright laws are currently not quite as stacked against the consumer as U.S. laws are.)
Anyway, thanks to a lot of bloggers, chief among them law professor Michael Geist (whose site offers a pretty good link primer on the whole controversy) and Cory Doctorow, Bulte found herself, as the campaign wore on, cast as "Hollywood's Candidate." The perception being that her point of view was heavily, and perhaps unfairly influenced by powerful lobbyist backers.
Bulte did herself no favors, by casting the opinions of those who disagreed with her approach as "pro-downloading zealots.." (reducing a big, big issue to the RIAA-sponsored bogeyman talking points.)
Anyway, she lost. But it's how she lost that's really interesting. Her support from the 2004 election didn't really change that much -- but almost thirty percent more people came out to vote for her opponent. The turnout in the riding was 72 percent, which was about 8 percent or so higher than any other riding in the country. If the turnout experienced in this one riding had been reflected nationally, 123 of the House of Commons 308 seats would have been in different hands today. That's incredibly significant. And it indicates that just maybe, the combination of copyright, the taint of lobbyist influence, and the blogosphere had an impact.
More on that here.
One of the interesting results from the election is that the Liberal candidate in Parkdale-High Park, a West End Toronto riding, Sam Bulte, was thrown out by Peggy Nash's NDP.
Why is that interesting?
Well, if you've been reading Boing Boing, you probably know. Sam Bulte had some heavy-duty friends. A few days before the election, she held a fundraiser that was sponsored in large part by lobbyists who are trying to get Canada's copyright laws changed. Basically, powerful interests who want RIAA-style onerous laws that benefit multinationals and corporate interests, at the expense of citizens. (Canada's current copyright laws are currently not quite as stacked against the consumer as U.S. laws are.)
Anyway, thanks to a lot of bloggers, chief among them law professor Michael Geist (whose site offers a pretty good link primer on the whole controversy) and Cory Doctorow, Bulte found herself, as the campaign wore on, cast as "Hollywood's Candidate." The perception being that her point of view was heavily, and perhaps unfairly influenced by powerful lobbyist backers.
Bulte did herself no favors, by casting the opinions of those who disagreed with her approach as "pro-downloading zealots.." (reducing a big, big issue to the RIAA-sponsored bogeyman talking points.)
Anyway, she lost. But it's how she lost that's really interesting. Her support from the 2004 election didn't really change that much -- but almost thirty percent more people came out to vote for her opponent. The turnout in the riding was 72 percent, which was about 8 percent or so higher than any other riding in the country. If the turnout experienced in this one riding had been reflected nationally, 123 of the House of Commons 308 seats would have been in different hands today. That's incredibly significant. And it indicates that just maybe, the combination of copyright, the taint of lobbyist influence, and the blogosphere had an impact.
More on that here.
The Problems with Cancon
All through this election in Canada, just concluded, I would receive missives from Arts groups like my union, the WGC, and the Actor's Union, ACTRA, and various other arts organizations agitating the same line, "make culture an issue in this election." I kind of ignored them, because I knew that the real issues in this election would never be shoved aside for a discussion for culture, and because I honestly believe that an election is a stupid time to talk about culture anyway. It would just get reduced to hysteria about naked bums.
Now there's a Conservative government coming in. It'll be a weak government, and likely it won't be able to do much in the culture gutting department. But so many of my friends who don't work in the industry, or who are U.S. -based, don't understand the issues of "government support of culture" in Canada that I thought I'd just drop a few f-bombs here. Um. Wait. No. Not F-bombs. Call them "context statements."
The idea of "Canadian Culture" (in the vast, sparsely-populated English speaking part, not the concentrated French-speaking part) is always going to be one of nuance. Canadians do mostly define themselves by how they're different than Americans. And to an outsider, the truth is, they're not that different.
But Canada is in a unique position. We are the only country whose movie receipts are counted as part of the U.S. domestic box office tally. Think about that. We also are the only country where U.S. shows air at the same time, not just on the U.S. channels that we get on our cable, but on the Canadian networks too. (The situation is different for Cable channels...for instance, we don't have HBO, we have two Canadian equivalents, but they show all the same shows, and pretty much everything makes it up here sooner or later. Some of our Cable channels, like, say, Showcase or Space, I think are actually better than their U.S. equivalents) In fact, our position is so unique that our networks get to do something pretty extraordinary: if they show a show like CSI at the same time as CBS does, they get to block out CBS' signal with their own, for the duration of the show. So their commercials air on two channels. Pretty sweet.
This is one of the reasons why if you own a TV station, Canadian broadcasting is pretty lucrative. Plus, you don't really have to spend that much money promoting the shows you bought -- you just piggyback on the US media exposure. Again, if you're a network prez in Canada, awesome. That little gift used to be combined with one for the other side: the production community: Canadian drama quotas. But in 1999, the Broadcasters managed to get the rules changed so that they could count low-cost reality shows as CanCon. And overnight the number of drama series in Canada dropped from about 12 or 13 to, like, 4. Whoops. They still get the sweet commercial-substitution dealie, though.
Canadians have a voracious appetite for U.S. cultural product. Why should they be any different than the rest of the world?
Yet, because this is a nation of 30 million next to one ten times bigger, when the discussion of US cultural types comes to "there should be a level playing field" (code for: stop government support of the domestic TV production industry) the discussion becomes silly quickly.
As does most of the discussion surrounding the moaning the private networks do here about the CBC. Most of the private broadcasters would like it if the CBC couldn't sell ads. They don't want to compete with the CBC at all. They want the CBC to be like PBS in the U.S.
Now, here's the problem. Due respect to the Wingers down in the U.S.--you know what, scratch that, who am I kidding?-- but Canadians, in ways other than culturally, don't really resemble the United States all that much. We are more liberal up here. We are not nearly as religious. Yes, the Conservatives just won a government, but they did it with only 36% of the vote -- meaning the majority of the population voted against them. (This happens in just about every election here -- it's one of the quirks of the parliamentary system when you have 3 or 4 viable parties.) The Conservative support is mostly concentrated in rural areas. They didn't win a single seat in the three largest cities in Canada -- Toronto, Montreal, and Vancouver. The funny thing is that the regions that the Conservatives draw their support from, are probably, well, more conservative -- more in line with the Red States in the USA. But Bush, for whatever reason, got 51% of the vote in 2004. In Canada, the Conservatives simply cannot make that claim. Hence the reality, that at any time, the other parties could cause the government to fall. (That's what's meant by "a minority," -- the ruling party doesn't have enough seats to pass legislation without help from some of the other parties.)
I'm sure that the Conservatives would love nothing more than to squish a lot of cultural talk or product that tells Canadians, that, um, you know...they think a bit differently than Americans do. Because that would mean that the American values' -- which are closer to their supporters than the majority of Canadians -- would be the only ones shown on TV. Maybe that would result in more social conservatism. Who knows. Stranger things have happened.
I'm amazed whenever I talk to Canadian nationalists who are rabidly anti-American, then in the same breath, rage at the fact that they can't get any American channel they want. There's a lot of hippie-dippie talk from Canadian cultural types about "supporting our stories" and there's plenty of cultural theory to back it up -- but the more compelling fact is that Canada was out of step with most western countries in that it was the one place where homegrown drama and comedy wasn't in the top twenty watched shows.
When I was in South Africa in 2004, I was fascinated by the wide range of homegrown product that was available. Youth shows like Yizo Yizo, and lots of soaps, sitcoms, dramas -- all cheaply made, of course...but they were popular. And sometimes they were in eleven languages. Freaky.
But here's the funny thing...that attitude has just started to change in Canada. The argument before from networks has always been 'Canadians don't want to watch Canadian shows.' But now there's shows like Corner Gas, and Degrassi, and Falcon Beach (which is doing very respectably for Global,) and even smaller cult hits like those dastardly Trailer Park Boys, that proves that nope, that's not true either.
So why support them at all with Government money? Because given a choice and a "level playing field" -- most Canadian networks would rather buy CSI cheap, and count their money. There is no level playing field. The networks have a way easier deal than networks in any other country. They're basically sucking at the teat of the U.S. tv industry, without having to break a sweat. And our broadcasting regs help them to do it. That's not level. Taking away cable substitution and saying, "Okay, CBS, you can now compete for Canadian ad dollars..." that's level, right? No? Um...why not?
The problem is once you introduce government funding for the arts in a large scale way, it becomes bureaucratized. You see this sometimes in the kinds of shows that get made, especially on CBC. They don't appeal to people, because they're committee'd to death, or greenlit for a reason other than, "we think audiences will really like this." There's no vision there. So that's a problem with government support of TV.
But here's the flipside: the arguments made against government support of the arts are exactly the same arguments made against CanCon on Radio in the 1960's. Then, a man named Pierre Juneau spearheaded those regs. (The Canadian Grammy Award, the Juno, is named after him.)
All the arguments that people made -- the "there should be a level playing field" stuff -- were made then about radio. And for a while, the CanCon quotas did mean that a lot of crappy Canadian music got played more than it should.
But then the industry grew up. Legions of musicians came up, and found support, and the result today is that the Canadian Music Industry is actually an industry...not a toy, like the domestic TV industry is. Bands like Tragically Hip can make a good living touring and recording, even though they've never really "broken through" in the USA. It's not unusual in the slightest for young Canadians to talk about, and love -- even prefer, Canadian music. The best hip-hop I heard last year was from K-OS, a Canadian artist who hasn't made a dent in the States.
In fact, the Canadian music industry got so successful with the regulations, that it became attractive to the majors. And there were mergers, and consolidations, and lo and behold, the major labels here are all run by lawyers now. They don't break new talent, they push for RIAA-style copyright restrictions that benefit multinationals, not humans, and the true excitement in the music scene comes from a network of independent bands and labels: Broken Social Scene, Arts & Crafts, Stars, Metric -- and a host of others. The fact that there is a vibrant indie scene only reinforces the fact that Canadian music, given a chance to grow through concerted, committed regulatory support, eventually matured to the point where even the independent artist could claim support and make a living on their merits.
We're seeing the first blush of success with homegrown shows on TV now. Will it be snuffed out because of political expediency? Or is it possible that twenty years from now, we'll be talking about the Pierre Juneau of Canadian TV?
Now there's a Conservative government coming in. It'll be a weak government, and likely it won't be able to do much in the culture gutting department. But so many of my friends who don't work in the industry, or who are U.S. -based, don't understand the issues of "government support of culture" in Canada that I thought I'd just drop a few f-bombs here. Um. Wait. No. Not F-bombs. Call them "context statements."
The idea of "Canadian Culture" (in the vast, sparsely-populated English speaking part, not the concentrated French-speaking part) is always going to be one of nuance. Canadians do mostly define themselves by how they're different than Americans. And to an outsider, the truth is, they're not that different.
But Canada is in a unique position. We are the only country whose movie receipts are counted as part of the U.S. domestic box office tally. Think about that. We also are the only country where U.S. shows air at the same time, not just on the U.S. channels that we get on our cable, but on the Canadian networks too. (The situation is different for Cable channels...for instance, we don't have HBO, we have two Canadian equivalents, but they show all the same shows, and pretty much everything makes it up here sooner or later. Some of our Cable channels, like, say, Showcase or Space, I think are actually better than their U.S. equivalents) In fact, our position is so unique that our networks get to do something pretty extraordinary: if they show a show like CSI at the same time as CBS does, they get to block out CBS' signal with their own, for the duration of the show. So their commercials air on two channels. Pretty sweet.
This is one of the reasons why if you own a TV station, Canadian broadcasting is pretty lucrative. Plus, you don't really have to spend that much money promoting the shows you bought -- you just piggyback on the US media exposure. Again, if you're a network prez in Canada, awesome. That little gift used to be combined with one for the other side: the production community: Canadian drama quotas. But in 1999, the Broadcasters managed to get the rules changed so that they could count low-cost reality shows as CanCon. And overnight the number of drama series in Canada dropped from about 12 or 13 to, like, 4. Whoops. They still get the sweet commercial-substitution dealie, though.
Canadians have a voracious appetite for U.S. cultural product. Why should they be any different than the rest of the world?
Yet, because this is a nation of 30 million next to one ten times bigger, when the discussion of US cultural types comes to "there should be a level playing field" (code for: stop government support of the domestic TV production industry) the discussion becomes silly quickly.
As does most of the discussion surrounding the moaning the private networks do here about the CBC. Most of the private broadcasters would like it if the CBC couldn't sell ads. They don't want to compete with the CBC at all. They want the CBC to be like PBS in the U.S.
Now, here's the problem. Due respect to the Wingers down in the U.S.--you know what, scratch that, who am I kidding?-- but Canadians, in ways other than culturally, don't really resemble the United States all that much. We are more liberal up here. We are not nearly as religious. Yes, the Conservatives just won a government, but they did it with only 36% of the vote -- meaning the majority of the population voted against them. (This happens in just about every election here -- it's one of the quirks of the parliamentary system when you have 3 or 4 viable parties.) The Conservative support is mostly concentrated in rural areas. They didn't win a single seat in the three largest cities in Canada -- Toronto, Montreal, and Vancouver. The funny thing is that the regions that the Conservatives draw their support from, are probably, well, more conservative -- more in line with the Red States in the USA. But Bush, for whatever reason, got 51% of the vote in 2004. In Canada, the Conservatives simply cannot make that claim. Hence the reality, that at any time, the other parties could cause the government to fall. (That's what's meant by "a minority," -- the ruling party doesn't have enough seats to pass legislation without help from some of the other parties.)
I'm sure that the Conservatives would love nothing more than to squish a lot of cultural talk or product that tells Canadians, that, um, you know...they think a bit differently than Americans do. Because that would mean that the American values' -- which are closer to their supporters than the majority of Canadians -- would be the only ones shown on TV. Maybe that would result in more social conservatism. Who knows. Stranger things have happened.
I'm amazed whenever I talk to Canadian nationalists who are rabidly anti-American, then in the same breath, rage at the fact that they can't get any American channel they want. There's a lot of hippie-dippie talk from Canadian cultural types about "supporting our stories" and there's plenty of cultural theory to back it up -- but the more compelling fact is that Canada was out of step with most western countries in that it was the one place where homegrown drama and comedy wasn't in the top twenty watched shows.
When I was in South Africa in 2004, I was fascinated by the wide range of homegrown product that was available. Youth shows like Yizo Yizo, and lots of soaps, sitcoms, dramas -- all cheaply made, of course...but they were popular. And sometimes they were in eleven languages. Freaky.
But here's the funny thing...that attitude has just started to change in Canada. The argument before from networks has always been 'Canadians don't want to watch Canadian shows.' But now there's shows like Corner Gas, and Degrassi, and Falcon Beach (which is doing very respectably for Global,) and even smaller cult hits like those dastardly Trailer Park Boys, that proves that nope, that's not true either.
So why support them at all with Government money? Because given a choice and a "level playing field" -- most Canadian networks would rather buy CSI cheap, and count their money. There is no level playing field. The networks have a way easier deal than networks in any other country. They're basically sucking at the teat of the U.S. tv industry, without having to break a sweat. And our broadcasting regs help them to do it. That's not level. Taking away cable substitution and saying, "Okay, CBS, you can now compete for Canadian ad dollars..." that's level, right? No? Um...why not?
The problem is once you introduce government funding for the arts in a large scale way, it becomes bureaucratized. You see this sometimes in the kinds of shows that get made, especially on CBC. They don't appeal to people, because they're committee'd to death, or greenlit for a reason other than, "we think audiences will really like this." There's no vision there. So that's a problem with government support of TV.
But here's the flipside: the arguments made against government support of the arts are exactly the same arguments made against CanCon on Radio in the 1960's. Then, a man named Pierre Juneau spearheaded those regs. (The Canadian Grammy Award, the Juno, is named after him.)
All the arguments that people made -- the "there should be a level playing field" stuff -- were made then about radio. And for a while, the CanCon quotas did mean that a lot of crappy Canadian music got played more than it should.
But then the industry grew up. Legions of musicians came up, and found support, and the result today is that the Canadian Music Industry is actually an industry...not a toy, like the domestic TV industry is. Bands like Tragically Hip can make a good living touring and recording, even though they've never really "broken through" in the USA. It's not unusual in the slightest for young Canadians to talk about, and love -- even prefer, Canadian music. The best hip-hop I heard last year was from K-OS, a Canadian artist who hasn't made a dent in the States.
In fact, the Canadian music industry got so successful with the regulations, that it became attractive to the majors. And there were mergers, and consolidations, and lo and behold, the major labels here are all run by lawyers now. They don't break new talent, they push for RIAA-style copyright restrictions that benefit multinationals, not humans, and the true excitement in the music scene comes from a network of independent bands and labels: Broken Social Scene, Arts & Crafts, Stars, Metric -- and a host of others. The fact that there is a vibrant indie scene only reinforces the fact that Canadian music, given a chance to grow through concerted, committed regulatory support, eventually matured to the point where even the independent artist could claim support and make a living on their merits.
We're seeing the first blush of success with homegrown shows on TV now. Will it be snuffed out because of political expediency? Or is it possible that twenty years from now, we'll be talking about the Pierre Juneau of Canadian TV?
Tuesday, January 24, 2006
THE CW?
Well. Bust my balls.
Just what we need. One LESS outlet for television ideas.
I love it when the business guys do things to salt my game. Interesting from a business POV. From a creative one? Not so much.
Daddy wants a Guinness. Before one p.m.
Not a good sign.
Just what we need. One LESS outlet for television ideas.
I love it when the business guys do things to salt my game. Interesting from a business POV. From a creative one? Not so much.
Daddy wants a Guinness. Before one p.m.
Not a good sign.
Monday, January 23, 2006
Good News, For Now...
Well, it looks like the Conservatives will form the next Canadian government, but not with a very strong mandate. It'll be a very weak minority, which probably means we in Canada will have to suffer through three federal elections in about six years. Mark sometime in 2007 on your calendar. Sigh.
Anyway, the other piece of news I got today was way better. I've had a pilot shortlisted in the new Pilot Program sponsored by The Canadian Film Centre.
This is the Canadian Film school founded by director Norman Jewison. I was a resident there in 2001. The new program is an initiative where the film centre will become involved, with broadcaster participation, in the production of pilots each year. Canada generally doesn't produce pilots -- shows are given 6 and 13 episode orders based on scripts. Which seems a ridiculously risky idea to anyone who's worked in the American industry, I know.
So, anyway, good news. One iron that might catch fire.
Now if I could just throw off the reality tv yoke, all would be swelligant.
Anyway, the other piece of news I got today was way better. I've had a pilot shortlisted in the new Pilot Program sponsored by The Canadian Film Centre.
This is the Canadian Film school founded by director Norman Jewison. I was a resident there in 2001. The new program is an initiative where the film centre will become involved, with broadcaster participation, in the production of pilots each year. Canada generally doesn't produce pilots -- shows are given 6 and 13 episode orders based on scripts. Which seems a ridiculously risky idea to anyone who's worked in the American industry, I know.
So, anyway, good news. One iron that might catch fire.
Now if I could just throw off the reality tv yoke, all would be swelligant.
Oh Canada?
I know it's cold. But get out there, get off your ass, and go vote. If you don't, you lose all bitching rights til the next time (which hopefully will be in two years, thanks to a minority gov't.) In any case, if you don't vote, we get to send you for a little time out in Nunavut.
Unless you're in Nunavut, in which case you're going to have to go to Vancouver. Seriously. Vancouver. Come on. Ask yourself: is it really worth it? Vancouver. Seriously. You'll have to deal with all of them. Oh, yes, I said it, bitch. It's on.
Vote. Yes, the system is screwed up. Yes, the choices are all lackluster. But sometimes even when the choice is turd sandwich and giant douche, you still have to step up.
If I can go to the trouble to do the rigamarole of voting from South Africa (which I did in 2004,) You can walk down to the legion hall or grade school. Bring I.D. if you don't have your voter card. Now git.
Tuesday, January 17, 2006
On 24
Still up to my eyeballs. I've got reality, I've got historical drama, I've got a pitch meeting for a cartoon, and I got Broken Social Scene tickets for Friday Night. What you got?
Here's something else I got that you should get, too:
Slate's interview with one of the writers of 24, Michael Loceff.
Wonder about torture porn? Cheating real time? Anything else? Go read. My favorite bit:
Sci Fi fans -- or a great rollicking portion of them, anyway -- live for fridge logic. It's not enough that it's a transporter. How does it work?
The TWOP haters are famous for that, too.
It's one of the reasons why Shatner was right.
Here's something else I got that you should get, too:
Slate's interview with one of the writers of 24, Michael Loceff.
Wonder about torture porn? Cheating real time? Anything else? Go read. My favorite bit:
We do have an investment in plausibility. We've hired writers who have done heavy research in espionage and anti-terrorism and worked with the government. And we've met with consultants from the intelligence community and other parts of the government, just to help stir up ideas and help us come up with something that seems compelling. But I think ultimately what makes the show is not the reality but the drama. Joel and Bob approach 24 the way they have always approached dramatic television: They've approached it with the idea that the drama is, in the end, more important than the factual aspect of the story. Joel in particular is really good at ignoring reality when it's convenient.For years, I interacted regularly with Sci Fi fans at the Space channel, who are pretty much the antithesis of the regular tv viewer, because they watched stuff looking for Fridge Logic issues. (Fridge Logic is the stuff you can get hung up on in the room that doesn't matter because no one will care until they're standing at the fridge a half hour after the show's over going, "hey, could Jack Bauer really have run down those steps in twenty seconds?" )
Sci Fi fans -- or a great rollicking portion of them, anyway -- live for fridge logic. It's not enough that it's a transporter. How does it work?
The TWOP haters are famous for that, too.
It's one of the reasons why Shatner was right.
Sunday, January 15, 2006
Going Fishing
Blogging will be light over the next several days, as I've got a biggo writing deadline, coupled with a quickie production job in ... reality TV ... shudder.
See y'all on the other side.
See y'all on the other side.
Relax. He's Really Good At This.
Well, they don't disappoint, do those 24 people.
Best act-outs on TV. Bar none.
Tink-tink-tink-tink-tink.
Man, I've missed those notes.
All that and Connie Britton too?
Jack Bauer puts the mmm in Terrorismmm.
Friday, January 13, 2006
Mickey Mouse Has Grown Up a Cow
One of the nice things about being a television writer is that sitting on your couch watching TV actually, no fooling, counts as research.
Now there are two types of writers I know. The first, and I think more prevalent type, are the ones who try to avoid watching anything similar when they're writing a script. A friend of mine who was developing a show about male friends avoided watching Entourage til his show was solid. If you're writing a cop show, you don't watch CSI or Law & Order, because you don't want to be influenced.
This kind of self-censorship, by the way, is way easier than actually trying to remember where your ideas come from. If you're aware of your ideas flowing, I find the spigot tends to get all crusty. And nobody wants a crusty spigot. There's a cream for that, but it smells kind of bad.
The easiest stories of unintentional influence come in the songwriting realm. A few years ago, the Stones settled because they unknowingly wrote a song that had more than a passing reference to the chord changes in a k.d. lang song...they settled becuase they thought, "yup, that probably did influence us." Not stole, understand. Influenced.
There was a similar thing years ago between Robert Palmer and Rod Stewart. Palmer recorded a song that sounded a whole lot like Rod's "Some Guys Have All the Luck," which, it turned out, was being recorded in the studio next door while Palmer was working there... the point is, the hyper-awareness of your creative process and "where things come from" is the first thing you have to let go of when you do this a lot. Because otherwise you'll go nuts before you ever get anything down on paper.
Every year I hear from some spec monkey about how their 'great idea' was stolen by so-and-so...never mind that the idea was a logical extension of what was in the news, or on the bestseller lists, or utterly derivative of something else... anyway, the point is that creativity and idea-generation cannot be a self-conscious exercise. And for some, when you're in that state, you can be highly suggestible. So those types tend to avoid similar stuff when they're creating.
I said there were two types of writers, and there are. I'm the second type. I love watching similar stuff when I'm working. Because you can find similarities in the strangest places, and strangest contexts. I find it makes me think about my own ideas in a different way -- and I don't really (or at least I don't think I do) become confused or hungup on what's coming from me and what's from them. I think that's because when I'm generating ideas and working them out, I can't really do anything else. I can barely read a Newspaper. But when things are banged into semi-coherent shape, I find that what helps me most is to watch things that have a similar element, but a vastly different treatment. It's almost like keeping yourself on the work track, while still being able to relax. Call it "recreationally staying in the wheelhouse."
One of my current projects is a show about a character in two eras. We play the story of the younger man in the 1960's against the story of him today in the 21st century, as an old man. Naturally, there's a mystery: something that happened then is having an effect now. And so on and so forth.
This script has been a real bear. I've done two of three episodes now, and the show's changed many times in development, as the broadcaster's vision of what they wanted evolved. At this point, I'm probably nine months into development on this, off and on...and it's easily the hardest thing I did in 2005.
So I eagerly and giddily tucked into a new BBC drama the other night. It's a show that I obtained through my highly placed TV monkey sources. I don't believe it's been on here yet. My guess is when it comes over to these shores, it'll likely show up on BBC America and BBC Canada.
Anyway, here's the premise of Life On Mars. Sam Tyler is a Detective Chief Inspector with the Manchester police force. They're chasing a serial killer. They get the wrong guy. His girlfriend, one of the other cops on the force, he's having an affair with her, see? And she has this idea that the suspect can lead them to the real killer, and...well, she gets nicked. And Sam is trying to collect himself, calm down, on the side of the road, see? And his Ipod is playing David Bowie's Life on Mars.
Then Sam steps out in the street and gets mowed down by a car.
When he wakes up, he's in 1973. His wallet says, Sam Tyler...he's a Detective Inspector, not a Chief Inspector. The highway he was beside hasn't been built yet. He wanders to the police station and finds a bunch of unrestructured, thug cops. There's no DNA testing...no computers, no mobile phones. Getting prints analysed takes two weeks. Everything's on Paper files.
What the hell is going on?
Through the course of the narrative, there's not just the fish out of water stuff, but there's also the ambiguous hints that , hey, is Sam in a coma inventing all this? Or did he somehow really travel back to 1973? There's evidence for both sides. What is true is that the case he was following in 2006 seems to have a connection here. But to follow that lead, he's going to need to convince his less sophisticated cop brethren to see through their swagger and embrace some new methods...like, oh, trusting women and stuff. Top performances from John Simm and Philip Gleinster.
The description doesn't make it sound like the best thing ever. But there's something haunting and terribly, terribly inventive about this show. For all the fooferal over Threshold and Invasion and the return of Sci Fi to tv -- Life On Mars is easily the trippiest and most compelling time travel thing I've seen in a while. A nice subversion of a lot of different genres and storytelling tropes...Life On Mars has more than a bit of Potter's amazing Singing Detective to it. There are seven more episodes to come. And I'll be looking forward to all of them.
And maybe they'll inspire me to return to my dual-era show with new vigour.
The Life On Mars site at BBC is here.
Now there are two types of writers I know. The first, and I think more prevalent type, are the ones who try to avoid watching anything similar when they're writing a script. A friend of mine who was developing a show about male friends avoided watching Entourage til his show was solid. If you're writing a cop show, you don't watch CSI or Law & Order, because you don't want to be influenced.
This kind of self-censorship, by the way, is way easier than actually trying to remember where your ideas come from. If you're aware of your ideas flowing, I find the spigot tends to get all crusty. And nobody wants a crusty spigot. There's a cream for that, but it smells kind of bad.
The easiest stories of unintentional influence come in the songwriting realm. A few years ago, the Stones settled because they unknowingly wrote a song that had more than a passing reference to the chord changes in a k.d. lang song...they settled becuase they thought, "yup, that probably did influence us." Not stole, understand. Influenced.
There was a similar thing years ago between Robert Palmer and Rod Stewart. Palmer recorded a song that sounded a whole lot like Rod's "Some Guys Have All the Luck," which, it turned out, was being recorded in the studio next door while Palmer was working there... the point is, the hyper-awareness of your creative process and "where things come from" is the first thing you have to let go of when you do this a lot. Because otherwise you'll go nuts before you ever get anything down on paper.
Every year I hear from some spec monkey about how their 'great idea' was stolen by so-and-so...never mind that the idea was a logical extension of what was in the news, or on the bestseller lists, or utterly derivative of something else... anyway, the point is that creativity and idea-generation cannot be a self-conscious exercise. And for some, when you're in that state, you can be highly suggestible. So those types tend to avoid similar stuff when they're creating.
I said there were two types of writers, and there are. I'm the second type. I love watching similar stuff when I'm working. Because you can find similarities in the strangest places, and strangest contexts. I find it makes me think about my own ideas in a different way -- and I don't really (or at least I don't think I do) become confused or hungup on what's coming from me and what's from them. I think that's because when I'm generating ideas and working them out, I can't really do anything else. I can barely read a Newspaper. But when things are banged into semi-coherent shape, I find that what helps me most is to watch things that have a similar element, but a vastly different treatment. It's almost like keeping yourself on the work track, while still being able to relax. Call it "recreationally staying in the wheelhouse."
One of my current projects is a show about a character in two eras. We play the story of the younger man in the 1960's against the story of him today in the 21st century, as an old man. Naturally, there's a mystery: something that happened then is having an effect now. And so on and so forth.
This script has been a real bear. I've done two of three episodes now, and the show's changed many times in development, as the broadcaster's vision of what they wanted evolved. At this point, I'm probably nine months into development on this, off and on...and it's easily the hardest thing I did in 2005.
So I eagerly and giddily tucked into a new BBC drama the other night. It's a show that I obtained through my highly placed TV monkey sources. I don't believe it's been on here yet. My guess is when it comes over to these shores, it'll likely show up on BBC America and BBC Canada.Anyway, here's the premise of Life On Mars. Sam Tyler is a Detective Chief Inspector with the Manchester police force. They're chasing a serial killer. They get the wrong guy. His girlfriend, one of the other cops on the force, he's having an affair with her, see? And she has this idea that the suspect can lead them to the real killer, and...well, she gets nicked. And Sam is trying to collect himself, calm down, on the side of the road, see? And his Ipod is playing David Bowie's Life on Mars.
Then Sam steps out in the street and gets mowed down by a car.
When he wakes up, he's in 1973. His wallet says, Sam Tyler...he's a Detective Inspector, not a Chief Inspector. The highway he was beside hasn't been built yet. He wanders to the police station and finds a bunch of unrestructured, thug cops. There's no DNA testing...no computers, no mobile phones. Getting prints analysed takes two weeks. Everything's on Paper files.What the hell is going on?
Through the course of the narrative, there's not just the fish out of water stuff, but there's also the ambiguous hints that , hey, is Sam in a coma inventing all this? Or did he somehow really travel back to 1973? There's evidence for both sides. What is true is that the case he was following in 2006 seems to have a connection here. But to follow that lead, he's going to need to convince his less sophisticated cop brethren to see through their swagger and embrace some new methods...like, oh, trusting women and stuff. Top performances from John Simm and Philip Gleinster.
The description doesn't make it sound like the best thing ever. But there's something haunting and terribly, terribly inventive about this show. For all the fooferal over Threshold and Invasion and the return of Sci Fi to tv -- Life On Mars is easily the trippiest and most compelling time travel thing I've seen in a while. A nice subversion of a lot of different genres and storytelling tropes...Life On Mars has more than a bit of Potter's amazing Singing Detective to it. There are seven more episodes to come. And I'll be looking forward to all of them.And maybe they'll inspire me to return to my dual-era show with new vigour.
The Life On Mars site at BBC is here.
Thursday, January 12, 2006
Jacks or Better...
Four Kings tonight?
Not bad. Watchable. Ladies and gentlemen, meet the rule of three.
That's why, much to my chagrin, most of the time I will always give a show a second chance. Especially when it comes from the pedigree of those guys.
I still don't know if it will play over time, but I found the characters more likable and the situation less forced tonight. I still don't see how you get 22. But at least I laughed.
Not John Stewart laughed, but still.
By the way, anyone who writes a spec script without taping and logging three episodes first is a poopy weakling.
Not bad. Watchable. Ladies and gentlemen, meet the rule of three.
That's why, much to my chagrin, most of the time I will always give a show a second chance. Especially when it comes from the pedigree of those guys.
I still don't know if it will play over time, but I found the characters more likable and the situation less forced tonight. I still don't see how you get 22. But at least I laughed.
Not John Stewart laughed, but still.
By the way, anyone who writes a spec script without taping and logging three episodes first is a poopy weakling.
Macallan 25
That's what Daddy gets to have every time he ships out a 1st draft.
Just one.
Sherry Wood.
Daddy is happy.
Just one.
Sherry Wood.
Daddy is happy.
Stop the meme, I want to get off.
So I guess the meme is winding down, but there was a wrinkle when someone posted a challenge about, "what's your favorite line that you've written?"
I find these days I have trouble remembering scripts once they ship out the door. Quite to the contrary of every standup I've ever worked with, who'll claim every line like it was birthed from their own loins, I tend to forget (in a production room) what I wrote and what the room came up with. For instance, I no longer have any clear idea what the hell I wrote or came up with on Charlie Jade. I think this is a delightful coping strategy.
However, I've been doing mostly development lately. And in the end the lines you love most, I think, are the ones that make you laugh. Sometimes against all reason.
In one of my recent comedy pilots, a group of students in residence throw a Canadian Thanksgiving. Through hijinks, two of the characters wind up having to deep fry a turkey. Amidst discussions of the (not inconsiderable) danger involved, one comes across something he's never seen. The character, TED, is a sweet Inuit guy who's in his fifth year of undergrad. He asks his friend if he's ever heard of a "turducken," the famous turkey stuffed with a duck, stuffed with a chicken. Then he comments:
Now, I just hope the network greenlights me.
I find these days I have trouble remembering scripts once they ship out the door. Quite to the contrary of every standup I've ever worked with, who'll claim every line like it was birthed from their own loins, I tend to forget (in a production room) what I wrote and what the room came up with. For instance, I no longer have any clear idea what the hell I wrote or came up with on Charlie Jade. I think this is a delightful coping strategy.
However, I've been doing mostly development lately. And in the end the lines you love most, I think, are the ones that make you laugh. Sometimes against all reason.
In one of my recent comedy pilots, a group of students in residence throw a Canadian Thanksgiving. Through hijinks, two of the characters wind up having to deep fry a turkey. Amidst discussions of the (not inconsiderable) danger involved, one comes across something he's never seen. The character, TED, is a sweet Inuit guy who's in his fifth year of undergrad. He asks his friend if he's ever heard of a "turducken," the famous turkey stuffed with a duck, stuffed with a chicken. Then he comments:
If someone showed up in my village with a bird like that...we’d have made him a shaman.I don't know. That just makes me laugh. And that's why I started in this silly business anyway.
Now, I just hope the network greenlights me.
Wednesday, January 11, 2006
Tagged!
Well, the Mad Pulp Bastard Bill Cunningham tagged me with a Fun Joel meme, and because I'm self-involved and procrastinating and a little hungover I have no choice but to follow blindly, just as I always did in the schoolyard. Here's the deal...
What was your earliest film-related memory?
I have a vague and happy recollection of being taken to the animated Disney version of Robin Hood, at a theater in New City, New York, where we moved after we decamped from the Bronx, and where I lived til the end of 1st grade. It was a theater in the same plaza as a Stop & Shop and the Bradlees. The other early film memory I have is when we moved to Florida. Disney had this thing where they would show movies in one of the Hotels of Walt Disney World. My Dad would get the tip on what hotel they were showing in and we, as a family, would crash. The only downside was you never knew which movie would be showing. I think I saw Darby O'Gill and the Little People three times. Is that why Sean Connery makes me want to cry? Or is it Zardoz? I can't figure for sure.
Name two favorite lines from movies:
"You know, Rick, I have many a friend in Casablanca, but somehow, just because you despise me, you are the only one I trust." - Peter Lorre in Casablanca
"I want more life...fucker." -Rutger Hauer in Blade Runner
Jobs You'd Do if You Could Not Work In "The Biz":
-Sadly....lawyer.
-Disaffected Record Store Employee
-Marine Biologist. Fuck, I don't know. What do you mean, if I couldn't work in the Biz? I was a TV producer for ten years and was pretty good at that. Too bad about the hating it.
Name four jobs you have actually held outside The Industry.
-washed soft drink syrup tanks in the 7up plant. It was The Death of Hope.
-Video Store Clerk; Yes, I was Randall from Clerks.
-Sold ads in a "business directory" for a shady type. Lasted two weeks.
-helped produce and write a corporate video for the CAW. Look for the union label.
Three book authors I like:
John Irving. Nick Hornby. Chuck Klosterman.
Name two movies you would like to remake or properties you'd like to adapt:
A book: The Republic of Love by Carol Shields. Deepa Mehta filmed it, and totally messed it up.
Hooper. Yes. I said it. Hooper. Deal with it.
Name one screenwriter you think is underrated:
All of them. Yup. That's a punt.
The other answer, of course, would be "me."
Three people I'm tagging to answer this meme next:
Alex Epstein
Diane Kristine
Matt Watts
What was your earliest film-related memory?
I have a vague and happy recollection of being taken to the animated Disney version of Robin Hood, at a theater in New City, New York, where we moved after we decamped from the Bronx, and where I lived til the end of 1st grade. It was a theater in the same plaza as a Stop & Shop and the Bradlees. The other early film memory I have is when we moved to Florida. Disney had this thing where they would show movies in one of the Hotels of Walt Disney World. My Dad would get the tip on what hotel they were showing in and we, as a family, would crash. The only downside was you never knew which movie would be showing. I think I saw Darby O'Gill and the Little People three times. Is that why Sean Connery makes me want to cry? Or is it Zardoz? I can't figure for sure.
Name two favorite lines from movies:
"You know, Rick, I have many a friend in Casablanca, but somehow, just because you despise me, you are the only one I trust." - Peter Lorre in Casablanca
"I want more life...fucker." -Rutger Hauer in Blade Runner
Jobs You'd Do if You Could Not Work In "The Biz":
-Sadly....lawyer.
-Disaffected Record Store Employee
-Marine Biologist. Fuck, I don't know. What do you mean, if I couldn't work in the Biz? I was a TV producer for ten years and was pretty good at that. Too bad about the hating it.
Name four jobs you have actually held outside The Industry.
-washed soft drink syrup tanks in the 7up plant. It was The Death of Hope.
-Video Store Clerk; Yes, I was Randall from Clerks.
-Sold ads in a "business directory" for a shady type. Lasted two weeks.
-helped produce and write a corporate video for the CAW. Look for the union label.
Three book authors I like:
John Irving. Nick Hornby. Chuck Klosterman.
Name two movies you would like to remake or properties you'd like to adapt:
A book: The Republic of Love by Carol Shields. Deepa Mehta filmed it, and totally messed it up.
Hooper. Yes. I said it. Hooper. Deal with it.
Name one screenwriter you think is underrated:
All of them. Yup. That's a punt.
The other answer, of course, would be "me."
Three people I'm tagging to answer this meme next:
Alex Epstein
Diane Kristine
Matt Watts
HOUSE Does DMc -- In Spades.
I've often remarked to friends that I'm just smart enough to watch HOUSE, but not smart enough to write it. I know, I know, were I to write HOUSE, I'd have lots of medical researchers to help me out -- but the very nature of this medical show -- A Rubik's puzzle that illuminates the very real, and yet very scary (and very absent from television) notion that Doctors, God love'em, are guessing. Guessing based on a preponderance of evidence and observation, but, you know...still.From the earliest days of HOUSE, I've had an idea. It was an idea that I never thought I'd pursue, not in a million years. I didn't think I would pursue it because I knew it was such an interesting medical condition that eventually they would get to it.
The condition was aphasia. Aphasia, for those who didn't watch, is a neurological condition which can be caused by a number of factors, where the patient thinks that they're communicating, they can understand what's being said to them, but when they speak, it comes out as gibberish. Anyone who's ever suffered through a family member who's had a stroke probably knows more about this than me. But to me it is the perfect metaphor, and also the perfect conundrum for Dr. Greg House. He already believes (with evidence amply supplied through a season and a half of shows) that everybody lies. So what happens if you can't even challenge the patient? What happens when they can't tell you the truth -- or if you can't even pick through their lies, because you don't understand what they're saying?
That was my idea. As I said, I never thought of writing that as a spec script, because I knew they'd get there eventually, and my script would be dross.
So tonight they do that story, and the devil, my friends, as always -- lives in the details. First, the sufferer/patient is a journalist. A truth teller. Nice. Is he lying? Of course. It's HOUSE. How does House expose him? It's really hard. Because the whole time he's six hundred miles away making out with his Ex-Wife in snowed-in Baltimore.
Man. I salute you. This is the thing, chickens. Over the years, I've advised a lot of people about those first all important spec scripts. I've laughed and commisserated as people saw their ideas scooped, and done by the show. Most specs I have in my library were eventually invalidated by the show itself. Sometimes, my take was better. Often, it wasn't.
But moaning and bitching aint the NFL kids. No one's asking you to write a spec. When you tamp out that Smallville or Commander in Chief or My Name is Earl, it doesn't just have to be a typical episode -- it has to be way better than a typical episode.
It has to take that great idea I had about aphasia -- and plus it...just like HOUSE did last night.
Which, at the end of the day, is why they're pricing new Priuses and split levels in Silver Lake and I'm in Canada. Their take on my idea? Way, way, way, way better than I ever considered. Man, I enjoyed it.
I still can't believe HOUSE is a popular show. Thank you, American Idol. I forgive some of what you've wrought.
Tuesday, January 10, 2006
Handicapped
So James Frey got caught. Sorry, Oprah.
And JT Leroy isn't an HIV + ex-street kid; he's a 40-year-old woman.
You know, what I have to say on this is very simple.
I'm a white kid who got moved around a couple times by my parents. Good for you, Mom and Dad, for getting me out of the South Bronx. That probably wouldn't have proved to be rich ground for a memoir. Oh no.
So okay, I live in a foreign country. Occasionally I got teased for having an accent. I'm forever fighting my waistline. I got held up at gunpoint in a bar a few years ago. But I've never OD'd. I've never once spent a night in jail. I haven't huffed, discharged a firearm, or had my stomach pumped. I've never been brought home by the cops. Never sold my blood or plasma for money. Never been in a bar fight. Yes, I had nine years of catechism, and three years as a Catholic altar boy, but in that time, I was never once touched inappropriately; hell, they never even gave me a swig of the sacrificial wine.
And yet now, here I am, trying to make it as a writer.
Mom. Dad. Little Sister #1, Little Sister #2 -- I blame you.
Thanks for the happy childhood. Thanks for %$#@% nothing.
Now if you'll excuse me, I have to go make shit up.
And JT Leroy isn't an HIV + ex-street kid; he's a 40-year-old woman.
You know, what I have to say on this is very simple.
I'm a white kid who got moved around a couple times by my parents. Good for you, Mom and Dad, for getting me out of the South Bronx. That probably wouldn't have proved to be rich ground for a memoir. Oh no.
So okay, I live in a foreign country. Occasionally I got teased for having an accent. I'm forever fighting my waistline. I got held up at gunpoint in a bar a few years ago. But I've never OD'd. I've never once spent a night in jail. I haven't huffed, discharged a firearm, or had my stomach pumped. I've never been brought home by the cops. Never sold my blood or plasma for money. Never been in a bar fight. Yes, I had nine years of catechism, and three years as a Catholic altar boy, but in that time, I was never once touched inappropriately; hell, they never even gave me a swig of the sacrificial wine.
And yet now, here I am, trying to make it as a writer.
Mom. Dad. Little Sister #1, Little Sister #2 -- I blame you.
Thanks for the happy childhood. Thanks for %$#@% nothing.
Now if you'll excuse me, I have to go make shit up.
Monday, January 9, 2006
Emily's Reasons Why Not
1) Because Heather Graham not being able to find a man is the stupid kind of "that would never, ever happen" science fiction. If that's going to be the kickoff of your series, your main character better travel using the TARDIS.2) Because she was funnier on Scrubs, and deserves writing at that level - cause she can actually do it.
3) Because, as a straight man, I will confess right now that all of us straight men pretended to like this show already -- when it was on HBO with the older woman and the prissy one and the strangely hot man eating one and the one that we were pretty sure was a guy.
4) Because Nadja Dajani also deserves better.
5) Because by comparison, it actually made Jake In Progress look funny. And that cannot be forgiven.
The Devil & Daniel Webster
So The Book of Daniel came, and the people who freak out at such things freaked out.
I thought it was a pretty genial, sympathetic show about the good parts of The Bible. You know, the forgiving parts. It upsets me to think that in this battle of fundamentalism in which we're now embroiled, the one truism seems to be that God can't have a sense of humor. (I mean, really, the giraffe and the platypus and New Jersey to the contrary.)
Aidan Quinn's a very likable actor who carries off the part of a troubled and overwhelmed clergyman with aplomb. His talks with Jesus play not quite as santimoniously as on Joan of Arcadia, which is probably a good thing.
It actually put me in mind of The Last Temptation of Christ a little bit. Long after my faith had started to flag and wane, seeing that movie revived things a bit. After years of having Christ's divinity pounded into you, the portrayal of his humanity did a whole lot more to make me appreciate the m
ysteries of my faith than Mel Gibson's violent porn show ever could.
Now that the right wing wack jobs have total control in the USA, (but still get to whine like someone's actually trying to take stuff away from them) I think the values embedded in shows like The Book of Daniel could provide a tonic. If NBC doesn't cave in, all afraid, that is.
Although, gotta admit, seeing Garret Dillahunt (left, with Aidan Quinn) as Jesus is weird after being creeped out by him all through Deadwood's season two.
Historically, Daniel Webster was the best President the United States never had. A man famous for compromise, who got things moving and solved through finding a middle ground. That strikes me as a very good quality for a man of faith, and a very rare quality in the public discourse today.
And let's not forget that in literature, Daniel Webster out-argued the Devil.
Hope he gets the chance to do the same on NBC. But I shant hold my breath.
UPDATE: for another take (negative) on the show -- but refreshingly, not a crazy (or unfair) one -- check out Salon's review by the Real Live Preacher.
I thought it was a pretty genial, sympathetic show about the good parts of The Bible. You know, the forgiving parts. It upsets me to think that in this battle of fundamentalism in which we're now embroiled, the one truism seems to be that God can't have a sense of humor. (I mean, really, the giraffe and the platypus and New Jersey to the contrary.)
Aidan Quinn's a very likable actor who carries off the part of a troubled and overwhelmed clergyman with aplomb. His talks with Jesus play not quite as santimoniously as on Joan of Arcadia, which is probably a good thing.
It actually put me in mind of The Last Temptation of Christ a little bit. Long after my faith had started to flag and wane, seeing that movie revived things a bit. After years of having Christ's divinity pounded into you, the portrayal of his humanity did a whole lot more to make me appreciate the m
ysteries of my faith than Mel Gibson's violent porn show ever could.Now that the right wing wack jobs have total control in the USA, (but still get to whine like someone's actually trying to take stuff away from them) I think the values embedded in shows like The Book of Daniel could provide a tonic. If NBC doesn't cave in, all afraid, that is.
Although, gotta admit, seeing Garret Dillahunt (left, with Aidan Quinn) as Jesus is weird after being creeped out by him all through Deadwood's season two.
Historically, Daniel Webster was the best President the United States never had. A man famous for compromise, who got things moving and solved through finding a middle ground. That strikes me as a very good quality for a man of faith, and a very rare quality in the public discourse today.
And let's not forget that in literature, Daniel Webster out-argued the Devil.
Hope he gets the chance to do the same on NBC. But I shant hold my breath.
UPDATE: for another take (negative) on the show -- but refreshingly, not a crazy (or unfair) one -- check out Salon's review by the Real Live Preacher.
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