Lee Goldberg

Winslow is Hot Hot Hot

by

Author Don Winslow’s latest novel THE WINTER OF FRANKIE MACHINE hasn’t even been published yet, but Variety reports that Robert DeNiro is already attached to star in the movie version for Paramount Pictures.

De Niro would play a Mafia hit man who has given up the game to become the
proprietor of a bait shop. When he finds out that he’s been targeted for a hit,
he gets back in the business.

Winslow’s work made the rounds in New York recently, sparking the interest of
Tribeca. De Niro and Rosenthal committed to the adaptation and, with the help of
CAA, shopped it around to studios.

If the package comes together and a movie gets made, it would bring De Niro
back to a type of character that helped make him famous. He has said he wouldn’t
return to the Mafia world in film but then "Frankie Machine" came along.

Your Great Idea for a Pilot

by

My friend Javier Grillo-Marxuach, supervising producer of LOST,  has a wonderful, brutally honest post on his blog about his experience writing and producing pilots. The post is nearly a year old, but the wisdom and bite of his story hasn’t dimmed.

so anyway – pilots. the one question i hear most is “i have a great
idea for a pilot, what do I have to do to get it see/produced/on the
air?”

the stock answer to this is “move to los angeles and spend
ten years making a name for yourself as a television producer with an
established track record that will make a studio and network believe
that they should trust you with forty-four million dollars of their
money to produce twenty-two hours of television.”

however,
things have changed in television, and now it is easier than ever to
get a pilot on the air without establishing a track record as a
producer…

…and I say that in the same way one might say “now
it’s easier than ever to put an orbital mind-control laser in a
geosynchronous orbit over your mother-in-law.”

You’ve got to read the rest. It will make you weep.

How do I become a television writer if I don’t have any contacts?

by

I get asked this question a lot…but it’s disingenuous, since I’m a
TV writer/producer and whoever is asking me that is really asking me to either read
their script or to invite them in to pitch. So, theoretically, they already
know somebody in the business.
 
They’re luckier than I was when I got started. I didn’t know
anybody in the TV industry. But I got in. How did I do it? Everybody’s story is
unique. Most of those stories, however, share one common element. You have to
put yourself in the right place to get your lucky break. And it’s easier than
you think. 

The first thing you have to do is learn your craft. Take
classes, preferably taught by people who have had some success as TV writers.
There’s no point taking a class from someone who isn’t an experienced TV writer
themselves. 

You’d think that would be common sense, but you’d be
astonished how many TV courses are taught by people who don’t know the first
thing about writing for television or who, through a fluke, sold a story to Manimal twenty years ago and think that
qualifies them to take your hundred bucks. Even more surprising is how many
desperate people shell out money to take courses from instructors who should be
taking TV writing courses themselves.

There’s another reason to take a TV writing course besides
learning the basics of the craft. If you’re the least bit likeable, you’ll make
a few friends among the other classmates. This is good, because you’ll have
other people you can show your work to. This is also good because somebody in
the class may sell his or her first script before you do… and suddenly you’ll
have a friend in the business. 

Many of my writer/producer friends today are writers I knew
back when I was in college, when we were all dreaming of breaking into TV some
day. 

A writer we hired on staff on the first season of Missing was in a Santa Monica screenwriters group… and was the
first member of her class to get a paying writing gig. Now her friends in the
class suddenly had a friend on a network TV show who could share her knowledge,
give them practical advice and even recommend them to her new agent and the
writer/producers she was working with.

Another route is to try and get a job as a writer/producer’s
assistant on an hour-long drama. Now only will you get a meager salary, but you
will see how a show works from the inside. You’ll read lots of scripts and
revisions and, simply by observation, get a graduate course in TV writing. More
important, you’ll establish relationships with the writers on the show and the
freelancers who come through the door. Many of today’s top TV producers were writer/producer
assistants once. All of the assistants I’ve had have gone on to become working
TV writers themselves… and not because I gave them a script assignment or
recommended them for one. I didn’t do either.

 The first step towards getting into pitch a TV producer for
an episodic writing assignment is to write an episodic teleplay on spec.

Read more

PJ Parrish Talks Sex

by

The writing team that goes by the name PJ Parrish talk about the sex…or, rather, the lack of good sex…in mysteries.

Why are crime writers such major wussies when it comes to sex? What the hell
happens to most of them when they have to write about it?

I’ll tell you
what happens. They turn trite and sentimental. Or they become boring and
flaccid. And they get as self-conscious as pimply prom dates. Crime writers can
meet murder head on and not flinch, can even render death poetic. But faced with
having to describe copulation — especially in the context of, gasp!
relationships — they can turn out the most dreadful, unbelievable, embarrassing
treacle.

Reruns on Demand

by

Variety reports that Warner Brothers will make 14,000 episodes from more than 300 series available on America Online for free, on-demand viewing. What’s the catch? Commercials. The new program launches in January.

"We want to create a new broadband network for content looking for its next
window of distribution," explained Kevin Conroy, exec VP of AOL Media Networks.
"This is an IP (Internet protocol) television service that is available
whenever, wherever in the digital home."

It will be interesting to see how the WGA, DGA and SAG will take this news…and what residual formula will be adopted, at least initially, to pay writers, actors and directors.

Just When You Thought It Was Safe To Go Back In The Water

by

Warner Brothers hopes Al Gough and Miles Millar can do for AQUAMAN what they did for SUPERMAN with SMALLVILLE. Variety reports that the writing team have been signed by the WB to produce a pilot about the young Aquaman.

As with "Smallville," their successful reinvention of the "Superman" saga,
Gough and Millar plan to focus on character rather than cheese. Skein
won’t be called "Aquaman" — indeed, the "A" word won’t even be mentioned — and
Curry "won’t be talking to fish or riding a seahorse," Gough said.

And while "Smallville" recently generated great ratings with an episode
featuring an appearance by Aquaman, the new project won’t be a spinoff. To
underline that point, Alan Ritchson, the actor who played Curry on "Smallville,"
isn’t under consideration for the role in the pilot.

Thanks, Joe!

by

Author, comic, blogger and international sex symbol Joe Konrath surprised me by giving my new book THE MAN WITH THE IRON-ON BADGE a plug on Amazon:

This isn’t satire or parody, even though it is laugh aloud funny.
Goldberg has written a cleverly plotted mystery– one that also happens
to be a tribute to mysteries in general, pulps and TV private eyes in
particular.

If you’re a fan of the genre, you’ll find a lot to like here.
In-jokes abound, and Harvey Mapes is one of the most likeable PIs in
years. But don’t expect Naked Gun type antics. There is blood. There is
sex. There is tragedy. And there are even some bittersweet moments to
go along with the many belly laughs.


The Man with the Iron On Badge flaunts convention while also being
a part of that very same convention, and the result is a cross between
Dave Barry and Donald Westlake. It’s a one-sitting read, and more than
worth the price of admission.

Thanks, Joe!

Murder He Wrote

by

045121662801_sclzzzzzzz_Author Donald Bain’s MURDER SHE WROTE novel, MARGARITAS & MURDER is now in bookstores.  This is the 24th book in the long-running tie-in series. 
Remarkably, every book  is still in-print — adding up to more than three million copies sold since the series was launched. And there’s more to come. Don reports that he’s signed a contract for another four books in the series, which he now writes in tandem with his wife Renee. I hope my DIAGNOSIS MURDER books, which wouldn’t exist if not for his amazing success, do even half as well…

Portrait of an Anxious Writer, the Sequel

by

Novelist Joseph A. West, author of the GUNSMOKE novels (among many others) read my previous post on this topic and sympathized with Sanda’s anxiety. He, too, knows it all too well ("writing is a lot of agony and damn little ecstasy," he tells me).

My worst
bouts of dark depression come after I’ve sent in the manuscript. After a week
with no word from New York the conversation between my wife and myself always
runs something like this:

"Well Emily, that’s it. The end. The end of everything."
"What are you talking about?"
"Brent hates the book. He probably thinks it’s the worst piece of shit
that’s ever been written in the entire history of the world. Maybe in the entire
history of the universe."
Emily, her head bent to the embroidery on her lap: "Don’t you think if the
book was bad he’d have called and told you so?"
"Hell no. He’s so appalled by its shitiness he’d been struck dumb, maybe
even blind. He may have shown it around to other publishers as the worst book
ever written and they’ve also been struck dumb and blind. In one fucking stroke
I could have single-handedly destroyed the whole New York publishing
industry."
"I thought the book was fine."
"You’re my wife. Don’t you think you may be just a wee bit
prejudiced?"
"No. And I also think you’re nuts."
I shake my head. "It’s the end, the end I tell you. I knew that book was a
piece of fucking crap from the first word to the least.God, I may have killed
Brent. He could have read the damn thing and suffered a massive stroke."
"I’m outta here," Emily says."I have to put on the potatoes."
And me, I call after her: "I’m doomed, I tell you, doomed."
Then to myself: "I should have done like my old grandpappy told me to do
and become a plumber."