Current Affairs

Ottocratic

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Edward Champion reports that Otto Penzler  is threatening to sue him:

I just received the following message from Otto Penzler:

“If you don’t remove this TODAY, I will sue your ass. I have already
discussed this with my lawyer who agrees it is actionable. You may find
this humorous–I don’t. I do have your address and you will be served
with a cease and desist order, plus a liable suit, copyright
infringement suit, and some other stuff as we think of them. NOW, Mr.
Champion.”

Mr. Penzler takes apparent umbrage to several recent posts that satirize and parody his New York Sun columns.

Champion is leaving the posts up, but has added a disclaimer that they are a parody. I wonder if I should be watching my mailbox for a letter accusing me of  "liable," too.

(Thanks to Arizona Jim for the heads-up).

Discipline, Deadlines and Creativity

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Yesterday, in my post "Going Hollywood," I wrote:

You can’t always force creativity, regardless of the immutable reality of a production deadline. But I have to believe that if I have a bad afternoon or a completely wasted day, that I’ll make up for it later.

After reading author Loreth Ann White’s thoughts on the subject, I realized that I needed to clarify my comments. In TV, you can’t wait for inspiration to strike…the show is shooting on Monday whether you are feeling creative or not.  A deadline is a deadline. The pages must be written. A professional TV writer will get them done.

The same is true of my MONK and DIAGNOSIS  MURDER novels. I have 90 days and, in some cases, less to write them. I may not feel motivated or inspired today, or even tomorrow, but I will make up for it later…because I am a professional writer, and that ‘s my job. Some days are better than others. I try not to sweat the bad ones too much (though I do).

What I should have said is that I have faith that if the writing is going badly at any particular moment, I will "get inspired" in time to meet my deadline, whatever that deadline may be.

It’s amazing how inspired I am the closer I get to a deadline. The reality that something has to be done at a certain point forces you to focus and to silence your inner critic.

If I don’t have a real, honest-to-God, make-or-break deadline, then I have a much harder time focusing…which may be Paul’s problem with his pilot.

Holy Lawsuit, Batman!

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The daughter of BATMAN producer William Dozier is suing Fox for $4.4 million in unpaid royalties on the TV series. Thinking of the TV Batman brings back memories (as it did for Bob Sassone at TV Squad) My Mom grew up in Walla Walla with Adam West, who played BATMAN, and I was an avid fan of the show when I was a kid. I remember wearing my Batman Halloween costume to the premiere of the movie (the one based on the TV show).

In the late 90s, we cast Adam West on DIAGNOSIS MURDER and, although I spoke to him on the phone, I didn’t get a chance to meet him. The week he was shooting, we were in Hong Kong researching a pilot we were writing for CBS. But he was the best thing about the episode and is great in Conan O’Brien’s unsold pilot LOOKWELL.

I’m Changing My Hair Color And Moving to Germany

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German researchers report that red heads have a lot more sex than everybody else.

The study by Hamburg Sex Researcher Professor Dr Werner Habermehl
looked at the sex lives of hundreds of German women and compared them
with their hair colour.

He said: "The sex lives of women
with red hair were clearly more active than those with other hair
colour, with more partners and having sex more often than the average.
The research shows that the fiery redhead certainly lives up to her
reputation."

Oh, wait, it only applies to women. Damn.

Born to Write

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My brother Tod ponders  today whether writing can be taught.

Oh, sure, you can teach someone how to write correctly — how
to format dialog, where to place a comma, how to avoid using adverbs in
dialog tags, he noted furiously, how to present plot in a cogent
fashion, what the 7 basic conflict plots are, all that academic stuff
— but you can’t teach someone how to be creative or compelling in
their fiction.

He shares some particularly scary examples of students who will never be published (at least  not without writing a check to iUniverse).

I tend to agree with him that you can’t teach creativity…or even basic story sense.  I’ve had a few students over the years in our online course who simply couldn’t comprehend what a story is. They couldn’t grasp the concept of "franchise"  and "conflict or why you couldn’t tell a story on MONK in the same way you would on, say, CSI. " Those students could take a thousand classes and it won’t change a thing. They will never be TV writers.

On the other hand, I’ve just finished teaching a course for the UCLA Extension was wowed by how creative, bright, and genuinely talented my students were.  Not because of what I taught them, but because they were born writers. I  just introduced them to a structure and way of thinking about story that they didn’t know before. There were one or two who struggled…but I think they’ll get the  hang of it.

Lori’s Ever-Changing Claims

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Oneimage_1
Lori Prokop, online huckster and the originator of the Book Millionaire scam, posts this claim on her website:

“I’ve never seen anything like your four hour book signing at Barnes and Noble in Las Vegas. More than 1,174 people gladly stood in line for hours to meet you, buy your book and have them autographed. The line wove through the aisles of the store. Barnes and Noble
removed floor displays to make room for your book buyers. The Las Vegas NBC
affiliate covered the event and said they had never seen anything like it.
That’s amazing in Las Vegas, the city of excitement and entertainment.”
— Tali Mauai, Co-Author of the audio book
From Zero to Hero

I thought it was pretty amazing too. So, in the spirit of fairness
and accuracy, I checked into Lori Prokop’s claim (made through Tali Mauai) with friends in Las Vegas and my book industry sources and, as far I can tell, there was never any such booksigning event for her at a B&N there in the last five years nor the corresponding booksales that she implies she made. Perhaps she would be kind enough to provide the
exact date of the event and specific store where it took place so we can corroborate her claim?

Oddly enough, Lori uses the same claim from Tali, slightly reworded, to push her "Chiropractic Best Seller Book Program," a scheme to convince chiropractors that it would be a good idea to pay her vanity press to publish their articles and books. Note the significant differences (which I’ve boldfaced and italicized) between the two versions of the claim:

"I’ve never seen anything like our four hour book signing at Barnes and Noble in Las Vegas. More than 1,100 people gladly stood in line for hours to meet us, buy our book and have them autographed. The line wove through the aisles of the store. Barnes and Noble removed floor displays to make room for our book buyers. I felt like a local celebrity and my life has never been the same. I love it. The Las Vegas NBC affiliate covered the event and said they had never seen anything like it. That’s amazing in Las Vegas, the city of excitement and entertainment.” Tali Mauai, bestselling co-author, Zero to Hero

There is yet a THIRD version (again, with the differences in italic and bold-face) of the quote, this time pushing her seminars that will allow you to  "discover your powers to heal yourself, achieve abundance and create what you want in your life."

“Lori, I’ve never seen anything like your four-hour
book signing at Barnes & Noble in Las Vegas.
More than 1,100 people stood in line for hours
to meet your authors, buy their books and have
them autographed. Barnes & Noble removed floor
displays to make room for your book buyers.
National media covered the event and said they
had never seen anything like it.” Tari Mauai, Bestselling Author, from Zero to Hero.

I wonder which quote is "the truth."  Again, perhaps Lori would be kind enough to clarify for us exactly when which author, selling what book,  had this mobbed Las Vegas booksigning that made members of the local (or it was it national? Perhaps even GLOBAL) press corps faint with astonishment.

There’s No Excuse

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Stories like this almost make me ashamed to be an American.  The Bush Administration has done so much damage to our country — and caused so much pain, suffering, and death (between the incompentent handling of Hurricane Katrina, the pointless war in Iraq, the torture of prisoners, the massacre of innocent people, etc.) in the process — that they might as well be terrorists themselves.  They are doing Osama’s job for him.

Cat Tales

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Emmy-winning writer-producer Ken Levine talks today about the time a cat held him up for a higher salary.

I said as much as we too loved working with Charlie and greatly admired
his many talents, I would hate to stand in the way of his feature
career so I passed on his offer. 

Unbelievably, we somehow managed to find another gray cat that could sit in a chair.