Film and Television

Don’t Hire This Spenser

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Bob Sassone reports over at TV Squad that Rykodisc is releasing the four, made-on-the-cheap-in-Canada SPENSER reunion movies  on DVD. Those crappy, flatly-directed, and exceedingly dull MOWs shouldn’t be mistaken for the underappreciated SPENSER FOR HIRE  series (and I’m not just saying that because I wrote for it).

Robert Urich and Avery Brooks were the perfect Spenser and Hawk,
the scripts were literate and intelligent, and the on
location filming in Boston added a lot of atmosphere and color. But
then the show was cancelled, and they decided to make these rather
so-so movies, and they don’t include Barbara Stock as Susan Silverman
(sorry again: Wendy Crewson and Barbara Williams just aren’t the same).
The good news? They aren’t the lame Joe Mantegna Spenser
flicks that A&E produced later, and it’s great to see Urich and
Avery together again. The bad news? It’s not the TV series.

I hope the TV series comes out on DVD soon and not just because I’d like pristine copies of my episodes. It was a very good PI series and seems to have dropped out of syndication a few years ago.

Unlike Bob Sassone, I actually liked Joe Mantegna as Spenser a lot (and I love his readings of the Parker novels on CD) …but he was teamed with lousy actors as Hawk and, once again, the movies were shot on the cheap in Toronto with bland Canadian actors. The scripts weren’t so hot, either.  I think if they’d cast Mantegna and Avery Brooks, and shot the movies in Boston, and hired better writers (like Bill Rabkin & me!), the movies might have worked…

Tom Selleck, who did a bang-up job playing Parker’s Jesse Stone on TV recently, would make a good Spenser. So would Robert Forster who, incidentally, does a great job reading the Jesse Stone novels on CD.

Kill Bill, Kill Cinema

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I enjoyed KILL BILL.  Well, at least parts of it. Was it a great movie? No. Was it visually interesting and fun? Sure. That said, I think Ron Rosenbaum’s observations in The New York Observer are absolutely correct:

I don’t blame you if any or all of these made it impossible for you
to stay awake for the eyeball-squishing, that moment of cinematic
mastery, the true climax of the two-part, four-hour Tarantino
"masterpiece."

Still, it’s too bad if you missed it, because it was the perfect
epitome of and metaphor for what I would like to call "The Cinema of
Pretentious Stupidity." The eyeball-squishing represented the crushing
of vision by lead-footed pretension, the blinding of creativity by
referentiality. The idea that ceaseless tedious references to obscure
martial-arts movies known mainly by video-store geeks adds up to art.

I’ve heard so many defenses of Kill Bill that depend on the
apparently marvelous and unheard-of-before wonder of its
referentiality. Dude, just because you make a reference—or many
references—doesn’t make it meaningful or worth four hours of our time.

(Thanks to Ed Gorman for the heads-up on this!)

Land of the Lost

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Variety reports that Will Ferrell will star in a feature film adaptation of the live-action children’s series LAND OF THE LOST, about a father and his kids who take a rafting trip and end up going back in time to when dinosaurs walked the earth. The movie will ditch the kids and is being directed by Adam McKay, who also helmed Ferrell’s ANCHORMAN. This will be Ferrell’s third big-screen, TV series remake — he’s also appeared in STARSKY & HUTCH and the upcoming BEWITCHED.  How long before he signs up to star in MR. ED and SHAZAM?

Reality Check for Trekkies

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A while back, I wrote  about the silly campaign by Trekkies to raise the money to finance another season of STAR TREK ENTERPRISE.  The LA Times reports today that even the Trekkies are finally realizing  what anybody who has spent even a little time visiting the real world already knew — that Paramount isn’t going to ever accept money from viewers to produce ENTERPRISE or any other TV series. Duh.

But now there’s a scandal in the Trekkie universe. It turns out the folks spearheading the inane effort, led by  Tim Brazeal, were informed by Paramount at the get-go that their campaign was pointless…but the Trekkies in charge kept this communication secret.

After Paramount posted the letter on its www.startrek.com website earlier this month, Brazeal tried to
explain to his fans that he hadn’t mentioned the Paramount letter earlier
because he had made "personal promises" that he wouldn’t reveal any information
about the negotiations.

Brazeal’s rationale unleashed a torrent of abuse on various "Trek"-related
online forums, where insult and invective are fairly common. Critics poked fun
at some of TrekUnited’s colorful leaders, including Andrew Beardall, the
attorney and sometime seafood purveyor who is perhaps best-known around
Bethesda, Md., as "the Lobster Guy," and Al Vinci, a mysterious Canadian
producer and publisher who said he was spearheading talks with an unidentified
executive at the studio. In a phone interview last week, Vinci refused to
provide details of the discussions, names of other broadcast professionals he’s
worked with or the titles of his recent credits.

Brazeal insisted that he was not raising the money for his personal enrichment.
However, as the attacks continued he admitted in an online posting that he had
been arrested on suspicion of marijuana possession in 1979 and served probation
for an auto theft charge in 1983. He also confirmed to the Los Angeles Times
that he filed for bankruptcy in 1998, but added that he does not believe the
filing is relevant to TrekUnited’s mission.

Brazeal now says he just
wants his life back. "You reach a point where you have to say, ‘Reality’s
reality.’ … Paramount is just unwilling to bring [the show] back," he
said.

Pax Goes Info

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Variety reports that PAX is giving up on original programming and going back to being an infomercial network. This news is sure to rile up the fans of one of the worst-titled shows in TV history: SUE THOMAS: F.B.EYE, the adventures of a deaf FBI agent who reads lips and her hearing-ear wonderdog Levi.

03fb_eye1300The show was shot in Toronto and our casting director on MISSING was always touting actors who  delivered " powerful" or "unforgettable"  performances on SUE THOMAS: F.B.EYE like it was the pinnacle of Canadian drama.  The scary thing is, it probably was.

(Click on the photo for a larger image…and then ask yourself: Why does an FBI dog need a photo ID? Could you really tell the difference between the face of one Golden Retriever and another? And if the pooch needs a photo ID, why doesn’t she?).

The Equalizer coming to a multi-plex near you

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EqualizerBob Sassone at TVSquad reports that THE EQUALIZER is the latest TV series up for a big-screen redo.  I always felt THE EQUALIZER, about an ex-spy-turned-vigilante, was an under-appreciated series (with a great theme by Stewart Copeland). It was shot on location in NY and, as I recall, was very well written and produced (by James McAdams and Matthew Rapf, fresh off of KOJAK).   When star Edward Woodward was sidelined by a heart-attack, Robert Mitchum stepped in for a few episodes to take his place. Mitchum was so good, I was almost sorry when Woodward came back. 

Q&A With Chris Abbott

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Chris Abbott is one of the most successful writer-producers in television, with credits like Magnum PI, BL Stryker, Dr. Quinn Medicine Woman and Diagnosis Murder.  She’s just written a terrific book called "TEN MINUTES TO THE PITCH: Your Last Minute Guide and Check-List for Selling Your Story."  And all proceeds from the book benefit the Writers Guild Foundation.

Tf_pitch_1She’ll be signing her book this weekend at the Los Angeles Times Festival of Books on April 23, 11-12, at the  Writers Guild Booth.

Why did you write this book?

Leonard Stern, from Tallfellow Press, came to me with the
idea. He saw it as the second book in
their “Ten Minutes To Success” series, which began with “Ten Minutes To The
Audition” by Janice . I liked the idea; it seemed to me I had seen
dozens of books about writing, but none about pitching and I believe they are
two distinctly different talents.

 There are a thousand “How To” books for writers on
pitching and selling scripts. What makes
yours different from all the rest?

 A thousand? Really? Honestly, I didn’t think
there was even one book out about pitching as I was writing it. I have noticed, since, one other book. Nevertheless, I’m sure you’re right,
hyperbole aside, there must be several books on pitching. Mine is different insomuch as my professional
experience is different from the other authors. I think it would be valuable to read everyone else’s book as well as
mine. But the value of mine is that it
is very practical; it is very small so you can take it with you; it has stories
from lots of successful writers to amuse or enlighten; it doesn’t take long to
read.

Before you even get into talking about pitching itself,
you pay a lot of attention to the importance of seemingly irrelevant things…
like double-checking the address, arriving very early, going to the bathroom
before the meeteing, bringing a pencil and paper, turning off your cell phone…
but they aren’t irrelevant things, are they?

 When Leonard first talked to me about this idea, it was subtitled “A Parking Lot Primer For
Wrters.” The idea was that you’re in the
parking lot, you’re ready to go pitch
your heart out, what are the things you want to remember before you get into
the office?

 So that accounts for some tips, like “going to the
bathroom”, that you might not see in other pitching books! But there is something that I hope is a bit
more profound behind the seemingly mundane ideas. For example: Are You In The Right Place? This
isn’t just about making sure you have the correct address (although without
that, you are doomed to failure); it is
also about making sure you’ve brought the right kind of pitch to the studio
that is likely to consider buying your story. Each of the ideas has its own Zen-shadow idea I think writers need to
seriously consider before even showing up in the parking lot. 

Read more

History Repeating

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TimetunnelZap2it reports that the SciFi Channel is developing a TV series remake of producer Irwin Allen’s TIME TUNNEL… a one-season wonder on ABC decades ago (Fox shot a revival  pilot in 2002 but never aired it). Then again, SciFi has had great success reviving another, decades old, one-season wonder on ABC: BATTLESTAR GALACTICA.

Hard Placement

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I saw FEVER PITCH today and, to give you an idea how involving the film was, the only bit that sticks with me was the prominent placement of George Pelecano’s book HARD REVOLUTION in a scene. It was displayed on a high school secretary’s desk, full cover forward. I wonder whether the publisher paid for this product placement, or if Pelecano is a friend of the Farrelly Brothers (who directed the movie).

To Pitch or Spec

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If you’re a professional screenwriter with a great idea for a movie…should you go out and pitch the idea or write it as a spec? Traditional wisdom is that you’re better off writing it. But  screenwriter (and WGA Board Member) Craig Mazin thinks otherwise.

I think pitching is almost always the way to go. Admittedly, I’m a bit biased here.  I like pitching. I
think I’m good at it, and I’ve had success doing it. Every original
screenplay I’ve ever written was first sold as a pitch. In fact, in ten
years of professional screenwriting, I have written a sum total of zero
spec screenplays…

…I pitch my original stories because I’m selling more than words…I’m
selling a total service. I want to be the man they can trust to
shepherd the story of the movie from the first draft to the locking of
the last reel. I want to be the writer they recognize as a partner,
with all of the rights and obligations that go along with that word. I
want to be someone who offers them a chance in a “what if?” and all of
the excitement and possibility that goes along with that, rather than
someone who gives them a “what it is”, and who then must struggle to
change my identity from “author of 120 pages I bought” to “story teller
of a movie I’m making”.

Personally, since I hate doing anything on spec, out of sheer laziness I would lean towards pitching instead…besides, I enjoy pitching.