Since it's Halloween, everybody and their avatar is posting horror videos. But you want to know what's really scary? I mean jolts up the spine, hands get clammy and blood turns to ice water scary…? It's that first time the guy (or woman) who's going to direct your script tells you how they want to approach the material. You've babied it from three words on a napkin or an image you got while taking...
Content
The Star Whackers
"They are demons dispatched by Satan to lower the standards!" -- Bill Hicks The first time I met Randy Quaid, he was in shackles. They weren't the real kind, like the ones he may be wearing today as he sits in a Vancouver jail fighting an extradition warrant and claiming refugee status to escape "The Star Whackers". The shackles he wore at our first meeting were movie props on the set of "The Last Detail". The film was Randy's...
Maybe Children Shouldn't Play With Dead Things
In 1972, director Bob Clark, who would later create cinematic icons like "Porky's" and "A Christmas Story" spent $70,000 to make his first film, a quickie horror flick called "Children Shouldn't Play With Dead Things". It was about a bunch of teens who dig up a corpse named 'Orville' they use in a Satanic ritual intended as a joke. But somehow this causes others of the dead to rise and well, complications ensue. The movie...
Lazy Sunday #142: Old Jews Telling Jokes
I blame Myron Cohen. These days Myron Cohen is one of the answers to a trivia question about artists who shared the stage of "The Ed Sullivan Show" with "The Beatles". Meaning that as out of place as he may seem in such company, Mr. Cohen's act was once witnessed by more than 70 Million people one cold February evening in 1964. 70 Million people! That's like 15 seasons of "Being Erica". But Myron was a star long before...
The Best Show You Can't See On Canadian TV
For a while I prayed that some network executive in Canada would buy the Canadian broadcast rights for the new FX series "Terriers". Because it exemplifies everything I've always believed about how you make the kind of good television we're capable of creating here. You can make it cheap. You don't need big stars. You can take chances. You don't need to swing for the fences to be successful. If it's honest and it's well done,...
The Elephant & The Jet
"I don't want to ride an elephant. I want to fly a jet!" -- Bobby Draper "Mad Men" # 413 Two of the more significant television series of 2010 concluded their seasons Sunday. By the end of their runs both "Mad Men" and "Rubicon" were Internet and media darlings, each episode endlessly...
Lazy Sunday # 141: The Billion Dollar Question
The photograph above is one of the most iconic of the Vietnam War era. Protestors facing phalanxes of police outside the Pentagon in Washington, placing flowers in the muzzles of loaded guns. It epitomized not only the "Peace, Love and Groovy" vibe of the time, but just how far the paranoia of the establishment had drifted from the reality of those questioning their actions. Photographs like this one convinced many that maybe...
Your Choice of "Canadian Values"
(The) two basic strategies are: on the right, "People are swine -- endorse my position, or join them in my estimation"; and on the left, "people are essentially good at heart, can't you see that, you sick fool?" -- David Mamet "Bambi vs Godzilla" There have always seemed to be two solitudes in Canada. First it was French and English. Then it was East and West. Now it's Left and Right. We lost our bid for a seat on the United...
Happy Thanksgiving!
For all the Canadians reading this, I hope this day affords you the opportunity to gather with friends and family and give thanks for all the good things that have come your way. For all you Americans, who still don't understand why we celebrate Thanksgiving a month before you do, this simple explanation… It's mostly a weather thing. The seasons change sooner here. Our harvests are done. But also, if you look at a map you'll...
Lazy Sunday # 140: Jai Guru Deva Om
So begins the refrain from "Across the Universe" written and sung by John Lennon on the Beatles' last album "Let it Be". Translated from Sanskrit it means "I give thanks to my heavenly teacher" or according to some "I give hope to my heavenly teacher". The literal translation is "Glory to the shining remover of darkness". Any of those works for me. Yesterday was remembered as John Lennon's 70th...
How Do I Know You Can Write?
All writers know it's difficult convincing others that you can write. Every big name from Ernest Hemingway to Aaron Sorkin was repeatedly turned down at their beginnings, earning far more rejection slips than offers to option their material. In later life, many authors of note wear those rejections as a badge of honor, proof that they prevailed and overcame their detractors, confirming the entertainment industry rule that...
