Yesterday we brought you Part 1 of Robert X. Cringely’s look at showbiz and the tech biz and how they’re each trying to screw the other trying to work together. Time now for Part 2:
By Robert X. Cringely
Author: LB
A legendary figure in the television writing and production world with a career going back to the late ’60s, Larry Brody has written and produced hundreds of hours of American and worldwide television and is a consultant to production companies and networks in the U.S. and abroad .
Shows written or produced by Brody have won several awards including - yes, it's true - Emmys, Writers Guild Awards, and the Humanitas Award.
LB: If I Hadn’t Made It in Television, I Would’ve Been a Comic Book Writer
…Like my buddies Roy Thomas and Gerry Conway. (Although Gerry did a fine job of escaping that ghetto, didn’t he, by rising to Co-Executive Producer of LAW & ORDER: CRIMINAL INTENT, among other TV shows?).
I’ve always thought that those working in the two media had a lot in common, and recently two writers still working in comic books have cemented that theory – John Ostrander and Martha Thomases. Here’s Martha’s take on soap opera, which coincidentally happens to be right in line with, yeah, you guessed it – mine.
Soap by Martha Thomases (ComicMix.Com)
LB: “The Only Writers Who Haven’t Sold Out are the Ones Who Haven’t Been Asked”
Nope, I’m not quoting myself. The above are just a few words spoken to me by Norman Mailer back in the day. (I.e., when he was alive and holding court in Manhattan and I, as a young writer, had just been introduced to him by – I kid you not – an NYPD detective. (No, not one who’d ever arrested him…yet.)
Mailer’s words to me come to mind because of this invigorating article from one of my favorite sites, io9.Com. I like io9 a lot. (Mostly because from time to time they mention me and seem to like me too. Just call me the Sally Field of TV writing.)
LB: A Couple of Cartoons
…that may not have been created with writers in mind but which certainly tell our tale:
Non Sequitur
LB: Screener Report – 3
Time now for the third and final installment of my mini-reviews of the screeners I’ve received from Oscar, DGA, and WGA award contenders.
The first time around, I reported on 5 films. The second time, I gave my opinion of 4. Now – well, now I’m so thoroughly disgusted with the films various studios are touting as the best of 2012 that all I can talk about is 1.
Yep, 1. Pathetic, isn’t it? A true testament to crappy film making. Or, maybe, to my intolerance and short attention span. You be the judge.