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.

Remember the WGA – ATA Negotiation?

by Larry Brody

The War Between TV and Film Writers and the Association of Talent Agents has been going on for about a year now, and on Valentine’s Day the Writers Guild of America West emailed its members the latest status report.

As far as I’m concerned, it’s a doozy. Because its unwritten premise is, “Hey, kids, we aren’t negotiating with the Association anymore because it’s no longer necessary. We’re dealing one on one with the various agencies, and we’re scaring the hell out of the big, obnoxious ones, the gangs that insist on doing the packaging fee thing.”

Here’s the precise text. How does the situation sound to you?

Dear Members,

It has been a while since we’ve given you an update on the agency campaign.  As you know, since the beginning of the year the remaining mid-level agencies have signed, which leaves us with five large agencies still without a franchise agreement.  The WGA has had substantive discussions with all but one.  Those we have spoken to have said directly to me they would like to make a deal.  We continue to place pressure on them, by pursuing the lawsuit, by negotiating with the smaller agencies, and by withholding their ability to represent writers.  The goal remains in sight: to realign all our representatives’ financial interests with their writer clients by ending packaging fees and curtailing agency ownership of production.

A number of the unsigned agencies, while professing to want a deal, continue to engage in misconduct. We know that some agents are harassing former clients to work with them in secret under the false premise that “everyone else has come back.”  These same unfranchised agents are inserting themselves into potential deals by calling executives and acting as if they still represent writers who fired them. This is itself an indication that the pressure is mounting on them.  We talked about this misconduct in a previous email, and there may be helpful information in it if you find yourself faced with this kind of pressure.

We’ve also heard the rumors that some writers have gone back to their unfranchised agents.  When we receive specific information the allegations are investigated, starting with outreach by the Guild’s Working Rule 23 Committee.  We have looked into a few reports that turned out to be without merit, which is why confidentiality is so important.  But we continue to investigate other reports, and for any writers breaking the rules there must and will be accountability.

Despite the challenges of this new landscape, writers continue to pursue their careers working with the help of a manager, a franchised agent or on their own, often utilizing Guild-provided tools.  The numbers speak for themselves: overall employment is up, compensation is higher, and writers are maintaining health benefits at higher levels than last year.  The Guild will continue to provide and improve the tools we’ve set up to help writers find work. If you have questions or concerns as always you can contact: Agency@wga.org.

As we head into MBA negotiations, some in the industry have pushed the narrative that the agency campaign has weakened us.  But it has had the opposite effect: we have taken on the status quo, challenged business practices that everyone hated but no one else would question, and, in doing so, changed the way the whole town does business.  The companies have seen another powerful example of the Guild’s unity and sense of purpose in protecting the well-being of writers.  There is no doubt it has made us stronger.

Invitations to the MBA member meetings will go out next week.

In Solidarity,

David A. Goodman

Larry Brody: Live! From Paradise! #84 – “Tick Tick Love…”

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THE USUAL NOTE FROM LB: From the summer of 2002 to  the spring of 2010, Gwen the Beautiful and I were the proud and often exhausted owners of a beautiful Ozarks property we called Cloud Creek Ranch.

In many ways, the ranch was paradise. But it was a paradise with a price that started going up before we even knew it existed. Here’s another Monday musing about our adventure and the lessons we learned.

Oh, and if y’all detect any irony, please believe me when I say it comes straight from the universe and not your kindly Uncle Larry B.

by Larry Brody

Awhile back I wrote about ticks and how they’ve developed super-itchy bites. For reasons too terrifying to contemplate, I’ve gotten more response on this subject than just about anything else I’ve written about here.

One reader wrote, “There is one natural and beautiful thing to use against all those…bloodsuckers: ethereal oils. Especially Lavender!…Try it. They won’t come near you.”

Another suggested, “You could try guinea fowl for the ticks.”

A third got right to the point: “Move to the city!”

A reader from Indiana came up with a reason why bug bites today bug us more than they did years ago:

“My belief is that this is connected to chem trails and their substances…Insects…pass these into a bite, as a mosquito does malaria.”

According to this reader all the environmental poisoning human beings have done over the years is coming back to haunt us as poisoned creepy crawlers inject the bad stuff right into our bloodstreams while they’re latching on.

All things considered, that sounds like as credible an explanation as any to me. The preventatives sound good too, but none of them have worked so far.

Splashing lavender all over my body didn’t work for me because guess what? Turns out I’m allergic to it. Which means thate ven a more conservative dabbing of it on my wrists and behind my ears didn’t fit me any better.

On the guinea fowl front, my farmer neighbors tell me that guinea hens are wanderers, just as likely to roam over to someone else’s property and eat his ticks as mine, and that giving the chickens we’ve already got here at The Mountain free range would work better.

That may well be, but our dogs, Emmy the Bold, Decker the Giant-Hearted, and Belle the Wary, have another use for free range chickens, and in spite of our best efforts at mediation (and more aggressive forms of peace-keeping) letting the Cloud Creek flock out for only a couple of hours a day didn’t do much but whittle it down from a dozen to—gulp—three.

As for moving to the city—I’ll take our country menaces over the city ones any time.

Most readers were too sensible and polite to comment on another part of the column, my discovery that vultures are nature’s ultimate get-along-guys, and my decision to ask the next one that flew by for advice. A wiser man would’ve taken the hint. But I went out and waved the long vulture feather I’d found at the pond at the biggest carrion-eater I’ve ever seen—

And got a reply, which as per the non-sensible promise I made, I’m now passing on:

“I see you, My Brother,” the vulture said, “waving a lost piece of myself at me. I see you and recognize kin.

“This secret of vulture life I pass on to you. It’s about searching, and finding the strongest current, and using that current to take you where you need to go. It’s about adapting and changing and making friend out of foe. The outside world is our challenge, not our enemy. The enemy is within.”

The vulture made a big circle over the sparsely populated chicken yard and flew on, leaving me to figure out what it meant.

I think it boils down to this:

The itching is what bothers me, and my body’s auto-immune system is responsible for that, not the ticks. The trick is to get my body to cool it.

A psychologist friend of mine believes that the way we control our emotions (and therefore our bodies) is to say them out loud. Native People all over the world believe similarly and make that the basis for their ceremonies. And all the great religions and philosophies of the world advocate, “Love your enemy!” in one form or another.

So what I’ve been doing whenever I get something new to scratch is talk to my body instead. To thank it for fighting off the intruder. To love the fact that I’m so uncomfortable because I know that someday I won’t have a body and be able to feel anything, good or bad.

And guess what? It’s been just like talking to my kids when they were young. I tell my body to do something—“Keep itching!”—and it responds with, “Aw, this is no fun anymore” and within a few minutes the itching stops.

Go on. Love your enemy. Love yourself.

Works for me.

Let me know what it does for you.

LB: Thousands Donate to Keep Local Theater in Business

by Larry Brody

Some of you know that I live near the northeast tip of the Olympic Peninsula, in a small town called Port Townsend, Washington.

Many of you may also know that I’m a big believer in supporting local artists and arts organizations of all types. In keeping with the excitement being part of a genuine local arts scene brings to me, I’m reprinting this article from The Seattle Times about a recent feel-good event that happened in the Port Townsend neighborhood, only 25 minutes from the Brody home.

This one should make you smile:

Small-town theater, saved!
by Moira Macdonald

Sometimes in life, things work out like a Frank Capra movie.

Craig Smith opened the Firehouse Theater in Kingston a dozen years ago; a friendly place with real butter on the popcorn, and Smith himself out front selling tickets and personally introducing every film. (The name is appropriate; Smith renovated the town’s former fire station, creating a two-screen cineplex.) Though the theater was popular in the community, Smith had long struggled to recoup the costs of the renovation — and, at 65, was wondering how long his dream could be sustainable. Last month, his children helped him set up a GoFundMe for the theater. In its first couple of weeks, it raised about $6,000.

Then, after a “CBS Sunday Morning” story about Smith and the Firehouse aired early Sunday, contributions started to pour in. As of noon Sunday, the fundraiser had raised approximately $140,000, from nearly 3,700 individual donors. Comments from donors — located all over the country — indicated that Smith’s story touched them: “The American Dream should live on,” said one, giving $15. “I donated because I love the movies and those who try to keep their spirit alive,” wrote another with her $20 donation. Another, giving $10, wrote, “I donated to support Craig’s contribution to his community, and to help allow him to continue his passion.”

The CBS story followed a Wall Street Journal story on the Firehouse in December by Seattle freelancer Chris Kornelis, who was interested in the struggles faced by small local theaters. Smith, a lifelong film lover who “grew up seeing movies the way the filmmaker wants them to be seen,” was happy to talk. A CBS producer spotted the article, and things happened quickly: In early January, a small crew went to Kingston, filming in and around the Firehouse for two and a half days. The segment aired, appropriately, on Oscar Sunday — and suddenly the GoFundMe was, appropriately for the theater’s location, on fire.

Speaking by telephone Sunday, after getting his first two matinees under way (the phone had been “ringing off the hook,” and one of the movies started a bit late due to unexpected crowds), Smith was overwhelmed by his theater’s sudden good fortune. “It’s like manna from heaven,” he said, noting that he stopped taking a paycheck from the theater some time ago. “In my heart of hearts, I did not dream of this. Those (CBS) guys, the way they told the story was true. I just didn’t imagine it would come across like that.”

Larry Brody: Live! From Paradise! #83 – “The Brodys Go Batty”

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THE USUAL NOTE FROM LB: From the summer of 2002 to  the spring of 2010, Gwen the Beautiful and I were the proud and often exhausted owners of a beautiful Ozarks property we called Cloud Creek Ranch.

In many ways, the ranch was paradise. But it was a paradise with a price that started going up before we even knew it existed. Here’s another Monday musing about our adventure and the lessons we learned.

Oh, and if y’all detect any irony, please believe me when I say it comes straight from the universe and not your kindly Uncle Larry B.

by Larry Brody

In all the time Gwen the Beautiful and I have lived in Paradise neither one of us has ever had a mosquito bite.

For awhile we thought it was because of the bats who live in the caves in the ridge above the Original Settlers’ Cabins, but last summer we discovered we were only half right.

Yes, bats consider a mouthful of mosquitoes to be haute cuisine, but no, the bats who’ve been dining on the skeeters on our Mountain aren’t just living in the caves. They’re also right here in the house. In the space between the gable venting and the inside wall.

It was the chittering and fluttering that gave them away.

The noise started in late summer. One afternoon Gwen went upstairs and stopped dead in her tracks.

“Rats!” she shouted. “I hear rats. Or squirrels. Rustling and scraping in the wall.” She stopped, listening. “Uh-oh. Now I hear fluttering. Like wings.”

“Must be birds,” I said.

“Do birds chitter?” Gwen said. “I hear chittering too.”

Bats chitter, and they flutter too. I went on the alert and, sure enough, I spotted ‘em a couple of weeks later, flying out of the venting before dusk. In principle, neither Gwen nor I minded sharing the place with bats, but their activities grew louder day by day.

There was only one explanation for it. The bats were multiplying at an unusual pace. We had no choice but to take action. This was a job for Brannigan the Contractor.

“Get those things out of there and seal it up so they can’t get back in,” I told him over the phone, and after a week had passed Brannigan and his Bat Removal Ladder arrived.

He backed his pickup as close to the house as he could get. Set the ladder up on the bed. Offered Burl Jr. the New Groundskeeper a handful of cash to climb up and nail some wire mesh to the open slats in the vent.

“I’m paying my own guy to go up there while you watch?” I said.

“Absolutely not!” roared Brannigan. “You’re paying your guy to go up there while I supervise. And you’re paying me too—“

He broke off as Burl Jr. cried out and hand-over-handed himself down the ladder. “There’s a ton of bats up there!” he said. “Big, mean, brown ones. They growled at me!”

“They won’t hurt you!” Brannigan said.

“That’s for sure. Because I’m not going up there again. I’m late for my day job.”

Off Burl Jr. went. Brannigan looked disgusted. “Kids!”

But he climbed up the ladder, and an hour and a half later pronounced all the bats gone and the venting sealed.

“Problem solved.”

Or so we thought.

Until the chittering and flapping resumed.

“Brannigan didn’t get all the bats,” Gwen said. “Who knows how many are in there, starving to death because we sealed them up?”

“Not ‘we,’” I said. “Brannigan did the sealing.”

“Because we told him to. You’ve got to get him back here to let the poor things out.”

“You mean take down the screening he just put up?”

Gwen’s nostrils flared. “We can’t let them die!”

It took another week for Brannigan to get the time to come back. This time he didn’t bring the ladder.

“Those bats really do growl,” he said. “Go up there again? Not me.”

He took a long pole with a macheté duct-taped to it from the back of his truck, started jumping and poking and swiping…until, with a CRACK!, not just the mesh but the whole venting hit the ground.

The wall was wide open. A couple of fuzzy, brown, bat-faced peeked out.

“There you go, bud!” Brannigan said. “They’re free now.”

“What about the hole in my wall?”

“Nothing to worry about. Since we’re friends, you can have that for free! I’ll have to charge you to fix it though. We’re talking time, labor….”

If you’re a homeowner you know where I’m headed. Operation Bat Removal is over. New venting is in place, uncovered and awaiting the bats’ return from their annual migration. Everything’s just as it was when Gwen first heard the chittering and fluttering.

Well, not quite everything. Three hundred dollars flew from my pocket into Brannigan’s, and all I’ve gotten in return is this fair ole country tale.

There better not be one single, solitary, uneaten mosquito on this property come spring.

Larry Brody: Live! From Paradise! #82 – “Gwen’s Resurrection”

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THE USUAL NOTE FROM LB: From the summer of 2002 to  the spring of 2010, Gwen the Beautiful and I were the proud and often exhausted owners of a beautiful Ozarks property we called Cloud Creek Ranch.

In many ways, the ranch was paradise. But it was a paradise with a price that started going up before we even knew it existed. Here’s another Monday musing about our adventure and the lessons we learned.

Oh, and if y’all detect any irony, please believe me when I say it comes straight from the universe and not your kindly Uncle Larry B.

by Larry Brody

Everything about life fascinates me, but one of the most intriguing aspects is the way its little ironies work.

Good somehow produces Bad. Bad miraculously creates Good.

And we mortals experience both.

Case in point:

Since we discovered the cause of Gwen the Beautiful’s stroke and how to overcome it her health has been getting better and better. She’s well. She’s whole. She’s happy.

But just a few days ago out of all that improvement came a crisis of the first magnitude.

Last Monday night I was awakened from sleep by a loud crash. Followed by a series of thumps as though someone was falling down the stairs. But the sound wasn’t’ coming from the stairway. It came from the bathroom. Groggily, I reached out for Gwen.

She wasn’t there.

My grogginess vanished.

“Gwen? Gwen? What’s going on?”

Even as I said it I was getting out of bed. From the bathroom, Gwen called out weakly. “I think I need you,” she said.

I flicked on the lamp on my nightstand. Hurried across the room to the bathroom doorway.

And found Gwen lying on the floor, surrounded by cosmetics that had fallen from a big, old, wooden rack we use for storage in there. Gwen lay on her back beside the rack, arms straight at her sides, legs extended perfectly straight as well.

Gwen’s head was twisted against the wall. Her tongue was out. Her eyes wide open.

She wasn’t moving.

Not a twitch.

Not an eye flutter.

Not a breath.

I knelt down and put my hand on her neck. No pulse.

The only positive thing about what I was looking at was that there was no blood.

I’ve always thought of myself as the kind of person who performs best under pressure. “Crises ‘R Us.’” In an emergency the world around me slows to a crawl, time seeming to stop while I become aware of what’s happening, figure out what to do…and then do it.

Not Monday night.

Monday night I stared at the face of the person I love most in the world, and it was the face of death. Gwen and I both have taken CPR, but did I tilt back her head, clean Gwen’s airway, and start compressions?

I did not.

Training went right out the window.

Did I do the practical thing and run to the phone to call 911?

Nope. Practicality was wiped from my mind.

What about the spiritual route? Did I pray? Or try to contact the Universe in any other way?

Not by a long shot. I was way too overwhelmed.

Instead, I wrapped my arms around her head and cradled her and howled, as loudly as I could, “Gwen! Gwen! I love you!”

Gwen’s eyelids fluttered. I said it again. “Gwen! Gwen!”

She took a shallow, ragged breath. Another. Her eyes moved. Focused.

On me.

“What’re you doing?” she said. “Is something wrong?”

“I said, “Do you know where you are?”

She looked around, puzzled. “What am I doing on the floor…?”

“I don’t know. Let’s put you in bed.”

I raised her to her feet, half-carried her to the bed. The next morning she was fine, as though nothing had happened. But something had. And we needed to get to the bottom of it.

We went to Paradise’s favorite doctor, Dr. Max. Dr. Max is old school, more Marcus Welby than Gregory House, with maybe a little touch of Hawkeye or Trapper John. He took one look at Gwen’s blood pressure and knew what’d happened.

“Your blood pressure’s too low,” he said. “You probably stood up too quickly in the night and fainted. It’s not uncommon.”

“But my blood pressure’s always been high. I’ve been taking medication for it for years.”

“Time to stop,” Dr. Mack said. “All that work you’ve been doing to make sure you don’t have another stroke has solved your blood pressure problem for you.” He rubbed his forehead thoughtfully. “You might say it made you so well it almost killed you.”

So that’s where we are. Did I mistake my wife’s unconsciousness for something worse? Or did she die a couple of nights ago and then return?

I’ll never know. I don’t think it matters. What I do know, and what does matter, is Gwen survived and is better than ever.

But, Universe—whatever you are—although I appreciate the lesson, next time you want to demonstrate one of the ironies of creation—

Can’t you please do it a little more gently, and make it just a little bit less life or death?