Tag: online TV writing workshop

Gerry Conway on “The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel” and the Death of the American Middle Class.

by Gerry Conway

There are many reasons to watch this show on Amazon Prime set in 1958 New York City – terrific writing and direction, wonderful and funny performances, and mouth-watering art direction – but one possibly unintended benefit is the view it provides of a vanished American species: the upwardly mobile, culturally secure, highly educated middle class.

Midge Maisel’s father is a professor of mathematics at Columbia University. He earns what I would assume was considered at the time a reasonable middle class salary as a tenured professor (he’s not a department head). With that salary, he put a daughter through Radcliffe College, employs a maid, lives in an expansive Upper West Side apartment, and supports a stay-at-home wife.

I’ve read reviews by younger Generation-X and Millennial writers who apparently think this is a ridiculous fantasy. Sadly, that says more about those writers’ experiences and expectations in post-Reagan America than it does about the realism of a show set in post-World War II boom-time United States. read article

Stop Sugar-coating Creativity!

Sometimes the truth hurts. But knowing it still will set you free. The article below has a very businesslike tone, but don’t let that stop you from reading what is nothing less than the painful truth all creatives need to know:

by Milena Z. Fisher, Ph.D.

In response to a high demand for answers, the bunkum and balderdash of oversimplified creativity solutions are continuously shoved down a hungry market’s throat. The question remains: Is the current state of knowledge about creativity in a position to deliver meaningful, scientifically sound conclusions to what creativity is and how to foster it? read article

Munchman sees ‘The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy’

TV science fiction’s best robot and friends, one of whom is human. Can you tell who’s who?

by Munchman

One of my favorite series of books when I was in high school was Douglas Adams’ Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy. They were funny, they were – to me at the time – new, they weree – again, to me at that time – deeply philosophical and a wonderful analyses of the human condition.

To high schooler munchman, AKA tim muncher, or (and this one fills me with shame) t.t. muncher, as I thought of myself back then in a now-embarrassing homage to several obscene mags I’d seen while peering into the darkened window of a San Fernando Valley adult bookstore, Adams’ was what/who (?) Kurt Vonnegut Jr. was to the feeble old folks of LB’s generation.

My Writing God. read article

Cartoon: ‘How to Become a Literary Recluse’

Important how-to instructions from our favorite artist/philosopher, Grant Snider, who doesn’t necessarily practice what he preaches here. By which we mean – dood, we saw you on television! It was so exciting!

Well, we saw you on YouTube, that’s for sure. And that really was exciting.

read article

Kathryn Graham: ‘You’re No Hemingway’

by Kathryn Graham

When I was a freshman at Marist College, I was deeply insecure about my writing.

I didn’t trust the people I knew who said I had talent. Of course they did, I thought, they loved me. They were hopelessly biased (hi mom!), and even if they wanted to be objective, they never could be. read article