It’s been a while since I posted the last excerpt from Allan Weisbecker’s book, Can’t You Get Along With Anyone: A Writer’s Memoir and Tale of a Lost Surfer’s Paradise (we call it CYGAWA for the sake of brevity). But I promised six parts, and you’re getting six parts, dammit.
If you didn’t catch the first five excerpts, they start here (also a good place for some background on what the hell I’m talking about right now, in case you were confused). Included at the end of today’s excerpt, Allan has graciously begun offering CYGAWA in its entirety as a free e-book. As Allan likes me to point out, out of 126 reader reviews, the book got 115 five-star ratings. (I don’t mind pointing it out, because one of those five-star reviews was mine).
You call this a movie script? Give me a couple $5,000-a-week writers and I’ll write it myself. -Joseph Pasternak, movie producer
Anyway, here it is, enjoy.
I wouldn’t recommend a book that I hadn’t read and thought was pretty kickass, and didn’t have a ton of cool stuff about Hollywood in it. Can’t You Get Along With Anyone: A Writer’s Memoir and Tale of a Lost Surfer’s Paradise has both, and was interesting enough to get its first publisher sued. Allan Weisbecker had to start his own publishing company to get it back in print, and long story short, he was kind enough to let me publish the most movie-related sections here on FilmDrunk.
If my books had been any worse I would not have been invited to Hollywood, and if they had been any better I would not have come. - Raymond Chandler [Can't You Get Along With Anyone]
I’m hoping it’s something you’ll read and enjoy, and as a side benefit, will tide you over through the New Year when I’ll be sleeping off my hangover on a pile of hookers somewhere. Anyway, check out the first section after the jump, and if you need a little background on who Weisbecker is, check out our interview from a while ago. See also: Allan’s Author’s Note.
[From Chapter 10 of CYGAWA]
If my books had been any worse I would not have been invited
to Hollywood, and if they had been any better I would not have
come. - Raymond Chandler
When Advance Reading Copies (ARCs) of In Search of Captain Zero came
out in early 2001, my movie-writing agent – whom I would later fire and
whose response to that is the title of this book – gave one to a producer she
represented, who liked it a lot. The producer called my agent saying she
wanted to option the book.
I was wary.
Why was I wary?
Because there was a catch-22, based on the fact that there is no movie in
In Search of Captain Zero. (My favorite catch-22 is the old Groucho Marx line,
“I wouldn’t belong to any club that would have me as a member.”) Here the
catch-22 was more or less this: No one who wants to make a movie out of my
book is smart enough to get it done.
So I was wary.
But the movie producer had a trump card to play in persuading me
to let her option my book. The trump card was Sean Penn. She’d made a
documentary that Sean had narrated. Sean’s manager had read my book
and really liked it, thought it would make a terrific movie, she said. Sean
hadn’t read the book yet but wanted to co-produce it and maybe star in
it. (If you find it surprising that a Hollywood star would want to produce
and maybe star in a movie made from a book he hadn’t read, I can only
chuckle at your ignorance of how Hollywood is.) Said she knew a director
who wanted to direct it – the guy who directed the documentary Sean had
narrated.
Given that there is no movie in my book, and given that all these people
wanted to make a movie out of it anyway, I was thinking that there are a
lot of dumb people in Hollywood. But I already knew that, from personal
experience. From unnerving personal experience, if you get my demented-editor drift.
So I waffled out of wariness, out of fear of getting involved with a lot of dumb people.
The producer sensed my wariness. She of course had no idea of the reason
for my wariness. I mean I didn’t tell her that there was no movie in my book,
or that I assumed she was dumb. Hey, I’m not dumb. But having sensed my
wariness, the producer had Sean Penn call me. On a certain level it was a
strange conversation, since Sean and I were discussing making a movie out
of a book that he had not read.
That Sean had not read my book was never outright dealt with during
our phone conversation. The closest we came was when – in response to
one of my desperate ideas on how to make a movie out of a book wherein
there is no movie – Sean said, “I’m missing a little information here.”
Although I was wary, I was also human. I pictured Sean Penn up there
on the silver screen, playing me. I also pictured the money. Although the
option offer was small, a couple grand, if the producer could get studio
backing the movie deal would be up in six figures whether the movie got
made or not. And I knew that since there were so many dumb people in
Hollywood, studio backing was not out of the question; far from it. I mean
look at the movies that do get made. I mean who knew.
I let the producer and Sean Penn option my book.
READ ON FOR PART 2: BREAKFAST WITH SEAN PENN
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[From CYGAWA Chapter 12]
People do not wish to appear foolish; to avoid the appearance of foolishness, they were willing to actually remain fools. -Alice Walker
Aside from the Cosmic Banditos movie contract fiasco, as described, it was right around this time that the In Search of Captain Zero catastrophe reached a possible turning point. The current option period was up. (To be exact, on February 18, 2004.) To recap the deal:
The studio (via Sean Penn, the other producer and the director) had not bought the rights to my book; they’d optioned the rights, a year at a time, at $5,000 per. So it was put-up-or-shut-up time on that date each year. I know: chump change, considering they’d already spent a couple hundred grand for my adaptation – the whole “it’s-brilliant-then-it’s-not-the-script- we-expected” fiasco – plus a producer’s fee went to the above trio. Not chump change, in total.
Thing was, though, everything had gone so poorly that my feeling was they might let the option expire, stop throwing money into the fire. I certainly would have, had I been in their position. But hold on. A version of my catch-22 kicks in here, no? Something like Anyone dumb enough to think there’s a movie in my book in the first place is dumb enough to keep throwing money into the fire.
And now there was another catch-22; or rather, the first catch-22
becomes a compound catch-22, which is sort of like an exponential whammy.
Something like Anyone dumb enough to think there’s a movie in my book in
the first place and then, in the second place, dumb enough to ignore a really good
screenplay that somehow gets written, is certainly dumb enough to keep throwing
money into the fire.
So it was absolutely guaranteed that they’d keep throwing money into
the fire.
I’m just realizing this now, as I write about it. At the time I thought maybe
they wouldn’t keep throwing money into the fire. And that would have
been fine with me, since I’d get back the movie rights to my book. There
was a problem here, though. Steven fucked up and failed to negotiate a buy-
back clause in the contract, which meant that I’d get the book rights back
but the studio and producers would still own the screenplay I wrote based
on the book. The bottom line of this piece of Hollywood ridiculousness
was that nobody could make a movie out of my book (at least not from
the screenplay I wrote). Yes, still another catch-22, of the simple, classic
variety.
But hold on. What’s the problem here, really? If someone else, another
studio, say, wanted to shoot my screenplay, couldn’t they just buy it from
the current studio/producers, those morons?
No.
Why not?
The studio/producers wouldn’t sell it to them. They’d just sit on my
screenplay and swallow the money lost.
Why would they do this?
Because if someone else made a movie from my screenplay and it was a
hit, the studio/producers would look…. how?
Right: Foolish
So forget that.*
If no one could make a movie out of my book and, indeed, if I got the
rights back it would cost me in option money not earned, then why did
I want the rights back? I’m not sure, but here’s an analogy that comes to
mind: Imagine you’re in love and your mate starts fucking someone else,
some scumbag. You leave your mate, it’s over. Then you find out that your
mate and the scumbag are not fucking anymore. You’re happy about it,
even though it’s still over between you and your mate.
Why are you happy about it?
Same thing here, somehow.
I wonder where that came from.
There was an amusing aspect to the option situation, though. Steven
called and said the studio suggested that I extend the option for free –
presumably because they figured that either, One, I liked them all so much,
or, Two, money was not a concern of mine.
Insofar as it’s possible for one to laugh in a Hollywood movie studio’s
face through an intermediary – in this case, one’s attorney – from a cell
phone at the end of the road at the bottom of Central America, that’s what
I did.
So they sent me the $5,000.
While the studio was busy making nonsensical proposals to my attorney
and then sending me money, I was busy too. I mean aside from dealing with
Lisa and her distressing antics, plus the hit man/Ron fiasco, plus crack-head
thieves moving onto my property, plus my attorney telling me to sign a
contract authored by Amy-frickin-Nickin without reading it, and so forth. I
was busy trying to get my draft, the “brilliant” one – written before the one
wherein I went into the tank – to Sean Penn. Aside from putting the draft
on my website and asking anyone who knew Sean to please give it to him,
I’d sent the draft to his Hollywood manager with a note asking him to read
it and, if he liked it, send it along to Penn.** I knew this wouldn’t work but
I gave it a shot anyway. I knew it wouldn’t work because Penn’s manager
was also the director’s manager,† and the director, along with the other
producer and along with the studio did not want Penn to read my draft. I
also knew the manager wouldn’t do anything as intelligent as reading the
draft and giving it to Penn because (if you’ll remember) the manager was
one of the idiots who thought there was a movie in my book in the first
place. Right: That catch-22 again (or a slight variation of it).
Regarding that catch-22: That catch-22 did not apply to Sean Penn because
he still hadn’t read my book (and hence had no reason to know there is no
movie in it). I know this because I’d asked the other producer if Sean had
got around to reading it. She told me no, but that Sean’s wife, actress Robin
Wright Penn, told her a copy of my book was sitting on their living room
table.
“But you know Sean,” the producer said. Meaning that a copy of my
book’s current location on Sean’s living room table wasn’t a whole lot of
progress towards him reading it.
“No, I don’t know Sean,” I said. Not only did I not know Sean, but I
hadn’t seen him or spoken to him in quite a while — since the breakfast
meeting at the Four Seasons, actually, when the producer repeated how he
gets involved early in the script stage and how I will enjoy working with
him. So, no. I didn’t know Sean, but I was getting the drift.
In case you haven’t figured it out: I wanted to get my draft to Sean Penn
because I figured he’d like it and straighten all the morons out – my draft
would go back to being brilliant (plus I’d be a genius again). Which was
why everyone was petrified of Penn reading it, since they’d look foolish if
he did like it.
Can you wrap your mind around all this stuff?
My other move was to dig up Penn’s assistant’s name and address and
send the draft to her. Sent it off to Hollywood (the state of mind Hollywood,
since her address is in San Francisco) from Big Turkeys then waited to see
What Would Happen Next while all this other shit was going on.
As I say, it was a busy time.
* This particular studio did do this once, i.e.; sell back to the writers a screenplay they owned but
didn’t like. I’ve mentioned this one before, in another context. There’s Something About Mary.
Right: You wanna talk about looking foolish?
** It’s still on my website (the aweisbecker.com one), so you can read it there too – see if I have my
head up my ass like everyone else.$
$ As Steven made sure to point out, putting my draft on my site was illegal since I don’t
own the draft, the studio/producers do. They could sue, Steven said. To which I say:
Good luck to the fuckers! I imagine some Hollywood asshole in a suit with a briefcase
showing up at Big Turkeys to serve me papers and getting accidentally shot by a hit man
looking for my sorry ass or mugged by the crack heads on my property or bit by the
deadly terciopelo viper.
† Still more Hollywood incest, and still another example of how I was surrounded.
PART 8 COMING SOON…
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PART 1
PART 2
PART 3
PART 4
PART 5
PART 6
AUTHOR’S NOTE
INTERVIEW
I’m a Hollywood writer; so I put on a sports jacket and take off
my brain. - Ben Hecht
More Hollywood stuff, this regarding my first book, Cosmic Banditos, a goofball novel about The Meaning of Life wherein the protagonist is an unbalanced guy strongly based on me.
There’s a movie deal for Cosmic Banditos too. The actor John Cusack has optioned that book. Here on this little Caribbean island I got an email from Cusack’s company, New Crime Productions, saying he wants me to adapt that book for the screen. I got that email within a few days of the one from the movie studio for which I’m writing the screenplay to In Search of Captain Zero.
I’ve got movie deals up the wazoo.
If you’re one of those sad souls who is fascinated by movie stars and who has kept reading this book solely to find out which major movie star I physically threatened, why, and what happened when I did so, I have something to disclose: It was John Cusack I physically threatened. If you don’t remember that I physically threatened a movie star – it was mentioned a long time ago – good for you. In a sense I respect you for it.
The Cosmic Banditos saga is a good one, with plenty of bizarre Hollywood
doings. The bizarre Hollywood doings are best summed up by the fact that
I physically threatened John Cusack and now he wants to hire me.
How did that work?
I’ll soon get around to that, but first: My having fired my movie writing
agent means that Steven, my Hollywood attorney, will handle the Banditos
contract negotiations. At first I thought this would save me money since I
would not have to cough up the 10% commission agents get for making a
couple of phone calls. However, Steven informed me that since he will be
acting as my agent as well as my attorney, he will get the 10%. I came within
a hair’s breadth of firing him on the spot for this bullshit, but decided to
wait on that, since it would mean I’d have no one left to handle my affairs
in the States.
An important point is that I myself put the Cosmic Banditos deal together
in the first place, minus only the contract details. Putting the deal together
in the first place is 90% of an agent’s job. So, in theory, I should get to keep
90% of the 10% Steven wants. When I mentioned this to Steven, he said,
“That’s different,” then changed the subject.
We’ll see how it goes with Steven, but I’ll tell you, my finger is quivering
on the firing-someone-else trigger.
At the time of the original Cosmic Banditos option deal, which was back
in the spring of 2001, two other writers – a writing team, as the Hollywood
expression goes – were hired to write the screenplay. How did they do? I’ll
put it this way: If they were a football team instead of a writing team, the
goddamn New York Jets could have kicked their ass. They wrote The Worst
Screenplay in the History of the World. But more about that to come. I’ll
fucking loop back to it.
Still more Hollywood stuff. In order to keep my fee down, Cusack’s
mpany is calling it “a rewrite.” A rewrite of The Worst Screenplay in the
History of the World. Since it’s The Worst Screenplay in the History of the
World I will not in any way be referring to it in my work. Cusack’s people
have agreed to this, i.e., that I should not refer to it in my work. (They have
more or less agreed that the first screenplay is The Worst Screenplay in the
History of the World.) So how could it then be a rewrite? When I queried
everyone involved on this matter they all said the same thing: “That’s
different.” Then they all changed the subject.
Anyway, all kinds of things will be up in the air when I leave this little
Caribbean Island and return to my home at the end of the road at the
bottom of Central America, aside from how it goes with Lisa.
’m supposed to be writing the screenplay to my first memoir, In Search
of Captain Zero, a book wherein there is no movie, and for which I’m being
paid a ton of money, and in the writing of which I intend to go into the
tank, i.e., purposefully come up with a bunch of utter crapola.
I’m also about to be hired to write the screenplay to my other book, which
was optioned by another major Hollywood star, one whom I physically
threatened. (Did I mention that I have doubts about whether there’s a
movie in that book?)
And yet I’m not writing either screenplay. I’m writing this book, for
which there is no guarantee that I’ll be paid anything, or even that it will
be published at all. Not only that but – in case you haven’t figured it out –
as soon as word about this book gets out, my writing career will likely be
over.
Who is going to want to come near me after this?
Unless, of course, this book becomes a howling success. If this book
becomes a howling success, I’ll basically be able to do what I want, including
answering thorny questions with the words, “That’s different.”
I gotta say it again: On top of all the sweating and forehead bleeding and
firing mega-talent-agency pimps, plus queasy guts, this is some wild-ass
job, this writing job, no?
READ ON FOR PART 4: THREATENING JOHN CUSACK
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[From Chapter 12 of CYGAWA]
Context is all. And a relatively pure heart. Relatively pure –
for if you had a pure heart you wouldn’t be in the book-writing
business in the first place. -Robert Penn Warren
Last week just before The Horror took place here on this little Caribbean island I got an email from the movie studio that wound up backing the In Search of Captain Zero movie deal. As things go in Hollywood, and as I more or less predicted back in 2001, the producer who optioned the book was able to find a studio to put up the money to make a movie out of my book, even though there is no movie in my book. One reason for this, I think, was that the studio head who decided to shell out the cash hadn’t read the book. If this sounds somehow both odd and familiar – and it would be odd (or flat nuts) in a similar situation in any other business – the familiar part is likely due to Sean Penn having co-optioned the book without reading it either.
And the deal was up there in six figures. I’m rolling in loot. Mostly
because I insisted on writing the screenplay. Screenplays are where the
money is. You think I cared that there is no movie in my book when I
insisted on writing the screenplay to my book, given that screenplays are
where the money is?
Ha!
But to sum up: Two of the main people who wanted to make a movie out
of my book hadn’t read it, and, meanwhile, another important person, the
one writing the screenplay, me, knew there was no movie in my book.
To knock off an old song title: Hooray for Hollywood!
A digression to a related matter, a Meanwhile: Nonfiction writers, of
which I am one at this moment, routinely lie like slugs in their narratives.
Often they’ll lie like slugs about facts, which, as you already know, I
sometimes do. Sometimes lying about facts is okay, sometimes not. But
what’s never okay is to lie in subtext, purposely cause the reader to have a
rush of insight about the workings of the world which the writer knows to
be false. Lying in subtext is a sin. Writers who do this, of which there are a
bunch, will rot in Writer Hell. My theory is that this worse case lying-in-
writing scenario is invariably caused by the same condition that causes
bad behavior of any sort: a failure in self-reflection.*
If you’re going to write a book (but not someday): The key to writing,
good writing, is self-reflection. In a sense, it’s a writer’s job, his only job.
Take that to the bank and put it in an interest-bearing account.**
I know a writer, mostly a Hollywood writer, who, when he looks in the
mirror, does not realize that there is little more than a lying, treacherous
shitball motherfucker staring back at him. So even when he’s looking in
the mirror there is no self-reflection. The guy is a pretty good writer, but
only in that he knows how to string words together. Other than that, he’s a
shitball writer. No self-reflection.
But what does all this have to do with movie deals and making a movie
from a book wherein there is no movie?
My going on about demented editors and people I’ve fired and am
pissed off at and shitball motherfuckers in general raises a question about
my character. I’ll phrase the question like this: What sort of potentially
cynical and greedy shitball motherfucker would let his book be optioned
and accept a ton of money, like 200 grand, to adapt it to the screen if he
knows there is no movie in the book? I use the qualifier potentially (which
is an adverb, possibly on the road to hell) here because the status of
this hypothetical person (based on me) as a cynical and greedy shitball
motherfucker is pending.
So this is the question, and it’s a good one, no? I mean possibly humorous
catch-22s aside…
No one who wants to make a movie out of my book is smart enough to get it
done.
By way of answering the question, in essence defending myself against
a serious charge – and plus maybe against the most serious charge there is
regarding self-reflection, or lack thereof, which is hypocrisy – here’s how
the deal went down…
But first for perspective I want you to imagine something. Imagine that
a bunch of lawyers and MBAs get together and buy a hospital. One day
they’re sitting around and an MBA or lawyer says, “You know, I’ve always
wanted to try my hand at brain surgery.” Another MBA or lawyer nods,
saying that when he was a freshman at college he was thinking of going to
medical school. “Hey…” he says, “we own the hospital. We can do what we
want. Let’s go down to the operating room and give it a shot!”
This is Hollywood in a nutshell, when producers and studio executives,
MBAs and lawyers, insert themselves into the creative process, the
storytelling process. They just can’t help themselves. It makes them feel
like they’re actually doing something — aside from making phone calls and
getting coverage instead of reading anything. They also do it because they
can. Hey, they own the hospital.
Enough perspective. Defending myself against these serious charges.
The deal. How it went down.
By July of 2001, two months after Mom died, the producer, along with
Sean Penn as co-producer, had found a studio that was interested in the
Zero project — an executive at the studio plus his yes-man had actually read
the book. A meeting was set up to discuss a possible development deal.
Development deals are deals wherein the first money the studio coughs
up goes to the screenwriter, plus expenses and an up front fee for the
producers. Then, if the screenplay passes muster, the movie gets made –
assuming a few miracles transpire. If the miracles transpire and the movie
gets made, everyone gets a lot more money.
The meeting was to be at breakfast at the Four Seasons Hotel in L.A.
In attendance were the producer, the director (‘attached’ to the deal), the
studio head, the executive who had read the book, his yes-man, plus Sean
Penn, plus me. I say the meeting was to be at breakfast because it pretty
much ended up being at lunch due to Sean Penn being a couple hours late.
This notwithstanding that he was staying at the Four Seasons, meaning he
didn’t have far to go to get to the meeting. Traffic was not a problem.
“You know Sean,” the producer said to me as we waited and waited in
the lobby, along with the director. Although I had talked with Sean on the
phone about making a movie out of my book – the conversation wherein
he said he was “missing a little information here” – I didn’t actually know
him. But okay. The producer reiterated that I was going to enjoy working
with him, meaning in the writing of the screenplay, in the process of which
I had been assured that Sean gets involved early.
I’m looking forward to it, I said, as we waited.
Eventually Sean steps out of the elevator and says Hi to the producer
and the director, whom he knows, then he and I shake and say Hi, then,
by way of apology for his tardiness, Sean says he had “a pharmaceutical
night.” We all laugh.
We join the studio people in the dining room.
Everyone says Hi to everyone else. Sean and the studio head are old
pals. Sean repeats his de facto apology about his pharmaceutical night and
we all laugh. Sean sits down and lights up a cigarette. By this time I could
use one myself, but I can’t bring myself to do it, what with the No Smoking
signs and people eating nearby.
Allan smokes too, the producer says to Sean. You two are going to get
along great. We all laugh, although I’m wishing she hadn’t said that. I’m
embarrassed about smoking.
There’s chit-chat about some party Sean went to the previous night,
who was there and so forth, then the meeting gets underway. You must
remember that no deal has yet been struck with the studio. The only money
I’d got was a couple grand for a year-and-a-half option on my book. So big
bucks were hanging in the air for yours truly that morning (maybe it was
afternoon by now) at the Four Seasons Hotel in West L.A. – in Hollywood,
actually, the state of mind Hollywood.
Cutting through the politics and the personal relationships and the
compliments about how great my book is and other bullshit, what this
meeting is, is an audition, my audition, as screenwriter.
So I’ve got the floor. I’m hoping I’ll be “good in a room” as the Hollywood
expression goes, and which I used to be back in my old Hollywood days. So
I start in on how to make a movie out of my book but my rhythm is broken
by a waiter who comes over and asks Sean not to smoke. An ashtray is
secured and Sean eventually puts out his cigarette. I try to inhale the last
wisp of the fucking thing.
All right. Here we go.
In a sense my pitch of how to make a movie out of my book is of the I
have good news and I have bad news sort. The bad news, I say, is that there is
no movie in my book.
Hold on. I don’t exactly phrase it this way, as I will much later when the
deal turns into a full-blown fiasco. Here’s how I do phrase it: My book does
not provide an actual story, I say, due to a lack of real conflict between the
two main characters. I then point out that conflict is what a story is built
upon. In essence, conflict (plus the turning points it creates) is what a story
is. But we all know this, I say. I’m being disingenuous since – possibly apart
from Sean Penn (pharmaceutical night or no) – I know that no one here
knows this, although they all nod.
The book works, I go on (trying to avoid sounding too didactic), because
of the narrative voice, which defines the book’s principal conflicts as internal
– internal conflicts are not directly translatable to the screen. Further, I say,
the book ending hinges on an internal turning point and is likewise not
translatable to the screen. In other words, we have no ending.
I then point out something else I claim we all know, which is that in
storytelling, especially screen storytelling, endings are very important.
In fact (and here I quote screenwriter William Goldman), endings are
everything. No ending, no story.
What the book provides, I say, is a premise, a good one, and I’m not
being disingenuous here. I really feel that way. The premise: A middle-aged
surfer gives up his straight life to search for an old friend and ex-partner in crime
from their younger days, who is missing in Central America.
That’s pretty much all the book provides, I reiterate. So: They’re
contemplating coughing up a couple hundred grand plus a producer’s fee
(plus overhead and interest) for one sentence. To distract them all from this
implication I quickly ramble on, saying that the narrative will have to be
reinvented. That’s the word I use. Reinvented. I also work in the fact that my
book is nonfiction, meaning some sort of portrayal of real life, and real life,
almost by definition, is not dramatic. Real life is a pain in the ass that way,
making a movie out of it.
Everyone agrees to all this, including Sean Penn, via a nod, although,
aside from his pharmaceutical night, he’s missing a little information here.
But okay. That everyone agrees is a relief. It’s a relief because not only do
I want the money, I want to write this screenplay. I want to reinvent my
book.
See if you concur: With everyone’s agreement that the book lacks an
actual story and that the narrative will have to be reinvented and that
they’re coughing up a couple hundred grand for one sentence, they are
in effect also agreeing with my catch-22, notwithstanding that they don’t
realize it.
More defensiveness on my part: Was it my responsibility to outright
define my catch-22? I didn’t – and still don’t – think so. I’m trying to let
myself off the cynical and greedy shitball motherfucker hook here. I admit
that.
Back to the meeting. I then go on to outline the conflicts I concocted that
will provide the turning points necessary to build an actual story around
my premise. Now, I say, regarding the ending, which the book does not
provide, what I want to do is create a mythical kind of The Endless Summer
meets Apocalypse Now finish. I know better than to use Heart of Darkness,
the novel upon which Apocalypse Now is based, in my Hollywood short-
handing, figuring that no one else in the room has read, or even knows
about, Joseph Conrad’s book.
Not only does everyone like my concocted turning points that will
provide the necessary conflicts, plus the idea of The Endless Summer meeting
Apocalypse Now, but the studio head, (who, again, hasn’t read the book) says
this, and I remember his words exactly because I will repeat them minutes
later when the producer and I are alone, and then again on the phone to
my then-agent, whose response to my later firing her is the title to this
book. He says, “I want to stop you right here, Allan.” He pauses. He has
everyone’s undivided attention. “I just want to say that you have this deal
right now, if you want it.”
Not only has the studio head not noticed my implied catch-22, but he
apparently is sufficiently impressed by not noticing it, if you get my drift,
to offer me the deal then and there, no further ado or blabbing or being
good in a room on my part necessary. So it’s agreed: Everyone’s people will
be in touch with everyone else’s people to work out the legal details.
Sean adjourns to the patio and lights up. The producer, the director and
I join him. I light up. We chit-chat for a bit and the producer reiterates how
Sean and I are going to enjoy working together.
I’m looking forward to it, I say.
—
So this was in July of 2001 and now it’s March of 2003. I’m on a little
Caribbean island with Lisa, the woman with whom I’ve fallen in love at
age 55. The Horror will soon take place and, meanwhile, I’ve received an
email from the studio from the above meeting, the outfit that’s paying me
to adapt my book for the screen. The email includes the studio’s “notes” on
how I should rewrite my last submitted draft of the screenplay.
As a result of this email I’ve decided to go into the tank.
Go into the tank is a boxing expression. It means a boxer is going to throw
a fight. Lose on purpose. In this case, go into the tank means I’m planning
on writing a piece of shit screenplay. Write a bunch of utter crapola and do
it on purpose.
Why would I do this?
Hang in and I’ll get around to that, but first some other stuff, including
stuff with Lisa that makes The Horror look like a day at the beach.***
—
*My view is that lying about facts is sometimes “okay” when the writer’s sole motive is to keep
the story moving, or to foster unity (symmetry), or to ease the narrative onto another subject (a
segue), with no deceitful implications about how the world works.
**Aside from self-reflecting in his work, a writer has to keep the reader wanting to know What
Happens Next. So, regarding only jobs, writers actually have two.
***Since I’m hinting at future narrative events, this chapter ending is an example of looping,
which I’m doing all over the place. I love looping! Hey, I’m becoming an “I loop, therefore I am”
sort of writer. To put it another way: To my demented editor, assuming she is reading this right
now: Take your looping and shove it up your ass.
—
READ ON FOR PART 3: JOHN CUSACK, COSMIC BANDITO
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