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Posted on January 18, 2012 - by writerman

this one time at McDonald’s

In a previous life, I played in a ska band.

You haven’t heard of us. We weren’t particularly cool or popular. We never got on MTV, signed a record deal or played at the Peach Pit After Dark. We did manage to tour a little and write a lot of upbeat songs about drinking and surfing and girls who hurt our feelings. The pinnacle of our success came in 2004, when the single from our first record reached the #2 slot on the Canadian college radio charts, outplaying bands you have heard of like Modest Mouse, Broken Social Scene and even that fella Jack White beat up from the Von Bondies. That was a good week.

But, the times weren’t always so good. Playing ska is a little like growing a mustache – it inspires highly polarized responses in those around you. Whenever you tell someone you play in a ska band, they invariably have one of three replies:

“Oh my god I love ska! The Specials¹ are totally my favorite band!” I think it’s important to point out that this is, by far, the least common of the three responses.

Getting back to my earlier comparison, the second type of response is akin to the glare someone gives you when that hipster mustache makes you look like a convicted sex offender and you are standing too close to their child. These people usually say nothing, but their disdain and disgust with your musical tastes are clearly written all over their faces.

The third and most common response always comes in the form of a question:

“What’s ska?”

After a while, I begin to prefer the hatred. At least hate is an emotional response. This reaction reminds me way too much of that time in junior high when I spent all night screwing up the courage to ask Robyn Erickson to slow dance. God, my thirteen-year-old self had a terrible crush on her. I saw her in homeroom every day. She had this mole on her cheek, just below her eye. And I’m not talking about one of those Cindy Crawford / Madonna beauty marks, either. This was an actual mole around the size of a dime. She was probably self-conscious about it, but as far as I was concerned it only made her prettier. Anyhow, when the familiar strains of Careless Whisper came on, I knew this would be the last slow song of the night, so I raced over and asked her to dance before my nerves could get the better of me. She blinked and said, “Do I know you?” Not outright rejection, just confusion. Her friends turned to see who this sweaty young stranger was. I fled.

Years later, I wouldn’t run away when confronted with confusion about this strange musical genre we played, but I never really found a satisfying way to answer that question. And I won’t try and answer it now. Google it, if you like.

The reason I share all of this is to help set the context for what follows. I’ve been in bands, but we never had a tour bus and I’ve certainly never rolled around in a limousine full of strippers and cocaine. Also, you should know that I’m not a drummer, singer or guitar slinger – I play the trumpet. Even if we had gotten famous, I’m no Dan Auerbach or Travis Barker. More like Vince DiFiore.²

Still, once in a while your number comes up.

One night, we’re playing a small club in Vancouver for the Hot Breakfast record release party. Even though the other guys are technically the “headliners,” we go on last. This allows Canada’s favorite surf-rock-reggae-cowboys to play when the bar is at its most crowded. It also gives them a couple of hours after their set to sell CDs and t-shirts over at the merch table. Our job is to keep the crowd entertained and thirsty so they hang around long enough to spend the rest of their money on drinks and Hot Breakfast merchandise. The crowd stays. The record sells. This is one of the good ones.

After the show, the usual suspects head to the Railway Club for drinks. Which is a lot like going out for a pint after work, except it’s 3:00 am and you’re already drunk. A few beers later, last call is called. Me and Braces decide to hit McDonald’s on the way home and pick up some cheeseburgers to eat in bed. It’s busy, but I suppose that’s what you get at a fast food joint thirty minutes after all the bars downtown close their doors. Still, we’re hungry, so we decide to wait it out.

A rowdy group rolls up behind us. I’ve seen this gang before – rockabilly band Big John Bates, along with three burlesque dancers from the Voodoo Dollz. They are also on the way home from a show and still in costume. One of the girls notices my horn case and wonders what’s inside. “A trumpet.” I tell her.

“Will you play it?” she asks.

“What, now?”

“Yeah – if you play us a song, we’ll strip.”

“Seriously? Right here, in McDonald’s?”

I look at Braces to see what she thinks. I know it might seem kind of old-fashioned, but if three strange women offer to strip for you in a public place, I believe a gentleman should check with his girlfriend first to make sure she’s comfortable before proceeding. Braces’s eyes flash me that “what the fuck are you waiting for?” look she has the patent on.

To business then. I get the horn out and start playing. And, three girls in fishnets and corsets get their striptease on for a packed house of hungry drunks, homeless guys and under-paid kids in polyester uniforms. It’s dinner and a show for the price of combo #5. Impressively, the hardworking employees of Ronald® carry on selling fries as if nothing out of the ordinary is going down. Of course, if you work the graveyard shift at a downtown McD’s, you’ve probably seen a lot worse.

The girls get really into it. Shimmying and shaking and flinging their tops around and hamming it up for the crowd. Personally, I’m having a hard time concentrating. You might think this is because of the half-naked brunette gyrating next to the ketchup dispenser to my left, but the truth is I just kept wishing for the chance to make a quick phone call.

A phone call³ to my thirteen-year-old self to give him the pep talk I never got:

“Look dude, I know girls think you’re invisible and the last thing you want to do every night is practice the stupid trumpet, but just hang in there and stick with it. Trust me, someday it’s all going to pay off.”

1. Band reference can be substituted with The Skatalites, Sublime, Operation Ivy, English Beat, King Apparatus or The Mighty Mighty Bosstones, depending on the age, sex and nationality of the speaker. [↩]
2. Who’s Vince DiFiore? Exactly. [↩]
3. If anyone manages to invent this time-traveling phone, please let me know. I figure it’s never too late to make this particular call. [↩]

Posted on January 12, 2012 - by writerman

top 10 high school movies

The hardest thing about putting this top 10 list together was narrowing it down to less than eleven movies. Chalk it up to my protracted adolescence or perpetual immaturity, but I just frickin’ love movies about high school. That said, this is a Top 10 list. So there will be no “honorable mentions” and no ties for 10th place. Ten movies – no more and no less.

I am, as they say, a stickler for the rules. And so, in spite of my enthusiasm for so many movies that did not make the list, I will not mention the one that set the template, or any movies involving pies, football, selling your underpants, remarkably articulate pregnant girls, the Ramones, Charlie Sheen, buckets of pig’s blood, and definitely not that one with the time machine.¹

10. Clueless (1995)

This movie gets a lot of props for being a Jane Austen remake and for giving us all the 411 on how the cool kids talk, but the reason it landed in my top 10 is because of Alicia Silverstone’s amazing performance as everyone’s favorite spoiled, selfish, rich, shallow, vapid, vain, self-centered, clueless and yet somehow still loveable high school girl.

 

9. Superbad (2007)

The most outrageously profane movie on this list, Superbad makes the top 10 for bringing simplicity, sweetness and an endless parade of dick jokes back to the high school comedy. And, for introducing “cockblock” into the common vernacular.

 

8. Fast Times at Ridgemont High (1982)

Nearly 30 years later, Fast Times is largely remembered for the iconic scene where the white guy from Beverly Hills Cop fantasizes about a half-naked, underage Phoebe Cates and her red bikini. That moment has been imitated countless times since then, but the rest of the movie still holds up for it’s hilarious but unflinching look at real high school issues like drug use, abortion and ordering pizza to history class.

 

7. Heathers (1988)

The fashions are so 80′s, but the themes are timeless:

I mean, who hasn’t fantasized about murdering that evil bitch and the asshole jocks who terrorized their high school? Right?

 

6. Napoleon Dynamite (2004)

The Internet tells me that this movie inspired the term “The Napoleon Dynamite Problem”, the phenomenon whereby “quirky” films such as Napoleon Dynamite, Lost in Translation, and I Heart Huckabees prove difficult for researchers to create algorithms that are able to predict whether or not a particular viewer will like the film based on their ratings of previously viewed films.

Also: your mom goes to college.

 

5. Dazed and Confused (1993)

Richard Linklater’s best movie, Matthew McConaughey’s finest performance, and the greatest use of Foghat in the history of cinema, Dazed  is one of those rare movies that gets more and more fun the more times you watch it.

 

4. Election (1999)

Sure, she was pretty good in that movie about Johnny Cash, but for my money this is the performance that should have earned Reese Witherspoon her first Oscar. Pick Flick!

 

3. The Breakfast Club (1985)

Oh John Hughes, how could we possibly ever forget about you?

 

2. Rushmore (1998)

When I scribbled down a first crack at my top 10 high school movies, I left Rushmore off the list altogether. Which is odd, because it’s actually one of my favorite movies of all time. I guess that’s because it doesn’t really feel like a high school movie, even though the main character wishes he could spend the rest of his life in high school. Still, it gets the #2 spot here for giving Bill Murray a second act, but mainly because it’s the funniest movie about love, hate, jealousy, rivalry and revenge I’ve ever seen.

 

1. Ferris Bueller’s Day Off (1986)

Simple, funny, sad, honest, wacky, outrageous, ridiculous, sublime, inspired² and inspiring.³

This movie is the shit.

Seriously, anytime there’s a midnight screening of Ferris in town just give me a call and you’ll get to hear me say:

1. Or the other one with the time machine. [↩]
2. On a personal note, it was Ferris Bueller himself who inspired me to start cutting class back in the day. Of course, I got busted a lot more than Ferris and I sure as hell never got to drive a convertible Ferrari. [↩]
3. Just last month, I picked up the menu at a pizza joint and ordered the “Abe Froman.” [↩]

Posted on January 4, 2012 - by writerman

have I told you the one about…

I am descended from a long line of compulsive storytellers.

Seriously, my Grandpa James was the World Heavyweight Champion of talking shit. Get a couple of whiskeys in the man, and he would hold court for the rest of the night. Fish stories. Tall tales. Jaw-droppingly-inappropriate jokes. Dirty limericks. You name it. And my dad – my dad could have filled a dozen books with his bedtime stories about the wild adventures of Skreed Pailin and Rudd Major on the Black Planet of the Vos. Every word of which he generated spontaneously, on the spot, night after night.¹

This is what my people do. We get sunburns. We make sandwiches. And, we tell stories.

I suffer from the same affliction² – I’ve been telling (and retelling) stories for as long as I can remember. In fact, aside from the obvious physical discrepancies like longer legs and smaller ears, the only real difference between me and my forefathers is that I can type. Which is exactly where all of this is going. I’m carving out this little corner of the internet in an attempt to get all of the stories I’ve been collecting over the years down on paper, so to speak. The DMV Story, That Thing That Happened at McDonalds, the one about how I got Punched in the Face by a Girl, and all the rest.

But first, a couple of disclaimers:

• 90% of what follows is 85% true. Chalk the rest up to a selective memory, wild exaggeration and artistic license. After all, I’m the Writerman, not a historian.³

• These are not in chronological order. I’ll just write ‘em as they come to me.
• I have no idea how this is going to work out. I’ve told some of these stories hundreds⁴ of times, but this is my first attempt to write any of it down.
• Names may or may not have been changed to protect the innocent. If your name hasn’t been changed, you probably aren’t innocent.

There, now that all of the formalities are taken care of, only one question remains:

Which story to tell first…?

 

1. I emailed my youngest brother, who heard the most of these stories, to check the spelling of the character’s names. His reply: “How would I know? Dad never wrote any of it down.” [↩]
2. Case in point: once, while out on a first date with a Very Pretty Girl, I got very nervous during a lull in the conversation and started filling the void with a wild and wooly tale about The Time I Went to the Movies with Harvey Keitel. Now, this is a great story – practically guaranteed to win friends, influence people and impress first dates. Full disclosure: I totally stole it. The story in question actually happened to an ex-girlfriend (a fact I may have neglected to mention on that fateful first date). To be fair, the Ex tells it way better than I do, especially the part about how a jet-lagged Jeff Goldblum stumbled into the theatre during the screening, promptly fell asleep in his seat and then almost immediately began hitting on her when he woke up. Some would say this behavior makes me a “liar.” As I mentioned before, I prefer “compulsive storyteller.” I won’t make excuses for my bad behavior, but will say two things in my defense. One: I eventually came clean and fully confessed my crime to Very Pretty, even if it took me almost a year to get around to it. Two: she married me. [↩]
3. If you would care to dispute the facts in any of the stories that follow, please get in touch. I can’t promise I’ll change anything or print a retraction, but if you were there when any of this happened, it would be great to hear from you. [↩]
4. Not exaggerating. Ask my lovely, patient wife. [↩]

Posted on December 28, 2011 - by writerman

Top 10 Christmas Movies

The mall is a madhouse, the house smells like pine needles, the fridge is packed with leftovers and I’m full of turkey and pie, so it must be time to count down the Top 10 Christmas Movies of All Time…

10. The Muppet Christmas Carol (1993)

I’ll admit this isn’t the strongest outing from the Henson Company (for my money, that’s got to be the one with Richard Prior), but it’s The Muppets, so I had to put it on the list, right?¹

9. We’re No Angels (1955)

No, not the shitty remake with De Niro, Sean Penn and that girl from Blame it on Rio. Number nine on my list goes to the original, featuring Bogie and Peter Ustinov as a couple of escaped cons from Devil’s Island who may or may not be angelic.

8. A Christmas Story (1983)

Because you gotta respect a kid who knows exactly what he wants for Christmas:

“A Red Ryder carbine-action, two hundred shot Range Model air rifle with a compass in the stock and a thing which tells time.”

7. Die Hard (1988)

You probably forgot that this 80′s gem takes place on Christmas Eve, what with all the gun fights and explosions and Alan Rickman’s groovy accent. But if John McClane’s dirty undershirt is good enough for the Smithsonian, then this movie is good enough for the Top 10 Project.

6. Catch Me If You Can (2002)

Certainly not Spielberg’s finest work, but definitely one of his most fun. Though only marginally related to Christmas, this based-on-a-true story caper has loads of style and charm to burn, making it a perfect holiday treat.

Plus, Tom Hanks tells the greatest knock-knock joke in history:

5. It’s a Wonderful Life (1946)

The first time I saw this classic was the first year I brought a girl home to spend the holidays with my family. In honor of her family’s tradition, we sat down and watched It’s a Wonderful Life (her very favorite movie) all together. By the time George Bailey stood on the bridge, my mom was banging around in the kitchen, my dad was snoring, two of my brothers had left to do something “less boring” and I had perfected my Jimmy Stewart impersonation. She didn’t speak to me for two days.

In that girl’s defense, since our awkward holiday screening, I’ve become a real fan of the movie. Sure, it gets a little syrupy now and then, but Jimmy Stewart is fantastic, Mr. Potter exudes pure evil as a classic movie villain, and between you and me, Donna Reed is a fox.

4. A Charlie Brown Christmas (1965)

This one beats you over the head with the Bible a little harder than I usually enjoy, but the righteous dance party, the little tree that could, and Vince Guaraldi’s Second Greatest Christmas Soundtrack of All Time² more than make up for the Sunday School flashbacks.

3. Elf (2003)

Fifty years from now, when everyone has forgotten about Ricky Bobby and Ron Burgundy, this is the role Will Ferrell will be remembered for. And I don’t mean that as a dig – he is magically naive and innocent and hilarious in this movie. Also, high fives to Jon Favreau for casting James Caan as his dad and writing a scene where my girlfriend gets to sing in the shower.

2. Bad Santa (2003)

This movie is full of a hundred fucking genius moments, but this one has a special place in my heart:

 WILLIE                               (mumble)
                         What the fuck is it?

 KID                          A wooden pickle.

               Willie stares at it.

 WILLIE                          Why'd you paint it brown?

 KID                          Not paint. It's blood from when I
                         cut my hand when I was making it for
                         you.

1. How the Grinch Stole Christmas! (1966)³

Technically a TV special, for my money this is the best Christmas movie ever made.

Thanks Dr. Seuss!

1. The woman in my life may never forgive me for excluding Emmet Otter from this list, but I had to go with Gonzo and Fozzy. [↩]
2. Listen to Mr. Presley sing Number One right here. [↩]
3. We don’t talk about the Jim Carrey remake. [↩]

Posted on March 11, 2011 - by writerman

Video of the week

As I watch this little video for the 8th time today, I wonder if I love it so much because I’m both a Star Wars geek and a dog owner, or just because it fucking rules.

Patrick says:

“When I was a kid, there are two things I wanted badly and never got…

A real dog and a Kenner AT-AT Walker.”

 

AT-AT day afternoon from Patrick Boivin on Vimeo.

Music by Blithe Field
myspace.com/​swallowoceans

Some day, I hope to meet Patrick and give him the high five he so richly deserves.

Posted on November 10, 2010 - by writerman

Screenwriting, explained

Three minutes and three seconds of the best lesson in screenwriting¹ you’ll ever get:

WORDS from Everynone on Vimeo.

Color me inspired. I will now make more coffee and continue to put one word in front of the other.

Thank you, Everynone.

1. I was going to write some pseudo-clever commentary here about why, exactly, this is the best screenwriting lesson ever. But honestly, this is one of those times where the best thing to do is just shut up and watch the movie. In fact, I’m gonna watch it again, right now. [↩]

Posted on May 1, 2010 - by writerman

flying to africa to make a film

Today two friends from Vancouver are jumping on a plane, headed for the tiny West African nation of Liberia to take pictures, make a film and try to rediscover a place that has radically transformed since they grew up there in the 70′s.

I’m stoked, proud, nervous and excited.

Also a little jealous. Partly because they are going to Africa, a place I have an almost-unhealthy obsession with. But mostly because in a previous life, I used to go places and shoot little movies and spend endless hours in editing bays and attend film festival screenings and Q&A sessions and their adventure makes me miss those times.¹ But enough about me. This is about Jeff & Andrew:

The film is called Liberia ’77.

The caption below is copy / pasted from the website. I strongly recommend you check it out, follow their exploits or even throw a couple of bucks their way if you dig what they’re doing.

————–

Thirty years after a bloody coup and two brutal civil wars devastated the country, Canadian writer and photographer Jeff Topham returns to the place he grew up, to rediscover the tiny West African nation that so profoundly impacted his life — and to make a documentary.  In a journey to reconcile gaps between what he remembers, what he knows from his father’s photographs, and the true history of the country, Liberia ’77 is an adventure for us all — an exploration of the importance of history, environment, art, and family in defining our lives.  Also there will be chimpanzees and maybe some surfing…

—————

Good luck boys!

1. Although, not the times when the bank called because you funded post-production with your Visa and the licensing fee you got from that little station in Australia was just barely enough to make the minimum payment… [↩]

Posted on March 25, 2010 - by writerman

How not to write a crock of shit

Some refreshingly direct wisdom on drama, the job of the writer and how not to be a dickhead, courtesy of Hollywood’s favorite literary pugilist, David Mamet.¹

Highlights cut & pasted below, but if I were you I’d click through and read the whole thing at Movieline. For the record, I have no idea why it’s in ALL CAPS.

———————————–

“THE JOB OF THE DRAMATIST IS TO MAKE THE AUDIENCE WONDER WHAT HAPPENS NEXT. NOT TO EXPLAIN TO THEM WHAT JUST HAPPENED, OR TO*SUGGEST* TO THEM WHAT HAPPENS NEXT.

ANY DICKHEAD CAN WRITE, “BUT, JIM, IF WE DON’T ASSASSINATE THE PRIME MINISTER IN THE NEXT SCENE, ALL EUROPE WILL BE ENGULFED IN FLAME”

THINK LIKE A FILMMAKER RATHER THAN A FUNCTIONARY, BECAUSE, IN TRUTH, YOU ARE MAKING THE FILM. WHAT YOU WRITE, THEY WILL SHOOT.

HERE ARE THE DANGER SIGNALS. ANY TIME TWO CHARACTERS ARE TALKING ABOUT A THIRD, THE SCENE IS A CROCK OF SHIT.

ANY TIME ANY CHARACTER IS SAYING TO ANOTHER “AS YOU KNOW”, THAT IS, TELLING ANOTHER CHARACTER WHAT YOU, THE WRITER, NEED THE AUDIENCE TO KNOW, THE SCENE IS A CROCK OF SHIT.

DO NOT WRITE A CROCK OF SHIT. WRITE A RIPPING THREE, FOUR, SEVEN MINUTE SCENE WHICH MOVES THE STORY ALONG, AND YOU CAN, VERY SOON, BUY A HOUSE IN BEL AIR AND HIRE SOMEONE TO LIVE THERE FOR YOU.”

LOVE, DAVE MAMET
SANTA MONICA 19 OCTO 05

1. Rumor has it this is from a memo Mamet wrote to the staff of The Unit. Of course, it’s probably only a matter of days before we find out the whole thing is a hoax, and the actual author is Kurt Vonnegut or Mamet’s dog walker or some guy who writes for The Onion. But does any of that really matter on the Internet? It’s still a fun read and pretty good advice. [↩]

Posted on January 12, 2010 - by writerman

Mr. Unlucky wins Champion Screenwriting Competition

Got some good news to kick off 2010. After a series of near-misses, short-lists, semi-finals and finals, Mr. Unlucky finally stepped up to the plate and hit one out of the park. That’s right, my little screenplay about leprechaun gangsters, true love, road trips, diabolical corporate executives, game shows, breakfast cereal, a 1960 Plymouth Valiant and the unluckiest guy in the world is the official Champion of Champion.

Righteous!

Now let me tell you – this is my kind of screenwriting contest. Prizes were handed out over beers, fortune cookies and steaming plates of Kung Pao on a Friday nite in Hollywood. The next two days were a blur of high-fives and bourbons at the Coach & Horses, a weekend crash course in screenwriting (courtesy of Mr. Jim Mercurio) that featured a cold reading of our scripts by the talented and ever-so-handsome AJ Quartermaine, and finally taking my beautiful out for a steak dinner at Musso & Frank’s to celebrate.

And just in case you were worried that this sudden success will go to my head, allow me to share a little story. The Falcon was in the shop that weekend, so the very first thing I did after winning the contest was slide the winner’s check into my pocket, walk down to La Brea, and wait 45 minutes for the bus to take me home. In the rain. Damn right it’s glamorous being the Writerman.

Just watch for me on Entourage next week, baby.

Thanks Jim!

Posted on December 23, 2009 - by writerman

Jim’s totally excellent screenwriting seminar

I must admit: I’ve always been a little suspicious of screenwriting seminars and the people who teach them. If Robert McKee really knows how to craft a Black-List-topping, low-to-mid-six-figures-selling, Oscar-winning screenplay, why doesn’t he sit down and write one of his own, instead of charging me and you and everyone we know a thousand bucks to learn his patented secret formula? I mean, what could a guy like this Jim Mercurio character possibly teach that couldn’t be learned from watching Chinatown for the 23rd time?

It was with this general air of skepticism and a mild hangover that I entered Jim’s A-List Screenwriting class on a Saturday morning. And, by the time we hit California Pizza Kitchen for lunch, my headache and my doubts had vanished. Jim really knows his shit.¹

Jim’s unique way of thinking about writing opened my eyes to a whole new way of looking at a script. In short order, he armed me with a ton of ideas for exploring character, revealing theme, tightening plot and turning up the funny in my stuff. The guy is a diet-soda-fueled tornado of insights and ideas. His knowledge of film is encyclopedic. His DVD collection is first-class. And his course is fun, fast-paced and seriously inspiring. He’s also way funnier in person than this photo makes him appear. I strongly recommend.

1. Full disclosure – I did not have to pay for Jim’s class, I won a free pass from the Champion Screenwriting Contest. So, I have no idea what he charges, but I would say if you’re serious about writing the movies then it’s probably worth it to scrape a couple of bucks together and give it a shot. [↩]