C I P R I A N I

I don’t write a lot about the film business on this blog. While I thought I’d write a little more about it than I have, this is at least semi-intentional.

I’m currently working on a memoir about my experiences and most of my observations about the business wind up there. Occasionally I’ve posted a piece of fiction here, but I’m thinking of starting another blog for that kind of thing. And of course, there are the other books and screenplays that I’m working on that live in their world. My essays live here.

Whether this departmentalization is good or not, who knows. This is the Age of Brands and Synergy which in reference to me is kind of like telling Superman this is the Age of the Red Sun and Kryptonite.

My career, such as it is, is nowhere near where I thought it would be. I imagine though, that I’m with the majority of the people pursuing this kind of work. I would bet that even a large portion of the folks that from the outside that seem enormously successful, aren’t where they’d like to be. It’s the nature of things.

The thesis, such as it is, for my book is that basically things don’t turn out how you’d expect. Like you need me to tell you that.

It’s a tough, weird business. You don’t necessarily need to sell your soul to the Devil, but the soul does take a beating. In some cases, you might have more success if you just don’t have much of one to begin with.

So the jury’s still out on my synergy … ah, who am I kidding? Guilty as charged. And my “brand”, which is pretty much in the same place as my career…hmmm…

#correlation?

The light bulb goes off – A DING sounds in my head. Wait, that’s not a ding in my head. It’s my email inbox. It’s from LinkedIn – Linkedin! The convicting evidence from the prosecution that my brand is wanting!

My LinkedIn page needs some serious clean up. I’ve been meaning to get to that for awhile but haven’t largely because I didn’t think anyone was really checking it out. But, in the last few weeks it seems as if there’s a sea change and more folks are making their way there. Initially, it was something that I simply “accepted” “links” to and other than that, paid little attention to it. I don’t even think this blog is “linked” there as of this writing. In fact, I’m sure it isn’t because another problem I have is that I don’t really publicize this thing.

In fact, if you’re reading this right now, thank you.

It’s the central irony of my writing life. I want people to see my stuff and, of course, like it. But I don’t want to advertise it. At least this. I like the idea of people I don’t know stumbling upon this blog. Silly, but there’s a different sensation when you hear a song on the radio instead of selecting it from your playlist or a cd. This is a sensation that may disappear in a generation if it hasn’t already. It’s a similar sensation to coming across an old movie or show on TV. Rather than downloading it or putting in a DVD, you just stumble across it. This will also most likely disappear soon. So maybe I’m clinging to outdated romantic inclinations. Or perhaps, it is in situations like this – stumbling upon blogs, etc. – where those kinds of sensations will now live, since movies and music and such are now OnDemand.

I also just feel uncomfortable announcing to the cyberworld – “Look at me and what I just wrote.” There seems to be more satisfaction for me in the “stumbling upon” even though it doesn’t appear that many folks are, but there seems to be…something better about – I don’t know what word I’m looking for, but it might be synergy? But that can’t be right, can it?

I don’t really know why I’m like this, but it’s probably a problem. I don’t necessarily know if it’s unhealthy. Maybe it is. I don’t know. I prefer to be a person not a brand, but in this day and age I guess I’m really reaching for the stars there. Especially if I want to make a decent living.

I’m in the dark about a great many things, but I do know this: I’m not in the business of remaking Good Times. Well, actually, I guess I am in that business. Or at least hope to be because this is what my industry is doing. Whether I like it or not.

For the unlearned, Good Times was a Norman Lear sitcom from the 70’s about life in the Chicago projects that featured Jimmie Walker saying “Dyno-Mite!” A lot. This is really all I remember. I do know that I loved “JJ” as a kid because his name was “JJ” – which, at the time, was about the closest thing to anyone having a name close to mine on television.

A brief aside, it always made me feel neglected when Miss Sally never said my name at the end of Romper Room when she was looking through her magic mirror.

Picture, if you will, an awkward, lonely child, probably around five. He sits in front of the TV with baited breath after devoting a half hour of his short life to a program called Romper Room – a show where a group of children played. He sits watching the happy the children play, by himself, waiting for the end of the show, waiting for Miss Sally to pick up the magic mirror and once, just once, say that she can see him.

Seemed as if every name that began with a “J” was called out at one time or another – John, Julius, and the meanest tease of all, Ja…son – but never simply Jay. No, Miss Sally could not see that lonely boy or the tears he shed or his broken heart or his sometimes awkwardly loquacious blog, often melodramatically exaggerated to drive home the occasional point. Maybe there’s a connection to my flawed brand and Romper Room – Jesus Christ, how the hell did I get here…

AH! JJ from Good Times – (From a literary standpoint, perhaps on some level I think if I don’t advertise, maybe that gives me license to just think out loud … and miss the occasional typo.)

Oscar winning producer Scott Rudin announced yesterday that he’s going to turn Good Times into a movie. Like The Dukes of Hazzard and Car 54 and Bewitched and The Brady Bunch before it, countless successes and failures in the movie business are derived from existing properties, in short, brands.

But Good Times?

Maybe it will be brilliant. I was skeptical of The Brady Bunch, but that turned out to be rather clever … and a franchise. I still haven’t seen Car 54.

Sometimes these movies do wind up being entertaining, but how much soul they actually have is arguable.

Good Times?

What do I know? Other than that Good Times is a brand and I am not much of one…yet, little in the grand scheme of things. And what is it they say? Better to go with the Devil you know?

The movie’s in development, so who knows if it will ever see the inside of a theatre. Hollywood releases and makes fewer movies each year and this has been the trend for awhile. Many movies are in active development, countless others aren’t and they’re working on bringing Good Times to the screen instead of some unknown property.

It is a business and there is a place for brand and synergy. This is a reality and, in fact, a necessity. You need the big brand pictures to sustain the small unknown ones. Sometimes revisiting certain things make sense both creatively and financially.

Hollywood likes the familiar and really can’t be blamed too harshly for that. After all, it’s human nature. And sometimes things are not as simple as they appear. I do think if I pitched a Good Times movie to a studio exec, they’d laugh me out of room, but at this point in his storied career, Scott Rudin’s earned the right to make a movie about whatever he wants and his involvement does open my mind enough to think that it might not be bad. That maybe I’m wrong, that maybe I’m missing something, that maybe …

…Or maybe I’m spot on and it’s just a bad idea.

Either way, it’s disappointing. Because I do wonder if Hollywood would be better off taking chances on getting to know that stranger with the pitchfork and horns a little more often than they already do, it might be pleasantly surprised. And it wouldn’t be the first time it brokered such a deal.