Comments on Writing On Spec: There's Nothing on TV

Hi, Dave. Thanks for the kind mention of WE, THE ...

2006-08-04T20:37:00.000-04:00

Hi, Dave. Thanks for the kind mention of WE, THE SCREENWRITER -- I made it and, given the rather niche audience it's geared for, am very pleased you found it!

The comment you refer to was made by longtime TV writer-producer Larry Brody, who's won about every award one can win in TV over the span of his career. What Larry actually says is this...

LARRY BRODY: If I'm anywhere in the world and someone asks me what I do for a living and I say, "Write television," the next statement to me is not a statement, it's a question. And it's always, "Why is TV so bad?"

The counter to that, not in the trailer, is one that I believe you might appreciate as much as I do. It's from Ronald D. Moore, who currently runs BATTLESTAR GALACTICA, but also did ROSWELL and STAR TREK: THE NEXT GENERATION for several years, among other things...

RONALD D. MOORE: I kind've always go back to a quote of Harlan Ellison's that I read year's ago. "Every endeavor, ninety-percent of it is crap and there's only ten-percent of it that's worth anything." So when you think about it in those terms, yeah, there's ten percent of TV that's excellent, that's outstanding, that is to be remembered year after year, and ninety percent is crap!

Having written a lot for TV, my own feeling is that some of the best, most provocative and entertaining stories you'll ever see can currently be found on TV. But as always with television, these are the best of times and the worst. And you gotta wade through a lot of worst to find the best!

While we won't know the status of broadcast and distribution of the movie for a few months yet, if you're interested, you can watch the first eight minutes of WTS at here: http://www.randomcove.com/production/footage/wts_first_nine_Medium.mov (if we start chewing through bandwidth, I'll know it's you to blame).

Thanks again for the support.

--msg

I was going to respond here, but I had a lot to sa...

2006-08-02T00:20:00.000-04:00

I was going to respond here, but I had a lot to say, so I made my own blog post on it at 101.

I'd go the other direction and argue that there's ...

2006-08-01T19:00:00.000-04:00

I'd go the other direction and argue that there's soooo much good television out there that it puts most movies released of late to shame...

Veronica Mars, Six Feet Under, Soprano's, Battlestar Gallactica, The Wire, Sleeper Cell, The Office, Entourage, Deadwood, and on and on (some no longer on but only recently)...as well as many Dave already mentioned.

Yeah, it's sad how little time a new show is given...

2006-08-01T14:49:00.000-04:00

Yeah, it's sad how little time a new show is given to succeed. I can't stand the current Reality trend.

Seems to appeal to alot of folks though.

Recently saw where Aquaman (regardless of how good it was) got yanked before it premiered (which it won't now).

Perhaps there will be life for shows on downloads instead of TV. Might be interesting to see (i.e. Heroes is premiering on iTunes).

I have something good on my television every night...

2006-07-31T21:22:00.000-04:00

I have something good on my television every night...

A movie playing from a DVD.

Unfortunately, the good shows that are on television don't seem to have longevity anymore... And, unless you can get the demographic that loves a particular show to write into the network, not really much we can do about it from the comfort of our own homes unless we're hooked up to a Nielsen box.

Add to that insult that everybody's SCRATCHING for the next hot reality television show and networks don't really care if a GOOD SHOW lasts anymore if they can replace it with some fucked up reality series for a year or two.

I was raised on LEAVE IT TO BEAVER, BONANAZA, HAVE GUN WILL TRAVEL, etc. etc. and when I flip through the channels, I'll still leave it on one of those shows IF it happens to be playing on TV LAND or whoever plays those shows...

I do however recall recently that EVERWOOD was cancelled and I thought that was an outstanding show. After it was cancelled, the public reared it's head and screamed back with letters and emails but alas... The show remains cancelled.

Hence, the reason, I shove a DVD into the DVD player.

In fact, I just purchased season 1 and 2 of LEAVE IT TO BEAVER.

Unk