Random Rumblings

I'm still pissed at NBC for giving Isaiah Washington a job. I hope manages not to attack his new co-stars, though, if I were them, I would invest in some Krav Maga lessons, just to be on the safe side.

Was I the only person who watched Victoria Beckham's speical last night and thought it was okay? I mean she at least came off as a semi-decent human being. She didn't use the phrase "that's hot" and she could coherently string together a sentence. Yes, she did come off a bit shawllow but this a woman whose claim to fame is being a former Spice Girl. Give her a break. She had a self-depricating humor, yes, it was that dry British sense of humor that most Americans don't get, but, she is British. Anyway, I thought it was an okay show. I TiVoed it and watched it before I went to bed.

After a converstaion with my manager today, I decided against writing a period crime noir picture. I all ready have a great period script in my portfolio and there is no point in writing something nobody will want (again). I've decided to write a smaller, more "indie" type picture that has been floating around in my head for a while. Wish me luck.

Say Bye to Bionic Woman

Boycott NBC's Bionic Woman. Yes, I know it doesn't come until fall, but they have hired Isaiah Washington for the show. Um, didn't ABC can his homophobic ass? ABC did the right by getting rid of dead weight and now NBC has gone and given the homophobe another chance. Now, I'm all for forgiveness but when has his arrogant ass ever tried to attone for what he said? If the shoe was on the other foot and T.R. Knight had used the "n" word to Washington and gotten fired from ABC do you think any of the other networks would be putting him in their fall lineup? Um...I'm guessing no.

Some Things Are Timeless

According to one of the party guests in "The Cat's Meow", the California Curse is characterized by the following symptoms: One: You think you are the most important person in any room. Two: You value money above all other things in the world. Three: You no longer have any sense of shame or morality.

Well the movie "The Cat's Meow" was set in Hollywood of the 1920's and somehow, today, 80 some years later these symptoms of the "California Curse" still ring true.

In this town everybody thinks they are the most important people in the room. On the road. In the restaurant. They are so important they can't even put their phones down while driving and trying to make a left hand turn.

All this being said. I love living in Los Angeles. I get a thrill out of driving along Hollywood Blvd. and looking up into the hills and seeing the famous Hollywood sign. I love the fact that I live two blocks down from Jack Nicholson. Okay, so, maybe, it's not my house technically. My boyfriend is the one who is responsible for the mortgage each month but Jack is still only two blocks down the street. When I dine at Musso & Frank's I always think about which stars may have dined there. I once looked at an apartment in the Alto-Nido just because that is where Joe Gillis lived in "Sunset Blvd."

I have finally decided that all this Hollywood nostalgia/history obsession is trying to tell me that it is time to start the noir/murder mystery script that has been kicking around inside my head every since I started film school. I know it's not in vogue to write a period piece but sometimes you have to buck commercial trends and write what is in your heart.

Things I Don't Get About L.A.

Let's start with Pinkberry. For any of your non-L.A. based readers, out there, Pinkberry is this frozen yogurt joint that is patronized by celebs and everyone else who will wait in line for long periods of time to eat sour yogurt. Yes, sour. I don't know about most people but I like my ice cream to be sweet. Okay, so, I know frozen yogurt isn't ice cream, but it's still sour.

I don't get the drivers on the L.A. freeways. Hello! Please pay attention when people have their turn signals on and would like to get over a lane. Yes, I know the "L.A. way" to drive is to just floor it and cross the line. The people with less expensive cars will get out of the way so they don't ding your Benz. Well, I don't drive a Benz, not even a Prius for me, so, I actually put my turn signal on and then wait endlessly to get over into the lane I want.

Gay themed material in Hollywood. Now, I've been to the bars and other gay hangouts and I've seen lots of show folk there: agents, producers, execs, even a few (well more than a few) actors and yet almost any project that has anything to do with being gay is meet with a resounding "no." I don't get it. Execs will party at Rage but would rather swallow a Cosmo made with discount liquor than say yes to a gay-themed project. I know the naysayers out there say that gay themed projects don't make money and this is show business. Well my answer to that is aren't there a lot of mainstream projects out there that lost business. Um...how much money did "Lady in the Water" make or "Basic Instinct 2"?

Well I've ranted and raved long enough. It's time to get back to work on my treatment for a one hour program. I'm hoping to pitch it to LOGO. The last time I checked I think they still produce work with gay themes.

Happy reading...and writing everyone!

Young, Fabulous & Unemployed

Sigh...another staffing season has come and gone. Did moi get a job? If I did the tone of this blog post would be a lot more upbeat. My boyfriend came home the other day to find me rearraging our living room furntiure. He looks at me and says, "Having a bad day?". Um...I'm rearranging the living room furntiure. Yeah. I'm having a bad day. I just got off the phone with my manager who assured me that despite my talent and my unique voice that there were no offers for a staffing position. Some people would have hit the bottle but my health insurance plan doesn't cover rehab. Maybe I should go to Promises? Everybody else is. Who knows? I could meet LiLo and become her next BFF. My luck I would get stuck in a county facility next to the crack addict who set himself on fire while freebasing.

After I got done rearraging the living room furniture I hit the phones. I called my best friend to bitch but she lives in Pittsburgh and doesn't get the whole Hollywood thing. I called my other BFF who does live in L.A. She gets my pain. She says she is a the 4F queen...fat, fourty, funny and fabulous.

I'm about to start work on a new sitcom pilot. I know. The sitcom is dead but what can I say? I like a challange. Plus, haven't we maxed out on the one-hour shows a bit?

I am going to start reading my copy of "The Secret" again. It doesn't do me any good sitting on my desk.

Gray's Gets GLAAD Award?!? WTF?

What has happened to this world? We've got a crazed dictator in the White House. A crazy man in Iran who wants to launch nukes and now GLADD gives an award to GRAY'S ANATOMY? Why don't they just give Ann Coulter? I mean she uses the "f" word, too. Doesn't she get an award? If I were her people I would be pretty pissed right about now.

I am boggled as to how a group the says they advocate for positive portrayals of gays in the media could give an award to show the employs a bigot? CBS had the right idea when they caned their racist bigoted radio show hosts for insulting the fine ladies of the Rutgers basketball team. Maybe he was just jealous because those ladies could whip his butt on the court any day.

What does ABC do with their bigot? Not a blessed thing. So he didn't say faggot openly he just insulting his co-worker on set in front of the crew and things like that. Yeah, okay, that was really a private exchange of views. I applaud T.R. Knight for his dignified handling of the entire affair. Why doesn't GLADD give him an award instead of Jennifer Aniston? And why does GLADD only kiss up to shows in the mainstream media? Have they forgotten there is gay and lesbian networks out there now?

By rewarding shows the employ bigots and do nothing to help the image of gays in the media GLADD can kiss my annual doncation good-bye. This year I think I will send the money to an organization like The Trevor Project that actually does some good for the gay community.

Temporay Prison

Welcome to L.A. L.A. Land. The realm where there is a temp agency on every corner. There are actually three in one block near my house.

I thought that temp work would be a great way to substitute my income while I wait for that call to come from some producer wanting to buy (at this point I'll settle for an option) my fabulous script, alas, that call hasn't come but I just got "The Secret" so the call WILL come soon. I remember working for a temp agency in college and it was great. I got sent out on one or two day jobs when I wasn't working and over term breaks took longer term assignments. I worked in a variety of offices and met a lot of cool people. Since my last round of unemployment ran out I figured temp would be the way to go. Sigh. I so picked the wrong agency. Maybe the waiting room full of 40+ year old men in 40 year old suits should have tipped me off that this probably wasn't the environment for a creative spirit like me. I never listen to that voice in my head. Maybe it's because the Lithium shuts up the more interesting ones? Who knows? I digress.

Do you think you can type? They ask. Um...let me see...I'm a writer. So yeah. I know how to freaking type! Do you feel comfortable answering the phone? Well I've had asked for a phone line on my 8th birthday, so, yeah, I feel comfy using the phone. Next they gave me a round of assessment tests to prove it and after that they said they would call. I've heard that speech before but this time--they called.

I was sent to a far reaching area of the SFV (for all you non-L.A. residents...that's shorthand for San Fernando Valley) that was so far out there it might as well have been Texas. Who knows? The commute was so long maybe it was. They put me in a bank. I'm not sure what about me screams banker. I don't even balance my own checkbook.

The office was like that scene in 9 TO 5 with rows of cubicles and people working. Nobody talked. They worked all day. What did I do? Well the data entry job they promised me turned out be a job in the file/mail room. I can honestly say I know what hell feels like. I am really pissed at the temp agency because I'm Jewish and we don't have hell. So why did the temp agency send me there?

That place was a black hole for my creative spirit You would think that a mindless job wouldn't require much effort. You'd be wrong. My brain was so fried at the end of the day I couldn't even open my laptop to write. I probably went brain dead from terminal boredom. My muse said "Screw this...I'm going to the bar." I'm not really sure where she went but I hope she comes back now. I really need her. I think I'll join her at the bar.

Does anybody else hate Ellen Pompeo?

The powers that be on Grey's want to slim down the cast and give Kate Walsh her own show. Yeah! I loved Addison and miss her very much, since I no longer watch Grey's for three reasons. 1) I can't stand Meredith Grey or her real life counterpart Ellen Pompeo or as I like to call her Miss Wrinkle Lips. She should be the poster child for anti-smoking. 2) I hate Patrick Dempsey's holier than thou Dr. McDreamy. Really...he's not all that dreamy. 3) Ever since Isaiah Washington wasn't tossed out on his ass for what he said to T.R. Knight, I figure why should I give my time and attention to this show.

What I don't understand is why the cast is so upset? Did Isaiah Washington think they should give him his own show? What would they call it? Bigot's Anatomy?

It seems that Miss Wrinkle Lips got her panties in a twist believing that as the star of the show she should be consulted before they made an offer to Kate Walsh. Doesn't she get that she doesn't need to be consulted? She's an actress. She didn't create the show. She just mouths the words the writers tell her too.

Is Miss Wrinkle Lips afraid of a little competition? Afraid that America would rather watch a smart, complex character like Addison Montgomery than Meredith Grey who goes town like the Titanic on every stranger she meets in the bar?

Either way it's a sad commentary on these crazy actors who go from total unknowns to stars and then forget that it's only by the grace of some force of ___(God, the Universe, luck...you can fill in the blank) that they ended up where they are in the first place.

Conversations with Mommy Dearest

My Mom likes to call me and give me little updates on all her friends' kids. You know So and So's kid just graduated from med school. This person's kid just got a promotion. Chubby Suburban Mom's kid just bought their first house. Then she tells me that she never knows what to say to her friends when they ask what I am doing. Like I am out here giving handjobs on Santa Monica Blvd. or something. I'm not that broke. At least not yet. "What should I tell them?" She aks.

Tell them I went to a very prestigious film school, graduated with a M.F.A. and now I'm a writer. She could also tell them while Chubby Suburban Mom's kid is shoveling the snow off their new driveway, I'm lounging in the pool. Yeah. A pool. That's way better than living in Pittsburgh.

"You have nothing to show for being a writer." She likes to say. Sure I do. I have stacks of rough drafts, second drafts, and third drafts of screenplays littered over my place. Actually, I'm too much of a neat freak for that. I organize everything into storage bins. Gotta love Ikea. I also have the letter my former manager sent me when I was unceremoniously dropped as client. Yeah. Class Act he was.

Maybe I could mail her the expired parking passes from various studio parking lots where I've had meetings. She could show all those to her friends. You think they'll be impressed?

Getting to know me, all about me

Dear Reader(s)....thanks for stopping by. I'm being optimistic by hoping there is more than one person reading this blog. So, you ask yourself...who is this person writing this blog. Well I like to consider myself a writer. My parents would probably tell you I'm a freeloader. No, I don't live with them. Oh God, how horrible to be my age and still live at home. As depressing as that thought is I actually know of several people who I went to high school with who still do live at home with their parents. Then again half the kids I went to high school with still live in the same town as where they were born. Not me! I took the first bus (okay, plane) outta there.

In case you are wondering exactly how old I am...let's just say I am older than Lindsay Lohan but younger than Nick Lachey (but then again isn't everyone). Like everyone else in L.A. I'm not originally from here. I'm an Southern by way of Pennsylvania. Scratching your head to figure that one out? I was born in Pittsburgh and I went to college in Atlanta before moving to L.A. for film school.

That was four years ago. So, you are asking yourself, what has this person been up for the last four years? Well, shave off two years because I was in film school. I've graduated with the debt to prove it, too. What have I been up to for the other two years. Well, I worked for a BIG TIME PRODUCTION COMPANY that was behind one of the BIG ACTION movies that came out over the summer. Unlike a lot of assistants I don't have any real horror stories to tell since my former employers were all nice people. No, I'm not just saying that. They really were.

Anyhow, back to me. Why did I decide to write this blog? Why not? I figure if I can't get Hollywood to read my stuff than I can at least get a few readers out in cyber space to.

I could have called this blog "Tales From A Frustrated Writer" but I figured that sounded whiny. In case anyone cares the title for my blog comes from Dorothy Parker. One of her quotes...it's not like she talks to me from the grave. Dorothy Parker and Tullulah Bankhead were having a chat and Tullulah said to Parker "Why, it's as easy as ducking for apples", to which Parker replied, "Hah, change one letter in that sentence and you've got the story of my life." Why Dorothy Parker? She was witty and liked to drink. If you change one letter in that sentence you've got the story of my life.