With the pending writers’ strike in Hollywood, writers in both America and Britain are being warned that if they break any potential strike they will never work in Hollywood again. While I understand the reasons the writers may strike (they don’t seem to get a fair wage for any follow-on sales of their work in DVD, downloads, internet etc), I see this as an opportunity to offer my services to Hollywood as a writer on some of their most popular shows.This would help ensure that shows keep running during the strike, and since I’m not part of a union the threat of never working in Hollywood is a fair price to pay to get a one-off writing credit on something like 24 … it might go something like this:
Jack: Drop the weapon now! Now!
CTU agent: He’s dead, Jack.
Jack (calls CTU): The henchman is dead. He resisted arrest as we took him into custody and I hit him very hard a few times – there was nothing I could do.
Head of CTU: you’re in big trouble Jack, you’re a loose canon – the president needs you dead, we’ll have to bring you in.
Jack: I’m your only chance to stop this baddie before the world explodes … you need me now. Once he’s in custody I’ll come in quietly.
CTU: Fair enough … did you get anything from him before he was killed?
Jack: No, but I managed to get the last ten calls he made off his cell phone – I’ll send them to you via a very sophisticated electronic device which I happen to have with me, hang on … the numbers with corresponding addresses, credit reference details, electricity bills and fridge contents are transmitting to your system … upload them, reposition a satellite to these coordinates and send me the infrared image and building schematics on my portable hand-held device.
Ok, I’ll keep working on it.
I happened to stumble across a repeat of x-factor yesterday afternoon and was compelled to watch (rather like rubber necking a car crash). What I saw was some young girl singing some random pop song … she was horribly out of tune.
This was supposed to be some kind of studio stage where I presume the contestants have been vetted and should be “good”, so I was surprised by how bad she was. Three of the judges kindly called her performance “nice” or “nervous”, but when Simon Cowell simply said she was flat, he got booed. This was the plain truth … she was flat.
What does this show actually achieve? Are we to congratulate mediocrity and put it on a pedestal just because there was no-one better?
I also believe that the x-factor transmits some kind of hypnotic sub-conscious image stream which mixes your brain waves and fixes your eyes on the screen, rendering you unable to switch channels. It wasn’t until my wife came in, horrified by my vegetative state, that I was able to turn it off and do something less boring instead …
