I promise to bring the focus back to the entertainment industry and writing about it very soon. However, posting Viralink on my blog last week and done wonders for my technorati popularity, so I couldn’t pass on including the new-and-improved ViralTags. Thanks to Andy Coates and Founders Cafe.

If you are a blogger, BY ALL MEANS, read the rest of this story, and copy and paste the text into a post on your site. It WILL improve your site’s chances of getting seen. Everyone else, continue about your business.

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There’s a geeky twelve-year-old boy inside of me that just starts drooling at the promise of huge spectacle movies based on the treasures of my childhood. I seriously remember tingles running through my body during certain movie trailers. Sometimes my inner geek-boy’s anticipation is paid off (as by all but the last five minutes of the Lord of the Rings trilogy) but sometimes his hopes are crushed (as by all but maybe the theme song and Yoda fighting in the Star Wars prequel trilogy.)

But lately, Inner Geek-boy is just getting annoyed. Please, Hollywood, stop it. Leave my memories alone for a while. Give me new stories to enjoy. (Knocked Up made it’s money back in one weekend, in one country. Know why? Because it didn’t cost an amount equal to the GDP of Bolivia to make. Plus it’s funny and original. Please consider that business model. Employ more comedy writers, and the world will be a better place for everyone. Or at least for comedy writers.)

I have absolutely no tingles for the new Transformers movie. The art design looks horrible. Why does every straight line need to have eight curvy spikes coming off of it? And if that’s the choice they’re making for the look, what must they have decided about story?

Bleck. There goes any hope I might have had (not that I did) for the He-Man remake. And Warners greenlighting Thundercats? That’s just stupid. Inner Geek-boy is done. (Although if they decide to make a movie out of M.A.S.K., I’m there.)

I was talking the other day to a woman I want to involve in my online sketch comedy troupe. She was the talent in a short exercise we shot a few weeks ago, and she was both very skilled and great to work with, so I’d love to involve her as much as possible. I explained that the next step in the group-building plan is a big group audition, where we would all do writing exercises and improv together, and I’d ask each person who wanted to focus on acting to perform a short monologue. Strangely, she panicked a little. She was completely interested in participating, but she wanted me to understand that her monologue might not be very good.I was confused. The short we had shot together was essentially a monologue. She hadn’t had the tiniest problem with memorization, and she has some real comedy chops. So what was the problem? She can never find a good comedy monologue. Ahhh… That makes more sense. I’ve heard this complaint before. There are many, many choices for a man to show of his comedic timing, but it’s much tougher for a woman. It had always been my understanding that an actor’s audition monologues were supposed to be from plays that had been produced and would be recognizable, but she felt it was far more important to have a funny piece that could show off the actor. Makes sense. So, after reassuring her that she wasn’t going to ruin her standing with me through her monologue, I offered to write her something she could use. (Not so much for our audition, but in general.) I explained that I have made the offer to many actors that if they told me what kind of character they want to play, I would write them something to show them off. No one ever takes me up on it. Easier to complain, I guess. And after all, coming up with ideas is the writer’s job, not the actor’s.

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I did some freelance work for a branch of the Disney company about a year ago, and that brief experience left me with the impression that their legal army is vast and humorless.  Disney has a history of getting petty with the little guy over copyrights, and had much to do with the passage of the Copyright Term Extension Act of 1998.  Said act protected against, among other things, Mickey Mouse entering the public domain.

The video seems intent to re-open a fascinating legal debate, all but slapping the giant corporation in the face and daring them to bring it to the Supreme Court. By all means, watch this video now, before I get hit with a cease and desist.

(P.S. Go Card!)

The reviews today are mixed over last night’s airing of an Americanized, half-hour Creature Comforts. Some critics are raving about the subtle humor and clever juxtaposition. Other critics say it goes on too long and there’s no laughs to be had. That second group of critics are the ones I like to call “dumb critics.” For those who’ve never seen the Oscar-winning short or the subsequent BBC series, this concept is built around interviews with everyday people. Then the creative team creates animates animals around the soundtrack of these everyday people speaking. Much of the wit comes from what animal has been chosen to exemplify the character of the person’s voice. In last night’s episode, for example, a woman speaking definitively about how she had no interest in the sexual advances of a male friend of hers was portrayed as a panda bear. Hilarious. Add to that the always fantastic undertones of Aardman-style animation (Wallace & Grommit) and you’ve got TV worth your 30 minutes.

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When I attended the “Breaking Into the Box” workshop at the WGA a couple of weekends ago, I was surprised to hear Shawn Ryan (creator of The Shield) recalling his distress when he suddenly got his show on the air. In TV, the writer has creative control comparable to the way a director calls the shots in feature film. When The Shield was picked up by FX, Shawn Ryan found himself suddenly responsible for hiring a crew, casting actors, making the final call about editing, etc. He was a writer. Why, he wondered, should he suddenly know about casting and editing and such? Listening to him say these things, I felt a strange calm. After all, I *DO* know about hiring people, and about casting and editing and such. I could totally run a show. Of course, I’m no expert, and Shawn Ryan could likely kick my butt at just about anything. Still, I felt a weird reassurance that I am following the right path. Earlier this week, I was meeting candidates for my online sketch comedy group effort. I’m excited, because so far I have found a small handful of really fantastic people. Obviously, I expected it to be easier to rally a troupe in L.A. than it was in Seattle. But the cherry on top is how, with some sifting and searching, I can much more easily find folks who want to participate as a life passion into which they pour their spare hours. Which is what I want

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I follow several web sites on the subject of blogging, just to keep abreast of the best tips and tricks out there. Andy Coates has invented a great one here, with Viralink. The internet is a fascinating frontier, where ideas can take shape quickly. Any of you with blogs (or any web site you’d like to promote) should do a post similar to this one. Copy the text from my site below, and paste it into your site. Make one modification: link one of the empty stars on the grid to your site. When you do, I’ll get a pingback, and I’ll modify this post to include a link to you. The sooner the better, because everyone who copies this from here will then be including a link to your site, as will everyone who copies it from them. When someone copies and pastes this from YOUR site, you’ll get the pingback, and you make a link to them. It’s sorta like a pyramid scheme or a chain letter, only without the $10K investment or the ancient Chinese curse. Since google and other search engines function based on how many pages link to you and how many pages link to those pages, you’ll be increasing the odds of people finding you (and me!) on search engines, both now and long-term. Sweet idea, Andy!  (Matrix after the break.)

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