The Story of My Life

There's a T-shirt I love which shows a guy, just a face in the crowd, suddenly looking at all the near-identical people around him and thinking, "Hey, what if I'm not the main character?"

When I was younger I definitely considered myself the main character in the story of my life (and back then there was some evidence to support the theory). These days I really don't. I mean, if I was gonna make a movie of my life, nobody as ugly as me could star in it. Actually, I'm hoping to get Chow Yun-Fat for the role.

No, I don't really want to be the main actor anymore, I don't think. I'm better behind the scenes. I think I want to direct my life rather than star in it. And God knows this life needs a new director. Whoever's running the show right now has no skill for the dramatic.

So, okay. The first thing I'm gonna do is fire the screenwriter. I mean, the original idea was pretty good, and he's got a knack for snappy dialog, but the plot is beginning to drag a little bit. So much could be done with this story; certainly a few of the characters are very well-drawn and interesting. But it needs a little spicing up. For one thing, it could certainly use a steamy sex scene or two. And we're gonna need a complete rewrite in Act Three...I mean, this ending needs work. Who wrote this garbage? You know, people are getting tired of movies that don't have happy endings. How's this: boy and girl go to Italy and take up raising goats on a hillside overlooking the Mediterranean? And have three perfect little girls named Xenia Voltaire, Circe Rousseau, and Virginia Mercy? And live simply and happily ever after? Everybody loves a movie like that.

Today's scene sucked ass beginning to end, writing, shooting, scenes and performances. The star was hungover and sick at heart, much of the dialog was turgid and excessively emotional, and at least one of the costars has gone completely off the script. Let's snap this up a little, huh? That little bit of violence with the fruit juice machine looks pretty good in the rushes. Let's build on that. Tomorrow we'll start with a car chase. Those are a lot easier to write.

Also, the production designer had better start pulling his weight. This setting is getting pretty dull, the same sad sorry tiny little town for nearly five years. What happened to the old guy, the one who set scenes in California and New Orleans and DC and New York and Boston? What happened to those wonderful old sets like the Southern Belle, Third Street Diner, Madison Square Garden, the Village Cafe, and the Art Institute in San Francisco?

We'll need to work on continuity next. In too many of the main character's relationships, the nature of the relationship changes from one day to the next. It's too confusing for the audience, and seems to make it hard for the actor to learn his lines, as well...half the time he's up there on the screen and you can just tell he doesn't know WHAT'S going on around him. We can't have the movie changing so radically from scene to scene. Let's go back to the tried-and-true formula, "Boy meets girl, boy falls for girl, girl digs other boy, other boy turns out to be unworthy, girl eventually comes back 'round to loving the hero." And for God's sake, let's try to be linear.

The casting director did a good job for a while but these days her choices are pretty lousy. We need to change all the actors who play co-workers, for example. They're nice enough folks, sure, but they should be doing commercials for the Kentucky Lottery. Bring in Sarah Polley, Peggy Lipton, and Jeremy Irons instead. Oooh...do you think Diana Rigg is free?

The prop man needs to get off his ass. The principal possessions of our hero are WAY too left-over-90's-slacker. I mean, they're so last decade. We're trying to make a hip, happening film here, and you can't do that with a twenty-year-old TV, a jukebox with blown-out speakers, and burned-out light fixtures in the john. That furniture is atrocious, and the kitchen is simply too small to be convincing. Can we get somebody in here to work on that, please?

I need to light a fire under the producer and get a bigger budget for this thing, too. $12,000 a year just isn't cutting it. How are we supposed to afford location shoots on that? We can't even get decent meals catered with that kinda money.

And somebody do a little research, alright? We need a little quality control here. I mean, a little while ago we're shooting a scene in early June and it's raining and forty degrees out! Somebody wanna get on his horse about fixing that?

For Christ's sake, I'm a hella director, but you can't expect me to do everything.