DVD Junkie #4: Nip/Tuck

Now I just want to say, despite what may transpire in the paragraphs to follow, this show is very close to my heart in many ways. Nip/Tuck is known for great music editing, beautiful design, and some of the best special effects makeup guys in the business. But what really sets this show apart from its peers is the writing. Honestly, i don't know what to think about the writers. either they have more fun than anyone else in the business, or they've gone completely shit-eatingly bonkers. And I mean bonkers - Tom Cruise without a publicist bonkers. Gary Busey off his meds bonkers. Amy Winehouse with a Chinese finger trap bonkers.

The first positive thing that floats to mind for me with Nip/Tuck is that the promos are great. This will be the first time (of probably hundreds) that I'll laud the skills of those talented people who think up and execute promos for FX - the slickness, the richness, and above all, the specificity that goes into thos promos is fantastic. This season they've been teasing us since August with Follies style dancers in low-cut tops dancing with over-sized medical instruments, and there's even some Kanye to back it up.

What's great is that the slick promos are actually backed up by real substance - FX is the most consistent cable network on TV for excellent original programming. With their dramas, they've had very few out and out bad shows. They're like the less-extreme cousin to HBO and Showtime - and I have a theory that the conservative limits placed on them by being "just" a cable network has forced them to spend a lot more time and effort on producing a high quality product than a good number of their premium cable rivals. This is mirrored in the kind of talent they attract - their shows have garnered long-running starring and guest starring roles by Oscar winning and high-octane actors (and don't try to feed me any Timothy Hutton crap. I'm talking Glenn Close, Peter Dinklage, Forest Whitaker, and Danny DeVito here, among others. Timothy Hutton won for Ordinary People, and I had to imdb him to even know that, and now he's in a show on TNT so i think we can all agree that shit don't count). I'll be tackling many of these FX shows one at a time, but all you need to know now is that FX usually ain't nothing to fuck wit' when it comes to original programming. Nip/Tuck on the other hand, definitely is.

Nip/Tuck tells the story of two Miami plastic surgeons who are best friends and have a joint practice - one's a poon-hound playboy type, the other's a family man. As they help people with their increasingly ridiculous plastic surgery needs, the slight semblance of reality that helped the audience make it through the first season is stripped away, to expose the viewer to the true madness that lies at the heart of any writer who goes into a project without a beat sheet or a series bible.

Firstly, Nip/Tuck is trashy - it's like if the cast members of Dynasty all got medical degrees and tans, then opened shop in General Hospital - but it's trashy with such reckless abandon, with such wanton lack of regard for everyone involved - viewer and character alike - that you can't help but be at least fascinated. And the fact is, the first season sets up the characters so succinctly and beautifully that you actually care about what happens to these awful, awful people. The writers' flair for the overblown is so predictable you can see plot twists brewing from three episodes off, but you still watch, because it's that fucking fun.

ZOMGLESBIANS!!! We cast Portia De Rossi as a LESBIAN!
ARE YOU NOT ENTERTAINED?

As the show has moved from one season to the next, the plot has been stretched thinner than an aging socialite's skin. The first two seasons were the only ones with any real plot to them, and honestly if you're looking for an engaging story, that's where you should stop. Because of the way the second season ends, you may be tempted to continue to the third - but trust me, it's not worth it. That way, madness lies, as it is slowly revealed that no one had any idea where they were going with any of this. After the half-hearted attempt at plot that the third season presents, the show transforms into some dadaist exquisite corpse, disjointed and without any real glue to hold the whole thing together. Seriously, it's like they have four people on the writing staff, and one of them knows current events, and the next has a medial dictionary, and the next has a wish list from the effects department, and the last one took a screenwriting workshop at the learning annex and left halfway through because they wanted to make him watch foreign films and he "doesn't go to the movies to read".

You think I'm joking, but it's true.

I realized that the writing of Nip/Tuck had been turned over to the Harry Potter slash writers that got banned from livejournal during the episode that one of the major, longtime characters has their kidney stolen, and not one person on the show bats an eye. This was during season four, so I hung on far longer than anyone really should, but still. Season Four is unusual in several ways, most notably for the fact that this is the season when things truly start flying off the handle in earnest. One of the only grounding forces in this shit-storm of crazy is an excellent cameo by Peter Dinklage, who brings a tiny modicum of respectability to the show that is quickly countered by an even more prominent cameo by Rosie O'Donnell.

And guess what? One of these two guys fucks Rosie O'Donnell
ARE YOU NOT ENTERTAIIIIIINED?

After season four, everyone finally realized the show was going to die a slow, painful death if they didn't enact a major paradigm shift, which they did by moving the show's location from Miami to Los Angeles. This gave them a chance to change things fundamentally. They could have struck off into another bold direction, marking new territory and reclaiming the emotional connection they once had with their viewers. And what do they do instead? The delve into meth, build-a-bear, and have a cameo from everyone's favorite questionably famous hoodrat New York.

Despite the writing, one of the reasons I originally became interested in Nip/Tuck, and one of the truly unimpeachable parts of the show's concept and design, is their special effects make-up. Throughout their seasons, Nip/Tuck's make-up is impeccable in a way that special effects makeup usually isn't - in most shows and movies, usually once you know what to look for in effects you can spot places where the artists have slacked off - a seam here, some overzealous stippling there - but Nip/Tuck's makeup has a craftsmanship to it that is uncanny. In my five years of watching this show I can't think of any time the effects have been obviously lacking or lazy. it's pretty gruesome, honestly - there's a lot of gore in the surgeries, and little is left to the imagination, but the ridiculousness of the plot is complemented nicely by the pseudo-realistic brutality of what is actually done to bodies and faces during even the most mundane procedures. Interestingly enough, it's that realistic feel that helps take this show over the top.

I must admit, though, for all of the bullshit and ridiculousness this show has put me through, I'm still watching. Season six started this week, and once again I'm hopeful that these writers can turn it around. I mean, they've got everything going for them. The acting is excellent at it's best and only flat at its worst. The design is fantastic, and as the show has grown more unreal and stylized, the costumes and sets have reflected that. Everyone else is working together seamlessly, it's just the writing that needs to get in line and stop letting everyone down. Seriously. What the hell, people?

DVD Junkie is a weekly review of TV Series on DVD. Kosmic takes her cable dramas seriously, and actually enjoys this show a lot, because of the horrible writing.

What, When, Where this Weekend - The Unborn, Bride Wars, Just Another Love Story

What, When, Where is a weekly guide to select screenings, discussions and events in the NYC-area of interest to screenwriters. Have an event you'd like to see listed here? Give us a heads-up at info@screenwritersleague.com.

- Film Forum is screening a new print of Godard's classic Made in U.S.A.

Opening this weekend...

THE UNBORN, written and directed by David S. Goyer


Premise: Haunted by strange dreams and recurring ghostly visions, Casey Beldon turns to a spiritual advisor for help. Together, they learn that Casey had a twin brother who never made it to term, and that her intended sibling is tied to a curse that requires Casey's death in order to manifest itself in our world.

Playing: Everywhere.

I'd be lying if I said I wasn't sold by the poster right off the bat. But, it's written by David S. Goyer (The Dark Knight, Dark City, Kickboxer 2) which gives me a little hope. It looks creepy from the trailer. But, the PG-13 rating worries me. (Has there been a good PG-13 Hollywood horror flick since The Ring?)

This is one of those movies I'm a complete sucker for - I really, really want it to be good.

BRIDE WARS, written by Greg DePaul and Casey Wilson, dir. by Gary Winick


Premise: Two best friends become rivals when a clerical error results in their respective weddings being held at the same place ... on the same day.

Playing: Everywhere.

Anne Hathaway could potentially be up for an Oscar for Rachel Getting Married while doing the publicity rounds for this movie. I can't say I have any interest in this one, but I expect Cake Man will be lining up for the midnight showing.

JUST ANOTHER LOVE STORY, written and directed by Ole Bornedal


Premise: JUST ANOTHER LOVE STORY is about Jonas, a likeable but world-weary husband with a wife and two kids who lives in a leafy suburb and whose life takes an unexpected twist when he inadvertently if at all causes Julia to crash her car and go into a coma. When Julia comes out of her coma her memory has vanished. Via a grotesque mix-up she and her nearest and dearest believe that when Jonas pops into the hospital to see how she is, he is in fact Sebastian, her exotic new boyfriend, whom they had all been expecting to fly in from abroad. Jonas assumes Sebastians identity and pretends to be the man Julia believes is the love of her life: a brand new identity, a brand new life, and an untrammeled existence full of promise opens up to Jonas. But real life can't be lived on fantasy and exotic dreams, and one day the truth comes knocking at the door.

Playing: Cinema Village

The plot description (ganked from IMDB) doesn't make this Danish film sound remotely as interesting as the Time Out New York review does. No mention at all of corpses or morgues - and it sounds like this film is chock full of 'em!

What are you doing/seeing this weekend?

2008 Spec Script Sales

Here at the League, we're doing a lot of talking about selling our specs recently (what with our query letters and competition hopes and whatnot). We came upon this listing of spec sales posted by Scott Myers at Go Into The Story. What's really cool about this breakdown is that Scott's done it by which managers and agents were attached to each of the sales made throughout the year. Obviously, the big guys like WMA and CAA (for agencies) and Benderspink (management) are leading the charge. But, if you're thinking of sending out those queries, the list should give you an idea of who else might be worth querying.

It's also worth checking out Scott's breakdowns of the spec sales by genre and studio.

Keep in mind, though, that these genres can flip-flop overnight. Since there were so many comedies bought up, Hollywood might decide that 2009 is the year of the Historical Epic (wouldn't you love that, Onyx) and let the comedy trend die out for the time being. Granted, that's an exaggeration of how it'd happen, but just remember that what's hot yesterday might be ice cold today.

Facing reality: Re-working your outline for the greater good of your novel

With any new year, most people take a moment to come up with resolutions for the next twelve months. Lose weight, find a new job, travel, etc. I'm usually hesitant to tack on life-changing edicts to a kind of pointless holiday, but I did find myself coming up with a rather long list of overall 2009 "to-dos," which I won't get into here in detail. But, thinking over things I want to accomplish in the next year really brought to the forefront something I haven't dealt with in my head over the last few months.

I don't really like the book I'm writing.

Some background, for those of you new to the adventures of King Suckerman (me): I've been working on my first novel for about six months now. It's titled SILENT CITY and is set in Miami. It tells the tale of Pete Fernandez, a burnt out journalist working a dead-end copy editing job for The Miami News after the death of his father and the subsequent flaming out of his once-promising sports writing career. Pete's basically a wreck, drinking his life away and meandering through what little he has to be awake for. He gets a call out of the blue from the father of one of his formerly close friends, Kathy, asking him to check in on her. What Pete discovers leads him into a story of murder, intrigue, backroom drug deals and the realization that while you may never be able to reclaim the life you once lead, you can always move forward to create a new one.

I saw the book as part crime novel in the vein of Pelecanos' A Firing Offense and Lehane's A Drink Before the War and, later, to some degree, Ellroy's The Black Dahlia. A nice, short (200-250 pages) detective story that would (ideally) set the stage for more adventures with Pete but also be the story of how a person who has no desire or inclination to be a private eye at page one ends up realizing it's in many ways his salvation. On a secondary, but arguably more important level, it would also show how friendships can evolve and die over time, specifically the dissolution of Pete's circle of friends and how, as we get older, we deal with more and more people but find that we are only close to a small handful, only interacting with people we know because we know them, and not so much because we like them. So, part crime book, part Rick Moody/The Ice Storm with a dash of Miami flavor to set the scene.

I started off sprinting -- 50 pages in the first few months. Most were written in jags of 10-15 pages, usually on Saturday mornings with jazz playing and coffee brewing. I got into a good routine. But there was a problem -- I had a general idea of where I wanted the story to go (Pete gets call, Pete searches for friend, hilarity ensues...), but the minor plot points that make a good detective novel -- the clues planted early on, the friendly character who turns out to be not-so-good later on, etc. Not cliches, per se, but things that you would be able to generate with more planning and a better sense (detail-wise) as to where the story was heading. And, more importantly, how it was going to get there.

About 40 or so pages in I decided it was time to write up an outline. This is where the trouble hit. I found a structure I was relatively happy with -- every third or fourth chapter would be a flashback sequence involving Pete's past: his friends, his father, his job; these flashbacks would hopefully add some perspective for the reader, showing a more jovial and human Pete and giving them a sense of why these friends were once important and how they've changed in the process. The main novel thread would follow Pete as he stumbled toward solving the main crime, which involved a number of current and former friends and the seedy Miami drug underworld.

After writing a first pass of the outline and getting some feedback from some members of the league, I realized that a) a lot of the flashback chapters were inconsequential, if not repetitive and b) Pete didn't really DO much. Most of the book, if it was going to be written based on my initial outline, dealt with Pete reacting to what others were doing. In the end you were left with the same guy, but everything was sort of resolved and things were looking rosy. Basically, the outline needed some serious work. Serious work that would probably involve going back and rewriting the 50 pages I already had in the can and was relatively happy with. You see, if the entire structure of the book is off, it doesn't matter how great the first few chapters are.

So, that brings me here. I'm not happy with the outline, but I'm procrastinating rewriting it because I know it could potentially mean tossing everything I've done or changing it significantly. When it came time to see what my goals were for the new year, finishing SILENT CITY was definitely one of them, but how to do it?

The bottom line is, I need to rework the outline. Maybe Character X shouldn't die in Chapter Y, or whatever. But I need to dive in knowing that this new outline, which ideally will be stronger, could potentially mean that the work I put into the book initially might be lost or made unrecognizable. Only now am I really coming to terms with that and feeling OK about it. It happens. You try one thing, it doesn't really work, you try again. I just need to get back on the writing horse.

Anyway, most of my posts here usually deal with stuff going on outside my laptop or movies I've seen/books I've read, but since this group is about the experience of being a writer, I thought it would be interesting to share my experiences so far. I've been researching general plot techniques to find the method that seems best suited to my writing style, but I'm open to suggestions.

Contest Alert - Cowrite

The League recently received an email from Todd Soffian, creator of Cowrite, a new screenplay contest (http://www.cowritescript.com/). We thought the contest sounded pretty cool and unique and wanted to share it with our readers. The contest is open to to everyone and could result in the participating writers working on a Hollywood feature.

Please note that we in the League have not submitted to Cowrite, so we can not speak about it from personal experience. This is just an informative post about another contest option out there. You can read about our experiences in various contests here and here, as well as other places on the blog.

The following information is from Mr. Soffian, but can also be found on Cowrite's website.

A movie premise will be posted on the Cowrite website and writers now have the opportunity to submit their version of the first ten pages of the story. The best opening ten pages ($10 per 10 page entry), selected by the Cowrite judges, will be posted on the website and the story will build from there.

Every other week, the best ten-page script submission will be added to the developing story until the script is finished and ready to be sold. There will be eleven winners over the six month contest. For their ten-page contribution, each winning entrant will receive money and prizes totaling $3000, a pitch meeting with Benderspink and a chance to win the grand prize of a paid rewrite of the script. Winners will also share in any potential script sale proceeds.

Another exciting aspect of the Cowrite website is the "Pro's Take" section where professional screenwriters and industry professionals will offer comments and suggestions on the developing story as well as insight into how to get started in Hollywood. This mentoring program will serve as an invaluable tool for aspiring screenwriters and help guide the story along. Guest mentors will include screenwriters Andrea Berloff (World Trade Center), Shintaro Shimosawa (The Echo) and Josh Schaer (TV's Jericho).

This is believed to be the first screenwriting competition where the end goal is to try to sell a collaborative screenplay. In true Web 2.0 fashion, Cowrite utilizes social networking and the "wisdom of the crowd" to create a community-sourced product. Cowrite believes this method of art creation will become a widely accepted, and, in fact, sought out way of finding new talent while producing blueprints for major motion pictures. After all, what better market research tool for studios trying to figure out what audiences want to see at the theaters than letting the audiences provide the content?

Cowrite has partnered with The LA Film Festival and software companies Final Draft and Jungle Software, all of which will supply prizes to each of the eleven winners.

Please let us know if you submit to this competition and what your experiences with it are. We'd love to hear your responses, as this sounds like a neat idea. We'll certainly let you know any experience we have with it.

Death Neglected IV: Unexpected Heroes

I think I mainly went to see Defiance because I didn’t want to see Valkyrie. Before the movie, I had one of those workdays that punch you in the stomach then run away laughing. When I sat down in the theater, I really really wanted the film to fully utilize 007 and have an exploding budget kick ass WWII movie, knowing full well that’s not going to be the case since it’s only playing in one theater in NY. When I walked out 2 hours later, it was the non-Hollywood scenes that I liked best.

There were definitely moments when the movie steered into melodrama, and had one too many inspirational speeches. But when the film moved away from that, the scenes felt real and oddly enough, easy to relate to. The story of Defiance starts out with the four Bielski brothers escaping into the Belorussia woods to escape the Nazis. They find some other escaped Jews in the woods, others were thrust upon them during food hunts, then more people found them. Before they know it, the Bielski name is known around the region, and the oldest brother Tuvia decides to take in any Jew that comes to them (including the sick and old), while the second brother Zus joins the Russian partisans to actively fight the Nazis. Much of the movie is not watching heroes do heroic things, but normal everyday people suddenly needing to survive in the woods. The struggle aren’t just about evading the Nazis, but how to feed so many hungry people, what to do when disease spreads out in the camp, how to survive the winter. In one scene, the newly arrives have to report their occupation so they can be assigned work, one man said weakly, “Accountant”. I couldn’t help but think how many of us actually have a job or skill that’d help us during a time of crisis. It was easy to watch the film without detached awe or sympathy.

Another thing I appreciate is the characters. Tuvia (Craig) might be portrayed as the protagonist, the king of the forest, Moses-reborn, the guy who prance around on a white horse while giving an inspiration speech (honestly guys? Honestly??), but he’s not above rage, hesitancy, and genuine hopelessness. While he actively (and forcefully) asserts his position as the unquestionable leader, other times he seems bewildered and uncomfortable when people recognize him for a hero. On the other hand, Zus (Liev Schreiber) is the surly, arrogant, aggressive and competitive brother. But instead of getting into trouble and needing the protagonist brother to save his ass as would happen in most movies, Zus is without a doubt a hero during the time of need. At the end one has to recognize that just because he believed differently from his humanitarian brother, doesn’t make him wrong. What I suppose was the most surprising though, is Asael Bielski (Jamie Bell), the third brother that people (and the movie) often forget since it’s hard to get in the center of the screen with Tuvia and Zus around. But over the course of the movie, he grows slowly and realistically from a boy to a man, and at the end has his moment where he outshines his brothers. It felt good to watch characters that aren't your typical hero, black sheep, and exposition dish.

All in all, the movie had its Hollywood, melodramatic moments (complete with sad violin playing in the back, I’m not kidding), and heavy-handed Biblical themes. But honestly, it’s a holocaust movie. It’s just that the scenes that are heart-felt and realistic make intercutting a wedding and a bloody ambush with soaring music seem unnecessary. I didn’t get the adrenaline rush movie I had walked in wanting, but I walked out with a satisfied feeling that the twelve bucks were well paid.

The Writing Week (Vol. 2) part 53 – Naming Characters and the Outline Begins

Last year, when I began writing my post-Apocalyptic spec, I went about it without an outline. I knew the setting and general arc of the script. I had a clear vision of the opening scene. And I knew, more or less, who my protagonist was. This script – let’s call it my “Roman Army Spec” – not so much.

Actually, I’ll admit right now that this was the hardest time I have ever had in cracking the first act. Usually, Act One pours out of me like whiskey into my (bottomless) glass. I almost always have an idea for the very first scene, the inciting incident, and everything between those two beats and the end of Act One. This time, though, I was stuck. I know the general arc of the plot and had some notion as to how, maybe, I might possibly get there. But what I really knew was that I was stuck.

The blank page was taunting me something awful. I felt like that kid in Algebra who swears the clock actually began ticking backwards. I was going nowhere fast, and it was painful. Finally, something clicked. I knew how to begin developing my protagonist – give him another antagonist, one we follow more closely at first, and build off of that. The overall story involves an enemy that the protagonist confronts, but not for a while. So, I decided to give him another adversary that we would see more immediately.

I still felt stuck, though. That was until I went to the tried and true Behind the Name, a site I think most writers go to frequently. It was becoming increasingly difficult to outline my script without being able to actually name my characters in the beats (other than Protagonist, or Antagonist, or Protagonists’ Friend). Soon, the names were flowing. I had more than I needed, so I went back and bolded the ones I wanted to use, then ascribed personalities/roles to those. I had my protagonist, antagonist, big “boss” protagonist, and everyone in between. What’s more, by finding all those names, I also found I was able to fill in character roles that I didn’t know I needed or didn’t plan on using, but which made the story so much stronger. Soon enough, Act One was outline, and Act Two was halfway there – note: outlining Act Two always SUCKS; the fact that I just about nailed half of it in one sitting and know what the second half will be like (I’ll do that part tonight) blows me away. I’ve either hit it just about right or am so far off the mark I don’t even see it. Either way, my characters have names, and in a week and a half, when we next meet, the League will tell me if my outline’s worth a damn.

When do you name your characters?