If I were the movies, and this was happening to me, I would probably buy a gun and start killing people like Aaron Sorkin.
I would not plead out. I would take this to trial. I would get up and speak my piece in front of a jury of my peers; other movies that have also suffered through the humiliation of prequels and sequels and remakes.
I would deliver my closing arguments to The Women, and watch tears fall from their eyes as they think about being remade with Meg Ryan and Eva Mendes. I would make eye contact with Born Yesterday, and see the humiliation that comes with casting Melanie Griffith in the Judy Holiday role. Over and over, I would make the case that this kind of treatment had hindered my ability to make a living, and destroyed my reputation.
The jury would have no choice but to let me go. “Aaron Sorkin drove the movies to do it”, they would say on the subsequent special with Nancy Grace.
But I’m not the movies, and life isn’t fair. And even if I could shoot people and get away with it, I wouldn’t waste the opportunity on Aaron Sorkin. Not while the cast of The View is still out there.
So what choice do we have but to be grown-up? To be positive? To think about how fun this movie can be. Because “fun” is absolutely the word I’d use. Right after, say, “diarrhea.”
So let’s all put on out party clothes and run screaming from the incredibly disappointing Studio 60, and skip headlong into yet another aging and irrelevant meme that Sorkin is not only too old to relate to, but doesn’t possess the technical ability to understand! That has success scrawled all over it in royal icing, don’t you think? All piped from a pastry bag and dusted with glittering sugar.
My Grandmother has more internet savvy than I do, and she’s been dead for 33 years!.
Now how great is that line? His sainted grandmother knows more than he does, and she’s dead! ROFLMAO, Aaron!*
* Have your researchers explain that one to you
So I suggest we all get involved in this one, because I really think we can help him out. I mean, I don’t think we’d get any air time or writing credit or money or acknowledgment, but that’s a lot like working with Aaron Sorkin to begin with. So who knows? You may be able to put it on your resume.
Below is a list of characters and ideas we’d like to see fleshed out. I’m going to give you the starting block, and you fill it in. When you get it the way Aaron likes it (verbose, labored, self-conscious, joyless, sexless, devoid of physical and romantic chemistry and wheezing under the weight of it’s own exposition), submit in in the comments. I’ll choose my favorites and try to weave a short pilot treatment out of it. Then we’ll email it to Aaron, and maybe his dead grandmother can forward it to him by way of Jon Edwards.
CAST OF CHARACTERS
(Feel free to flesh these out as much as you think necessary)
1. The ambivalent, engaged, sexually ambiguous woman “in a relationship”, who flirts with everyone and everything and posts lots of drunken pictures of herself partying in various states of undress.
(played by_________________)
2. The band singer who sells CDs on his page, and who relentlessly tries to suck people in to see him play in the shittiest bars in the worst parts of town.
(played by_________________)
3. The mildly retarded girl or guy who only speaks in LOLcats macros.
(played by_________________)
4. The one sending hoax emails about everything from free gas to dying children who want postcards before they die; none of which he’s bothered to check with Snopes.
(played by_________________)
5. The girl always trying to engage you in puzzles and word games that are inordinately time consuming and not very fun.
(played by_________________)
6 The one who wants to know how compatible you are when it comes to music or movies, so they bombard you with lengthy quizzes you have no desire to complete.
(played by_________________)
7. The one who sends you virtual presents like Japanese candies, good karma, baby polar bears and Star Trek characters, and you have to download a new application just to to accept the gift, which is worthless.
(played by_________________)
There must be more. If you think of a typically marginal denizen of Facebook, please flesh them out and submit them in the comments.
There could be a prize. That’s all I’m saying.
17 responses so far ↓
1 clevelandphil // Aug 28, 2008 at 10:31 pm
Where can I get the medications that April has been taking for her back? This and her latest posts—WHOOOO-HOOOOOO!!!!!!!!
2 steve // Aug 28, 2008 at 11:31 pm
8. The Relentless Commenter: this is that one friend that each of us has, who’s someone we vaguely know in real life and who suddenly “friended” us on facebook. It’s always a woman, and she’s always fat. She’s new to facebook, having exhausted all of her other friends with excessive forwards of 6.5 megabyte wmv files of kittens vomiting. She sees you in person and demands to know why you won’t be her “friend” on facebook. She sends a friend request every morning while she’s poring over every tiny detail of your “public” profile, wondering what she’s missing. Finally, you relent. ho boy! each day begins with 7 notifications: 6 of them are from her. 3 of them are comments she’s posted on your recent posts, 2 of them are comments on photos or posts from last year, and one is a question (posted as a comment) about your status. each morning is a new chance for her to “bond” with you, to “relate” to you on a “crazy” level, to post messages on your wall about how you “get her” and how you were “made for each other”.
played by ______________________.
(I’m thinking Molly Ringwald)
3 Speedy Cerviche // Aug 28, 2008 at 11:38 pm
http://encyclopediadramatica.com/Meme
There are some talented people on this site. I eagerly await the hilarity.
4 chrisbcritter // Aug 29, 2008 at 12:00 am
CAST OF CHARACTERS
(Feel free to flesh these out as much as you think necessary)
1. The ambivalent, engaged, sexually ambiguous woman… (played by Sandra Bullock)
2. The band singer who sells CDs on his page…
(played by Justin Long)
3. The mildly retarded girl or guy who only speaks in LOLcats macros.
(played by Tobey McGuire)
4. The one sending hoax emails about everything …
(played by Samuel L. Jackson)
5. The girl always trying to engage you in puzzles …
(played by Yeardley Smith)
6 The one who wants to know how compatible …
(played by Patricia Clarkson)
7. The one who sends you virtual presents …
(played by April Winchell) Hey, it’s character work…
5 bnaivar // Aug 29, 2008 at 4:53 am
8. The “Beautiful Blonde that’s sooooo hot for you”
played by Michael Moore.
6 JohnnyBoy // Aug 29, 2008 at 6:16 am
1. maggie_gyllenhaal
2. john_stamos
3. parker_posey
4. helen_mirren
5. mira_sorvino
6. paul_giamatti
7. helen_hunt
7 Knavish Rogue // Aug 29, 2008 at 7:46 am
1. Gary Busey
2. Danny DeVito
3. Jake Gyllenhaal
4. Ben Stiller
5. Bill Murray
6. Will Ferrell
7. Jerry Seinfeld
Now hear me out. I’m thinking an all-male cast so that we can take a Shakespearean tack on this thing and have the female roles with the cast members in drag. Kind of a Midsummer Nights Dream meets the Matrix. Or we can just have the provide the voices and have the whole thing done in CGI with motion capture. You think Disney or PIXAR might pick this up? How about this? I’d rather just see the pitch meeting for this and get the looks on the suit’s faces… Hey! How about a new reality/punked TV series… PITCH MEETING™ ©2008 with your host April Winchell!
8 ShannonS // Aug 29, 2008 at 9:35 am
1. (played byCourtney Love
2. (played by Bruce Willis)
3. (played by Paris Hilton
4. (played by Celine Dion)
5. (played by Jeanine Garafalo
6 (played by the Olsen twins
7. (played by Ed Begley Jr.
Now obviously I’m type casting here but I’m keeping in mind the Aaron Sorkin producing skills.
9 JohnnyBoy // Aug 29, 2008 at 11:10 am
Is there AssBook? cause there should be
10 ListenerJustin // Aug 29, 2008 at 11:15 am
I’m not even entirely certain who this Aaron Sorkin person is, and I can’t muster the interest to check him on imdb. Gotta say I hate his hair, though. It’s very “Jefferson” from Married with Children.
11 paper-hat // Aug 29, 2008 at 11:28 am
I. Amy Winehouse, no rehearsals needed, wardrobe ready!
II. Amy Winehouse, playing male role like Cate Blanchett in I’m Not There.
III. Amy Winehouse when she is as high as a kite.
IV. again, Amy Winehouse high as a kite.
V. Amy Winehouse, sober.
VI. Alan Sorkin?
VII. A young Amy Winehouse played by Miley Cyrus?
Add dreamy sound and visuals and you have it!
How’s that for some siskel’ebert dream-time swag?
12 JohnnyBoy // Aug 29, 2008 at 11:57 am
ListenerJustin, me neither, and I’m not going to go ut of my way to find out
13 Speedy Cerviche // Aug 29, 2008 at 1:34 pm
1. The ambivalent, engaged, sexually ambiguous woman “in a relationship”, who flirts with everyone and everything and posts lots of drunken pictures of herself partying in various states of undress.
(played by David Blaine, clean-shaven, with longer hair and boxframe glasses. Or Rumer Willis, clean-shaven, with longer hair and boxframe glasses)
2. The band singer who sells CDs on his page, and who relentlessly tries to suck people in to see him play in the shittiest bars in the worst parts of town.
(played by stock footage of Heath Ledger)
3. The mildly retarded girl or guy who only speaks in LOLcats macros.
(played by Sir Ian McKellen, because fuck you.)
4. The one sending hoax emails about everything from free gas to dying children who want postcards before they die; none of which she’s bothered to check with Snopes.
(played by Jenny “Green our Vaccines” McCarthy)
5. The girl always trying to engage you in puzzles and word games that are inordinately time consuming and not very fun.
(played by Tara Reid, who is herself a “puzzle [which is] inordinately time consuming and not very fun”)
6. The one who wants to know how compatible you are when it comes to music or movies, so they bombard you with lengthy quizzes you have no desire to complete.
(played by Marc “Mister K” Germain, who earns an associate screenwriter credit after supplying the aforementioned “lengthy quizzes you have no desire to complete”)
7. The one who sends you virtual presents like Japanese candies, good karma, baby polar bears and Star Trek characters, and you have to download a new application just to to accept the gift, which is worthless.
(played by Shia LaBeouf in Big Momma’s House-style fatsuit drag)
And the extra characters:
8. The girl with the shitty poetry, the pentagram wallpaper, and the annoying pseudo-goth music that autoplays when you open her profile.
(A Broadway cast of thousands)
9. The pervy, aging middle-management type who doesn’t really “get” this whole “internet” thing, but once saw a story on Dateline about underage girls getting picked up on social networking sites, so he decides to “give it a shot”.
(played by Scott Bakula, who ends up winning a surprise Academy Award for a nuanced, pathos-laden performance, most notably during the darker final third of the movie, during which the FBI catches him downloading CP off of LimeWire. This leads to the memorable climax sequence in which he cries to the heavens, “IT WAS RESEARCH FOR A BOOOOOOOOK!” while being led away in cuffs, a scene will be played in Oscar retrospectives for years to come.)
10. The spooky guy with the tiled confederate flag wallpaper, 50 links to Littlegreenfootballs articles, an animated gif in memorial to Dale Jr., and a tenuous grasp on punctuation rules.
(played by that one guy from the Wellpatch commercials. But, you know, with a hat. And maybe a dialect coach.)
11. The girl with the extremely slutty username and very few profile pictures, who describes her masturbatory habits in her blog post and is constantly soliciting cybersex from every male user who crosses her path.
(Voice-over for blog postings and messages played by Hayden Panettiere. Actual physical form, revealed at the beginning of the third act, is played by Jason Alexander in his underwear)
And finally…
12. The guy who openly mocks people who use sites like MySpace and Facebook, whilst simultaneously stroking his manly troll-stubble and gazing lovingly at his impressive e-penis.
(special guest appearance by Speedy Cerviche as himself)
14 pal Jacky // Aug 29, 2008 at 4:01 pm
1. Tina Fey
2. Matt LeBlanc
3. George Wendt
4. Harry Anderson
5. Jane Leeves
6.Lisa Kudrow
7.Kirstie Ally
Bonus points for keeping it to NBC Thursday night ‘must see TV”
15 laffingsherry // Aug 29, 2008 at 4:13 pm
OMG! I was LMAO at April’s thread but the responses have me rolling!!! I’m trying to read them to my husband but I’m laughing so hard I’m crying!
You guy are SO creative!!!
16 mrssarcasmo // Aug 30, 2008 at 5:38 pm
1. The ambivalent, engaged, sexually ambiguous woman “in a relationship”, who flirts with everyone and everything and posts lots of drunken pictures of herself partying in various states of undress.
(played by Tara Reid)
2. The band singer who sells CDs on his page, and who relentlessly tries to suck people in to see him play in the shittiest bars in the worst parts of town.
(played by Jack Black)
3. The mildly retarded girl or guy who only speaks in LOLcats macros.
(played by Nicole Sullivan (she could do her “Antonia” schtick)
4. The one sending hoax emails about everything from free gas to dying children who want postcards before they die; none of which he’s bothered to check with Snopes.
(played by Chris Elliot )
5. The girl always trying to engage you in puzzles and word games that are inordinately time consuming and not very fun.
(played by Bjork)
6 The one who wants to know how compatible you are when it comes to music or movies, so they bombard you with lengthy quizzes you have no desire to complete.
(played by David Spade)
7. The one who sends you virtual presents like Japanese candies, good karma, baby polar bears and Star Trek characters, and you have to download a new application just to to accept the gift, which is worthless.
(played by Jiminy Glick)
There’s also the person who has a conniption when you remove them from your “friends” list on Myspace.
(played by Dakota Fanning)
The creepy 40’s something guy who keeps sending 20-something girls “love” messages. (played by Tom Cruise)
The stalker. (played by Sacha Baron Cohen)
The annoying woman who’s so nice you just can’t tell her to drop dead when she keeps sending you religious crap that takes forever to download to your email client so you just block her. (played by Angelyne)
17 Andre // Aug 31, 2008 at 12:25 pm
What the hell is a facebook?
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