My friend Scott Kaufer, a TV writer/producer, asked me last night why I don’t write more frequently about The Industry on here. I think he likes it when I take potshots at people we know. But that’s the point, unfortunately. I’ve made a few too many enemies with this blog (yes, and some friends too, but still… as Willy Loman knew, we all desperately want to be liked.)
Nevertheless, I couldn’t pass up commenting on the latest screwball comedy at the Writers Guild. What most of the world doesn’t know – and why should they? – is that there are two, not one, unions of film and television writers – the Writers Guild of America, east (WGAE) and the Writers Guild of America, west (WGAW). The reasons for this are too complex and, frankly, incomprehensible to me, after thirty-some years in the Guild, to explain; so I won’t attempt to go into them here. But here’s the latest: The two Writers Guilds are now in the process of suing each other!
Again, the terms of these suits are prolix and fraught with seemingly-ageless personal enmities. (In the midst of this, WGA East President Herb Sargent died at 81.) Something about uncollected funds from thirty years ago and whether this should go to court or be arbitrated. It all has little to do with the welfare of writers and lot to do with people’s egos and union jobs. In the old days, the image of the writer was a wild-eyed bohemian. Now it’s a Teamsters-style apparatchik who wants to cling to his position as an officer of the Guild. I was a member of the Board of Directors back in 1990-1992 and when I bother to look at who is running the place now, I see the same members, avoiding term limits in one job by moving to another. Maybe they should spend a little more time writing. [It's a lot easier to pontificate at board meetings.-ed. No kidding!] In any case, after the multiple disasters at the WGA, you’d think a little housecleaning would be in order.
> Whatever Happened to Jack Kerouac?
He’s travelling with his laptop in a backpack, and uploading his web diary from a truckstop wireless network.
It’s hard to believe that you’ve made any enemies blogging, Roger…
Unions corrupt. Absolute unions corrupt absolutely.
I heard that Mickey Mouse is a teamster.
really.
Rank and file and management are growing further and further apart.
Roger, if you really want to piss people off get together with Mel Gibson and do a movie about the Muslims trashing the Library of Alexandria or invading Europe in response to the Kingdom of Heaven.
I doubt Mel would do what Scott did and allow leaders of the Muslim community a viewing to make sure their delicate sensibilities are not outraged….but it would be interesting.
The writer’s guild really does seem to be toothless. How long does it take for a writer to get paid these days? If they ever get paid that is.
SAG and AFTRA are no better. It’s a tough business to negotiate, but these unions have dropped the ball so badly with their members I can’t imagine anyone trusting them to have their best interests at heart.
Ooops. To clarify, I’m talking about screenwriters getting paid…or more likely NOT getting paid.
Muslims trashing the Library of Alexandria
That was most likely (and forgive me if I’m wrong as it has been a long, long time but I think the movies actually get it right in this case) Julius Caesar between six and seven hundred years earlier.
http://www.bede.org.uk/library.htm
…
In the old days, the image of the writer was a wild-eyed bohemian.
Would those be the good old days of say 1970-1974?
Much as it pains me to write this, I think the Coen brothers got the old days Writers Guild of America images right in Barton Fink. I so hated the movie that I only watched it once, but, if the character played by Michael Lerner started his ascent as a writer, you have the trinity in Fink, Meadows and Lipnick. If not, substitute Budd Schulberg’s Glick for Lipnick and there you are.
Patrick:
In 642 muslim caliph Omar orderd that all books in the Alexandrai museum be destroyed.
Well…to me, your average American bumpkin, it just wouldn’t be Hollywood© without prolixing, emnity and lawsuits.
Terrye—
I’ll save you the trouble of clicking on the link above.
The verdict on Omar
The errors in the sources are obvious and the story itself is almost wholly incredible. In the first place, Gregory Bar Hebraeus represents the Christian in his story as being one John of Byzantium and that John was certainly dead by the time of the Moslem invasion of Egypt. Also, the prospect of the library taking six months to burn is simply fantastic and just the sort of exaggeration one might expect to find in Arab legends such as the Arabian Nights. However Alfred Butler’s famous observation that the books of the library were made of vellum which does not burn is not true. The very late dates of the source material are also suspect as there is no hint of this atrocity in any early literature – even in the Coptic Christian chronicle of John of Nikiou (died after 640AD) who detailed the Arab invasion. Finally, the story comes from the hand of a Christian intellectual who would have been more than happy to show the religion of his rulers in a bad light. Agreeing with Gibbon this time, we can dismiss it as a legend.
Patrick Tyson ó At various times, the Romans, the Christians and the Moslems all destroyed part or all of the Library at Alexandria (indeed, according to Carl Sagan, the Church canonized the man who roused the mob that burned the library and raped, beat and dismembered its female head at the time).
Patrick:
Perhaps we will never know.
I think there was enough mayhem in the Crusades to go around and considering the fact that they covered several centuries I doubt there is anyway of knowing today just what happened.
This kind of stuff makes my eyes glaze over, so feel free to write less frequently about it.
richard—
Sagan! Brilliant!
Will Durant in The Age of Faith (1950):
The Monophysite Christians of Egypt had suffered Byzantine persecution; they received th Moslems with open arms, helped them to take Memphis, guided them into Alexandria. When it fell to Amr after a siege of twenty-three months (61), he wrote to the Caliph Omar: “It is impossible to enumerate the riches of this great city, or to describe its beauty; I shall content myself with observing that it contains 4000 palaces, 400 baths, 400 theaters.” Amr prevented pillage, preferring taxation. Unable to understand the theological differences among the Christian sects, he forbade his Monophysite allies to revenge themselves upon their orthodox foes, and upset the custom of centuries by proclaiming freedom of worship for all.
Did Amr destroy the Alexandrian Library?… The story [fuel for the baths after Omar's order] is now generally rejected as a fable. In any case the gradual dissolution of the Alexandrian Library was a tragedy of some moment…
That hundred-plus page essay I mentioned a few days ago (SAT essay topic) was inspired by Josephine Tey’s The Daughter of Time and dealt with, in a small way, the uses to which historical mysteries are put by subsequent writers—Tey included. My conclusions (history) is that the Princes were probably dead before Bosworth and that Richard was a better King than their father and (literary) that the sainted Sir Thomas was a master politician who ran into an even better one and the Bard (whoever he may have been) turned Richard into a master politician/villain (which he wasn’t) for the ages. As to Tey, the skeptic in me rejoiced when first I read her detective story. My impression is that a great many high school students have had the same reaction.
All that being written…
Ransom Stoddard: You’re not going to use the story, Mr. Scott?
Maxwell Scott: This is the west, sir. When the legend becomes fact, print the legend.
I look forward to seeing Mel and Roger’s treatment. It could be: Brilliant!
The misspelt word was not Plantagenet.
Two of the things missing above are “4″ and “Field”.
Rewrite!
Patrick:
My point was that Ridley Scott has made a film “The Kingdom of Heaven”, which has been denounced by British academics such as Jonathan Riley Smith as “complete fiction” that panders to Osama Bin Laden’s view of history.
CAIR, the activist Muslim group had to preview the film and ok it and the actor who plays Saladin said he would not a make a film that was not respectful to his religion.
Imagine if Orlanda Bloom had said such a thing.
Whatever the fate of the Library of Alexandria I doubt very seriously if the Muslims were anymore the victims in this case than they were in most others.
The truth is if not for the Crusades there might not be a Europe today. That does not mean that all the Crusaders were good guys but it does mean that the Muslims were not always the victims either.
That hundred-plus page essay I mentioned a few days ago (SAT essay topic)….
I know the SAT essay section is supposed to reward length, but isn’t that a bit extreme?
Uh, Yehudit, you mean the Writer’s Guild or the Crusades?
There are a fair number of us who either are members of the Guild or will be. We are (somewhat sourly) personally interested in the antics of the Guild.
Is it even possible to make an accurate film about a historic religious conflict, without some independently wealthy PR-immune individual backing it? I don’t think so. Not too many of those individuals around. For example, where’s the historically accurate big-budget Hollywood film about the Six Day War? Is it not there because it’s not much of a story? No. Producers just don’t want to live the rest of their lives behind big security fences. That’s why.
RBMN:
I think you are right.
If anyone today did a film that actually depicted a millenium of jihad the end result of which was the death or subjegation of millions I doubt they would live long enough to get an award.
Isn’t Spielberg supposed to be making a film about the murder of the Israeli athletes at the Munich Olympics? What ever happened to that? How can you possibly whitewash that one?
Kynna ó His version is told from the standpoint of a beautiful Cuban gymnast who falls in love with one of the Arab freedom fighters…