The Bumble Bee Pendant leads off.
Multi-cameras have always been my preference for watching a show because it often feels like a play.
That being said...now as a playwright, is there anything you'd love to bring to a multi-camera show that you can only do in a play or vice versa?
I’d like to bring back sophisticated comedies like FRASIER or CHEERS. I’d like to do a multi-cam where a network is not pressuring me to do a joke every second. I’d like the freedom to create characters with dimension and flaws and let the comedy come out of their behavior and struggles.
I’d like to be able to do long scenes. Again, there seems to be this fear that if the audience isn’t whip-sawed through an episode it’s going to instantly bail. I’d want my show to breathe a little.
And I’m convinced you could get MORE laughs and better laughs if you took this approach.
RyderDA asks:
How do you handle it when someone compliments a character for a line from a particular episode from a particular show that you wrote or helped write? "Ted Danson's so funny - last night he said 'You can't HANDLE the truth' I wish I was as witty as Ted."
Lots of people think the actors make up their lines. But as we are learning, there are a LOT of ill-informed people in this country.
When that happens I don’t say, “Hey, I wrote that line.” I gently say, “You do know the actors don’t make up those lines? That writers do?”
But what really pisses me off is ENTERTAINMENT WEEKLY that has that feature where they have a collage of actors with thought bubbles attributing pithy lines their characters said to THEM. Come on, EW, you should know better.
Dr Loser wonders:
Granted, you're going to want to write 90% of your scripts with David Isaacs, because you're simpatico.
What about the other 10%? Groucho Marx? John Cleese? Richard Pryor?
Is there somebody out there who you would really, really want to have written a joint script?
In a writing room you are collaborating with others so I guess I could say I’ve partnered with Larry Gelbart, Jim Brooks, the Charles Brothers among others.
But in terms of an actual partnership, I wrote a screenplay with Robin Schiff that we sold to MGM about 15 years ago. Otherwise, it’s either David or I write by myself.
As for a dream collaborator – I’d like to write a musical with Sondheim. I’d like to write anything with Sondheim.
And finally, DyHrdMET wants to know:
Have you ever seen a sitcom pilot which got picked up, but then the series was either cancelled after a few episodes and/or just lost its way that quickly, and you thought that it would have been better as a feature film instead of a TV show?
A couple I can think of offhand. There was a show on ABC about a group of idiots trying to rob a celebrity. How the hell can you keep that going for seven years? And then a CBS show called WORST WEEK about the mishaps leading to a wedding.
Both of those sound like movie premises. Good TV series need to have legs and room to grow. They need to be open ended. Shows that depend on a narrow narrative often box themselves in. That’s the way I felt about PRISON BREAK. After the first season when they broke out they seemed to flail around looking for story lines. My heart went out to those writers.
What’s your FQ? You can leave it in the comments section. Thanks much.
from By Ken Levine
Comments
Post a Comment