tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-19336675.post5246296433385413766..comments2023-11-03T06:02:02.128-07:00Comments on By Ken Levine: Before the internet...By Ken Levinehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17305293821975250420noreply@blogger.comBlogger16125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-19336675.post-53958081172563931352014-02-08T07:59:56.299-08:002014-02-08T07:59:56.299-08:00A personal favorite: A friend of mine once asked m...<i>A personal favorite: A friend of mine once asked me to look over her screenplay; it was a CHINATOWN knock-off set in 1937. In one scene, someone suggested going to dinner at Chasen's: "Elizabeth Taylor is crazy about their chili." I scratched out "Elizabeth Taylor," wrote in "Carole Lombard," and wrote in the margin, "In 1937, Taylor was five years old and living in London."</i><br /><br />From the art imitates life dept.: In the late '30s, after Alfred Hitchcock had emigrated from the UK, he became good friends with Lombard (he rented her house after she moved to the Encino ranch following her marriage to Clark Gable), and Clark and Carole took him to Chasen's; he became a regular. However, despite all the research I've done over the years for my classic Hollywood site "Carole & Co.", I have no record of whether Lombard liked their chili. However, Chasen's opened in December 1936, so at least your friend got <i>that</i> part right.VP81955https://www.blogger.com/profile/11792390726196611188noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-19336675.post-72807877886731485352014-02-06T07:02:57.196-08:002014-02-06T07:02:57.196-08:00There was an interesting sort of on-air correction...There was an interesting sort of on-air correction recently on "Brooklyn Nine Nine." In an early episode, the character played by Terry Crews referred to Francois Truffaut's "Breathless." Well, Truffaut wrote the original script for "Breathless," but Jean-Luc Godard directed it (and, by all accounts, greatly altered the script), and it is usually called his film.<br /><br />In this week's episode, one scene has Crews arguing with a pair of academics, and the first words we hear are "Yes, I know Godard directed it. But Truffaut wrote it, and I consider film a writer's medium. That's why I regard it as his film."<br /><br />Great save. (And, of course, it's funnier because Crews is a heavily muscled ex-football player, here playing a tough cop.)Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-19336675.post-3342144394534860722014-02-05T22:30:11.916-08:002014-02-05T22:30:11.916-08:00As something of a walking IMDb, I've spent man...As something of a walking IMDb, I've spent many years gladly answering questions of this sort. And thus it annoys me no end when I see movies making blatantly obvious errors that could have easily been fixed with the proverbial stroke of the pen. <br /><br />A personal favorite: A friend of mine once asked me to look over her screenplay; it was a CHINATOWN knock-off set in 1937. In one scene, someone suggested going to dinner at Chasen's: "Elizabeth Taylor is crazy about their chili." I scratched out "Elizabeth Taylor," wrote in "Carole Lombard," and wrote in the margin, "In 1937, Taylor was five years old and living in London." <br />cadavranoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-19336675.post-68525671130830080692014-02-05T13:06:06.673-08:002014-02-05T13:06:06.673-08:00My early career was spent writing sketches and I r...My early career was spent writing sketches and I remember doing sketch about Dick Turpin the British highwayman. I walked round to Marylebone library and researched the character. Three hours for a lousy 3 minute sketch! Ridiculous.Brian Levesonnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-19336675.post-23191473782518728812014-02-05T02:48:53.923-08:002014-02-05T02:48:53.923-08:00Ken: Yeah, true ... but the answer you get now fro...Ken: Yeah, true ... but the answer you get now from Google isn't the be-all and end-all undisputed truth. It's like the question of what was the longest home run ever hit in major league baseball? Was the 600' shots from Mickey Mantle, or was it the one hit by Babe Ruth that supposedly flew into a train car and kept going? And would a record 600' shot in the Rockies' stadium (where the air is thin and the balls fly better in Denver) still hold up as a record if the same ball was hit at a more sea-level park, where the air is thicker and balls don't fly as easy?<br /><br />Again, that's why, when you're a sitcom writer and sometimes you just throw shit into the wind, owning a character like Cliff fucking Clavin rules.ScottyBnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-19336675.post-54998116003313997712014-02-05T02:13:18.492-08:002014-02-05T02:13:18.492-08:00>>>"One was to just guess and put it...>>>"One was to just guess and put it in the script."<<<<br /><br />And thus, Cliff Clavin was born.ScottyBnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-19336675.post-33345611262905091882014-02-05T01:22:51.349-08:002014-02-05T01:22:51.349-08:00Ken: This may be an indelicate issue to bring up o...Ken: This may be an indelicate issue to bring up or ask you about, but since it was brought up here (link follows), I'll ask about it here.<br /><br />http://tv.yahoo.com/blogs/tv-news/jerry-seinfeld-s-blunt-take-on-diversity-in-comedy---who-cares--195219911.html<br /><br />It seems to me that Seinfeld is correct, and that a question like this should piss him off, or anyone else who writes/performs comedy. I can't count how many blog entries you've made that have to do with how destructive to the process of good comedy the studio suits can be. Sooo -- shouldn't the similar intrusion of political correctness be scorned just as much? I mean jeez, if the suits and political sensibilities had their way, every single sitcom would make sure it had a white, a black, a Mexican, an Asian, and probably a Samoan in it all getting equal time.<br /><br />So, basic question thru this all is: Where do you draw the line as not just a writer but someone in charge of the whole show?ScottyBnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-19336675.post-53171452962372024772014-02-05T00:26:06.349-08:002014-02-05T00:26:06.349-08:00BigTed
That's hilarious! I love Abe Vigoda. A...BigTed<br /><br />That's hilarious! I love Abe Vigoda. A great actor and such a good sport for taking the running gag about the mistaken death reports with good humour. May he still be with us for many more years to come.Hamidnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-19336675.post-37408971432080922732014-02-04T21:07:46.419-08:002014-02-04T21:07:46.419-08:00Friday question: Can you share any wild stories (l...Friday question: Can you share any wild stories (like this one from the clip)regarding any of the other casts that you've worked with when they were off the clock? http://teamcoco.com/video/ted-danson-woody-harrelson-mushroomsDiane L.noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-19336675.post-36961313001429554842014-02-04T18:36:04.792-08:002014-02-04T18:36:04.792-08:00A friend of mine teaches middle school students ab...A friend of mine teaches middle school students about research methodology. Oh, this isn't a "technology bad, books good" course. They're quite up to date. He says it's more about teaching these kids that "research," even on the vast, wonderful internet, extends beyond Wikipedia. He says it's sad to him that, with all the research options available to young people today, many of them rarely get any further than what Wikipedia says.Lloydnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-19336675.post-59722748678294379562014-02-04T16:12:59.739-08:002014-02-04T16:12:59.739-08:00This explains an error in Miracle on 34th Street -...This explains an error in Miracle on 34th Street -- the greatest movie about lawyers ever made. All the lawyers are good guys. The prosecutor, the defense attorney, the judge. Only the psychologist is a bad guy.<br /><br />So, in the movie, Edmund Gwenn is explaining how he breezes through psych tests and he's reciting the questions from memory. Then he throws in one of his own, "Who was Vice President under John Quincy Adams? Daniel D. Tompkins and I'll bet your Mr. Sawyer doesn't know that." Maureen O'Hara and Philip Tonge (Mr. Shellhammer) are impressed.<br /><br />But they shouldn't have been.<br /><br />Daniel D. Tompkins was James Monroe's Vice President; the correct answer would have been John C. Calhoun.<br /><br />Of course there's not many people who'd remember that. Even I was very young back in the 1820s. And Daniel D. Tompkins (to do a little Walter Matthau from "The Sunshine Boys") is a much funnier name than John C. Calhoun. And John Quincy Adams fits the rhythm of the joke much better than James Monroe. So maybe they did it on purpose.<br /><br />But, now, reading this post, I'm pretty sure you've hit on the explanation.The Curmudgeonhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/14723009641287783218noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-19336675.post-8269564476085938262014-02-04T14:15:34.842-08:002014-02-04T14:15:34.842-08:00I wrote a script for a show where the main charact...I wrote a script for a show where the main character said "John Lennon once said 'there's no such thing as talent - it's just knowing how to do something.'" Our research department asked me where I read that, they said you couldn't ascribe a quotation to someone unless you could prove they actually said or wrote it. I couldn't remember where I'd read it. They spent TWO DAYS pouring through every book about the Beatles they could get their hands on trying to find the quotation. Came up empty. Finally, they said I'd have to change the line. So I suggested, how about "I believe it was John Lennon who once said..." The research dept. said "Oh, sure, you can say THAT."Steve Pepoonnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-19336675.post-35511756693167574182014-02-04T13:51:55.561-08:002014-02-04T13:51:55.561-08:00Even better, NBC during the 1980s had an in-house ...Even better, NBC during the 1980s had an in-house library at its NY headquarters. Its highlight was a deep and wonderous collection of magazines of interest to us pop culture mavens (or news department researcers). I began building my database of rock 'n' roll TV performances by thumbing through the library's bound volumes of old TV GUIDEs that reached back to the 1940s. It was almost a time machine experience -- without having to worry about parking a DeLorean in midtown Manhattan.Mike McCannhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/06369457898152250682noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-19336675.post-17426521738016931872014-02-04T12:16:31.088-08:002014-02-04T12:16:31.088-08:00If you type "is alive?" into Google, the...If you type "is alive?" into Google, the second listing is <i>still</i> Abe Vigoda's website.BigTednoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-19336675.post-17298615852345704072014-02-04T10:14:41.082-08:002014-02-04T10:14:41.082-08:00I recall scrolling through the NYT on microfiche t...I recall scrolling through the NYT on microfiche to track down some needed fact. Or filling out a call slip and waiting for a librarian to bring the necessary volume. Time consuming. Inefficient. No fun. Love the big Goog. (At least when it comes to research and reference.)<br /><br />Just wrote a post on research and reference in the cyber age with lots of links to obvious and not-so-obvious sources.<br /> http://annerallen.blogspot.com/2014/01/writers-toolbox-5-must-have-research.htmlRuth Harrishttps://www.blogger.com/profile/15246050315747917109noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-19336675.post-18046084893011988662014-02-04T09:46:32.336-08:002014-02-04T09:46:32.336-08:00Dusty Pavarotti was a baritone, Luciano was the te...Dusty Pavarotti was a baritone, Luciano was the tenor.Breadbakernoreply@blogger.com