Wow, so I got a few personal emails this morning about the last post and how it “inspired” some of you, and here I thought I was just bitching and moaning about all the rules and regulations of “how to”. Just kidding, I was sort of complaining, sort of saying get off your duff and write something brilliant and stop thinking so much. THANKS for the messages. I am just saying, you have to do it, and not worry so much. Worrying to a writer is the worst kind of cock blocking to a player-don’t even allow it to happen.
NOW:
On the lines of inspiration, sometimes we need to hear from our heros, and not just the Johnny Cashes of the world-because we all know that musicians have a whole different life than the rest of us. Even the tragic life of a musician is somehow more sexy than the sad, lonely, depressed, life of the struggling writer-let’s face it, no on ever tossed their panties on the stage of a hit ‘shot in front of a live audience’ sitcom.
I was watching the very first episode of Two and a half Men, this morning-researching the funny- and saw this vanity card from Chuck Lorre. What I love about this particular one is that while I have always thought Chuck-you know I say Chuck like we are fast and steady BFFs hanging out breaking stories every weekend sipping over priced coffee in Malibu-I always think of Chuck as someone who never fails and every piece of writing he does is brilliant. Well here is the truth, told in a funny way-cuz you know he is a comedy writer-but still the truth, makes him a little more human, and lets us know that we all fail, and even when we are top showrunners we will continue to fail and fail big, and fail repeatedly until one day we don’t, then the network cancels us and it starts all over again.
Read this, be inspired, write your heart out, keep up the hussle, and ENJOY!
CHUCK LORRE PRODUCTIONS, #108
When Dharma was cancelled my heart was broken. Over the next few years my efforts to mend it by creating a new show led to an even deeper emotional nadir when I noticed that I had somehow become the author of a seemingly endless succession of failed pilots and pilot scripts. This was not a big enough string of stinkers to lower AOL-Time Warner’s stock price (that had already been done by people more incompetent than myself), but my ill-advised attempts at heart-mending were sufficient enough to cause people in suits to not look up from their cobb salads when I ambled into the WB commissary (in Hollywood even has-beens amble). But I was indomitable. I kept writing… and failing… and ambling. And then, about a year ago, my good friend and favorite cross-to-bear, Lee Aronsohn, told me he needed to write something fairly quickly in order to keep his Writer’s Guild health insurance. Everyone — friends, agents, execs — told me not to get involved. They assured me that I was too big, too successful, for such a partnership. You see where this is going. Lee and I wrote “Two and a Half Men.” Which brings me to the glaringly obvious spiritual lesson in all this. How do you mend a broken heart? The Bee Gee’s never figured it out, but I did. You help a friend keep their health insurance from lapsing.