Argo and see it

It seems to me one of the toughest hat tricks to pull off when you’re making a movie based on a real-life incident is building suspense when the audience already knows how it ends.

In fact, that used to be my joke when anyone said they were going to see Passion Of The Christ. I’d say, “Want to know how it ends?” I love that joke – if they ever re-release the movie I may resurrect it.

BAM! Thanks, I’ll be here all week. Tip your waitress.

Back to the point.

When a movie’s able to pull it off well, to make you forget the actual real life outcome and root for the ending, it’s downright miraculous. The ones that do it well, movies like Apollo 13, Miracle, Thirteen Days or JFK, are rare.

The reason I mention it is I saw Argo for the second time this weekend. It’s an outstanding picture, and Ben Affleck – already one of my favorite directors - is batting three for three. Not a lot of people knew about the clandestine operation by the CIA to get the six hostages out of Iran disguised as a movie crew during the height of the hostage crisis. But once the publicity machine started, everyone knew it was successful.

Despite that knowledge, the suspense is breathtaking. You’re literally on the edge of your seat.

At the end of the film, during the credits, the actors are show side-by-side with the real life people they're portraying. If there was ever a film that made the argument for a casting director Oscar, this would be it.

After a long, summer drought of movies I've wanted to escape from, it's refreshing to find one I want to escape to again and again.

The Shithouse Poet

One of the jobs of a copywriter is to find exactly the perfect words to describe what you’re talking about. Revision after revision, you rewrite, hone and whittle the copy down to turn the precise, interesting phrase to perfectly describe your subject.

When you get there, you know it instantly.

And when someone else comes up with it, you know that too.

I have a writer friend of mine I’ve known coming up on twenty years. He’s a writer of some renown in the business, and we’ve worked together as well as crossed paths at a number of agencies over the years.

This one agency we worked at decided to bring in a creative director to bolster its creative chops. So they brought in a guy originally from one of the big cities in California. I won’t say which one.

But it’s known for, among other things, sourdough bread, a bridge and cable cars.

Anyway, this creative director fancied himself a renaissance writer. He'd made his reputation with two big successes: drinking before eight in the morning every day of his life, and making sure no one he ever worked with in that California city remembers him in a vertical position.

I kid. I kid because I love.

Actually the award-winning, nationally recognized work he did for a sparkling water account and, at the time, a brand new car company is where he made his mark. He had a folksy style he thought was appropriate regardless of the account he was working on.

He also had a deep baritone voice he decided would be the voiceover for all the radio and tv we were doing on every account.

Someone thought very highly of himself.

I was talking to my writer friend one day about this creative director, and my friend called him the "shithouse poet."

I was crying I was laughing so hard. It. Was. Perfect. In two exacting words, he'd captured the essence of who this guy had been, was and would always be.

I'm still in awe of it.

Sometimes, out of nowhere, the phrase pops into my head. And when it does, it brings me as much joy as the first time my friend said it.

Sparkling water, cars or anything else, I'm pretty sure the shithouse poet never described anything so perfectly.

The impossible dream

Tossing and turning, bathroom runs and a dog that picks 2 a.m. to bark at nothing. Whatever happened to a good night’s sleep? I can’t even tell you the last time I had one. I can tell you I’m not alone.

Everyone I know is walking around in this fugue state brought on by sleep deprivation. I don’t have a friend who’s getting the rest they need and deserve. What makes it worse is since I’m awake so much of the night, I have plenty of time to sit there and remember a time when I could just hit the sack, and log about nine or ten hours in what would seem like the blink of an eye.

Not anymore.

The result is a never-ending state of this low level exhaustion which I’m pretty sure can’t be good for me. I think I need to stop checking my iPhone every few minutes, turn off the television before midnight and quit drinking a glass of water before I go to bed. The brain waves have to be slowed down (although many people who work with me would argue they’re plenty slow already).

The other problem is it seems when I finally hit my best sleep, the one where I’m dreaming and really down deep, it’s time to get up.

So much of life is timing.

If catnaps were an option during the day I’d definitely do it. I’m at the point now where, even if I can’t have it straight through, I’m going to take my sleep where I can find it.

Come to think of it, I have three meetings tomorrow.

Better remember to bring my pillow.

Humerus ain't it

The top step strikes again.

When you come visit our house, there's a winding, brick walkway from the sidewalk to our front door. You climb four stairs from the street, then two more at the front door.

Those last two are the ones that get you.

A few years ago I personally tripped on the top step, went flying into the door jamb and cracked my head open. When I got to the ER, because the head is so vascular, I looked like I'd been at the scene of the murder. After a quick exam, the choice the doctor gave me was stitches or staples. I took the staples. I thought it would be some high tech piece of equipment that seamlessly and painlessly stapled the wound together so it could heal quickly. Not so much. It felt like a Swingline from Office Max.

Medical technology isn't nearly as sophisticated as you'd hope.

Anyway, last night, the top step claimed another victim.

My mother-in-law had picked up my daughter and was bringing her home. My daughter went into the house first, and Grandma was behind her when she caught her shoe on the top step and went flying into the door jamb with her full weight propelling her. She hit her right side hard, and broke her humerus bone just above the elbow.

The x-ray above isn't hers, but it's about what her injury looks like.

She's 85 years old, and tomorrow morning she'll have surgery to repair her arm. Then both her and her dog Barnabus will stay with us a bit while she recuperates.

Her outlook is good and she's in good spirits. Her blood pressure is 120/70, and despite her age she's never taken a pill for it a day in her life. Plus her side of the family usually goes to around 100, give or take.

Essentially what I'm saying is the door jamb didn't try hard enough. It's going to take more than surgery, healing and physical therapy afterwards to keep her down. She's going to be around a long, long time.

Which is exactly the way we like it.

Radio radio

Yesterday I was talking about radio with my pal Rich Siegel, author, owner and grand poobah of Round Seventeen. In one of my many business schemes, I asked Rich why don’t we start a radio production company. We’re both good writers with lots of radio production experience. It seemed like a win-win to me.

Rich replied, “Who pays for radio anymore?”

Thanks pal. Here’s my balloon –pop it.

Of course, he’s right.

For starters, there’s not a lot of radio being done, and what little there is certainly doesn't have any money – real money – thrown against it. Agencies usually just hand it off to the juniors, or the interns because they pay them even less than the juniors.

In most agencies, radio is considered the bastard stepchild to, well, to just about every other media. Maybe it’s because good radio is so hard to do, but many writers suddenly seem to get swamped when a radio assignment is up for grabs.

I’ve never looked at it that way.

The fact is, for the most part, the agency leaves you alone when you write radio. It’s not that high on the glam-o-meter, so you can usually fly under the radar and write some pretty fun stuff. But let me go back to an earlier point: good radio is hard to do.

There are of course basic rules to writing good radio. But if you've listened to any radio commercials lately, I'm sure you'll agree there need to be more.

Here are a few I’d add:

First, no more spots where the listener is eavesdropping on the recording session, and then the talent realizes they’re recording.

Next, no fake stand-up comedians with bad fake material and fake canned laughs.

Then, no more spots where the talent is talking about a sale with another talent, and suddenly there’s a door slam sound effect and the first talent says something to the effect of, “I guess everybody’s going to the (CLIENT NAME HERE) sale!”

Even though many writers use them, filler lines have got to go. You know the ones I mean. Lines like “so what’re you waiting for?” or “Hurry in now, the only thing that’ll be gone faster than these (PRODUCT NAME) is this sale.“

Lastly, the direction “more energy, have fun with it” must be banned from all recording sessions. No real person is that happy about having to take erectile dysfunction pills or diarrhea medicines.

This isn't the first time Rich and I have talked about starting a business. Just a few days ago, he suggested we start a deli.

I thought it was a good idea. Obviously, since we work in agencies, we already have enough baloney to stock it.

Where cars go to die

Let me give you a gift, my own cautionary tale about why you should never buy a car at Carmax. It doesn't originate from buying one there. It comes from selling one.

I used to drive an Audi A6. Of all the cars I've owned, it was my favorite (my least favorite was my first - a 1965 Plymouth Fury, don't get me started). I'd get behind the wheel of my A6 and hit the curved freeway onramp by my house at 70 mph. It stuck like glue. After all, it was a car built for the autobahn. I’ve since tried it with my Lexus ES350, not exactly the same experience. (The picture below is an actual picture of both cars - can you tell there's a certain look I go for? I know it's hard..)

Anyway, one day I was on my way to work at Dentsu in Brea to work on Suzuki (remember my motto: the checks clear). While I was stuck in gridlocked, rush-hour traffic, I looked to my left to see a ton of white smoke billowing up. My first thought was I wonder if the car next to me knows that’s coming from her car. Then I looked forward, and saw more smoke coming from under the hood of my Audi. Fortunately I was close enough to an off-ramp to get off the freeway quickly.

It’s amazing how fast traffic will let you through when they think you’re on fire.

Come to find out I wasn't actually on fire: I was on fire adjacent. There was highly flammable transmission fluid leaking onto the catalytic converter, which runs at about 1500 degrees.

I managed to get the A6 back to my independent Audi mechanic in Long Beach, who told me the only reason I made it without catching fire is my speed was blowing the fluid off the bottom of my car. Long story short (if that’s even possible at this point), it cost me $3500 for them to fix the transmission well enough to get my car to run without the “check engine” light long enough to get it over to Carmax.

Now, here’s the thing with Carmax. Before they make an offer, they do a thorough inspection and test drive of your car. Apparently, mine passed with flying colors. That in itself may be all you need to know about Carmax.

So how much did they offer me? You got it. $3500. I broke even, which, just like when I'm in Vegas, I consider a win.

I miss the A6 often - usually when I'm hitting that onramp in the Lexus - and I hope Carmax just took the car for parts and didn’t sell it to anyone. However it is comforting to know they're there if you have to unload a car fast and get it off your hands.

And by the way, they don't carry very many hard-to-find makes and models. I'm telling you this because if you're at Carmax in the next couple of weeks, and you see a '97 Saab Turbo you think you might be interested in, do yourself a favor and pass on it.

It's not important how I know. Trust me.

The early signs

When my son was younger, much younger, I gave him a set of children's story books my parents had given me. Bound and colorful (the books, not my son), they were filled with the classic stories we've all grown up with. The set of books sits on his dresser, which is what he happened to be cleaning last night as he decided to attack the living ecosystem that is his room.

Going through the books, tucked between Little Red Riding Hood and Jack The Giant Killer, he discovered a couple of handwritten pages. The big surprise is that they were handwritten by me, a long time ago in a galaxy far away.

When he brought them out to me, there are two things I noticed right away. First, not bad handwriting for a 5th or 6th grader. And second, that short, clever, memorable headline that brings a smile to your face and tells the whole story in six carefully chosen words:

Pitcher Throws Himself Out of Baseball

I have some vague recollection of writing for my elementary school newspaper. And because, once again God proves he has a sense of humor, I was assigned to write about sports. In this case, the self-imposed retirement of Sandy Koufax.

It's hard to pinpoint when we first display a knack for what we'll be doing later on in our adult life. Whether it's growing up to be a fireman, doctor, politician or Dexter, the early signs may go undetected until the potential is realized.

Also, I never set out to be a writer. I was a Hollywood kid - I wanted to be an actor. I just didn't want it enough.

But it's funny where we wind up, and interesting to look back and see that even then, maybe, I had a bit of a knack for it.

The other thing I like about it is my son now has a bit of dad history as keepsake. It's not digital. He can hold it in his hands.

Perhaps years from now, after I'm long gone, late at night when he's thinking about me, he'll take it out, slowly read it, and with a slight smile on his face and a tear on deck, sigh deeply and think the only thought he can have about his old man after reading it.

"I can't believe they wanted him to write about sports."