New Script, Old Script, NewsRadio

Old Script
I just finished translating my notes from my meeting with Jay in to a list of script problems I need to solve. I am slowly coming to understand that writing is a function of ego as well as intellect. Before I started going through Jay's notes for me, I wrote one for myself:

REMEMBER:
1) The script is a script, which is quite something!
2) The script will be a good script after I work on it.

I felt pretty silly about that note until I realized just how many problems I needed to solve.

New Script
I know it's a comedy, and I know it's about food. Now I'm thinking my next script should be about food critics.

I couldn't shake the idea that if I was going to write something funny, it should be a workplace comedy.

Anna and I were talking yesterday about My Name is Earl and we decided saying a sitcom was better-than-average was not saying very much at all. That said, the sitcoms I've actually enjoyed over the years tend to be workplace comedies - NewsRadio, The Office, Sports Night, Wings, and I am man enough to admit I liked Murphy Brown.

To combine workplace comedy and food, my first thought was a restaurant. However, restaurants have been done welll and now they're just done.

They say write what you know, and use what you have. My first real office experience was in the college paper's newsroom. There are a lot of movies set in newsrooms because they have interesting people with often conflicting goals, the basic building blocks of drama. Plus, there are deadlines, which gives everything a sense of urgency. Newsrooms are also very cheap to build unless you really do it up.

Food writers also tend to go on quests. I got started on the food fiction idea because of a New Yorker article where a guy goes to Tuscany to learn to be a butcher. Quests are great because they give a protagonist a starting set of objectives.

The next step with this idea is to "brainstorm" characters.