Category: Art

Talking TV Series Writing with Gene Grillo (Podcast)

Gene Grillo Part I
Gene Grillo Part II

Since 1996, Gene Grillo has been a staff writer and series editor for a variety of hit, animated TV series, including Johnny Bravo, Jimmy Neutron, and Back at the Barnyard, and Kung Fu Panda.  Like many comedy writers, Grillo began as an actor working with Second City in Chicago — a sketch comedy/improv group where performers are also writers.  Presently, Grillo is working on the new show Breadwinners for Nickelodeon.

I spoke to Gene via Skype at his home in Pasadena, CA.

Visit Gene Grillo’s IMDB page here.

Cherish the Poets and Other Heretics

Shakespeare, a poet, wrote the line “The first thing we do, let’s kill all the lawyers,” for the character Jack Cade in the Henry VI cycle, and it refers to Cade’s vision of a utopian, social revolution in which he would be dictator.  Of course, the irony is that when it comes to establishing or maintaining autocratic rule, one must first kill all the poets.  After all, nobody really understands lawyers.

The Poetry Foundation, human rights groups, and other news agencies report today that Iranian poet and activist Hashem Shaabani was executed by hanging on Monday after suffering three years of imprisonment and torture.  His crime was “waging war against God.”  There’s a reason artists are invariably among the first to be killed or imprisoned by any authority predicated on orthodoxy; and it is the underlying reason why I will never stop writing or speaking about the rights and the value of artists.  Because their work is not just content.  And while we may take the absence of orthodoxy in our own governance for granted, we should not underestimate the social or economic force of artistic diversity for helping it stay that way.

Coincidentally, I leave this month for Rome to film some documentary material with the widow of my former film professor about a man named Giordano Bruno — philosopher, scientist, and heretic burned at the stake in 1600 by order of Pope Clement VIII.  Perhaps the trip will provide new food for thought for this blog.  For now, it’s enough to say that as we debate the subtle and profound ways in which technology changes our world and  our notions of civil liberty, that we are privileged to have this dialogue in relative luxury, with the leisure of academics, and at a safe distance from people who still hang poets.

Tarantino Sues Gawker. Hellz Yeah!

I am dying to hear the rationale for this one.  According to several stories this morning, Quentin Tarantino is suing Gawker for leaking and promoting access to the full screenplay for a feature in late-stage development called The Hateful Eight.  According to the LA Times, the director says he’s depressed over the leak and is shelving the production, but meanwhile, he’s suing Gawker for copyright infringement.  The first report I read stated that a rumor was circulating that the whole kerfuffle is a publicity stunt by Tarantino, but I doubt it; and I certainly hope not.  Tarantino doesn’t need a publicity stunt.  His films, like them or not, are provocative enough to be their own publicity stunts.

There are times when copyright cases contain shades of gray, but this isn’t one of them.   What possible social justification can anyone offer for leaking the screenplay of a motion picture in development? If you think you have an answer to that, find someone to administer a dope slap because your ego is eating the rest of your psyche.  Assuming there’s nothing more to this story, what Gawker is doing is an outright hijacking of a process that represents many hours and many dollars worth of stranded investment. What journalist does that absent any actual news that serves the public?  Have we become so debauched that we think we have a right to read an author’s work mid-process, let alone a component of a multi-million-dollar product in development? Tarantino should not only sue Gawker, but the responsible parties should have to clean his house without pay for six months.

It is apt that this story breaks this morning, when the House Judiciary Committee readies to hold another round of hearings on copyright review.  Today will be focused on the subject of fair use, and we will undoubtedly hear testimony from parties arguing to expand fair use, despite the fact that the U.S. already has the most liberal application of the principle among countries who uphold copyright.  Regardless, while there may be nuance to consider in this regard, this Tarantino case serves as a timely example of the fact that certain website owners would strain the legal foundation of fair use until the only part left is the use. This is what happens when people grow accustomed to making money for doing nothing: they become self-righteous about exploiting people who actually work for a living.

I don’t love every film Quentin Tarantino produces, but his voice certainly makes its presence known in the chorus of American cinema; and the world would be duller without him.  Gawker?  Really?  It could disappear tomorrow, and what?  Where would we ever find another team of lazy-ass gossip-mongers?  Check under the nearest rock.