House of Eratosthenes

Was refreshing my memory about the plot events in Bartleby, the Scrivener which we were tasked to read back in tenth grade by mean ol’ English lit teacher Mr. Andersen, who hated his job and it showed a lot. This was not as onerous a task as it seemed at the time, since it weighs in at a svelte forty-five pages or so. Researchers have picked up on the idea that Melville had a hidden message here, but there’s always some question as to what exactly it might be…at least, to those establishment types who seem to always be having the final word on things, the ones who more ordinarily get to do the writing.

It is also possible that the story is unconnected to any of the speculations above and simply a piece of fiction about an unusual character who sprung from Melville’s rich artistic imagination.

Since high school, I had occasion to read The Fountainhead…before which, I was inspired to do so. Fountainhead is not “svelte” and it doesn’t exactly flow along, so I imagine the same is true of just about everyone who’s read it. Minus, the ones who are forced to do so by their mean ol’ teachers…

But, no, what Melville was trying to communicate, was & is not a mystery at all. In fact, the two stories are the same, if compared only along the periphery of the central message being so communicated. Whatever ambiguity is built into the Melville side of the comparison, is simply an elegant nuance. It is the right way to embed commentary into fiction: “Whoever is receptive will get it, and whoever doesn’t get it likely never will.”

Bartleby is unique in that the types who are in positions to comment on what it could mean, as a general rule, are the ones who aren’t going to be receptive to it. I mentioned that Fountainhead has the same message; it is, therefore, for all intents and purposes, the same story. Howard Roark would prefer not to…

Both men disliked Roark. He was usually disliked, from the first sight of his face, anywhere he went. His face was closed like the door of a safety vault; things locked away in safety vaults are valuable; men did not care to feel that. He was a cold, disquieting presence in the room; his presence had a strange quality; it made itself felt and yet it made them feel that he was not there; or perhaps that he was and they weren’t.
:
“You’re fired,” said Cameron.

Roark stood, halfway across the long room, his weight on one leg, his arms hanging by his sides, one shoulder raised.

“Am I?” he asked quietly, without moving.

“Come here,” said Cameron. “Sit down.”

Roark obeyed.

“You’re too good,” said Cameron. “You’re too good for what you want to do with yourself. It’s no use, Roark. Better now than later.”

“What do you mean?”

“It’s no use wasting what you’ve got on an ideal that you’ll never reach, that they’ll never let you reach…”

It impresses me that you see exactly the same complaint coming from people who are not “scriveners” and are not building architects…people who can make an even sturdier claim that their occupation is to be original and creative. Movie script writers, that would probably be the most extraordinary example available in our times…although that could be an outsider’s mistaken perception, since the same complaint continues to emerge from the most talented within that vocation, repeatedly.

How does Stephen King feel about Kubrick’s adaptation of his book? [“The Shining”]
Initially King was flattered that Kubrick was going to do something of his. Later he expressed disappointment in the film. “There’s a lot to like about it. But it’s a great big beautiful Cadillac with no motor inside, you can sit in it and you can enjoy the smell of the leather upholstery – the only thing you can’t do is drive it anywhere. So I would do every thing different. The real problem is that Kubrick set out to make a horror picture with no apparent understanding of the genre. Everything about it screams that from beginning to end, from plot decision to the final scene – which has been used before on the Twilight Zone”

Sometimes, the creative differences are highlighted at the beginning rather than at the end. Maybe that sounds like an opportunity to avoid lots of grief, but, in an irony, that’s when things really get messy.

Writing is a business and as the old saying implies, business is the opposite of personal. Recently, however, I’ve written something that’s extremely personal and that I want to be made into a movie. It’s semi-autobiographical, so how could I not be deeply attached to it? So even though I am practically hackish, I’m emotionally on the other side of the spectrum regarding this work. The problem is that I wrote this screenplay knowing that it would require successfully making the longest long shot in the world – above and beyond the normal entertainment industry walls that keep would-be talent corralled in obscurity. My screenplay is based on my experiences with a real life performer. I wrote her into the movie and it’s named after her, so she would have to sign off on it before it got made.

I’ll spare you the emoting and just let you know that it didn’t get past her manager. Basically, his client isn’t interested in acting right now. And that’s a real shame because this story is amazing. Anyone who knows me knows that I’m a pretty cynical guy – I call it being realistic, but whatever. Knowing that, I have so much faith in the quality of this story that I foresaw nothing but success for this script. Granted, the script wasn’t rejected per se – I don’t think the manager even read it – so this rejection isn’t a referendum on my talent, but the fact the script isn’t going anywhere is heartbreaking.

This kind of thing is all over the trivia sections in more than a few of your favorite films, if you take the time to look.

It says something that this hostility to creativity endures across the centuries. I think we perceive it through a very fractured prism because, for any installment in this saga that makes its way to our conscious recollection, the installment is narrated by one side or the other; the iconoclast who is at war with the establishment, or the establishment itself. We very rarely enjoy a “stereo” view of any one part of it. When one side of the conflict wins in the contest determining who gets to tell the tale, that side wins big. Like they said at the beginning of Braveheart, “Historians…will say I am a liar, but history is written by those who have hanged heroes.” That’s the way history works. Each chapter is told by one side or the other, and we seldom to never manage to get hold of the perspective.

Most times, the establishment wins. This is by definition. Establishments are built to prevail, and their internal workings have to do with settling conflict, on the inside, behind opaque walls, by process of elimination. In Bartleby’s case, Melville, the iconoclast, emerged victorious because his legacy benefits from a brighter luster of immortality, than any picayune play or script review. The “We’re not completely sure what he meant to say here” thing, is the establishment’s attempt to get even. At least, that’s how I see it.

I’ve had occasion recently to read a lot of stories about the legacy publishing houses, dirty accounting tricks pulled in the movie industry to avoid paying percentages of net (the “net” magically vanishes behind fees, licensing, and advertising costs that are nothing more than imaginary line items), the draconian terms of many recording contracts in the music industry… you hit it on the head. When it comes to the gravy train, the actual creator – the person whose imagination fathers all of these works – is often treated like a hobo hiding out in an open boxcar. Reality is, the author’s the one who laid the damn tracks across the wilderness.

Even though it’s a very small thing, I’ve always really liked the way British television series handle the actual credit. When the title cards run, you always get “STORY” by “WRITER” up-front. In American entertainment, the writer of a television episode or screenplay often winds up getting the brush-off, unless that writer also produced and directed. Even a casual movie buff can rattle off dozens of famous directors through history, and possibly a few big-time producers. How many screenplay authors have that status? How many of those also happen to direct their own work (Tarantino, the Coens, Woody Allen, Mel Brooks), or are otherwise known primarily for something other than writing – such as the blacklisted writers of the 50’s like Dalton Trumbo?

Now, take a long-running British TV program. I’ll use Doctor Who, since I happen to be a fan. The writers of those get front billing, the directors often have to wait until the end of the closing credits. As a result, I can rattle off names like Robert Holmes, Terry Nation, Terrence Dicks, Russell Davies, and Steve Moffatt, without being able to pick a single director out of a hat. Heck, for a long while the actors themselves didn’t get billing until the closing credits, only the writer/creator got up-front notice.
- nightfly | 06/01/2012 @ 08:59

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Memo For File CLIXFriday, June 1st, 2012

Memo For File CLIX
Friday, June 1st, 2012