...will he ever win?

Weeell....if you weren't at Steve Worth's last night, TOO TOO BAD! You missed a chance to meet ace Twilight Zone writer, George Clayton Johnson (that's Steve on left and  George on the right, above). For readers who are unfamiliar with George, here's a yeoman introduction cribbed from Steve' blog, Animation Resources:

Mr. Johnson was one of the principal writers on Rod Serling’s “Twilight Zone”, writing both stories and screenplays for such legendary episodes as “The Four of Us Are Dying”, “Kick the Can”, “A Game of Pool”, and “Nothing in the Dark”. He also was the writer of the first regular episode of Star Trek to air, “The Man Trap” and the feature films “Logan’s Run” (he co-wrote the novel the film was based on) and “Oceans 11″. He was part of a group of Southern California science fiction writers that included Richard Matheson, Ray Bradbury and Charles Beaumont. He collaborated with Ray Bradbury on the story for “Icarus Montgolfier Wright”, an Academy Award nominated animated film produced by Format Films.


I came to the event with a bunch of questions for George, foremost of which was this: how does a dramatic writer fill in the details of a story without being boring? In George's Twilight Zone episode "A Game of Pool," the whole extended middle was a pool game. Now how do you make a thing like that interesting? 


The answer isn't obvious. I'd just seen the episode and there wasn't a single second where the film was less than fascinating, even though there were no fights, shouting matches, power outages or third characters. How did George keep the interest level so high? You're going to die when you hear what he said.


The answer in paraphrase was...personality...character friction...two appealing ideas in conflict...the gradual unveiling of an overriding great thought...and. of course, suspense about the outcome of the game and how the story's going to end.


Fine, I reply, but what kind of character conflict could possibly keep our interest for so long? One man's a seasoned pro and the other's a talented usurper. So what? What can you do with that, that hasn't been done a million times before?


George's answer was that I hadn't done my homework. I should have paid more attention to the human relationships on display in the street. It's not enough to characterize people as pro or usurper, or shy or extroverted. You have to try to understand why they're that way. Their outward actions are a manifestation of their inner ideas about the world. Exactly what are those ideas? What happens when those ideas are challenged? It's not anger, it's something more interesting. 


Holy Cow! When all those things come into play, the task of filling up the middle of the story seems like fun. In fact, the middle now becomes the most interesting part. Thanks, George! I'll never look at that problem the same way again!


BTW: are these theories relevant to animated comedy? Mmmmmm...maybe not exactly. Cartoon comedy has its own rules. But they're still very, very interesting, you have to admit.

February 05, 2012 10:54 PM

The pictures here are all from a different era. I couldn't find anything on the net to illustrate the particular modern fight I have in mind. Oh well, they're kind of interesting for their own sake.


Anyway, It's tough being a corner man in mixed martial arts. How do you stand out on TV and make a reputation? It's a job that everybody takes for granted...until now. I saw a fight on John's HD Net on Friday night where the corner man stole the show.



The man cornered for an African American guy...I wish I could remember the name. he was a terrific fighter, but had the handicap of being a gentle intellectual who'd rather be with his books. You could tell he deeply regretted the necessity of hurting other fighters.  He was like Ferdinand The Bull, if you know that story. The other guys on the bill all strutted in to the tune of gangster rap. This guy entered to classical music. I didn't recognize it, but it was something pastoral that suggested sniffing daisies in a meadow.


At the entrance to the ring his corner man, who was huge, turned around and began to insult the fighter. Right there on TV they got into a nose-to-nose shouting match. I'm not sure, but the corner man might even have slapped the fighter. The fighter got madder and madder, til he pushed the corner man aside and stomped into the ring, ready to tear apart anybody who got in his way. It looked to me like the corner man deliberately provoked him.

Like I said, the formerly gentle fighter was skilled, but his opponent was even better. At the round breaks the battered gentle guy would slink back to the corner where the derisive corner man would reinvigorate him by insulting him some more and throwing Gatorade in his face.

Regretfully the gentle man lost. I thought the whole drama was over, but there was one more act waiting to play out. His cocky opponent, the winner, came over to our guy's corner, put his arm around the corner man, and proceeded to chat the corner man up. I couldn't believe it! It looked like he was offering the corner man a job working for him. Our guy sat on the stool watching all this and was completely dumbfounded.

I know what you're thinking...that this was all staged to get a laugh. Maybe, but I don't think so. It looked like a real fight.

February 05, 2012 04:48 PM

When I was a kid shoe salesman was a high status job.


 The shoe salesmen were all well spoken and impeccably dressed. TV ads always portrayed them as consummate professionals. In some stores they even operated X ray machines called fluoroscopes which were specially designed for feet. I loved getting new shoes because that meant I got to look into the machine's viewer and watch my own skeletal feet.

Geez, that was dangerous radiation. I hope I don't wake up some morning with an extra head on my shoulders.


Parents had to be careful with money in those days, so they always got over-sized shoes that their kids could grow into. I guess that made the salesman's job easier.


Like a lot of kids in my time, I considered selling shoes as a possible career. Ads in magazines gave me the impression that only beautiful women bought shoes, and I was prepared to do my best for them.


I was aware of the hazard presented by dealing with beautiful legs all day. Even as a little kid I fully expected a lot of customers to throw themselves at me. I anticipated that I'd have to deflect their advances, and I was determined to do it with humor and savoir-faire. After all, a shoe salesman is a professional and must maintain a professional detachment.


I can't remember what changed my mind about selling shoes. Was it Bundy's horror stories about the job in "Married With Children?" No, that came much later. I guess I just got interested in other things, like being a pilot or a general....or a cartoonist.


 Occasionally I come across a veteran shoe salesman from the old days. These guys still dress like Cary Grant and still treat their customers as if they were lordly aristocrats. They still handle quality leather shoes as if they were marvels of technology and craftsmanship. I'm always tempted to ask them what it was like in the good old days. Ah, the stories they could tell!

February 04, 2012 02:50 AM

That's John Maynard Keynes above, the economist who popularized the idea that government intervention in the economy could prevent slumps and depressions. Keynes is one of the pillars of modern liberalism and progressivism.


That's Keynes' opposite above...Friedrich von Hayek, the Nobel Prize winning economist who believed that slumps and depressions are made worse by government intervention. Together with Mises, Hayek became one of the fathers of the modern libertarian and conservative movements.

The two men defined the economic battle of our time: whether governments should intervene in markets.


Now I know absolutely nothing about economics, but like most people that doesn't deter me from having an opinion about it. I'm a Hayek man (sort of)...though if you disagree, and have read a comic book on the subject recently, you could probably embarrass me in an argument.

If you're a Keynesian you'll probably love the book I'm reading now: "Keynes/Hayek: The Clash That Defined Modern Economics" by Keynesian Nicholas Wapshott. I like the way the author argues. At every step he digresses to explain what his opposite thinks, at least half the time fairly, and the biographical details go a long way in fleshing the ideas out.



If I were a book writer, that's the way I'd do it. You learn more from the intelligently laid-out clash of opposing ideas than from a book advocating a single idea. My own term for this type of thing is "conflict learning." This is one way I'd teach a class if I was a liberal arts teacher. I'd debate my opposite for half the class just to air the subject, then at the half way mark invite the class to participate. This could work, even for the discussion of literature.




But I digress. Keynes believed in government intervention in the economy to create demand.  Hayek believed that intervention would lead to a deepening of economic woes, which would create the need for still more intervention til we end up with a totalitarian state. Keynes thought that was silly. Look at Sweden and Switzerland...no totalitarian state there. Hayek pointed out the path taken by interventionist states like Germany and Italy in the thirties. That system was prevented from spreading only by war. I could go on, but you get the idea. The book is full of interesting back and forth like this.



Oddly, neither Hayek nor Keynes might recognize themselves in their modern disciples. Hayek is beloved by modern conservatives and libertarians, but he wrote an essay called, "Why I Am Not a Conservative," where he argued against nationalism, and laid out his belief that a culture should not be sentimentally attached to traditional ways of doing things. Keynes repudiated socialism as unworkable and believed that his system should only be applied at times of crisis when downturns in the business cycle brought about unemployment. Many of his modern disciples disagree and see government intervention as a constant. A fascinating book!




BTW: Who's the man in the cartoon (above)? He looks like both Keynes and Hayek.

Also BTW: Many, Many thanks to Kelly Toons and Jonathan Mastron for the great videos!!!!!!!! Both are worth watching.

February 03, 2012 05:36 PM

Groooan! It looks like I won't be able to avoid using a bad picture of myself (above) to illustrate this. Okay, here goes: I look a hundred years old in this picture! I look at this photo and imagine that there must be an IV stand and oxygen tanks just out of frame. How I wish the person who'd taken this had told me that when he took it. If I'd known, I could have struck a different pose, one that was more flattering.

February 02, 2012 05:48 PM

February 01, 2012 03:46 AM

What a headache this post turned out to be! This was intended to be an easy to do parody of an article in Look magazine, but when I tried to change the captions to make them funnier everything got buggered up. Oh, well.....

BTW: I just got an interesting comment from a British actor whose internet name is "Propeler." It regards a post I put up on August 11th called, "What Is the Purpose of Acting?" Here it is:

Eddie, I am a British actor, most of my career has been with the royal Shakespeare company and I work regularly on television and film. I have had a dream career so far. I have appeared regularly in londons west end, won awards for my stage work with the rsc and acted with dame judi dench, Patrick Stewart and Ian mckellen. But, I have lost all sense of joy or purpose in it. Your piece on the purpose of acting has totally reinspired me and effectively stopped me from retiring early. The job can feel so self indulgent but you have reminded me of what is great about what we do. I thank you sincerely

Wow! I'm speechless! I don't know what to say, except that it's wonderful to know that something I said was that helpful. Many thanks Propeler for the kind words.

The post Propeller commented on: http://uncleeddiestheorycorner.blogspot.com/search? updated-max=2011-08-25T01:53:00-07:00&max-results=20

February 01, 2012 03:06 AM

Hey does anybody have this issue?

January 30, 2012 07:33 PM

Most female expressions are the same as men's (above). Nothing mysterious here, just the same expressions of joy and sadness that men have, only on a smoother, sexier, more easy to read surface.

But hold on...there's some expressions that don't get on charts like this. We all know that some expressions are unique to women, so unique in fact, that men have difficulty understanding them. Let's take a look at a few.........


 Okay, this expression for example....what the heck does it mean? My best guess is that it's saying, "I don't know whether I'm attracted to you or not, but here's a low intensity sexy look to keep you interested while I make up my mind."


Or this one (above). Is that a neutral expression? Is she irritated? Is she murderous? Is she daydreaming? She doesn't seem ecstatically happy, but that's about the best I can say.



What is this woman (above) saying? I feel silly for asking since she's obviously striking a model's pose and not trying to convey a real emotion...yet there is something else going on there, I just can't figure it out.


 Here's a girl (above) who's shocked by something unpleasant that she's just seen. The basic emotion is easy to read...what makes it noteworthy is that a secondary emotion seems seems to be overlayed on it. Taken all together she seems to be saying, "Oh, my God! My neighbor's been chopped up with an axe...and, er... doesn't my horrified expression look pretty?"

Man, you gotta feel sorry for women. They're what Norman Mailer called "prisoners of sex." They're doomed to be constant spectators on their own exterior lives. It's nice to be a guy, where you can tune out that self-awareness sometimes, and just relax.


How about this picture of a friend taken when she was a teenager? It's charming and doubly interesting when you realize that no man except Robert Pattinson would ever strike a pose like that. It's a girl thing. There's nothing wrong with that; actually I like the idea that girls have their own expressions. It's just interesting that expressions can be gender specific.

By the way, some girls have their own dialects too. In the late twenties and early thirties it was what we would call today, "Telephone Operator." Today it's "Valley Girl." Girls have their own textiles, color palettes, glasses, bottled water, cigarettes, recipes, candy, philosophy, books, cable channels, movies...even their own pencils and pens.....even their own science. It's a different culture.

January 30, 2012 05:08 PM