Martini Shot

Once, a famous writer gave a talk to a lot of aspiring writers.  This kind of thing happens all the time – and not just at colleges and universities, but at weekend scriptwriting workshop seminars and writers' conferences, that sort of thing.  I've done a few myself...

I know someone who works in advertising, and on his first week on the

The people who run KCRW only give me four minutes to make these little jewel boxes of commentary –- something about wanting to broadcast the news or I don't know what –- so it's hard to fit everything in sometimes.  Most of the time it's easy, of course, because everything I say pretty much boils down to: writin's hard...

A few years ago, a friend of mine tried to fire his agent. It didn't go well. After a long, wearying phone call, in which the agent tried everything in his bag of tricks – you owe me! This is wrong!  I screwed up, I know! Gimme one more chance! This is a bad career move! -- all of them, my friend finally agreed to the thing he had been dreading – the thing that every single one of his writer friends told him, under no circumstances, to agree to...

I have an actor friend who, early in his career, attended a very popular, respected acting class. On the first day, the teacher arrived, told the class to stand up and said, "Now, each of you wrap your arms around yourself and give yourself a big, hurting hug. And repeat, wonderful, wonderful me!"

Years ago, when I was based on the Paramount Studios lot, we used to order take out  lunch maybe twice a week from the old City Restaurant on La Brea.  It's not there anymore, but I can still remember every item on the lunch menu...

A few years ago, I was working on a show and we had, as a guest actor,

You know that moment, in slasher movies, when the promiscuous teens who

Here's how I knew that the writers strike was over, really over. It