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Sunday, December 12, 2004 Because he's getting into TV, my friend Rick Marin-- aka "The Cad"-- has zeroed in on the notion of a "quote." Everyone in TV has a "quote." "What's his quote" means "what's he charge to write a script/pilot/whatever." Obviously, the size of your quote depends on your experience, your talent, whatever the market thinks you're worth. The guy writing the pilot for Housebroken: The Possible TV Show, has a pretty high quote, it seems. He's a co-EP (Executive Producer, aka top writer) on "Malcolm in the Middle," and has been on that show-- a hit show-- for 5 years. H'es writing it over the holidays, but I don't feel sorry for him. The amount of money he's getting is shocking, staggering, more than I could make in three years he makes in a couple of weeks. All I can say is: I hope it's funny. And I have a good feeling about it being funny, anyway my fingers and toes are crossed. I may pray. When my producer-friend Scott Schneider told me what this guy's probably gonna get, I thought, "Jesus, am I ever in the wrong game." I mean, I'm funny. This blog's not meant to be funny, just random thoughts, but when I put my mind to it (and yes I do try to be funny) it can be funny. I wrote a script for a show called "Yummy Mummies," starring the goddess Erica Ehm, and after a bit of a fasle start-- a complete misfire, actually, total rewrite, man was my first draft off the mark-- the exec said, "Hey, funny, I laughed out loud." All for $500. And I count myself lucky! Actually, in the middle of the abortive, misfired first draft, I got a call from a CBC Radio producer, let's call him AB. "Hey can you write a 3-minute thing for us about how everyone wants to be a teen these days, including those younger and older than teens." Perfect topic for me, because I have an 8-year-old son who already acts like a teenager-- he takes a break-dance class, he calls me "dude," wears baggy pants, looks and acts like a skateboarder-- and I look and act like a teen, too, I'm told. Why not? Being a teen is great. V. authentic part of a person's life. It was said of WB Yeats (and I said this in the radio piece) he was an eternal adolescent until he turned sixty, at which point he became the "eagle-eyed old man." Yes. Perfect. That's just the way for a man to age, I feel. A perfect topic for me to write a short piece about. But I was right in the middle of writing something else, and with three little rugrats nipping at my heels, I only have a certain amount of time and energy every day, and I told all this to AB, who said, "Well, you know, what do you think, can you do it?" And I said "What do you pay." "I'll have to ask my boss. But you know, it should be worth your while, I think." So I set aside the other thing, worked on the radio piece, got up the next mornign at 5:00 a.m. to get my shit together to go to the CBC at 6:30, voice the fucking thing. Came home, my day shot-- I can't function on five hours sleep anymore, I'm getting old-- despite the skateboard sneaks and adolescent attitude-- and anyway yadda yadda yadda, in the end he paid me like a teenager, too: "Well, normally we pay $112 but I managed to convince my boss to bump it up to $125, since you did it on short notice." Radio. "Hey, you guys gotta get realistic, this is the 21st century, dude." "I know, it's frustrating, I was a freelancer once myself..." I told him, in the free-flowing stream-of-venting-frustration that followed (gentle, and not aimed at him, I knew he was just a flunkie, sent by delivery boys, to deliver a message) that I am not a "freelancer," I refuse to even be called a freelancer, because it implies I'll do shit for a lousy C-note, and that the experience had at least taught me one thing: henceforward I would have a "quote," for any less than which I refuse to get out of bed. (Certainly not at 6:00 a.m.) No longer will I ask "What do you pay?" I'll say, "Here's what you charge." Everyone has a quote. My friend Scott, doc film maker, tried to get...uh...Stirling Moss?...old-time race-car driver?-- to voice a doc for him, and Striling Moss said "I don't think you can afford me, old chap. My rate is $5000 a day." From that point they dicker and bargain, but the point is Stirling Moss doesn't ask, "What do you pay?"-- that's for suckers, he has a quote. I need a quote, too. Though my friend Liz says I should just be humble, say yes to everything, be open to the, uh, nudgings of the universe (and also eat a lot of nuts and drinking unsweetened cranberry juice) and she is a woman of great Scottish wisdom, so I consider her point of view, too. Maybe in the end I learned...absolutely nothing. I'm kinda glad I did it on the other hand. Lotsa people listen. "That could be the tipping point, Dave!" Liz says, "You never know what's gonna be the tipping point!" And I *still* wanna be famous, more famous than I am, anyway, I don't even argue with this part of myself, it is simply a blind instinct, like sex, to argue with it is pointless. But at this point I'd settle for being *respected within the industry.* I don't have to be known outside them. As long as I have an enormous quote within the industry. Which industry? Just all the fun ones: books, TV, movies, magazines. The storytelling industries. I just want to rule them all. That is my humble ambition for the time God has allotted me on this earth. Maybe I'll fail but I have to try. Notice how I don't even mention Christmas? My radio is quacking about christmas right now, but.....My aphorism about Xmas is: "It's one day." Until then, back to work, Cratchit! People who spend all of December thinking about Xmas should get more compelling work, I feel. "I'm strictly business, just like EPMD..." With love, D. p.s. getting a little puppy today. A "Schweatzen," half Schnauzer, half Wheaten terrier. Don't tell my kids, though, if you bump into them today. It's meant to be a surprise. It's sad, and a little pathetic, I think, how much I'm looking forward to having this dog in our house-- a house that already contains two adults, three kids, two cats, and a snake. Probably, more than anyone, I need to get a life. But hey: you're reading this.
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