I have figured out why most television sucks.

I have figured out why most television sucks.

This blog seems like the best place to put a realization like this one. It's not so personal that it will
embarrass me later (though it is revealing), and it's not so important that I'm thinking of writing a book
on the subject. Yet it's been running around my brain since I finished watching the new West Wing
episode last night, and a person might say that this is related to my chosen profession.

So here's why most television sucks: No one ever does anything out of character. Everyone always does
what you expect their character to do.

I was trying to figure out, while watching the West Wing last night, what the aaron-sorkin-less
difference was and at first I couldn't place it. There were still great actors, acting great. They were still
television characters discussing and debating subjects that don't usually find their way onto television.
And there was still a heart beating under all that policy discussion.

But instead of people who had opinions, they became opinions who had people. All Josh did all episode
was say it was a bad idea to invoke the 25th amendment -- so that someone could argue with him and
get the other view out. In the Situation Room, each character had their perspective and they did
nothing but repeat it, repeatedly. The acting president is cavalier. Big shocker. Toby is cranky. Will
Bailey is too smart for his own good. Suddenly instead of being people in situations, they become a
series of tics and established characteristics in situations.

Maybe it's the product of writing by committee. In order to keep a consistency of feel between different
writers they have to follow certain cause and effect rules of behavior. Josh is the political one. Toby is
the cranky one. Ross is the nerdy one. Joey is the stupid one. Chandler is the sarcastic one. (I've been
watching Friends in reruns too, and besides the odd effect that Friends is actually better to watch in the
reruns than when it is first on -- I think its the not expecting anything syndrome -- I've also noticed
that people who seemed human and complex in the first two seasons become cliched and flat without
seemingly becoming inconsistent with the characters that were initially introduced.) If the writers are
following preset rules though, how they hell do they expect to surprise us?

Well, I guess, one character an episode gets to do something. Anything. Last night, the chief of staff
gets to show how much he really cares about Zooey and he makes an unprofessional outburst in the
situation room. Not that this is hugely surprising, but I can see how a committee of writers sitting around
a table might think that its something. (Don't get me wrong; it was a nice enough moment.)

What made The West Wing good was the way in which Sorkin constantly surprised. Yes, he wrote great
dialogue and great characters and intelligent plots. But I don't think those are exclusive to him as a
writer. I think the West Wing could find writers who can write great dialogue and great characters and
intelligent plots. Sorkin knew the characters as people and let them be people. Cranky is an accessory to
a person. Ditzy is an accessory to a person. It's in the things they fight and the way they fight for them
that we see their humanness. Toby will fight for them in a cranky way, but it's what he does that
matters as much. Would a committee of writers have written the scene in which he calls the president's
father an asshole (or whatever he said)? I doubt it because the superordinates can't talk in that way to
the President. That's a rule of character that a committee couldn't break. And if they did allow it, then
the scene would become maudlin and the president would see the truth of his outburst or something. No
committee would have written "He's my father, not a Dickens character."

Ross may have been a nerd in high school, but it was when he was going after Rachel as an adult with a
job and a life that he seemed like a human being. When he's just a grown-up nerd, he is a cartoon
character. Nerd too is just an accessory to the true character underneath.

OK, I admit it. I'm a nerd too. And the fact that I spent any time at all writing this out is frightening to
me. But -- what the hell. I have this blog thing here that Ciso set-up, and I was going to write
something this morning anyway. In my defense, I didn't really plan this essay out. 8 minutes, I think, this
took me to write. Is that too long?

On Monday, September 22nd

On Monday, September 22nd, The Playwright's Center will be presenting an informal reading of my new play, Music Lovers. The purpose of this reading is for me to hear the play -- with a pile of revisions I just completed this weekend -- in front of an invited, thoughtful audience. I'm hoping to discover where the laughs are and where the confusion remains.

The Center has gotten some good, professional actors for me, and, in an odd turn of events, Ciso Lobo will be coming up here to read the part that I originally wrote for him. Should be interesting to see him playing off of Minneapolis actors.

Here's the blurb we came up with (I hate writing them but this seems all right):

When a guitarist meets a woman in a crowded bar where his band is about to play, he believes he may have found someone who can help him escape from a life he no longer wants. But when the musical genius who shaped both their lives appears, they are forced to explore in barrooms and bedrooms how hard real change can be, and how much it can hurt.

Stop by the Playwright's Center of Minneapolis Monday at 7:30, if you're swingin' through this midwestern town. The reading is free. I have no idea what a plane ticket costs.

Much love.