Since writing about songwriter Leonard Cohen in my last blog, I watched Robert Altman’s film, “McCabe and Mrs. Miller,” which starred Warren Beatty and featured a sound track by our man Leonard. The theme of the movie was that McCabe lost; he lost big-time. But, in the end, he was a Cohen slash Altman slash Beatty type of hero; street-smart, guiltless, a victim of his own success.
I have never been a victim of my own success. Truth be told … I’m running out of chances to be that type of victim. It would be refreshing at this point in my career. I might rent a billboard on Sunset Boulevard: “Exploit me! Make me a victim of my own success while there’s still time! (Please, no harassing my family.)”
Ironically, I tried to place a billboard with that message on Sunset Boulevard but there was an identical one already up there.
I don’t know if I’m street-smart. At least I’m relatively guiltless. I say that based on letters from my readers, such as:
-- Dear Don: Have you patched things up with that monopolistic media giant in your area? Best Regards, Loyal Reader.
Dear Loyal Reader: As a matter of fact, no. Not even a little. Truth be told, I have this media giant’s complaint department (along with the repair department) on my speed dial!
-- Dear Don: Does everybody in your family dislike media giants? Best Regards, Loyal Reader.
Dear Loyal Reader: My Dad says the media giant’s stock is way up and that’s a good thing. So I wondered if I could like the media giant (for the way it treats stockholders) and dislike the media giant (for the way it treats customers) at the same time.
-- Dear Don: Can you?
Dear Loyal Reader: No.
-- Dear Don: Does your wife dislike media giants?
Dear Loyal Reader: Well, she tries to avoid the subject in an attempt to keep me calm around the dinner hour.
-- Dear Don: How does she do that?
Dear Loyal Reader: She suggests we turn off the world news and watch sporting events on “The Telly.” (That’s an obvious reference to The Kinks album, “Soap Opera.” In the 1970’s, British bands like The Kinks and The Who recorded albums that were mini-operas. The wife in “Soap Opera” wanted to sit around “The Telly,” eating shepherd’s pie.)
-- Dear Don: What if there are no sporting events on “The Telly” at that hour?
Dear Loyal Reader: Then we watch televised poker. Or, as Leonard Cohen calls it, “The holy game of poker.”
-- Dear Don: What’s shepherd’s pie?
Dear Loyal Reader: It’s ground beef and mashed potatoes mixed up with a few carrots and peas. I’m surprised at how many people don’t know that. And I’m normally difficult to surprise.
-- Dear Don: Can you share some other recipes?
Dear Loyal Reader: Not until I get my own cooking blog, which is unlikely, unless that billboard on Sunset becomes available. Truth be told – I had to get a third “Truth Be Told” into this blog -- I am working on a cookbook: “We’ll All Be Eating In 15 Minutes, No Matter What.”
The point I’m trying to make about writing is: our main characters must be vindicated and guiltless by the time we get to the final act, like McCabe was at the end of “McCabe and Mrs. Miller.” Sure, he had done some bad things but we loved him anyway. Clint Eastwood spent his career portraying those types of loveable, redeemable rouges. It’s like a character in a Bob Dylan song, “Jack of Hearts,” who had, “Done a lot of bad things, even once tried suicide; she was lookin’ to do just one good deed before she died.”
Even if you establish your character as a real snake, a malicious, sadistic, manipulative cretin … simply redeem him or her by story’s end. That’s all you have to do to make us love him, or her … and you.
Robert Altman directed a movie called “The Player” late in his career. The film was about not-very-talented, Hollywood sharks. (He disliked them much more than I do – he knew ‘em a lot better, too.) In response to criticism he had received -- about how some of his camera shots were too short and choppy -- he had his cameraman follow the actors around on the first shot of “The Player” for 20 minutes, uninterrupted! The first twenty minutes of the film had no stops, no cuts, no breaks! It was his way of thumbing his nose at the Hollywood establishment. And that’s always a good thing.
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