The Three Worst Scripts I've Ever Read (In No Particular Order)

These are in chronological order starting with the first one I read to the last. 1 and 2 I read as an intern. The second I read as a gainfully employed person, though that didn't make the experience any less painful.  Not even my "I'm Getting Paid to Read This" mantra helped.

1. The one with the Cow Abortion.
   
   I kid you not. After reading a script fille dwith gratuitous violence, uncertain motivations, and bad writing, I realized it was about these two guys who make moonshine during prohibition and sell it to gangsters. Somewhere between old-timey car chases, pointless standoffs, and caricatures of mobsters, they take the time off to--for no reason that I can tell, and no build up to this moment--abort a cow's fetus by sawing off its legs in utero one by one. All six of them.
   
   Here's the best part about this script. Are you ready?
   
   It's actually being made into a movie. (Though at last check, the director said the movie had 'fallen apart.' 3 guesses why, only one of them counts.)
   
   
2. The one with the guy who works at a fertility clinic and replaces the donor sperm with his own. He's then shocked when women start showing up with red-headed babies because...he didn't expect that to be a consequence of his actions? In addition to his surprise at the facts of life, the mothers want to return their babies. Because they didn't 'order' red heads. I'm not joking, this idiot stoner guy ends up with around 18 red-headed babies that the 'executive business women mothers' didn't approve of--the implication being these women are so career-oriented they couldn't find a man to answer their biological clock so they bought 'designer babies' and then decided to return them like badly-matched drapes once they'd given birth and the children didn't meet their expectations.
   
   BUT WAIT!  THERE IS A TWIST! 
   
   Turns out the guy who ran this fertility clinic was actually inseminating his clients whit HIS sperm so when he catches his erstwhile employee replacing the samples (this stoner kid was apparently trusted with 'vetting' all of the samples), he doesn't really have a leg to stand on.  Oh, and the hot doctor totally falls in love with the stoner and his 18 babies.
   
   The End.
   
3. The one with the father/daughter incest. Chinatown this was not.
   
   This script refused. to. end. None of the scenes were longer than a page. That's like having a book comprised of 100+ 'chapters' that are each about a page long. There's no flow to the story, no cohesion, and NO SENSE. None of the characters had any discernible motivations. The father--who rapes his daughter twice and then attacks her with a broom handle once he finds out she's pregnant--vacillates between creepy systematic predator and sulky depressive woobie who has these uuuuuurges he can't control. HIS DAUGHTER TAUNTS HIM, OKAY?
   
   On top of this, all of the female characters are indiscernible from one another, falling into one of three groups: the daughter (who has no personality to speak of and spends her time doing an impersonation of a mopey Kristen Stewart), aggressively pro-life Catholics, and mildly sympathetic people who hide the daughter from her father. The thing is, I still have no idea who knows about the abuse, who suspects, and who is oblivious. Writer, your word of the day is: Consistency. Please to be having it.
   
   Ugh. I need brain bleach.
   
   Thought the true tragedy of this is that my summation up there makes this sound better written than it actually is.

Truthfully, the most mind boggling part is that these scripts were submitted by people. Someone read each of these and went "This should totally be made into a movie! Let me call up all the people who I've met in the Industry and send it out because they HAVE to see how great it was and want to make it!"

Also, please note that I cannot properly convey how truly badly written all of these scripts were.  You'll just have to take my word for it.

o.O

It's alive!!

Yes, yes I am! And things have been crazy. I officially have a Master's degree from one of the most prestigious universities in the country, arguably the #1 school in the world for what I want to do. What does that mean?

Nada.

No, really. It means nothing other than I paid lots of money to meet some really cool people. (Okay, it's more complicated than that, and I really do like the people I met through the program, but let's not mince our words, K?)

But in the time since I last posted, I experienced my first bout of how crappy people in this industry can be. I accepted an internship with a brand new company that was a really good job prospect. Four execs in the office, a burgeoning TV side, looking to expand to about 20 people within three years. Seemed like a great first job with the possibility of expansion. And the execs, who liked me, would say things like "we want to put you on the payroll," "you could have a niche here," and "we want to hire you." So graduating-me is all excited.

Only once I graduate, I get "finish up your internship and we'll help you find a job." Um, EXCUSE ME? WTF mate. What happened to "we want to hire you"?? Yeah. So I speant a couple of days being angry, then decided to take a much needed break and go home for four weeks, with a stopoff in Texas to go to my best friend's sister's wedding. Sometimes the answer is to get the hell out of LA. Because the moment I got back? Job interview Thursday, hired on Friday, started on Monday.

With some place that didn't include a crazy receptionist/assistant who hates me. But more on that later, I have plenty of Internship Horror Stories to start updating with. But hey, at least you know this story has a happy ending!

End Game. Yo Gano.

The final leg of the Peter v. Alex e-mail chain, because he FAILS AT LIFE.

Since Peter decided to bring Monika the Intern Boss into this, I decided that made her fair game. I tried to get her to send Peter and e-mail with a 'message' from the Association for Bad Taste, Inc. attached, but that was a no go. But what finally happened was just as good. While I was just standing at Peter's desk, Monika came up and told him she was really upset, someone had forged an e-mail and she was on her way to talk to HR. She did it very convincingly, and I just kind of looked like the bemused intern. So this is what happened after:

From: Alex
To: Peter

Yo gano. So there.


FWD MESSAGE-------------------------------------------------

To: alex c
From: Z, Monika
Date: March 12, 2008 2:21:32 PM PDT
Subject: FWD: A request for Help

Alex,
Do you know anything about this?

FWD MESSAGE-------------------------------------------------


To: Monika Z
From: sec@aobti.org
Date: March 11, 2008 1:21:32 PM PDT
Subject: A request for Help

Dear Ms. Z--

Good day, madam. I know you are totally unfamiliar with our organization (begin one of the fortunate people blessed with impeccable good taste), so allow me to inform you about our organization/support group. The Association of Bad Taste, Inc. has as its president the member with the most aggressively bad taste; so you can understand why Peter S was unanimously voted president back in 1999. He's been our most consistent and unchanging President in recent history; people think he's actually become MORE suited for the job as the years progress. So you can understand our concern when he disappeared two days ago, taking our most rancid dead baby poster and our signed copy of Rico Suave's Gerardo. We contacted one of your coworkers, and Alex Creswick, but she seemed to think you might have a better idea of where he is. So if you see him, or have any way of getting in contact with our beloved Prez, please e-mail me as sex@aobti.org . We're quite concerned; rumor is he threw his argyle couch away, which would just be tragic.

(And I apologize for the repeating images of Vanilla Ice in the background; it's President Peter's second favorite after the dead babies.)

Sincerely,

Lemonjello Shithead Tallywacker, the First
Assisting Bad Taste Everywhere (and to that end, Peter S)

[background images removed: error code 00666 have some humanity]

---

From: Peter
To: Alex

Wow. Well played Crez. The war has begun. Meditate on my next move, I will.

Did you really forward this to Monika? Is that why she thinks someone doctored her email?

---

From: Peter
To: Alex

Apple emailed me today. At first I thought it was just spam, but soon realized it was personal. Check it out…

From: Danny.Dillenhoe@apple.com
Sent: Thursday, March 13, 2008 2:24 PM

To: S, Peter - Comedy Central
Subject: Consumer Alert!



Dear Mr. S,

Although our records indicate you’re a PC user (and a perfectly happy one at that), we would like your assistance with a frequent and delinquent customer of ours, Alex C. According to our records, C has purchased every new product we’ve put out, regardless of its usefulness or need. For example, she willingly purchased one of our new thin notebooks, even though they don’t do shit and you can’t even put CD’s in them. I mean, really, who would buy a whole computer that you can’t even insert CD’s into? We here at Apple readily admit we enjoy ripping the public off by offering machines sufficient in looks but seriously lacking in substance. However, we don’t ever intend to rip off the mentally handicapped, and how Ms. C managed to gain access to a credit card to buy all of our lame products, we’ll never know.

We would like your help in convincing her that it is not necessary to purchase EVERY single Apple product on the market. We appreciate her enthusiasm and all, but we really can’t keep up with her demands. If you’re able to convince her to chill with the Apple shit all the time, we promise you a free second generation iPhone. (after mail-in rebate)

Thank you for your time. I hear you have a beautiful mind.


Kind regards,

Danny

---

From: Alex
To: Peter

Weak.

Fun with Internships

So there's this Assistant here at CC who I like. A lot. (Note that by like I mean he's awesome and fun to be around. Not the 'let's make BABIES kind of like.) We joke around all the time, and I mock him and he tries to mock me back but his mocking needs serious work. But we've started trading these great e-mails. I've decided to share the last few of them. One thing to note...we have a running argument about the merits of Star Wars: Episode 1-3


From: Alex
To: Peter

Paradoxical things:
Military intelligence
kind of pregnant
naturally artificial
peter's brain
anarchy rules
hasten slowly
good grief

---

From: Peter
To: Alex

Things that are awesome:

Old & new Star Wars movies

Dallas, Texas

Pete S.

Rocks



Things that are lame:

New Indiana Jones movies

The south

Alex C.

Muppets

---

From: Alex
To: Peter

The Association of Bad Taste, Inc just sent me an e-mail.

FWD MESSAGE-------------------------------------------------

To: Alex "I Wanna Be Like Her" C.
From: sec@aobti.org
Subject: Searching for our Prez

Hello, as you know we here at the Association of Bad Taste, Inc. has as its president the member with the most aggressively bad taste. Yesterday, the Minister of Plaid Couches reported that our President, Peter S., went missing. There was a rumor that he was beginning to understand how bad Episodes 1-3 were, but we steadfastly refuse to believe that President Peter could ever develop anything approximating 'good taste' or 'discriminating judgment.' We hear you work with him, any updates on his whereabouts? And I apologize for any offense the background of this e-mail may give; I'm told the majority of the people out there think dead babies on spikes aren't funny (but the President Pete LOVES my background, so...).

Word to your Mom,

Lemonjello Shithead Tallywacker, the First
Assisting Bad Taste Everywhere

[background images removed: error code 00805 distasteful]

---

From: Peter
To: Alex

That’s so crazy, because strangely enough, Monika sent this email to me a little earlier today:


From: Z, Monika
Sent: Monday, March 10, 2008 1:07 PM
To: S, Peter - Comedy Central;
Cc: Sharp, Jim
Subject: The interns

Hey Pete,

So I was wondering if you could give me your assessment of this semester’s interns. I’m always so unsure of how they’ll work out, it’s always good knowing what a bright, intelligent and striking fellow such as yourself thinks. I think I did pretty good hiring Holly and Allison, and the new guy Joe seems to be pretty good, but I admit to striking out with Luke, and ESPECIALLY with that Alex girl. I’m not sure what the hell I was thinking. I tried to fire her, but she threatened to drop a piano on my head, so I quickly told her I was just kidding. I think she bought it, but I still walk around outside paranoid, constantly looking upward. Do you think I should write a company-wide email apologizing for the horrific hire? Let me know, you have such a beautiful mind. Just like Russell Crowe.



Best,

Monika

(Note: Monika is the intern boss)

I Got Dicked.

As in Andy Dicked. He had a meeting in the CC office today. I just happened to be filling in the assistant position on the desk of the main contact person, so it's my job to go see to it that everyone gets ushered into the correct meeting room, ask if they'd like anything to drink. Well, the man's 30 minutes late, calls up on his way in the elevator. Turns out, he's got a camera crew with him and wants to mike Gary (m'boss). So I'm thinking...OK, that's fine, we'll see you when you get up here.

So I get the call. Andy Dick is here, finally. So I go out there and BAM. Camera in my face as soon as I walk out the door. I'm totally taken aback by this, because I wasn't expecting a CIRCUS. But there are two cameras, each with their own mini-crew (that's like, 6 people each or some ridiculousness), three people in Andy's entourage, and four people camping out in the hall. So I go over to find out which conference room we're in, Camera goes back to defcon1, holding pattern. But it's LOUD. There are like 12 people in our tiny waiting room. So I'm standing up there, and say..."Um, Hi? Hello people?"

ZOOM. Cameras at defcon5!

So I start herding the cats, Andy's channeling his diva persona (because from what I understand he's a pretty cool guy when there aren't cameras on). Sits down. He wants a water 'room temperature.' This is totally planned. Fat hanger-on wants a diet coke. Cool, I can do this. I slip out a grab a couple of waters and a coke. Fat Hanger-on doesn't want a WARM diet coke. He starts complaining. I'm just vague and say I can look for a cold one (even though I KNOW that we only have a regular cold coke). He asks me if I drink soda warm. I said, of the soda I drink, sure. He looks at me like I'm making this up and asks me what kind of soda I drink. Well, that's obvious. Cheerwine. He's dumbfounded, going...What the heck's cheerwine? Well, for anyone who has ever HAD Cheerwine, cheewine is simply Cheerwine. You either know it or you don't. (If you don't, sucks to be you.) And I wasn't inclined to explain the intricacies of Cheerwine. I simply told him No, it's not 'wine' (We're discussing SODA here buddy) and said I'd look into a cool beverage (after Andy decided he wanted the warm diet coke, go figure.) So I made my escape, signed a release, and let everyone else suffer through the pitch.

Reality TV sucks.

The OC Girl

So the other day at my new internship, I'm given a script to read. It's a very funny script, great premise for a show, and we're in the process of casting it. So my supervisor gives me this script and tells me to come up with a list of people to cast in it. All of the main characters are supposed to be lithe and in their 20s (except one with pig-like features which I pretty much ignored). So I have about an hour and a half to read this script, track down some feasible actors to play the roles, turn it in and then go home.

Casting isn't as easy as it seems.

There's this whole universe to casting, and movies and TV exist in very separate worlds. I'm more invested in the movie world at the moment, though I'm familiar with a few of the up-and-coming TV stars, I couldn't tell you who's creating buzz at any given time. So this makes my job that much harder. So I really spent an hour combing IMdB thinking "What teen/young adult shows are now defunct, and whose actors aren't currently working?" Not the complexity of the requirements.

1. You need actors who have resumes; you don't just entrust your entire show to random new people.
2. They need to be available; i.e. out of work. Which due to the strike, may open up certain possibilities...
3. They need to match the characters (i.e. pretty people who look 20)

So it's harder than it sounds. But lo and behold...about 97% of the pretty OC people aren't working. So using people who have only done multiple guest spots and been in 5+ episodes, I pulled together a list of Pretty People Who Might Work. Not bad for an hour's research I think. I fill up a page with names for the 3 lead characters, just a 'look what I did in my hour, it's a crappy list but whatev' list.

So I turn my list into my boss. She looks it over and goes, "Oh. You must really like the OC." I looked at her askance because NO and said..."Actually, I've never seen an episode. They're just pretty and available. But for the main hero guy, that dude who played Bryce from Chuck would be perfect." So she smiles at me, says thanks AND THEN SAYS: "Awesome, I'll e-mail this to everyone."

.
..
...

WHAT?!

Good bye, fair Internship

As my internship with Sunshine Cleaning draws to a close, I reflect on some of my favorite moments, starting with my goodbye from Lesley.

Lesley: Hey, I'm leaving, so let me say goodbye.
Me: Oh, thanks for everything! Keep in touch!
Lesley: Yeah. Call me when you're 21 and I'll buy you a drink.
Me: I'm 22.
Lesley: Oh. There ya go.
exunt

I remember picking up lunch orders, which in and of itself seems like a fairly innocuous task. It is not.

Like the time I went to this cafe, where we eat rather frequently, and stood in line for my pick up. I handed the worker my boss' credit card. Said worker wandered off, then returned and asked me how I wanted to pay. I assured him he already had my credit card, and it would be GREAT if he could go ahead and scan it and give it back. Only he's LOST it. As in, it's not in his pockets, it's not in MY pockets, and it is no where to be found. And I'm holding about 8 people's lunches hostage while this IDIOT is trying to figure out how he lost a credit card. He called about 20 minutes later to say he'd dropped it on the floor and would we please come pick it up at our convenience. Ass.

I remember calling every tea and coffee shop in the greater Los Angeles area searching for Grace's Irish Breakfast Tea. The one and only place that sells it in the entirety of California was out. We had to special order it from the distributor.

I now know what brands of tea, chips, cookies, beverage, and fruit everyone in this office likes.

But all in all, it was a good time. And our movie got in to Sundance, so not a bad way to start things, na mean?