The Road to Nower: Part Two – The Project

Now this will be hard for some of y’all to believe, but there are people working on projects in Hollywood that have absolutely nothing to do with me. Why anyone would want to work on a venture that I am not part of is a blog for another day.

One such person is Joel, my Death and Taxes co-author; and one such project of his (among many, many projects) was directing and co-writing the musical Fellowship! This hilarious spoof on the Peter Jackson Lord of the Rings movie is so entertaining that I actually paid to see it several times.

Now, don’t get me wrong, I am willing to see friend’s work multiple times, as long as it doesn’t require any outlay on my part. It has to be good before I start shelling out the dough – I may be a friend, just not that good of a friend.

Fellowship! not only garnered the L.A. Weekly Best Musical of the Year award, it was a sold-out crowd pleaser every place it played.

And Grammnet is working with Joel in getting the little show to New York.

Not long after our pitch of Death and Taxes to them, Joel was hanging with the Grammies (hmmm, I wonder if they hate being called that) talking Fellowship! business. He was reminded of how much they enjoyed the pitch, and the sorrow at not being able to sell it.

Now the folks at Grammnet are whip-smart, and they know the biz called Show. (They are behind the hit Medium. Most shows follow a simple formula: let the actors be pretty and the story be cute. Medium allows the actors to be grounded characters and the stories to be smart. Risky in its simplicity.)

Joel, realizing that he has the ear of the whip and the smart, takes the opening and asks point blank for help in finding a show that the biz might not only find funny, but also sellable. Joel threw a handful of ideas out there, and the Gramma (hmmm, I bet they would hate being called that too) pointed out one that he thought would sell – the one sentence that would eventually evolve into Middle of Nower.

Now all Joel had to do was take his one sentence pitch, and create the story to go with it.

I would have to come up with another name for people that work at Grammnet. (Grammnetians? Ooh, rhymes with… Oh, never mind.)

Next: The Idea Becomes Fleshy

Just my thoughts,

Sean

PS Medium is a show about a, well, medium. If you don’t like shows about mediums, one need not read tea leaves to know that this show may not be your cup of tea.