And then actors discovered that if they put their moving images on celluloid they could entertain people in vast numbers, bigger than could fit in the largest theatre. In fact they could appear, simultaneously, in more than one place at once. What was once a small loyal fan based suddenly stretched into an army of desiring-philes, romantically swinging towards a preference of those on-screen over those who lived in their street, went to work and school with them.
But not all of these fans could make that vital distinction. If a man on screen shot another man, the story goes, he could risk being assaulted, or his hand shaken, on the street. But have things changed? In our sophisticated new century the sound of gunfire rocks the rarefied world of the screen actor when a fanatic realises he came all the way to meet his hero and the man he meant was just a man.
As a veteran of some forgotten war feels more comfortable in the company of another of his kind, the actors gathered together to maintain the common bond. One of the most select areas of Los Angeles was one of those locations. Hollywoodland, home of stars and studios.Go out of your home, walk a little, and turn up at work. Could it get any better?
These actors exist to keep us entertained. With the addition of special effects, from a spacecraft taking off and smacking firmly into the eye of the face on the moon, which reacts with open mouthed shock and indignation, to a fifty-foot ape shaking men off a log into a ravine, to a man turning into a wolf, in an ordinary London flat, sprouting hair, and the crack of an elongating jaw,spaceships the size of cities blocking out the light, the occupants of Hollywood (shaking off the ‘land’ early on, due to ordinary, normal ageing rotting it away, proving even the high and mighty become dust, even only by proxy.) took the world in it’s stride and held it tight and gave us all a reason to wonder.
And from the actors base, came other careers, you didn’t have to be in front of the camera to be loved, admired, lusted after, put in danger. The directors. names as famous as the actors, have a fan base not as large but more loyal as any actors. Even producers, a position created to clean up the mess the director had made so it’s fit for putting on screen, are looked up at with respect and admiration.
And they were unstoppable, the greatest combination. The directors put everyone in the right mood and position. the producers snipped and cut and made it all fit, reigning in the director’s dream to make it paletable to the largest audience. The special effects people, using pen and paper, positioning tiny models step by step, step, photograph, step, hours and hours, now putting a scene onto a computer screen and generating just the right imagery. The army of workers with exotic names like best boy, gaffer, grip, sculptor of corpses,
the dressers, the make up people, the caters, all work together.
And all to project that most rare of beings, the actor. Those at the top, on the A list, fight to remain in place while those because of their listing, less likely picked for the bigger, more ambitious works, are sneered at for having that most humbling of labels, the B list actors.
Without the actors, there would be no films, those people stunned by the doings on the big screen, or reduced to laughter at the antics of someone on a more private home entertainment systems, would have nothing to do.
Above them all, the studios. Powerful, faceless constructions, once ruled over by one man, a dictator who could kill a film, withdraw funding, break and actor, replace a director, and even forget the producer exists, now taken over by the more democratic dictatorship called a committee, who can kill a film, withdraw funding, break an actor, replace a director and even forget the producer exists.
But wait a minute. . .
Haven’t we left someone out?
Who is the main protagonist in all this? The one who, if she didn’t exist, would leave directors waving at nothing, producers sat at their desks, glum and without reason, the special effects people with nothing to work on, the whole workings of a screen production?
The one, who, with a union of his comrades, has done what zealous puritan types have wanted to do for decades, reigned the ambitious, unstoppable dream-juggernaut of Hollywood in, and threatened to bring it toppling down where it will shatter and remain, with people streaming away from it in a way that only biblegod could have dreamed up as punishment for his rebellious, stiff-necked people.
The writer.
That’s it.
Without the writer there would be nothing at all do work on, no Hollywood, no actors, no directors, all would have no reason to live.
The Writer’s Guild Association, the militant union with the Shakespearian sounding name, is destroying the film and television industry. Now, I’m only going off myself, but writing is mostly a solitary profession, inhabited by people with their heads down, working alone. Human interaction is looked upon as an intrusion in their own created world.
But somehow, somewhere, down this line, some writer looked at their pay cheque and compared it with the cheques of the actors, producers, etc, and realised,
WE ARE BEING CHEATED.
And they got together, and they decided to go for it. And they are winning. With their actor allies, they are making the studios pause and take notice. The biggest casualty so far is the Golden Globe awards has been reduced to a meeting of people who, without writers to tell them what to say, rambled on without making much sense in the way all the denizens of the Industry would.
And the studios are afraid. No one will break the impasse and work independently. And without input of any kind, the cash well is running dry, the nightly repeat is becoming a regular event, and more than one film slated for production has been put on hold. These mighty democratic dictatorships, who would kill a film, withdraw funding, break an actor, replace a director and even forget the producer exists are being made to reconsider.
Which just goes to show, every point that gives the film industry a reason to cling on has been washed away.
Or rather dried up and shrivelled due to lack of refreshing script material.
Come on, admit it. All of you. I’m a writer and I feel for my comrades over the ocean, short changed, treated like inconveniences, told to wait outside while the grown-ups talks and at last the facts are being exposed and the most vital one of all;
YOU ARE NOTHING WITHOUT US!
