Wired on Hollywood's Elite Message Boards

superflippy writes " Wired journalist Ben Mezrich gets the scoop on the online forums that film producers and other Hollywood heavyweights use to "track" the buzz on spec scripts, actors, writers, etc. "The tracking boards are the herd mentality gone digital," says one tracker. This helps explain how dreck like Kangaroo Jack makes it to theaters."

Comments

Hollywood Execs are a bunch of Trolls

[sulli]

Clearly these execs are just overgrown kids with too much time on their hands wanting to mess with each other. In normal parlance, they're Trolls.

As everyone knows, a certain well-known site has a similar problem. Yet with the magic of Zoo, trolls can be banished with just a few mouse clicks! And as we all know, now slashdot is perfectly free of such ill-behaved creatures.

So the obvious answer is for Hollywood to use slash! Blacklist the Trolls, and we'll get better movies.

So true...

[MrCaseyB]

I read this guys book "Bringing Down The House" I enjoyed every page of it. I read this article he has written about hollywood fuckwits, and it all seems farely believable.

Having to work around writers and executive producers and other people in the industry is a drain. You will never find a group of folks more full of shit. I completely agree with the article in that all the movers and shakers in the industry run on fear, constantly looking around to see what everyone else is doing.

Kangaroo Jack

[Dr_LHA]

This helps explain how dreck like Kangaroo Jack makes it to theaters.

That said Kangaroo Jack made money. It grossed $65 million in the USA alone, which matches its budget. Add in foreign releases and DVD/VHS sales/rental and you have a profitable movie. So what was wrong with it again? Oh yes - it was crap - but you know hollywood is a business.

missunerstood problem

[twitter]

The problem is NOT that Kangaroo Jack "makes it to theaters". The problem is that someone has the power to shove it onto everyone's screens while other quirky stuff never gets filmed and the vast majority of things that do get filmed never see a screen. The article's author gives us, "The truth is, I don't belong here. I am not a Hollywood player." The real truth is that there should be no such thing as a Holywood player. Theater owners should be independents who are able to pick and choose films suited to their own audience. In reality, some dorks in LA make a playlist.

Par for the course.

[CleverNickName]

Having to work around writers and executive producers and other people in the industry is a drain. You will never find a group of folks more full of shit. I completely agree with the article in that all the movers and shakers in the industry run on fear, constantly looking around to see what everyone else is doing.


We're discussing this at Fark. Here's what I had to say there:

Ben's experience matches up EXACTLY with what I've known to be standard industry practice for as long as I can remember.

We used to joke that there was one guy, who'd get drunk at a restaurant and spout out movie ideas (it changes as things go in and out of style -- in the 80s it was Spago, in the 90s I think it was the Viper Room. I have no idea what it is now, as I attempt to claw my way back up to the "b" list.) The joke went that there were execs from all the major studios, and they'd only hear flashes of the conversation, like ". . . asteroid . . . earth . . . big summer movie . . ." and we get two or three movies that are exactly the same.

The worst thing about this article is that Hollywood will see it, and they'll add Ben to the "we hate him because he doesn't play by our rules" list, and Bringing Down The House will never get made.

Which REALLY sucks, because I was hoping to score a part in it.

A friend of mine (who is now an indie director) worked on "Batman and Robin."

The horror stories he told me about the insane wasting of money on actor crap would make you explode.

The budget for actor garbage -- workout rooms, personal chefs, personal assistants, personal drivers, groomers, and all that useless shiat -- was THREE MILLION DOLLARS.

We made Neverland for less than 50 grand, and even THAT was a ton of money to me. (I'm not an investor, just an actor, in that picture.)

Jane White Is Sick And Twisted, which is coming out on DVD in just a couple of weeks, was similar in budget . . . and I'd wager that both of these movies are more entertaining, and more watchable than Batman and Robin.

Yeah, Hollywood is fucked. Royally. The big media conglomerates (you can't even call them 'studios' any longer) have co-opted "independent" as a marketing device . . . but there are some real indie studios out there, with people who love the material, love the process of bringing it to life, and create great work. It's just hard to find right now, is all.

As for Ben's movie? I'd DIE to play Kevin, but a part that big will go to someone who is currently "established," who can "open" a movie. (By "open," I mean that they can get people into the theatre based on their name alone.)

Kevin's character is asian in Real Life, IIRC, but they'll change that for the movie, and you'll see someone like Matt Damon (if Hollywood is smart, which they're not so we'll probably see someone who's a lousy actor, but on a "hot" series right now. I leave it to you to fill in the blanks on that one) in that role. Which he probably won't take, because it's too similar to "Rounders," which leaves it wide open for me!

. . . to lose out to some guy who's hot right now.

But Dealer #5 is all mine, baby! ;)

This is why they keep making drek like "Kangaroo J

[Mike McCune]

"This helps explain how dreck like Kangaroo Jack makes it to theaters."

Hollywood will keep making dreck as long as it makes money.

BOX OFFICE SUMMARY FOR "KANGAROO JACK"

Box Office Total: $65,708,774
Box Office Opening: $16,580,209
No. of Weeks at #1: 1
No. of Weeks in Top 10: 5

BOX OFFICE HISTORY
Week Rank Wkd. Gross Theaters Per Theater Cumulative
1 1 $16,580,209 2,818 $7,770 $21,895,483
2 2 $11,548,247 2,848 $4,055 $35,112,415
3 4 $9,048,362 2,848 $3,177 $45,886,113
4 7 $6,105,250 2,848 $2,144 $53,035,263
5 8 $3,953,199 2,535 $1,986 $58,954,899
6 13 $1,988,368 1,742 $1,141 $61,901,888
7 17 $1,363,485 1,545 $883 $63,609,564
8 19 $772,413 1,110 $696 $64,691,137
9 23 $352,060 615 $572 $65,478,341
10 44 $108,774 216 $504 $65,708,774
Box office cumulative figures also include daily grosses from Monday through Thursday (not shown).

Re:I don't believe this...

[JordanH]

Joel Hodgson's (of MST3K fame) relates a similar story in his brief biography:

Tartikoff's office contacted Joel, and offered a starring role in a new NBC sitcom. They sent him the script for the pilot, and after reading it, Hodgson turned the part down, telling Tartikoff's people it just wasn't funny. Perhaps predictably, the executives mistook Hodgson's complaints, assuming they were just a bargaining ploy. Their response was to offer the role to Joel again, at triple the amount of money they'd first offered.

That was the proverbial last straw. Hodgson was appalled that the executives could not grasp the notion that he would turn a project down purely on its merit and that no amount of money was going to get him to change that stance. Of course, he refused the offer, and in a few months he was back in Minneapolis, declaring he was quitting comedy.

(Incidentally, the series, called High School USA, which Hodgson astutely pegged as "a Fast Times at Ridgemont High rip-off," was one of Tartikoff's most notable failures. Three episodes aired before it was yanked from NBC's fall schedule.)

Hollywood types just don't get it.

Who cares? We care.

[gad_zuki!]

>. Entertainment is an industry, they produce what sells.

I wouldn't say that, even though, objectively its correct, but let's face it - we are obsessed with Hollywood. We complain when a bad movie gets released. Doesn't that seem a little odd? Its just taking up space at the local 20-screen cinema, its not like we're forced to watch them at gunpoint.

A movie critic is a respected international job. Why? The TV and the internet are constantly telling us who Julia Roberts is dating or what Heidi Clum wore last week in Paris.

I've divested in Hollywood long ago. I catch the occasional movie and am stunned at how many commercials I have to watch, how much I have to pay, and the how "movie people" simply act like little children when they don't get that perfect movie they were hoping for.

The best thing I did in a long time was buy a Tivo. I now have almost no connection to pop-America, have no idea who "hot" actors are, don't see commercials for crap like "Celebrity Justice," etc. Yeah, I sound like one of those, "I dont have a TV" people, but you know what, they make excellent points. You simply can't see the forest from the trees if you grew up watching TV like I did.

It would be nice if Hollywood would just make art, but it collectively decided long ago that the celebrity star system serves it well and people don't seem to complain much. Heaven forbid we see actors, musicians, and TV-people as our peers and not saints we hope someday will sign our chest with a sharpie at Barnes and Noble.

I love how concerns over real events that affect us, politics, the war, etc made the oscars look like the cheap industry backscratching it truly is. Who wore what? Who cares. Take your little statue and go home.

The nice thing about the internet is that media people have suddenly become real. Reporters have blogs and *gasp* they're trying to make their way through life too, even though they can occasionally get a quote or two from someone holding a powerful office in government. The most common thing I heard when Wil Wheaton's blog hit critical mass was, "Oh, he's just like an ordinary person. We were so mean to him." Or "I'm a dude who wrote some software, enjoy" compared to "Mega-corp announces its newest proactive and innovative product for PC consumers, this revolutionary...."

I think Hollywood's celebrity system is more or less destined to collapse due to the egalitarian aspects of cheap/free information. I'm not going to bother to provide supporting links: (im sure you've read these stories) TV time has been interrupted by internet time, the RIAA is losing sales and indie labels are experiencing a small boom, linux is in the enterprise and kicking ass, fans petition or even pay for quality TV episodes, access to lots of different news brings balance to national tunnel vision, etc.

I really hope my kids grow up in a society in which the self-important PR and other celebrity BS are seen plainly as lies. I hope they don't go crazy over the latest fads because J-Lo was seen wearing something similiar at Spago. Or even how to explain to them why adults can pay 9 dollars to see something like "Kangaroo Jack." I hope my generation looks crazy to them, because we probably are.