Last night I knocked out three final papers I have due this week. I wrote my final Dick Van Dyke Show paper on Sheldon Leonard. I was expecting to write about Carl Reiner because I freakin' adore that man, but I couldn't find the right angle for Reiner. I wanted to write about the narrative style of Dick Van Dyke, because I've noticed some distinct patterns in Carl Reiner's episodes. But Sheldon Leonard was ridiculously good at his job, and writing about how he saved the show numerous times with his God-like producing skills was easy. It was really inspiring in a strange way. The book I was reading described a scene where Leonard was consulting with Reiner about what was missing from his failed Head of the Family pilot (the precursor to Dick Van Dyke, starring Carl Reiner as Robert Petrie). Leonard had to break it to Reiner that they missed the mark with casting, including Carl Reiner as the lead. I can only imagine how awkward that conversation must have been; "You just spent a year pouring your heart and soul into this thing and its biggest problem is you. Bye now." Of course Leonard didn't break it to him like that, but my critical heart breaks it down to that. Leonard was able to convince Reiner that his right spot was as a producer/writer for the show. Reiner had never produced before, so he was wide-eyed and unsure of himself, but Leonard cited all these things Carl did with his scripts; the attention to detail, the thoroughness of a specific sight gag, everything right down to the costumes was present. Carl was thinking like a producer and didn't even know it. I know how silly this sounds, but I got a little choked up when I read that. As someone who only up unto four years ago thought he was only good at one thing (which coincidentally was acting; as happened with Reiner and Leonard), it fills me with relief that someone of whom I hold in the highest regard went through something very similar. Four years ago I didn't think I was capable of writing a screenplay. I had written comedy sketches before for speech team and variety shows and such, but never an entire 40-80 page script. Writing in prose format, as you may have noticed with my lazy sense of grammar, has always been difficult for me. Blah blah blah, I'm grateful for where I am now, yaddah yaddah yaddah, Carl Reiner and Sheldon Leonard are awesome, bloop-piddty-bloop-bloop, finding inspiration is a great thing.
I have one more final paper to write and I'm going to knock it out today. Are you ready to laugh? This is my prompt, in essence. I have to choose a specific game format (which will be table top RPG Dungeons and Dragons) and pick three different game elements from it. After finding three different game elements (which I'm thinking will be Bluff checks, racial/class bonuses, and the 20 sided dice), I need to find specific scenes from Charles Dickens Our Mutual Friend and point out where these game elements can be seen as story conventions. Bluff checks can be seen freakin everywhere because everyone in that book is lying about something. Racial and class bonuses can be applied easily because its Victorian England and the poor people are always at a disadvantage from the rich, and old money versus new money.
Can you think of any assignment more nerdy than this?
