"America isn't easy. America is advanced citizenship. You gotta want it bad, 'cause it's gonna put up a fight. It's gonna say "You want free speech? Let's see you acknowledge a man whose words make your blood boil..."
- President Andrew Shepherd in The American President written by Aaron Sorkin.
UPDATE: Full transcript of Aaron Sorkins comments. He thinks I'm disgruntled!
Aaron Sorkin hates my Aaron Sorkin loving guts. OK, maybe not my personal guts but the collective guts of everyone in the sketch comedy troupe, Employee of the Month, of which I am a member. You see kids, it all started innocently enough back in November when we put on a little show in Los Angeles that parodied Studio 60, Sorkin's new drama series about an SNL-like sketch comedy TV show.
At the time it seemed we all really wanted to like the show and some of us even did, including this humble columnist/actor. But the one thing we all agreed on was that the comedy sketches being featured were terribly unfunny. We weren't the only ones that shared these sentiments and as we heard through a very short grapevine similar thoughts were coming from some of the cast on the Studio 60 set. One of the producers heard what we were up to and thought it was a great idea.
We quickly whipped up 45 minutes of material that poked fun at the show-within-a-show sketches and then went on to flesh out some of the other writing ideas mentioned in the series. To tie it all together we threw in some ongoing jokes about the 'Sorkin style' (lot's of swift walking and talking) and some over the top parodies of some of the main characters (a very drunk Jordan McDeere, etc.)
We do our show, we get our laughs, and we go home. But alas the end was not to be.
Fast forward to Christmas Day when an article appears in the LA Times entitled "Comedy writers aren't laughing about '60'" featuring a few quotes from EOTM's very own Megan Lynn describing our recent show and why we performed it. Who knew people would actually read the paper on Christmas Day? People did, including Aaron Sorkin himself.
Find out what Aaron Sorkin had to say after the jump.
A few days ago Sorkin responded directly to that article and (as my fellow EOTM member Paul Ryan pointed out) several entertainment writers were quoted, including Emmy winning writer Ken Levine (MASH, Frasier, The Simpsons). Sorkin, however chose to single out our little comedy troupe:
From LAObserved.com:
"She interviewed [a member of the Los Angeles improv group] Employee of the Month, and if you look at their web site, you'll find that most of them are unemployed," Sorkin whines. "And we were nominated for a Writer's Guild Award as well."
Well you're right, none of us have a WGA although I do have a National Children's Film Festival award, do you Mr. Sorkin? HA! Also my friend Megan would like to set the record straight on the whole job thing. I mean one or two of us have jobs. He then goes on to dismiss the whole concept of blogging.
From The Oregonian:
"An enormous rise in amateurism," Sorkin said of the blogosphere. "And everyone's voice oughtn't be equal."
So free speech for everyone except those without Emmys, money and Lexi (more than one Lexus)? This seems a bit contradictory to all the First Amendment loving Sorkinisms that have soaked into my head after years and years of watching The West Wing. Isn't blogging the sort of leveling of the playing field that gives every man a voice in the democracy Sorkin has always preached about?
This isn't the first time Aaron Sorkin has publicly blasted bloggers and I wonder if he is getting us confused with something else.
Aahhh, lazy little Meerkats. OK, this one was funnier in my head.
Now at this point I want to reiterate that I am a huge fan of The Sorkin and respect his writing tremendously. The West Wing and Sports Night are among my all time favorite shows but I was a little surprised by his response. Plus as I am pursuing a career in acting and would cry like a hypocritical baby porpoise if I ever got on Studio 60, writing this column may not be the smartest move. But this is exactly the sort of thing Aaron (and my amazing parents) has taught me to do. Crap, I'm never going to work in this town again. Off to Bollywood I go.
Employee Mike says:
Well check out what he did to me.
http://blog.myspace.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=blog.view&friendID=27245080&blogID=219405859&Mytoken=665C9A14-C09B-4E79-8292C9FE392AB8E153146288
Will B says:
I'm bored at work...is that relevant to the article? I didn't read it. Sorry!