Welcome to the week where I review Amateur TV pilots. This competition was held exclusively through my weekly newsletter. To make sure you’re aware of future writing contests and opportunities, sign up for the newsletter here.
Genre: TV pilot – comedy half hour.
Premise: An unlucky-in-love American man inadvertently ends up becoming a Chinese Mail Order Groom.
About: A few hundred TV pilots were sent in. My assistant and I went through all of them. These are the five I chose to review. There was a lot of competition for the last two or three slots. I could’ve easily substituted in a dozen scripts. But these are the ones I chose to go with. My hope, as always, is that we find something great.
Writer: Alberto Valenzuela
Details: 27 pages
Off the wall Scriptshadow Choice For Doug: Donald Glover?
People always ask me: “Why does Hollywood continue to make all these crap movies?” “Why don’t the studios take more chances?”
The reason the studios don’t take more chances is because they don’t have any competition. There’s no one else out there making giant effects-driven movies besides them. Which is why all these movies either literally or virtually recycle old been-there-done-that ideas.
On the flip side, the reason TV has gotten so good lately is because the big 4 networks don’t control all the original programming anymore. Cable networks have loads of original programming to offer. And it’s forcing that world to be more creative, to take chances. With Netflix in the mix, the game is REALLY changing. I love how Netflix CEO Reed Hastings said, “I want more content. If we’re not coming up with some huge failures, we’re not taking enough chances.” Holy shit. When would you ever hear THAT from a Network??
And he’s backing it up, too. My favorite new show, Orange Is The New Black, is about a female prison focusing heavily on the racial politics and rampant lesbianism that goes on inside of these prisons. Not sure NBC would’ve green-lit that.
Which brings us to today. The reason I picked this pilot was because the first 10 pages had NOTHING to do with the main character. I’ve just never seen that before. I don’t know if it can be done, if one of these networks would allow that. And because we’re talking about taking chances, this lit a fire under me. I was in!
Darcy Fitzgerald is about to get on a plane when it hits him all at once. He’s leaving the woman he loves, Veronica. And by the powers that be, he can’t do that. So he leaps out of line and darts through the airport. Airport Security snags him. But when he tells them the story of his lost love and how they’re meant to be together, they change their tune and clear a path for him.
The cab driver does the same. When Darcy tries to pay him, he says “No.” He couldn’t possibly profit off of love this perfect. Even Veronica’s protective roommate melts when Darcy begs her to let him see her. She relents and informs him Veronica’s out on a date. So Darcy runs to the restaurant, confronts the love of his life, apologizes for ever even THINKING of leaving her, and PROPOSES to her, right there in front of everyone! Unable to resist the man she’s fallen so deeply for, she says yes. YES, she will marry him. Everybody claps! After which…
TITLE CARD: Darcy and Veronica lived happily ever after.
TITLE CARD: Probably.
TITLE CARD: Who knows.
TITLE CARD: Who cares.
TITLE CARD: This isn’t their story.
At that moment we meet Doug. Doug is the man sitting across from Veronica, her date. Doug is the main character of our story.
To add insult to injury, this Darcy guy came right before the food was served. Which means Doug is starving. So he wanders into the city, eventually coming upon a hole-in-the-wall Chinese buffet, with no one at the register. He heads to the back room, where the owner is conversing with a live Chinese woman via a virtual porn site. The man explains that he’ll make food for Doug, but that Doug must keep the woman entertained in the meantime.
Doug doesn’t really want any of this but the man doesn’t give him a choice. Once he starts chatting, the girl’s porn pimp comes onscreen and starts yelling at her. Doug tries to stop him but the man won’t shut up. When Doug gets really upset, the man offers to stop only if Doug gives him money. He tells Doug to hold up his credit card, and to stop him, Doug obliges. After that strange interaction, Doug gets his food and leaves.
The next day he’s kidnapped by a strange man, thrown on a boat that sails to China, and bussed to a gas station in the middle of nowhere. It’s there where he re-meets the quiet Chinese woman he met online. He’s informed that he was paid to become her husband. And that he now will live here, with her, for the rest of his life.
I loooooooved the first ten pages of Mail Order Groom. After those ten pages, I knew that I was including it in Pilot Week. I thought: This writer is hilarious.
However, after that opening, Mail Order Groom started heading in the same direction as China, south. What was so great about that opening was that it was fast-paced, a fun story, and had an unexpected ending. I wanted to see more of that. Instead, I often found myself confused.
For example, I had no idea why an intelligent person in this day and age would give a random person (particularly a person affiliated with porn) their bank account number over the internet! And because they were yelling at a person? That didn’t make sense.
I also didn’t understand why this person in China was paying Doug to come be this woman’s husband. Do all women in rural China have 10gs to drop for an American husband? Some of you may point out, “But that was the logline, Carson.” I didn’t read any of the loglines when reading the pilots. I would just go straight to the script. I wanted the writing to speak for itself.
I mean it would probably make a better sit-com if this woman was in a really dangerous situation in China and, to save her, Doug paid for her. She then came to America and he was basically now married to this woman that he didn’t even know. At the very least, that would make sense.
Another issue I had was that those last 20 pages didn’t pull anything from the first 10. It was a completely different story. Not that it’s a necessity, but you’d like to create some sort of connection between the opening and the rest of your story if possible. What if, for example, after Doug is screwed over, he just shakes his head, gets up, and walks out of the restaurant. It turns out this happens to Doug ALL THE TIME. He’s the unluckiest man in love ever. Every single way you can imagine losing a girl, it’s happened to Doug. And that’s the show. Following the dating life of the unluckiest dater in history. Yeah, it wouldn’t be as risk-taking as this idea, but I’m not sure this current idea makes a whole lot of sense.
Yet another problem I had here was that the script got sloppier as it went on. I’d read sentences like, “As you say, we’ve pasted the middle of nowhere,” and references to shows like “Locked up aboard” (instead of “Locked Up – Abroad”). Whenever I see this, I know the writer isn’t trying hard because he hasn’t even read through his script enough to notice these obvious mistakes. Before you send a script to anyone, you should go through it at least 50 times.
For this pilot to work, Alberto’s going to need to put a lot more thought and effort into it. On the thought side, he has to be sure that all the actions that are happening in the script actually make sense. Your supposedly intelligent lead is not going to give a sketchy Chinese guy his bank account number over the internet. And people in rural China need to have reasons for buying an American husband besides the fact that it sets up a fun situation for a TV show. As far as effort, that’s the one thing there’s no excuse for. Effort needs to be a given on everything you write. As soon as a reader senses you’re not giving 110% effort, they’re through with you.
I’d encourage Alberto to keep writing. The opening was great. Take these lessons learned and use them to become a better writer on your next script. Good luck. :)
Script link: Mail Order Groom
[ ] what the hell did I just read?
[x] wasn’t for me
[ ] worth the read
[ ] impressive
[ ] genius
What I learned: Alberto made a classic mistake. At the end of his submission e-mail, he says, “Overall, I just want to get a laugh.” Now obviously, whenever you’re writing a comedy, that’s what you’re trying to do. You’re trying to make people laugh. But I call this approach “Scriptus Relaxitis Syndrome.” It’s when a writer convinces himself that because all he’s trying to do is “get a laugh” (in a comedy) or “scare someone” (in a horror script), that he doesn’t have to try hard. It’s like he’s giving himself permission to not put as much effort into the script. And what do you know? As this script continued, that’s exactly what happened. It got sloppier and sloppier. A comedy or a horror script is no different than any other script you work on. You need to obsess over every little choice, every little joke, every little sentence and comma, until you believe you’ve put forth your absolute best. Never settle for anything less.
