THE WRITERS STRIKE
by Eddie Pepitone

So here goes again. Another sitnspin piece, time to pretend that I am connected to some greater reality so that when I read the piece at the comedy central stage it will carry some weight. The writers strike has just begun so I am wondering if I should be writing. The writers strike is the greatest excuse for people with success issues to stop trying to write. Writing is so painful to me. I think a strike is a great idea. I never want to write. I always feel so inadequate with what I put on paper. I read all the books on writers block by writers and to sum them all up they basically say- just write moron! Just write ! Tell your inner critic to stop trying to murder you. Your inner critic is an amalgam of people who want you dead- parents, teachers, lovers, friends- all the people who don’t want you too succeed. Just tell your inner critic that you have listened to what it has to say and now I am going to the King’s Road coffee shop to write my sweet little ass off and become a big fucking star who hurts people with their fame. That’s basically what these books say.

My two cats are so in love with me , and I with them. My girlfriend a true friend is also with me. I don’t have a care in the world except for very little money and shitty health.

I spoke to a republican friend who is in the writers guild. He picketed at Paramount today. Now he is on labor’s side. Asswipe. Ahhhh the writers strike. I just see some terribly skinny guy who writes for 2 and a Half Men with axe handles in his car ready to rumble, or some nerdy woman who writes for Heroes with a molotov cocktail or 2 in her knapsack, ready to toss it at the scabs. The writing staff of Carpoolers has already clashed with Pinkerton writers at CBS Radford. The showrunner was hit over the top of the head with a failed pilot presentation by one of the pinkerton strike breakers. I kid the writers because I feel so beaten down by Hollywood . I have only been here for 5 years, but as they said in the Shining “ you’ve always been here Mr.. Torrence”. I had visions of coming here and being wildly accepted by people in the industry. What I have found is it is very cliquey high school shit. Casting agents , fellow comics, the whole of the industry just hires their friends basically. People constantly gossip about each other in a mean game of fuck you and your family. I huddle in my apartment going on websites that have message boards that rate comedians- it makes me feel dirty. I see all the pretty actresses in town on auditions dressed like whores for a few lines on CSI Cold case. Even worse is to see how the actresses are dressed for commercials- fuck me and I will do an antacid commercial. Whores we all are. I thought I would be one of the people with a little power with a little pleasure, a little comfort. I am not one of those people. I remain true to my Brooklyn / Staten Island working class roots- always on the outside looking in- angrily.

I once read some academic article on comedians being dangerous because they sit on the periphery of society- they are outsiders. Well the guy who is making a good living on 2 1/2 Men is not as dangerous as me. I bitterly go to the coffee bean at sunset and argyle trying to write a screenplay. But with little money coming in and a manager who could care less about me because I am bringing nothing in to her coffers, I feel rejected and alone and abandoned. Does that make me dangerous or pathetic? When I go to write I am just angry at all the shit that gets shown across America and who gets lauded.

Adam sandler and his ilk. I have a couple of friends who work for him now and they are talented guys who now have sold out in a big fucking way. But who the hell am I kidding? I would sell out in a second. Give me a commercial campaign , I don’t care what it is. I would be the spokesperson for nuclear weaponry- “hello I’m Eddie Pepitone, you see these warheads behind me? They get a bad name, it’s not the warheads that kill, it’s misguided despots. Buy nuclear weapons today. Give me a big part in a sandler movie.Mr Deeds and Billy Madison fuck each other in the ass on their first 50 dates. I’m there. I want to be accepted and greeted by the crew when I come on the set- “hey eddie that was some funny shit you did in that scene yesterday. Adam really liked it. Looks like your part of the team. Apatow was on the set and he’s thinking of using you in his next opus about teenagers. “ I want to smoke a cigar in the hills, come down to the places where the commoners go and know that they saw me in the movie that just came out- the new comedy that was so good and that I was so funny. Instead I have my laundry piled up in my small studio apartment , I pick animal cards to guide me through the day, today I have picked the kangaroo, fuck the kangaroo, I hate that card. I have CNN on with Wolf Blitzer talking about the unsettling upheaval in Pakistan and how they have nuclear weapons and it’s a very dangerous time for us all.

It’s always very dangerous in Hollywood . The largest polarized city in America- the wealth differential between rich and poor the most staggering in l.a. The rich in Malibu and the Hollywood hills vs. the poor immigrants and actors and valets and gangs all co-exsisting in a tinderbox of stifling traffic and wildfires and drought and nasty smog and tremendous unrelenting sunshine that has driven so many people mad that they had to flee back east to get some clouds and healing rain back into their lives. I believe that’s what happened to Francis Farmer. This writers’ strike better not make the staff of Two and a Half Men mad. I see the greed by the studios, the producers the rich and powerful who do not want to relinquish their power that they have held for so long, for so long… so many of us poor people have committed suicide, gone batshit crazy, resigned to doing other horribly boring livings- but now the artists are making a stand. Or at least the staff of 2 and a half men. Luckily they have stockpiled episodes of 2 and a half men. This will keep the tinderbox of America from exploding. Reality t.v. has taken over in a large part. Wanna a reality show? Follow me around for a couple of weeks- to the coffee bean to the arclight cinema where I cry at the end of Into The Wild, to me playing with a feather toy with my cats at 2 in the afternoon because I can’t write because I was never loved properly, to me jerking off to bondage poronography, to me glaring at people in Borders who take forever to order a coffee,( are they ordering a coffee or picking out furniture), j, to me watching my sports teams- now that the Yankees were crushed I follow the Rangers in hockey and the Giants in football- I have such great hope when they win but when they lose I tend to reach for a Klonopin to numb me out a little. God are you there? 2 and a half men is in great danger once those stockpiled episodes run out god. Don’t let the Giants get killed by the Cowboys. Don’t let my cats get sick. Let me and my girlfriend prosper- help me break my bitterness and hatred- help me stop being a dangerous outsider and give me some insider money god. Please god. Please.