Many of you seem disturbed that I wear sweatpants.
And to that I would quote the great Andrew Marlowe and say this:
Get off my fucking blog.
The fact is, other than free sushi and a seven figure income, dressing like a sweaty fat Russian mobster is the single best part of being a multi-platinum-selling Hollywood screenwriter such as myself. That swish-swish sound your thighs make as you walk down the studio halls, the feeling of the polyester sliding on the black leather as you recline in the inevitable Eames chair and pop the top on your Diet Coke...
My God I'm getting Russian just thinking about it.
Because understand this: what you wear and how you look when you go to a meeting is of the utmost importance. Every interaction between a writer and an executive is a carefully orchestrated mating dance between power and creativity. It is Noh theater where every mask has been carved into a smile capable of four minutes of small talk about the newest Jon Krakauer book that the mask hasn't even read.
And by the way, when I say "power and creativity" let's be perfectly clear. They've got the power. And you sure as shit better have the creativity. If for some reason you're not feeling the creative vibe, you better at least look it.
That's where the sweatpants come in.
Because you have to FLAUNT your writer lifestyle, people. Work it on the motherfucking catwalk like Miss J for Chrissakes.
A friend of mine is a very successful writer and generally obeys the successful writer lifestyle doctrine. He's a white Jewish male in his early thirties, shaves about once a month, sleeps with pretty goyim he isn't qualified to sleep with, and drives a big black car with illegally tinted windows.
But every time I see the dude he's wearing a coat and tie. Seriously. Full-metal jacket and matching windsor. Here was my conversation with him the other day.
ME: Dude. Did you go to a meeting dressed like that?
HIM: Yeah, of course.
ME: What do people SAY to you in that get-up?
HIM: They ask me if I'd just come from synagogue.
This is not a good message to send, people. Not good, at all. Your meeting outfit should NEVER remind someone behind the desk that you are a member of the Worldwide Zionist Media Conspiracy.
PEOPLE: But Josh...We know Hollywood is run by the Zionists. Isn't there a good chance that executive is a member of the Worldwide Zionist Media Conspiracy, as well? Won't that improve your friend's chance of getting hired? Reminding the exec through his dress of their co-conspirer-ness...ish...dom?
ME: Do you honestly think we've kept the conspiracy going for this long by doing shit that OBVIOUS? My God. That executive is practically OBLIGATED to NOT give my friend the job just to throw everybody else off the scent! For the love of Theodor Herzl, people...Get with the fucking pogrom.
But we've strayed just an inch or two from what my larger point is: Ties, suits, pressed pants, collared shirts, these are not monkey clothes.
These are zookeeper clothes.
And friends, if you want to be a motherfucking infinite simian, you cannot also be a zookeeper. Sure, being a zookeeper can be cool. You've got the keys swinging off that fucking ring, you're the big man at the Snack Shack, you know what time the dolphins are jumping...you've got your own parking space at Paramount and aren't forced to park in that fucking overflow lot across the street on days when MI-3 has camped out ON ALL THE GODDAMN VISITOR SPACES...
But here at Josh Planet we are all about monkeys. Throwing our shit, howling at the top of our lungs while we hang our red ass out of the cage and masturbating in front of the tour group.
You cannot do that if you're a zookeeper. Things like that are frowned upon. That is the trade-off zookeepers make. Parking spaces, keys, two-year contracts with huge golden parachute production deals at the end...
But they cannot wear sweatpants to a meeting.
No way, no how.
In fact, I DARE one of them, just one, to show up to a meeting wearing sweatpants. I'll even buy a sushi lunch for the first one who does so. (And it can't be one of those three-hundred dollar Juicy outfits. It's gotta be an honest to goodness Straight Outta Foot Locker special.)
But it won't happen. I heard of an executive who tried to go tracksuit casual once--his assistant shot him with a tranq gun and the guy woke up naked in a dressing room at the Zegna store with his platinum card and his Blackberry duct-taped to his torso.
Because even though we're all on the team, we've still gotta pick sides.
And here's the corollary to the monkey/zookeeper theory: the bigger the zookeeper, the more you gotta re-affirm your monkeyness. And it's not easy believe you me...The first meeting you have with that director, the first president of production pitch, it's easy to lose your nerve and throw on that shirt you usually save for a first date.
You may as well lie down and give them your throat. It's the law of the jungle--show weakness, let them know you know they've got all the power and you're only there by their grace...they will eat you like a fucking impala.
Me, if I'm meeting with someone over the v.p. level I do two things differently: first, I strap on my expensive watch. Second, I don't wear any socks.
I find these two elements combine to make me practically invincible.
Now you should know I've got a bit of a sock hang-up to begin with...I have a hard time finding a pair that a) don't strangle my ankles or b) don't bunch up around my little toe and make me feel like I'm a drug mule with heroin packed in my shoes.
So I'm looking for just about any excuse I can to ditch the sock. It's rare, though, that I can send a MESSAGE. And the message here is this:
I, being of sound mind and Infinite Monkey body, am so ridiculously confident in my ability to absolutely write the fuck out of this project, am so thoroughly convinced that in the Writer's My So Called Life I am Jordan Catalano, that I have absolutely no problem and would never think twice about rolling out of my bed and coming right here to your insanely organized and important office three times the size of my house wearing WHATEVER THE HELL I WAS SLEEPING IN HALF AN HOUR EARLIER.
As to the expensive watch...well, a girl does love her bling.
So there's a place for everyone and everyone in their place. Sure, there's some crossover hits...Occasionally a zookeeper trades in the keys for the cage, and occasionally the monkey stops peeing in the straw, pulls a Koko and learns ASL.
(I've never really understood writers who became executives...Sort of like Jews for Jesus...which, by the way, I like to call CHRISTIANS.)
Frankly, the most impressive monkeys in the Hollywood Zoo aren't even monkeys at all.
They're actors.
Actors stand out by dressing down like nobody's business. In fact, if you walked through Beverly Hills in the middle of the day, the only people NOT dressed like actors are actors.
That's how they let you know they're actors.
The difference between the way an actor dresses down and the way a writer dresses down is the actor is very often also dirty.
Unshowered, clothes stained and unwashed...A typical Hollywood actor is so ridiculously good looking and charismatic that the only way to truly stand out by dressing down is to work it like motherfucking Pig Pen after a day of turning ten dollar tricks at a Grapevine truckstop.
Don't do this if you're a writer. You cannot pull this off. Sweatsuit casual is just that--casual--not sweaty.
Your message should be: "I'm so good and write with such grace that I remind you of a nice summery Saturday evening with that special someone you love..."
Not: "I haven't had this kind of flop smell since I lost my virginity with just enough time left to catch the bus."
But that's just me.
Shalom, fuckers.
And to that I would quote the great Andrew Marlowe and say this:
Get off my fucking blog.
The fact is, other than free sushi and a seven figure income, dressing like a sweaty fat Russian mobster is the single best part of being a multi-platinum-selling Hollywood screenwriter such as myself. That swish-swish sound your thighs make as you walk down the studio halls, the feeling of the polyester sliding on the black leather as you recline in the inevitable Eames chair and pop the top on your Diet Coke...
My God I'm getting Russian just thinking about it.
Because understand this: what you wear and how you look when you go to a meeting is of the utmost importance. Every interaction between a writer and an executive is a carefully orchestrated mating dance between power and creativity. It is Noh theater where every mask has been carved into a smile capable of four minutes of small talk about the newest Jon Krakauer book that the mask hasn't even read.
And by the way, when I say "power and creativity" let's be perfectly clear. They've got the power. And you sure as shit better have the creativity. If for some reason you're not feeling the creative vibe, you better at least look it.
That's where the sweatpants come in.
Because you have to FLAUNT your writer lifestyle, people. Work it on the motherfucking catwalk like Miss J for Chrissakes.
A friend of mine is a very successful writer and generally obeys the successful writer lifestyle doctrine. He's a white Jewish male in his early thirties, shaves about once a month, sleeps with pretty goyim he isn't qualified to sleep with, and drives a big black car with illegally tinted windows.
But every time I see the dude he's wearing a coat and tie. Seriously. Full-metal jacket and matching windsor. Here was my conversation with him the other day.
ME: Dude. Did you go to a meeting dressed like that?
HIM: Yeah, of course.
ME: What do people SAY to you in that get-up?
HIM: They ask me if I'd just come from synagogue.
This is not a good message to send, people. Not good, at all. Your meeting outfit should NEVER remind someone behind the desk that you are a member of the Worldwide Zionist Media Conspiracy.
PEOPLE: But Josh...We know Hollywood is run by the Zionists. Isn't there a good chance that executive is a member of the Worldwide Zionist Media Conspiracy, as well? Won't that improve your friend's chance of getting hired? Reminding the exec through his dress of their co-conspirer-ness...ish...dom?
ME: Do you honestly think we've kept the conspiracy going for this long by doing shit that OBVIOUS? My God. That executive is practically OBLIGATED to NOT give my friend the job just to throw everybody else off the scent! For the love of Theodor Herzl, people...Get with the fucking pogrom.
But we've strayed just an inch or two from what my larger point is: Ties, suits, pressed pants, collared shirts, these are not monkey clothes.
These are zookeeper clothes.
And friends, if you want to be a motherfucking infinite simian, you cannot also be a zookeeper. Sure, being a zookeeper can be cool. You've got the keys swinging off that fucking ring, you're the big man at the Snack Shack, you know what time the dolphins are jumping...you've got your own parking space at Paramount and aren't forced to park in that fucking overflow lot across the street on days when MI-3 has camped out ON ALL THE GODDAMN VISITOR SPACES...
But here at Josh Planet we are all about monkeys. Throwing our shit, howling at the top of our lungs while we hang our red ass out of the cage and masturbating in front of the tour group.
You cannot do that if you're a zookeeper. Things like that are frowned upon. That is the trade-off zookeepers make. Parking spaces, keys, two-year contracts with huge golden parachute production deals at the end...
But they cannot wear sweatpants to a meeting.
No way, no how.
In fact, I DARE one of them, just one, to show up to a meeting wearing sweatpants. I'll even buy a sushi lunch for the first one who does so. (And it can't be one of those three-hundred dollar Juicy outfits. It's gotta be an honest to goodness Straight Outta Foot Locker special.)
But it won't happen. I heard of an executive who tried to go tracksuit casual once--his assistant shot him with a tranq gun and the guy woke up naked in a dressing room at the Zegna store with his platinum card and his Blackberry duct-taped to his torso.
Because even though we're all on the team, we've still gotta pick sides.
And here's the corollary to the monkey/zookeeper theory: the bigger the zookeeper, the more you gotta re-affirm your monkeyness. And it's not easy believe you me...The first meeting you have with that director, the first president of production pitch, it's easy to lose your nerve and throw on that shirt you usually save for a first date.
You may as well lie down and give them your throat. It's the law of the jungle--show weakness, let them know you know they've got all the power and you're only there by their grace...they will eat you like a fucking impala.
Me, if I'm meeting with someone over the v.p. level I do two things differently: first, I strap on my expensive watch. Second, I don't wear any socks.
I find these two elements combine to make me practically invincible.
Now you should know I've got a bit of a sock hang-up to begin with...I have a hard time finding a pair that a) don't strangle my ankles or b) don't bunch up around my little toe and make me feel like I'm a drug mule with heroin packed in my shoes.
So I'm looking for just about any excuse I can to ditch the sock. It's rare, though, that I can send a MESSAGE. And the message here is this:
I, being of sound mind and Infinite Monkey body, am so ridiculously confident in my ability to absolutely write the fuck out of this project, am so thoroughly convinced that in the Writer's My So Called Life I am Jordan Catalano, that I have absolutely no problem and would never think twice about rolling out of my bed and coming right here to your insanely organized and important office three times the size of my house wearing WHATEVER THE HELL I WAS SLEEPING IN HALF AN HOUR EARLIER.
As to the expensive watch...well, a girl does love her bling.
So there's a place for everyone and everyone in their place. Sure, there's some crossover hits...Occasionally a zookeeper trades in the keys for the cage, and occasionally the monkey stops peeing in the straw, pulls a Koko and learns ASL.
(I've never really understood writers who became executives...Sort of like Jews for Jesus...which, by the way, I like to call CHRISTIANS.)
Frankly, the most impressive monkeys in the Hollywood Zoo aren't even monkeys at all.
They're actors.
Actors stand out by dressing down like nobody's business. In fact, if you walked through Beverly Hills in the middle of the day, the only people NOT dressed like actors are actors.
That's how they let you know they're actors.
The difference between the way an actor dresses down and the way a writer dresses down is the actor is very often also dirty.
Unshowered, clothes stained and unwashed...A typical Hollywood actor is so ridiculously good looking and charismatic that the only way to truly stand out by dressing down is to work it like motherfucking Pig Pen after a day of turning ten dollar tricks at a Grapevine truckstop.
Don't do this if you're a writer. You cannot pull this off. Sweatsuit casual is just that--casual--not sweaty.
Your message should be: "I'm so good and write with such grace that I remind you of a nice summery Saturday evening with that special someone you love..."
Not: "I haven't had this kind of flop smell since I lost my virginity with just enough time left to catch the bus."
But that's just me.
Shalom, fuckers.
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