Another Sketch

With yet another day passing without any post, it becomes more evident than ever how diminished my ability to follow through on planned goals has become, but why dwell on that? No one is interested in hearing any such thing, and anyway there are more useful ways of filling this post even in such a dire moment. As we speak, after all, I am eagerly anticipating the staging of my fifth sketch at iO West's "Top Story Weekly!" here in Los Angeles.

It came about in interesting fashion. I'd had some idea about a news story that would make a good sketch. I passive aggressively pitched it to a friend I know would be on staff (since I myself am not), and she encouraged me to send it out to the whole of the show's writing apparatus, or even better to inquire whether my services as a writer might be helpful given that the show had slightly fewer writers on hand this particular week than is usually the case.

When my offer was accepted, I felt that to be a real endorsement of my ability, since having as many writers as they did have in no way constituted an emergency. I'd previously been invited to sit in when there was only one staff writer available, and that was a reason to get desperate. Of course I took it. This time, they needed someone extra little enough that they did not seek anyone, but I felt that they valued me enough that they accepted me when they hardly needed me, if that makes any sense. Someone whose talent was in doubt would more likely be a liability than an asset in that situation.

The night I recently wrote of when traffic made me very upset is what happened next. That was the pitch session. The following night I made sure to be absurdly early so that there was no question of that being repeated. I arrived maybe forty minutes early and sat on the street corner opposite the place and read until it was a socially acceptable time to make my presence known. We then read about 18 or so sketches and debated their merits as regarding inclusion in the show.

I'd written three sketches. Two I had written first drafts of the night before while very tired and rewritten that same day because I knew how bad they were initially. A third I'd dashed off shortly before the deadline. All three were read in a row at the beginning of the night. The first, concerning JK Rowling's recently published story about Harry Potter in his 30s, received a very positive response and was deemed immediately worthy of staging. At first it seemed it might go in untouched, but it wound up getting a changed ending.

The other two sketches failed to get in. One hung on for a while. It was what they call a "desk piece", which is an interview segment kind of a thing. A writer who'd written a chapter in a book about surviving running with the bulls had gotten gored, and that seemed worth writing about. It fell a bit short. The third sketch never seemed to be seriously considered. It was about the TV networks seeking to destroy the websites whose shows are now garnering Emmy nominations. It was rushed and its lack of consideration was no snub.

That one sketch, though, was really pretty good, and I an quite anxious to see it staged. It might be the best of the five things I've had a hand in. Probably it is the best thing I have written by myself for the show. We will just see how it comes out of its final stage, for it is not as I written it now and it will soon not be as anyone wrote it. It is only to be hoped that it is improved for having been realized just as it was improved for having been taken out of my hands (as all creations must be). Probably it will be.