Okay, kids, time for an update on my other Life at Lifetime.
We made a couple of funny little movies last year, with even funnier titles, and the fun ladies at Lifetime Movie Network are about to inflict them on the general public in all their whiplash-melodrama glory.
And, yeah, I wrote the screenplays these films were made from.
This one ABOVE I already talked about a few posts back, so CLICK HERE for all the dirt! It’s fun!
But wait . . . did you hear me say I wrote TWO MOVIES that are coming out within months of each other? Yes. Yes, you did. And the second one, which I like, is . . .
Wow, umm . . . awesome poster, huh? (Umm . . . sorry, it wasn’t my fault.)
I SWEAR THE MOVIE AIN’T SO BAD!
And so are you ready for fun stories and stupid trivia from that nose-to-the-grindstone multi-hyphenate artist scamp who somehow still has a sense of humor** about his weird career? SURE YOU ARE!
So here goes.
This movie started life almost eight years ago as a concept I pitched to my producers at Lifetime; you pitch these things in batches, see, and it got weeded out for something way cooler… but here’s the thing: You NEVER throw anything away, dudes. It might really come in handy later. So what happened was… well, it really came in handy later. It was called KEPT WOMAN KILLER when we pitched it. It was also called that during development and even through production. Lifetime decided to change the title to… well, something else earlier this year. Can’t tell you what it was because, you know, ethics. Let’s just say we weren’t all that excited. BUT. Someone on our team, who may or may not be an actual legend in the film world, talked them out of it. We couldn’t go back to the original title because there was something too similar in current release… and so, after some fun with cutting-and-pasting words, they settled on what you see here. Hey. Beats the other title. And it beats the shit outta flipping burgers for a living too.
But seriously, folks.
The reason why I like this one is that it’s my first full-to-the-end MURDER MYSTERY WHODUNNIT THRILLER. I’ve done other movies where the identity of the killer was in question for a while, but never one where you have to keep guessing until, like, the very end of the film. I think it does a pretty good job of setting up the suspects and delivering real surprises. Yeah, so I’m proud of it. Anybody got a problem with that? Meet me in the parking lot later.
BUT SERIOUSLY, FOLKS.
TRIVA BITS WHCH MAY AMUSE YOU:
- The director of this also did another LMN movie of mine that I really like called SHE IS NOT YOUR DAUGHTER. Jeff Hare is fucking awesome. Write that down.
- The star of this movie also did another LMN movie of mine that I really like called SHE IS NOT YOUR DAUGHTER. Alicia Leigh Willis is fucking awesome. Write that down also.
- Ashton Leigh, who has one of the same names as Alicia and was also in DAUGHTER as a receptionist, shows up in this one in a much bigger role, where she gets to be a neurotic ball of fire who drinks, lies and screams bloody murder through most of the film… and it’s awesome.
- I tried to name Ashton’s character JACKIE REYNOLDS, which would have been a combination tribute to Jackie Gleason and Burt Reynolds from SMOKEY AND THE BANDIT. The powers-that-be asked us to change it though, so she ended up Jackie Reeves, which at least has a SUPERMAN shout-out in it, right?
- I DID get to name the heroine Catherine Brunner, which is a very obscure shout-out to a Micheal Moorcock novel (and movie) I love. It’s a synthesis of two names from the book and film… because I’m sneaky. Hey, they let me have an English teacher in one of my other movies who made her students do a book report on Harlan Ellison’s I HAVE NO MOUTH AND I MUST SCREAM. So maybe Lifetime movies are a lot cooler than you THINK they are, huh?
- I also named the lawyer after John Carpenter. Because of course I did.
- And the hunky leading man character of our film is named PAUL BURKE. If you are a nerd and don’t know why that’s a shameless shout-out, please turn in your pulse rifle.
- Other Easter eggs abound in this one. Spot them all and win absolutely nothing.
- I DO actually like this one and I’m not being a smartass. It’s pretty good movie for its weight class and has some nice moments. I credit them all to literally anyone who is not me, because I’m a swell guy.
And meanwhile, guess what? My next magnum opus goes before the cameras in June, just days after A DEADLY MISTAKE airs for the first time. (We just had the dreaded PRODUCTION DRAFT MEETING, like, today!) So we’re keeping busy.
Oh, and I sold my comic book company to Vinegar Syndrome and we’re doing lots of fun stuff over there that you’ll see soon. But that’s another post, from my other life. I swear I’ll get around to writing it soon. Just as soon as I finish making the world safe for…. you know, whatever.
In closing . . . if you are the type of person who enjoys having a murder mystery movie completely spoiled in every way by the trailer, please feel free to watch the following. It’s really a lot less like a trailer and more like a condensed-movie promo reel. It shows pretty much everything that happens, including the surprise ending. They used to circulate these things in-house only at Reel One, but now they post them in public on You Tube. I have no idea why. You really shouldn’t watch this.
Hey . . . I said SPOILERS….
Why are you…. don’t click that….
HEY!!!!
WE WORKED HARD ON THIS DAMN THING!!!
Ahh, nuts . . .
**Fun footnote because I love you. When I typed “sense of humor” in the article proper, the Internet Terminators decided to change the word “humor” to “whimper,” indicating that, in reality, I actually have a SENSE OF WHIMPER about my dumbass really super awesome writing career. That may actually be closer to the truth, come to think of it… but we all keep trying, like FOOLS! (Um. I changed it back to “humor,” because obviously.)