Blog Posts - Dan Fiorella: Writer @ large

Dan Fiorella

Adventures in Hardly-wood: Firelight

5/22/2019

Ok, so I answer this ad for a “major studio venture.” Turns out it’s some guy pitching a remake of “Dirty Rotten Scoundrels” and asks for my take on it. In mid-pitch, he pulls that project out and replaces it with his latest…

Christian Elias, our aspiring producer, sends me an email with big news: “Steven Spielberg’s Publicist Granted Me Permission Today to Remake ‘Firefly,’ Steven’s First Film.” And that’s just the Subject line!

Pasted into the email was some data about this home movie Spielberg made while in high school. It was a “science fiction type predecessor to “Close Encounters of the Third Kind.” Elias then told me his plan, to remake the film based on the publicist’s promise to view the movie upon completion. This is a plan? Two hours later he emailed me again to explain the plan; make a movie on spec as “the chance of a lifetime to win Steven Spielberg’s camp over with new film creation, to [sic] of his very first film when he was still in high school at the age of 17 back in 1964.” Again, this is a plan?

So right out of the gate, I’m confused; the Wikipedia link he sent me lists the film as 135 minutes long, and he’s talking about it like it’s a short and wants 15 pages. So, I questioned him about the soundness of doing a “movie on spec.” His reply mansplained it all to me:

Adventures in Hardly-wood - Brazen Hussies

5/16/2019

So, the movie, “The Hustle,” was released recently. It seems like it’s going to fade pretty fast. But it triggered a memory from a few years back, something I had not thought about in a long time. I’m sure I entered it into my writer journal, but I decided to look back at my emails instead, since that’s how the whole episode started...

TMI Minute - April 2019

5/6/2019

Finally got around to putting together all my jokes from April. Did okay. It seems like they're getting a little freer with the rewriting. They're rotating the hosts again, which they haven't done for awhile, so there's that.

Barely Home Companion: Outback Home Companion - 10/00

5/6/2019

From 1999 to 2004-ish, I was one of the contributing writers for Garrison Keillor's renowned radio show "A Prairie Companion." I learned a lot of things there, mostly how to spell 'prairie." It was a solid gig and I'm proud of my work there. But, like any other job, there were...things...

So, with one season under my belt and a summer off, I was ready to begin submitting for the new season in the fall of 2000. If I only knew when to. Would my submissions be welcomed? Would they be required? Who knows? No on contacted me. No one let me in on a schedule or even told when the new season began (October 7th). I kept checking the website until they posted the info and started gearing up on my own. I was a bit annoyed. And my writing started to reflect it. Some of my submissions began to parody PHC. I think this was the first. There was always a fascination with Australia, and summer 2000 they had hosted the Olympics, so it seemed to be a really hot topic. My take was to see what their version of PHC would be like. It's a short bit and could have got a lot bigger, but I tried to slide the parody by them. To an extent. It starts out as a goof on the Aussies, but then segues into a deconstruction of PHC.

Weirdly, it wasn't selected for broadcast! And it's certainly not a sketch that can be applied anywhere else, so it was back to the hard drive for this one. Until today! Join us now as we meet The:

Outback Home Companion

Barely Home Companion : Cinco de Mayonnaise (5/05)

5/5/2019

From 1999 to 2004-ish, I was one of the contributing writers for Garrison Keillor's renowned radio show "A Prairie Companion." I learned a lot of things there, mostly how to spell 'prairie." It was a solid gig and I'm proud of my work there. But, like any other job, there were...things...

Well into 2005, I was still submitting, but to diminishing returns. This was an idea I came up with and made the rounds with. I thought it was cute. Obviously, it's not the most unique idea (as my google search later proved) but I came up with it a long time ago. It was kinda topical at the time because illegal immigration was a big George W. Bush campaign thing.

Any, to break my chronological order at bit, for today, we present...

Cinco de Mayonnaise

Not for Nothing: Endgame

5/2/2019

Ok, I’ve seen “The Avengers: Endgame,” and I thoroughly enjoyed it. It was an amazing achievement of wrapping up 11 years and 21 movies that all occur in the same cinematic universe. Think of it as an epic “Happy Days,” “Laverne & Shirley” and “Mork & Mindy” cross-over event on “Law & Order.”

But, here’s the thing:

Cracked Look Backed: Easter Edition - The Upside/Downside of Easter

4/21/2019

Happy Easter! And here's my addition to your basket, my Easter piece for Cracked magazine, #343, May 2000!

Barely Home Companion: Easter Edition - Eastern Orthodox Easter

4/20/2019

From 1999 to 2004-ish, I was one of the contributing writers for Garrison Keillor's renowned radio show "A Prairie Companion." I learned a lot of things there, mostly how to spell 'prairie." It was a solid gig and I'm proud of my work there. But, like any other job, there were...things...

Here's a goofy sketch bordering on sacrilegious. The idea of Greek Orthodox holidays falling out of sync with the Catholic Church holidays has always fascinated me. And when you're trying to figure out a sketch every week, any idea might be a spark. Again, I wrote it, submitted it, it got rejected (passively) and then I filed it away, forgotten. I've never attempted to resubmit it anywhere, it was just gone from memory. It's brief. It's pretty funny. And it certainly would have stretched the premise of the PHC ad parodies to unseemly lengths.

And who won't want to find a copy of "Novel Concept" in their Easter basket? You can get yours at Amazon, hard copy or digital. It's a wacky, crazy tale of a young author on a quest to write the perfect history of the Pony Express but who then gets seriously sidetracked by stowaways, French heiresses, drug lords, mythical kingdoms and murderous Senators. It's a serious of unfortunate events all in ONE book!

Eastern Orthodox Easter

Barely Home Companion: Political Ads (10/00)

4/20/2019

Chironna Paid Political Message
by Dan Fiorella

(GK, SD: Stan Delaney, AN:Announcer)

GK: We'll be right back after this paid political
announcement.

SD: Hi, I'm Stan Delaney, former copy room boy. You know me,
you know Jon Chironna. You know his copies. Crisp, clean
and always collated. Ask yourself, are your copies better
now then they were four years ago? Hell, yes! they are.
Don't turn back the clock to the dark, pre-digital days.
We're on the edge of a copier revolution and Jon Chironna
is responsible for that. He wants to build a bridge to
the copyroom of the 21st century. Won't you help him?
I'm voting for Jon, you should too.

AN: Re-elect Jon Chironna as copy boy. He's an original.
Paid for by the Water Cooler Coalition.

Gilpin Paid Political Announcement
by Dan Fiorella

(GK, AN: Announcer, MN: MAN, SS, QA, Quick Announcer)

GK: We'll be back after this paid political announcement.

(sweet music, birds chirping, happy sounds)

AN: Jon Chironna wants to be re-elected copy boy. He tells
you productivity is up. He tells you copies are
plentiful. But what isn't he telling you?

(musical sting)

MN: Excuse me, ma'am, did you know Jon Chironna has been
caught with office supplies OUTSIDE the office five times?

SS: Why, no I didn't.

MN: Did you know that the maintenance bills on the copy
equipment are up 40%?

SS: I had no idea.

MN: Did you know that Mr. Chironna has switched to an inferior
grade of toner?

SS: That's very serious.

AN: Call Jon Chironna on extension 28 and say "Stop monkeying
around with our copy room!"

QA: This ad paid for my the Soft Money Committee to Elect Tom
Gilpin.

end

Barely Home Companion - Green Ketchup (10/00)

4/20/2019

From 1999 to 2004-ish, I was one of the contributing writers for Garrison Keillor's renowned radio show "A Prairie Companion." I learned a lot of things there, mostly how to spell 'prairie." It was a solid gig and I'm proud of my work there. But, like any other job, there were...things...

Back in 2000, Heinz decided to get out of the red ketchup business and start hawking other colors. Remember Crystal Pepsi? How about New Coke? The Edsel? Yeah, it was in that category. Now, here's the thing, I had access to a show that regularly featured ketchup--So, what if I wrote a green ketchup sketch? A sketchup, as it were (did I just coin a new comedy term?). So I wrote it up. It was rejected. In retrospect, I think maybe a wrote less a parody of green ketchup and more an actual endorsement. Plus I used the phrase "ketchup technology" twice, which is weak. I may have been too coy by about half. Anyway, it was a very topical bit that couldn't be recycled, so it's sat on the hard drive until now...

Ketchup Advisory Board

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