Register reporter tells story of his screenplay for $90 million film.
March 10, 2002
By KEITH SHARON
The Orange County Register
It feels like it isn't me.
It feels like there was this guy, Keith Sharon, who did something noteworthy a couple of years ago, and suddenly people are congratulating me for it.
It feels so strangely, incredibly, hyperventilatingly, I-need-somewhere-to-sit-down surreal that I have trouble explaining how it feels to write these words:
In the fall of 1998, I wrote a screenplay that has become a $90 million-plus-budget Warner Bros. blockbuster movie starring Robert DeNiro, Eddie Murphy, Rene Russo and William Shatner.
"Showtime," a comedy about two L.A. cops who become the stars of a reality-based TV crime show, is scheduled to open Friday. I am an education reporter at The Orange County Register, but tomorrow night I'll be walking down the red carpet with the stars at Grauman's Chinese Theater for the premiere.
Hard work, hard-charging producers, talented collaborators and a limousine-size load of dumb luck have landed me here in the middle of a goosebumpy Hollywood dream.
Suddenly, my name is on the cover of Daily Variety.
It appears in the trailer promoting the movie, which aired during the Opening Ceremonies of the Winter Olympics. It appears in Internet reports about movies. It appears in Polish, where I am credited for writing the "scenariusz." It will appear on the big screen, a moment that, I'm sure, will hit me in the solar plexus.
I'm being interviewed for a magazine. I'm being asked for my autograph. I'm getting calls and e-mails from distant friends and relatives who have seen promos for "Showtime" on television. I bought my wife, Nancy, a car for Christmas.
I'm thinking about how the hell I'm going to get DeNiro's and Murphy's autographs for the poster that is prominently displayed in my house.
I'm thinking about what to wear to the premiere. (Black tuxedo? Suit and tie? Jeans and disheveled hair?)
I'm thinking about those residual checks that will start arriving one year after the movie opens.
All this because I returned a phone call.
I swear I almost didn't.
Let's go back to the beginning My luck began long before the phone rang in June 1998.
In 1991, I was a newspaper reporter for the Jersey Journal, a daily newspaper located across the Hudson River from New York City. I began writing a nonfiction novel called "Born and Raised," the true-life 1978 story of two guys from Hoboken who thought the world would be a better place if they each killed the other's wife. Writing a book had always been my passion, my dream.
I finished the 600-page manuscript and got an agent. We shopped it around, but it didn't sell. Too dark, several publishers said. No heroic lead character. Rejection hurt.
In 1994, Nancy and I moved back to Southern California, where we were both raised. I took a job writing for the Pasadena Star News. In 1995, I wrote a feature story about a woman who had been raped. The story caught the eye of Jean Hale Coleman (Dabney's ex-wife) and Gino Tanasescu, a team of fledgling Hollywood producers, who called and asked if I would be interested in writing a television script about the woman.
The woman, however, refused to sell her rights. So the television deal fell through. When I could see the deal was exploding, I told Jean and Gino about my unpublished manuscript. They asked me if I had ever written a screenplay. I said no. So they showed me what a screenplay looks like. They told me to make the margins the same, to write 120 pages and put dramatic scenes on page 30 (the end of Act I), page 90 (the end of Act II) and end with a bang.
So I took a shot at writing my first screenplay.
That's when the Hollywood magic happened. Gino plays tennis every Saturday with David Wirtshafter, who, at the time, was the head of the literary division of International Creative Management, the largest talent agency in the world.
I'll never forget the Saturday morning when Gino called and asked if I could come for lunch at the Los Angeles Riviera Country Club. Two hours later, I was sitting with Wirtshafter, who said he had read my script, and ICM wanted to represent me.
The first brush didn't quite fly
"Born and Raised," however, never sold. It got close. Directors Gary Fleder and Mehdi Norowzian each became attached for periods, but they couldn't persuade a studio or an independent company to fund the movie.
But still, "Born and Raised" was a good calling card. Suddenly, I was having meetings all over town. I met with Spike Lee's production company. I met with Fox Search light, which produced "The Full Monty." I met with one of the producers of "Godzilla," who locked the door behind me and told me she wasn't going to let me leave until I gave her the idea that was going to be the blockbuster hit of 2001.
In every meeting they ask if you want something to drink. Here's my advice to young screenwriters: Take the Diet Coke. It may be the only thing you ever get out of the business.
In fact, I had so many meetings with producers that they all started to run together. All of them had ideas for screenplays. They just needed a writer - me - to come up with a pitch that would sell the studio on their idea. I spent weeks coming up with pitch after pitch.
None of the pitches went anywhere. No one was buying. No one is ever buying. I had a whole lot of free Diet Coke, but that's about it. To the outsider, it may seem like money flows in Hollywood like latte. But on the inside, it seems like the money is all hidden in some impenetrable castle guarded by a moat and poisonous snakes, and it takes Indiana Jones to extract it.
In June 1998, I got a call from Jorge Saralegui, a producer currently having a month that producers would kill for - he's produced "Queen of the Damned," "Time Machine" and "Showtime," all released in February and March. Somehow, he thought my gritty urban story about two Hoboken killers was a hint that I could write a buddy comedy about two cops in Los Angeles.
Thank goodness he did.
IT'S NO JOKE,
JOKES ARE KEY
I told him to give me a week.
A week later, I hadn't done anything. I woke up that morning and considered not calling him back. Even though my career was just a few months old, I was tired of rejection. With about an hour to go before my scheduled phone call, I pulled out a notebook and jotted down a few ideas for a film about two cops in Los Angeles.
I made the call.
He asked me to write up my ideas and meld them with his.
Then he set a pitch meeting.
We took the idea to Warner Bros. I can't remember being more nervous. A pitch meeting is like an audition. But I am not an actor. The studio executive comes out from behind his grand desk and offers you a seat on the couch. You make small talk - which I had rehearsed in my head the night before. If he's got pictures of his family on his desk, then I mention my wife and kids. If he doesn't, then I talk about baseball.
At the first lull in the conversation, the studio executive glances at his watch and says, "OK."
If you read your pitch, they don't like that. If your pitch is memorized but lacking details, they don't like that. If you talk too loud or too soft, they don't like that. If you go too fast or too slow, they don't like that. If you don't make them laugh, they don't like that. If you sweat profusely and take several drinks of water, they seem to like that. So that's what I did. The sweating. The stammering. Think Albert Brooks in "Broadcast News." I cannot believe that so much time in Hollywood is devoted to writers auditioning.
They bought it for $75,000.
About 23 seconds later, I quit my day job. At the time, I was working for The Orange County Register.
A TINY, COLD ROOM
AND THE SCREENWRITER
In my mind, I was writing for George Clooney, as Mitch Preston, the no-nonsense hero cop, and Will Smith, as Trey Sellars, the patrolman who always wanted to be a television star. Trey was the kind of guy who loved cop shows on television. I began researching TV cops so I could give Trey a vast knowledge of his heroes. That's when I came up with the idea that this team - especially Mitch - was so bad on camera that they needed an acting coach. Someone to teach them how to be cops on television.
William Shatner was perfect. He had played TJ Hooker, the quintessential TV cop.
It was the Shatner sequences that gave the film its hook. A TV cop was teaching real cops how to enter a building dramatically, how to play to the camera. I had no idea if I could write a part for William Shatner, but I turned it in anyway.
Saralegui loved the Shatner part, but he told me that star cameos can bog down the film process. What if the star isn't available? What if he's a pain to work with? Warner Bros. wasn't sure whether the Shatner scenes would stay.
In February 1999, I was called into a meeting at the Warner Bros. offices. They told me that they loved the script. But they needed a few changes made.
My agent informed me later - because I had no idea - that that day was the most lucrative of my life. By asking me to make a few changes, Warner Bros. had triggered the first "step" of my contract, meaning they would be paying me about $28,000 for the next two weeks' worth of work.
So, I finished my rewrite, and I got called into another meeting.
That's when they thanked me for writing such a wonderful script, and then they fired me.
My services would no longer be required. They were going to send the script "out to cast," meaning they were going to try to get stars attached to the project.
George Clooney said no. Will Smith said no, but he stayed involved with the project as a producer.
I called a few times to see how my baby was coming along. All I heard was that it was being rewritten, which is a normal occurrence in Hollywood. I was shown a script from "Lethal Weapon 4," which had nine writers. I've heard about projects with 14 writers, 35 writers.
Through the rewrite process, I heard nothing about "Showtime." A year went past. Most movies don't get made. In my mind, "Showtime" was finished.
REALITY PAYS
UNFORTUNaTE VISIT
I can't be a starving artist. I've got a wife and 6-year-old twins, Alison and Dylan. And a mortgage payment. And a car payment. And so many other payments I could barely sleep at night. I was scared I would never get another dime out of Hollywood.
I needed a job. So I returned to The Orange County Register. I felt embarrassed, like I had failed.
In January 2001, the telephone rang.
It was a producer friend of mine. He wanted to know if I had seen Daily Variety.
Robert DeNiro and Eddie Murphy had agreed to star in "Showtime." Tom Dey, who directed "Shanghai Noon," had signed to direct.
Saralegui, the persistent producer, had persuaded the studio to shell out the money for huge stars. We had a "green light."
Can I just take a moment to say this: ROBERT DENIRO AND EDDIE MURPHY. I'm screaming now. I'm calling my wife. ROBERT DENIRO AND EDDIE MURPHY. I'm calling my Mom. I'm pumping my fist.
My bonus for being the original screenwriter on a green-lit movie: $50,000. Think of all the Diet Coke that buys.
I called Saralegui's office, and he invited me to the set.
So I walk up to the back lot at Paramount. There is a 100-foot crane with a camera poised at the top. There are 300 people standing around. There are ROBERT DENIRO AND EDDIE MURPHY.
I work my way close to the script coordinator. I look over her shoulder.
And they're doing a scene that I can remember writing in my McDonald's office.
I get choked up.
I'm standing there with a lump in my throat when Tom Dey, the director, whom I had just met, notices me. He says, "Overwhelming, isn't it?"
I shook my head yes.
In that first few minutes, I tried to muster the nerve to approach DeNiro or Murphy. You know, to talk about their characters' motivations. But I have to admit, I didn't go near them. I snuck a few pictures of them, but that's as close as I got.
A production assistant scolded me for taking pictures. "That is so unprofessional," she said. She looked like a high school student.
But then there's William Shatner
I take a deep breath.
"Mr. Shatner, I'm Keith Sharon, and I wrote 'Showtime,' " I said.
"Are you here to pick up your unemployment check?" he said with a big laugh.
He shook my hand and smiled. Coolest Hollywood moment of my life, to be dissed by William Shatner.
"So you wrote this for me?" he asked.
I told him I had.
"What if I would have said no? Who would you have got?"
"Erik Estrada," I said.
William Shatner laughed. Coolest moment of my life, No. 2.
At this point, I am on a high that no pharmaceuticals could induce. I ate lunch twice.
They have a wheat grass grinder in the lunch line. I had the chicken breast. And a salad. And a turkey sandwich. And baked beans. And corn on the cob. And ice cream.
I think there were a few bags of chips in there, too. I took a plate into the huge trailer where the cast and crew watch dailies. I saw take after take of the same scenes. Murphy and DeNiro were hilarious over and over again.
After lunch, they shot a scene in which Murphy has to walk down an alley. The joke is that he's supposed to be doing police work, but he's on a Hollywood lot. As he walks, he passes Roman soldiers, the Batmobile, aliens and an elephant.
I didn't write that sequence.
In the middle of the setup, Dey stops the action and looks at me.
"Keith, I'll bet you never dreamed your screenplay would have a scene with an elephant," Dey said.
"If I would have written it, I'd have put in TWO elephants," I said.
"GIVE ME TWO ELEPHANTS," he yelled.
We're chummy, Tom and I.
I wonder if he'll be as overwhelmed as I will be Monday night, standing at the head of that red carpet, surrounded by photographers. I wonder if he'll go with the open- collared shirt or the suit and tie.
Maybe, when I see him I'll mention I've got a lot of ideas about "Showtime II."
But even if the sequel doesn't happen, I'll always have my first day on the set, hanging with William Shatner.
When that day ended, Shatner walked up to me with his wife.
"Honey," he said. "I'd like you to meet the author."
He called me the author.