You've Got 30 Seconds...

You’ve got 30 seconds.

Now, what I have here are the biggest ideas to hit television in a generation!

25 seconds….

First is a concept packed with intrigue, adventure, crime, crime fighting, and justice!

Tick-tock, tick-tock. I don’t have all day….

Okay. It’s a fish out of water story. The main character, Edward Country, or Ed Country is a small town kid who went to law school and moved to the big city.

I’m listening….

He goes to work cleaning up the big city with the help of his new friends.

And the show is called?

“Country Justice.”

I like it. Who are his friends that help him clean up the big city?

First off, you’ve got “Pa Booker”, an old-timer gold prospector who’s Ed Country’s next door neighbor. Pa Booker takes him under his wing as a mentor and helps him solve crimes.

Interesting.

Pa Booker is always using prospecting wisdom to help Ed Country. He’s the sage tough-guy that helps the young rookie kid. He’s a cross between Obi Wan Kenobi from Star Wars and Sam Elliott in the movie Road House.

Who do you see for Pa Booker?

Wilford Brimley.

And you can deliver on Brimley?

I called him 6 weeks ago and told him to stop trimming his moustache so that it’s extra-bushy for when we start filming. He’s in.

I like it.

Pa Booker lives across the hall from Ed Country in the condo on Wash Street in the big city. While helping Ed Country with his ideas and plans to solve crimes, he’s always saying things like:

“That plan reminds me of the gold nugget I found panning for gold on the Missouri River back in the spring of ’89…. Pure Gold.”

Or, to Ed Country’s idea to foil a bank heist:

“That idea reminds me of the vein of gold that I found in the Comstock mine back in ’92….  Pure Gold.”

So Pa Booker’s catchphrase is, “Pure Gold”

Yes. True and true.

I like it. What else do you have?

Pa Booker is bound to be a big hit with the 10 – 45 age group. So after the first season of Country Justice, we’ll write him into his own spin-off series.

Interesting. What’s the concept?

The show is called “By the Book”.

I like it.

Pa Booker is a middle school teacher that helps kids with their problems in adolescence using prospector wisdom. He’ll keep his catch phrase, here’s a script sample…. 

Billy: “If I practice real hard so that I can perfectly recite the entire Knights Who Say Ni scene from Monty Python’s, The Holy Grail, then Bad Bobby the Bully will finally leave me alone!”

Pa Booker: “Now Billy, that plan does not remind me of my #7 incisor, which is Pure Gold. It reminds me of my #32 lower molar, which is full of holes and is pretty much useless.”

That sounds like pure gold. But let’s go back to Country Justice.

Yes.

So, you’ve got Pa Booker, the prospector with gold mining sage wisdom to help Ed Country. Who are the other characters?

There’s the nemesis.

Who could that be?

His name is Matt Cello.

That’s a good name.

Matt Cello will always be adding a “Ch” sound as a prefix of sorts to augment words without changing their meaning.

How’s that?

He’ll say “Chello” instead of hello, “Chawesome” instead of awesome, “Chexcellent” instead of excellent, “Chordinary”, “Chumid”, and so forth…. “Cheasy” instead of easy.

I like it.

Matt Cello is the king of the underworld, but he pretends to be Ed Country’s best friend. They’ve known each other since they were children. Best friends from both sides of the tracks. Ed Country is slightly younger naïve, fish-out-of-water hero, whereas we have Matt Cello as a country-kid-turned-bad-turned-big-city-crime-lord villain.

And he and Ed Country are best friends?

Yes, and to make things more amazing, Matt Cello has a twin brother who is the crooked chief of police.

What’s his name?

Mathias Cello.

That’s a great name.

Thanks. After a few seasons, we’ll reveal that Matt Cello and Mathias Cello are one and the same; that they’re secretly the same person! No one will see that coming!

That sounds incredible!

And wait until you find out who their father is!

Now, let’s hit the pause button here. I know that you’re very enthusiastic, but I don’t have all day to get bogged down in the minutia. We need to move on.

Sure, okay.

However, I’d like to know…. Who do you see for Ed Country?

I see an unknown for that part.

Anyone in particular?

Me.

Interesting. That could work.

What else do you have?

Okay, next I have: “The Barrister Barista!”

I’m not following you.

The setting is in the “London” coffee shop. It’s the story of a lawyer, or what the British call a barrister working in a coffee shop as a barista, which is a fancy name for someone who makes coffee. The main character, Ed London, is the great, great, great grandson of the author, Jack London. The whole thing takes place in San Francisco, which is where Jack London was born.

That sounds complicated.

The story basically revolves around people coming into the London Coffee Shop with zany legal questions, and most of the regulars at the coffee shop are poets and aspiring writers, so there will be a lot of literary humor.

Hmm. What sort of jokes?

I’m not exactly sure at this point. I’m not particularly well read, so I was planning to farm out a lot of the literary joke writing.

Let me think about this. The title has a lot of syllables, which is problematic. Who are the other characters at the coffee shop?

There’s a character named Cheese Freely. Cheese Freely is an amazing….

I have to cut you off there. I’m not sure if this works, but let’s move on…. 

What else do you have?

Okay, I do have one more. The main character is a carpenter named Ed Nicely and the series is called "Nicely Done."

So it's a carpentry show. Is it a comedy or a drama?

Neither, it's more of a "This Old House" sort of show.

Interesting.

Only rather than the show taking place in modern times, it takes place about 2,000 years ago, during the time of Jesus.

That's an original concept.

Get this.... in the show, Jesus is Ed Nicely's business partner. In each episode, Ed and Jesus go around fixing houses together!

That's the best idea for a television show that I've heard in a long time. Amazing.

I know. It came to me when I started to think that everything in the New Testament is the sort of stuff that happens on the weekends. The wedding where Jesus turned water into wine was probably on a Saturday because weddings are on Saturdays. The Sermon on the Mount was probably on a Sunday because church is on Sunday. The one where he walks on water? He was probably out with his apostle buddies on a weekend fishing trip (maybe it was even the season walleye opener?). All that cool stuff probably happened on the weekends!

Interesting.

So, the next logical question is: What was Jesus doing during the week?

That does make some sort of logic.

I figure he was probably out there working to put bread on the table, sandals on his feet, and a little folding cash in his pockets of his robes. And everyone knows that Jesus' dad was a carpenter.

That's an interesting hypothesis.

There's nothing in the Bible that says that Jesus was some sort of lazy bum who sat around the house all day laying on the couch and doing whatever they did before daytime television and TV dinners were invented.

They do say that he was a carpenter.

He probably made all sorts of cool stuff. Can you imagine the kind of finished carpentry the Son of God would have been capable? I'll bet the furniture and homes that Jesus worked on were built to last, not like some of the shoddy craftsmanship that you might find these days!

That is an interesting idea. It makes me wonder if any of Jesus’ work could have survived the test of time, and still be around today.

No doubt it has! Keep your eyes open for a little "JC" carved into the underside of a wooden chair or end table while you're walking through antique stores. You never know what you might find. Picking up one of Jesus' chairs for $5 in some old junk shop would be a total coup. You'd be able to retire!

Or, maybe the carved inscription would read “JN” because he was Jesus of Nazareth.

Too true…. Personally, I’d buy anything with either inscription just to be safe!

So the show is about Ed Nicely and his friend, Jesus Christ, and the show is called "Nicely Done." And the idea is that they go around and fix up old houses.

Yes. Let's say some nice old lady has a leaky old roof and a crumbling foundation. Ed and Jesus show up at her front door with a camera crew and the story writes itself; all we need is a good film editor.

I like it!

And it'll be filled with suspense and mystery!

How's that?

Apart from being a carpenter, what is Jesus most known for doing?

Performing miracles?

Yes….

And the potential for miracles caught live on camera during the course of each episode will be amazing!

Exactly! The audience will never know when to expect the miracles.... they’ll be constantly on the edge of their seats waiting for the next amazing thing to happen!

Right, like if they're working on building the walls of a house, Ed will say something like, "Hey, Jesus, I think that we're going to be a few 2x4 studs short. Do you want me to make a run to the lumberyard?"

Jesus will then say something like, "Why don’t you go count them again, Ed?" At which time he will find that they have enough 2x4s plus a few extras in case they make a mistake and cut one or two a little too short later in that afternoon.

That's what I call good TV!

Another fun thing is that we'll always have a camera on Jesus so that we can get some real candid shots of him reacting. Like when Ed Nicely invariably hits his thumb with a hammer and yells "Jesus Christ!"

Oh man. The potential for comedy mishaps is huge with a show like this! I could just see Ed and Jesus getting in an argument with a building inspector over some code violation. Who do you think would win that argument?

I'd have pity for any electrical inspector who cited them for putting the wrong electrical outlets in some nice old lady's kitchen! Can you imagine how anxious the audience will feel for the building inspector knowing that he doesn't have a prayer for winning that argument?

No doubt, the suspense will be incredible. But wait, I thought you said the show would take place 2,000 years ago, back in the time when Jesus lived?

Hmm. That is true. Maybe there will be time travel too.

I suppose you could not rule out that sort of thing, given the cast of characters. 

Exactly. I'm glad that we're on the same page. Minor details like time travel will work themselves out during production.

Yes, we are on the same page. It's as if we are of one mind.

When can we start filming?

I say you've got the green light! Here's a briefcase filled with money. Go to work and make “Nicely Done” a reality!

Excellent!

And here’s a check for 150-million-dollars. I’ll take the Country Justice concept too; only rewrite it as a full-length feature movie. I see Academy Awards written all over this one.

Chexcellent!

And I’ll pass on the “Barista Barrister” concept. An English lawyer working in a San Francisco coffee shop just doesn’t sound plausible.

(This post is dedicated to Erin B. Thanks Jeremy S. for help with the writing of this classic Specious Reasoning post!)