Guess which politician is a screenwriter
So I’m flipping through my latest copy of The New York Review of Books and right there in the first paragraph of an article about U.S. Senator Jim Webb (D-VA) is this:
“Jim Webb, the junior senator from Virginia, who defeated the incumbent Republican George Allen in 2006, is or has been: a best-selling author; a screenwriter (Rules of Engagement, and another in the works); an Emmy-winning documentary producer; the author of a large number of articles and book reviews; an Annapolis graduate; a boxer (he lost a legendary and controversial championship match at Annapolis against Oliver North); an autodidact who grew up a military man’s son and indifferent student but on his own became a passionate reader of history; a first lieutenant and Marine rifle platoon commander with Delta Company in Vietnam, where he won the Navy Cross for heroism (the second-highest award in the Navy and the Marines), the Silver Star, two Bronze Stars, and two Purple Hearts; a graduate of Georgetown Law School who then worked on the staff of the House Veterans Affairs Committee; a teacher of English literature at the Naval Academy; and an assistant secretary of defense and then secretary of the Navy during the Reagan administration.”
This can’t be, I think. I immediately pop over to IMDB.com and wouldn’t you know it, Webb does have a movie credit: “story by” for Rules of Engagement, just like the NYRB article says. But what about that mysterious reference to “another in the works?” A little further in the article — a great story by Elizabeth Drew by the way — and there’s this little gem:
“He has written a screenplay called “Whiskey River,” to be produced and directed by Rob Reiner and set in that region, about two generations of service members in which the son, returned from Iraq with PTSD, is called back to active duty before he has recovered; his father, determined to keep his son from risking his life in Iraq again, kidnaps him.”
Interesting, clean premise with a strong emotional core, the father-son relationship. What inspired Webb to write this screenplay?
“Webb sought to find a way of writing about the soldiers in Iraq that wasn’t bathetic, and to make a movie about the war that people would want to watch.”
Might we have a screenwriter on the Dem ticket this fall? Rumor has it, Webb is on Obama’s short list. There’s even an online site to sign a petition to boost Webb’s chances.
If Webb gets elected, I wonder if he could do anything about raising screenwriter residual rates on DVDs….