Torpedoing Your Brand

I had a Professor, Jack Lechner, who put forward to us what he called Lechner's Law, which was this: At some point in a project's development, someone will propose getting rid of the thing that was most important to it. Usually it is the thing that is unique, the thing that makes it worthwhile. And what distinguishes a success from a failure is whether or not the producer/director/etc. accepts that poor advice.

Case in point. Animal Planet has a new tag-line: "Surprisingly Human." Their posters (you may have seen them on the Subway, New Yorkers) say things like, "It's not about Killer Fish. It's about one man's search for giant legends."

Excuse me while I lose my temper for a moment:

YES IT IS ABOUT THE FISH.

You're fucking called Animal Planet, for God's Sake. The reason people tune in is for animals.

But this isn't just Animal Planet. Cable is full of these sorts of self-sabotaging "Re-branding." Cartoon Network, for instance, is moving away from having its lineup be all cartoons. MTV no longer incorporates the words Music Television into their logo (in the same way that KFC was no longer Kentucky Fried Chicken for 16 years). Sci Fi Channel renamed itself "SyFy" just so they could own the trademark on its name.

Next up, I'm sure Comedy Central will start showing serious investigative journalism, and Cinemax will start to have feminist round-tables. C-SPAN will start covering the Oscars.

At any rate, these events are more extreme than "mission creep." It's a series of organizations basically deciding that they're not even going to treat their name as important. They dilute their own brand value and destroy their uniqueness without putting anything in its place.

So beware Lechner's Law, anyone. In order to avoid it, you have to be clear about what it is you offer (as all of the networks above really really should have been able to easily understand). That's what I loved about the Batman: Animated Series Writer's Bible that Isaac tossed up and I commented on. Those guys understood what it is that makes their work tick. If you forget it, you Jump the Shark.

Collaboration IV: Writing Bible

I just caught up and read the Batman: The Animated Series writer's bible that Isaac tossed up. (Yeah, anything that's more than one or two pages I email to myself to catch up on later). And I have to say, I find it infinitely superior to the Screenwriter's memo that prompted it.

Mamet's memo is a pretty useful "Don't do that, dumbass" memo that probably every first-year film student should tack onto their writing desk, but the writer's bible goes beyond that in scope: the writer's bible captures, in a direct and powerful way, to set up the metrics by which the show will be measured. To say, "This is what we want the show to do, and this is how you do it."

Especially with a source material as juicy and personal as Batman is (at least, to the sorts of people who would wind up collaborating on Batman: The Animated Series), it is important to define what you want to do. And you could literally do anything with it -- hence the enduring appeal.

Take on page 4:

"Our stories will be hard-edged crime dramas with villains who play for keeps. Yes, many of them will come from Batman's well-known Rogues Gallery, but they will be as wild, dark, and sinister as we can make them. Each episode will also feature a big SET PIECE, an incredible visual action visual that will be a looked-forward-to element in each show. This will be the climax, centerpiece, or show-stopper in each episode."

And the rationale is laid out on page 5:

"We hope to encourage our writers to take advantage of the almost limitless visual possibilities allowed by animation. With our animated Batman, we can "build" gigantic sets and create special effects that could never be realized with live action. Use this advantage!

(...)

We wish to pay special attention to the "arena" or setting of each episode. Stories which have a unified sense of place will always work better. This is not to say that Batman can't 'move around' in his adventures, but the locations (especially the climax) should be adequately established and foreshadowed."

Mamet's memo is good generic advice for any drama (although I can think of plenty of shows that I love that violate it up the wazoo). But this writer's bible is a very clear declaration of purpose for this project. In fact, the first quote reads like a mission statement for a single project.

I think I need to create a document like this for collaborative works. To say, "This is the kind of work we're working on, these are the tactics we're using to build it." Our last collaboratively devised work, based around the works of Kafka, came out well (especially since we created it from scratch in 9 rehearsals), but it could have used a unity of tactic/form a little more (one day we'll revisit it, I think, from the perspective of sound and silence). It would have been refreshing to know -- "This is what I find effective about the work of Kafka. This is how we can make that effective on stage. Now let's find out how we make that work."