NCIS: Yosemite

World For Travel

Another Untold Story From the Hollywood Slush Pile

In any given year roughly 250,000 speculative screenplays circulate around Hollywood, written for free by someone with a dream and a keyboard. Perhaps 50 will be purchased. That means 249,950 untold stories will silently wither, never to stimulate our imagination. But that Darwinian process ends here. Write Enough! is committed to resurrecting moribund scripts from the Hollywood Slush Pile, drawing on a veritable Marianas Trench of passed over stories for a peek at what might have been made, written by those who might've been paid.

Today we consider a 2015 submission entitled, NCIS: Yosemite.

Sailors are turning up slain in Yosemite National Park and it's up to the crack investigative team of the Naval Criminal Investigative Services to find out who, or what, is leaving our bluejackets deader than a sequel to Battlefield Earth. 

Quiz Peters was alone. 

The 28-year old unemployed student held a Master's Degree in Spittoon Art and $64,000 in student loan debt. He lived in a small room in Burbank, California, upstairs from a urine bank. In the fall of 2013, his girlfriend left him for a man who sold bagged oranges on freeway off ramps. Unemployed, except for the money brought in by a supervisory position with Americorps, Peters' life revolved around his smart phone, Amazon Prime, and NCIS.

Wearing headphones to drown out the constant downstairs flushing, Peters devoured episode after episode of the popular police procedural, year after year, Los Angeles to New Orleans. He loved the characters, especially the forensic tech with mad skills and a quirky personality. But he hated the fact that the show was not included free in the Prime members catalogue. Each episode required a separate purchase. Peters resented paying $1.99 a pop.

Then one afternoon, an epiphany: what if NCIS were a film? A film with a crime so cunning, that it's resolution would ensnare viewers like himself to watch over and over again? A film included free in the Amazon Prime members catalogue?

Could Robert McKee Hold the Answers?

Peters called CBS but couldn't get past the automated answering system. He trolled Reddit NCIS bulletin boards, seeking allies. He Tweeted. He drove past Fox, Universal, and Warner Bros. studies, yelling his ideas out through a bullhorn. He stalked Jeff Bezos and spent several months in jail. 

Quiz Peters finally realized he would have to strike the spark, light the match, stuff a flaming possum into the gas tank of Hollywood. He would have to write the script himself. 

Inspired, Peters took screenwriting courses online. He read Syd Field and Robert McKee. He took lessons from a man in a park who had once worked on The Last Airbender. Completing a story outline, character descriptions and pages of sample dialogue, Peters, after several months, finally typed FADE IN.

The Unseen Hand of Chick-Fil-A

In his story, yes, U.S. Navy personal were being found dead in Yosemite. But Peters became side-tracked by making all the characters quirky. The Supervisory Special Agent, the Special Agents, and the Medical Examiner dressed as Klingons, or nursed a desire to live as a baboon, or spent hours online flaming fellow geeks over plot points in Attack on Titan.

Almost as an afterthought, Peters scattered identical clues around each murder scene. Whether near Nevada Falls or atop Half Dome, crude signs in poor English would be uncovered saying, "Enemy bears no do this." From there, the plot decayed rapidly into an uprising by quirky bears with the Act III climax occurring at both a naval facility on Coronado Island and Comic Con.

Peters was unable to place his script with an agent or producer. On one occasion, a studio script reader came to his home and struck him. Wounded by the cruel, uncaring response to his work, Quiz Peters retreated back into Amazon Prime. He has since moved to Flan, New Mexico and is rumored to be living above a dung bank.

But now a lost tale has finally been told.

Other Untold Stories From the Hollywood Slush Pile

E.T.: Panzer Ace

Where's Aida?

When Shriners Attack

In eBook and Paperback

As we leave Dream Land, feel free to check out my horror novel, Hallow Mass over at Amazon. I'm on good terms with Jeff Bezos, as far as I know. Pick up a copy of the book that reviewer David I. Johnston called a "fun . . . fast-paced updating of the Lovecraft mythos."

Hollywood Slush Pile: When Shriners Attack

From two years ago, this is a slightly augmented version of my last—to date—offering from the Slush Pile.
 
(Here is the third edition of Tales From The Hollywood Slush Pile exploring the quarter million unsolicited screenplays that perish each year, passed over and forgotten along with their authors. This week we examine a work that sought to explore the depths of paranoia, but just didn't.)

“Dawn and a small Oregon town sleeps deeply like a sloppy drunk on New Year’s day. Suddenly the early morning peace is split by the sound of many tiny engines. 

Then they appear. 

A young women out jogging is the first to see them, riding out of the mist. She screams a forlorn scream of terror and despair and a darker emotion too primal to name but sometimes heard in Costco. 

But it is too late. 

They are many. 

They are Shriners. 

And they have come to rule.” 

Image: betterphoto.com

 
The above passage was taken from an outline prepared by Lisa Manly-Guam. Author of the screenplay, They Came in Little Cars, (originally titled Mark of the Fez). Manly-Guam was a 24-year-old activist from Salem, Oregon. Other than writing this cryptic photo play, she remains a cipher. All we know for certain is that Lisa believed passionately in odd things.

One of her outré fears involved a patriarchal coup undertaken by the Shriners, an offshoot of the Masons. Formed as a fraternal order in 1870, the Ancient Arabic Order of the Nobles of the Mystic Shrine, or Shriners, are noted for charitable works, wearing silly hats and riding little cars in parades. In Manly-Guam’s opus, they are the hidden hand behind the world’s ills, infiltrating politics and banking; biding their time, tugging strings from the shadows.

And then one day they strike.

 In her 1997 tale, the small town of Pine Head, Oregon is overrun by a Shriner horde. Shocked citizens cannot escape and must endure a reign of enforced fun. Our protagonist is the same jogger from the outline, Jenny Loam. In the wake of invasion, she find herself isolated as her parents and siblings embrace the Shriner ethos of good times and service. Loam stays silent, outwardly complying, even joining a Shriner women’s auxiliary, the Daughters of the Nile.

But inwardly, she vows to throw off the Shriner yoke.

Eventually Loam forms a guerrilla band, obtains automatic weapons and ambushes the Shriners at their weekly parade. Steel-jacked slugs riddle the invaders. Little cars crash, bursting into little flames. The Shriners attempt to fight back, hurling water balloons, but they are cut down like bunch grass. The film ends on a close shot of a bloody fez.

Registered with the Writers Guild of America West, Manley-Guam's screenplay landed at Sun Nova Pictures, a small independent production company. The coverage was puzzled.

      “The Shriner Menace failed to deliver. They came across as goofy but benign.”

     “Didn’t the Shriners build a hospital in Pine Head? Killing them sends a mixed message.”
       
     “Perhaps the story would make more sense if Jenny’s parents were maimed by a little car.”

Out of the slush pile and into the wastebasket.

No more is know about the subsequent life of Lisa Manly-Guam and her Shrinerphobic epic. She remains anonymous. But that happens. Unknown authors are as common in this town as…well…unknown screenplays.

But now a lost tale has finally been told.

Free Republic

Hollywood Slush Pile: When Shriners Attack

 (Here is the third edition of Untold Stories From The Hollywood Slush Pile, exploring the quarter million unsolicited screenplays that perish each year, passed over and forgotten along with their authors. This week we examine a work that sought to explore the depths of paranoia, but just didn't.)

“Dawn and a small Oregon town sleeps deeply like a sloppy drunk on New Year’s day. Suddenly the early morning peace is split by the sound of many tiny engines. 

Then they appear. 

A young women out jogging is the first to see them, riding out of the mist. She screams a forlorn scream of terror and despair and a darker emotion too primal to name but sometimes heard in Costco. 

But it is too late. 

They are many. 

They are Shriners. 

And they have come to rule.” 

Image: betterphoto.com

 
The above passage was taken from an outline prepared by Lisa Manly-Guam. Author of the screenplay, When Shriners Attack, (originally titled Mark of the Fez). Manly-Guam was a 24-year-old activist from Salem, Oregon. Other than writing this cryptic photo play, she remains a cipher. All we know for certain is that Lisa believed passionately in odd things.

One of her outré fears involved a patriarchal coup undertaken by the Shriners, an offshoot of the Masons. Formed as a fraternal order in 1870, the Ancient Arabic Order of the Nobles of the Mystic Shrine, or Shriners, are noted for charitable works, wearing silly hats and riding little cars in parades. In Manly-Guam’s opus, they are the hidden hand behind the world’s ills, infiltrating politics and banking; biding their time, pulling strings from the shadows.

And then one day they strike.

Red Fez Among the Evergreens

 In her 1997 tale, the small town of Pine Head, Oregon is overrun by a Shriner horde. Shocked citizens cannot escape and must endure a reign of enforced fun. Our protagonist is the same jogger from the outline, Jenny Loam. In the wake of invasion, she find herself isolated as her parents and siblings embrace the Shriner ethos of good times and service. Loam stays silent, outwardly complying, even joining a Shriner women’s auxiliary, the Daughters of the Nile.

But inwardly, she vows to throw off the Shriner yoke.

Eventually Loam forms a guerrilla band, obtains automatic weapons and ambushes the Shriners at their weekly parade. Steel-jacked slugs riddle the invaders. Little cars crash, bursting into little flames. The Shriners attempt to fight back, hurling water balloons, but they are cut down like bunch grass. The film ends on a close shot of a bloody fez.

Registered with the Writers Guild of America West, Manley-Guam's screenplay landed at Sun Nova Pictures, a small independent production company. The coverage was puzzled.

      “The Shriner Menace failed to deliver. They came across as goofy but benign.”

     “Didn’t the Shriners build a hospital in Pine Head? Killing them sends a mixed message.”
         
     “Perhaps the story would make more sense if Jenny’s parents were maimed by a little car.”

Out of the slush pile and into the wastebasket.

No more is know about the subsequent life of Lisa Manly-Guam and her Shrinerphobic epic. She remains anonymous. But that happens. Unknown authors are as common in this town as…well…unknown screenplays.

But now a lost tale has finally been told.

Untold Stories from the Hollywood Slush Pile: Where's Aida?

(Here is the second edition of a series exploring the quarter million unsolicited screenplays that perish each year, passed over and forgotten along with their authors. This week we highlight a strange comedy that came close to seeing the big screen.)

Vaughn Flores worked for a temp agency in Alhambra, giving typing tests, making coffee, and getting everyone to sign office birthday cards. Each night he returned to a small home in La Crescenta where he lived with Grandma Flores. One winter evening in 1994, while smoking pot in his room and watching Matlock, Vaughn decided to write a screenplay. Then he'd have one just like everyone else who worked at the temp agency.

By summer 2002, after numerous distractions and many bags of chili Fritos, his project was ready. He called the script, Where’s Aida? Vaughn’s surrealistic comedy revolved around the Zavala clan, an extended Mexican family and their pet cow Beso de Leche. A headstrong bovine, Beso constantly tries entering the house to watch television, preferring soap operas to soccer and news.

Whenever a crisis arises, the Zavalas call upon bossy-but-lovable daughter Aida to fix things. Never seen throughout the film, Aida is the measuring stick by which other characters resolve their conflicts—what would Aida do? After a big fight and chase, the movie ends with the Zavalas realizing Aida is a real pain-in-the-ass. They move without leaving her a forwarding address

Getting tips from his temp agency pals, Vaughn managed to land the script at 20^th Century Fox and Touchstone Pictures. But his work never passed the junior coverage readers. Said one about the screenplay: “More TV than film and bad TV at that, though I liked the cow.” Another wrote that 'Aida' seemed “a cross between Waiting for Godot and The George Lopez Show but with a funny cow.”

And so 'Aida' teetered before the plunge into that Tartarus of discarded visions called the Hollywood Slush Pile.

But in an odd twist, a company called Baja Quality Entertainment learned of the property through the grapevine and optioned it from Vaughn. They shot a screen test of a young actress, Carmen Solano, and a cow chosen to play Beso. 

 Where's Aida? seemed poised to spring from screenplay to produced movie. But the cow wrangler wanted too much cash upfront. Negotiations collapsed. The screenplay achieved the sterile honor of also landing in the Baja slush pile.

Deal deader than cheap gas, Vaughn lapsed into a depression. He had quit his temp job and used the option money to buy a cravat in anticipation of being a screen writer. Grandma Flores had already invited their family and friends to the Oscar awards. But time dulls all wounds. Vaughn realized that the hard work of writing didn't exactly fog up his bong. There were other things in life. And while he never stopped smoking pot, he eventually found a job where it didn't matter. Today, Vaughn Flores is in charge of Amtrak.

And now a lost tale has finally been told.

 video: lichoo

Untold Stories from the Hollywood Slush Pile

In any given year roughly 250,000 speculative screenplays circulate around Hollywood, written for free by someone with a dream and a keyboard. Perhaps 50 will be purchased. That means 249,950 untold stories will silently wither, never to stimulate our imagination. But that Darwinian process changes today. Every Friday Write Enough! resurrects moribund scripts from the Hollywood Slush Pile, drawing on a veritable Marianas Trench of passed over pictures for a peek at might have been.

Today's offering is the 1983 sci fi/historical thriller: E.T. Panzer Ace.

Eager to piggyback on the success of Steven Spielberg's 1982 mega-hit, screenwriters typed out their top friendly alien offerings. But one canny scribe counter-punched. Aspiring wordsmith Moss Karling, a military history buff and bartender at Bob's Frolic Room in Hollywood, poured his dark passions onto the page. Eventually he convinced character actor (and regular customer) Gill Hong to show the script to his agent.

Karling's story followed the Spielberg path of a lost alien. But Moss elected to have the creature  marooned in 1943 Germany. The frightened being is discovered hiding under a Panther tank by lonely gunner Manfred Knobble. Knobble lures it into the barracks by leaving a trail of schnapps and cigarettes. Through an improbable series of events, E.T. eventually becomes a top panzer commander on the Eastern Front, personally decorated by Hitler who is told the odd-looking soldier hails from Tibet.

In a rare production still, E.T. (Gill Hong) is awarded an Iron Cross by Hitler (Loaf Masters).

But a suspicious Gestapo want the chain-smoking alien brought in for questioning. Knobble helps his friend construct a device to call for rescue, using an old concertina, barbed wire and a Volkswagen battery. The contraption works and a spacecraft arrives. Soldier and alien toast farewell with mugs of schnapps. As the groggy extraterrestrial staggers onto the ship, Manfred presents a parting gift—an antitank rocket. Thick with drink, the befuddled E.T. accidentally triggers the weapon inside the craft, setting off a thermonuclear explosion that vaporizes ship, alien, Knobble, and twenty-nine acres of the Black Forest.

"I'm just not seeing this," said Gill Hong's agent. A determined Karling set out to film the picture himself. He raised enough money to shoot fourteen minutes of footage, using borrowed equipment and actors like Cleveland Bevel who went out to become a featured extra in Air Wolf.

In time, Karling's interest in the project waned and he began a successful career writing historical fiction. His copy may be found on many official U.S. government websites.  Hong worked steadily, later becoming a fixture in Tucson dinner theater. His former agent was arrested for lewd conduct with office furniture.

But now a lost tale has finally been told.
Image: alienresearchalliance.com