Charlie Kaufman News

Today the L.A. Times started a new weekly feature, written by Jay A. Fernandez, called "Scriptland", which is going to be about the "work and professional lives of screenwriters".

Could be interesting, though it's probably a good thing that he's not interested in the private lives of screenwriters; I don't think there are many screenwriters outside of Joe Eszterhas who make for very good tabloid fodder.

This week's column is largely concerned with notable scripts that Fernandez has been reading, including the new Charlie Kaufman script "Synecdoche, New York", which is apparently very hush-hush, and which Fernandez only provides minimal details about.

But according to Fernandez, it is great, a "wrenching, searching, metaphysical epic... about death and sex and the vomit-, poop-, urine- and blood-smeared mess that life becomes physiologically, emotionally and spiritually. It reliably contains Kaufman's wondrous visual inventions, complicated characters, idiosyncratic conversations and delightful plot designs, but its collective impact will kick the wind out of you".

Fernandez was so blown away by the read that he goes on to write "If this film gets made in any way that resembles what's on the page... Synecdoche will make Adaptation and Eternal Sunshine look like instructional industrial films. No one has ever written a screenplay like this. It's questionable whether cinema is even capable of handling the thematic, tonal and narrative weight of a story this ambitious."

Okay. Crap. Now I want to read it, now. Anyone who wants to sneak me a copy, feel free.

Because Spike Jonze is off in Australia directing "Where The Wild Things Are", "Synecdoche, New York" will be directed this spring by Kaufman himself. According to imdb, Philip Seymour Hoffman and Michelle Williams have been cast, though the movie is still casting.

The great thing about Charlie Kaufman is that though Hollywood likely (sadly) has no interest in ever making a ton of Kaufmanesque movies, it's great that he is out there, doing fresh and inventive things and inspiring us by showing that it's not always about staying inside the lines, even in Hollywood.

And whenever an imaginative film comes out, like "Stranger Than Fiction", everyone assumes that Kaufman wrote it, even though he had nothing to do with it.

So there's something out there to look forward to, though it's hard to imagine that it'll hit theaters before late 2007 at the earliest.