Do you have any appreciation for the kind of trouble this causes up here? That scene where the Afghans are going to hand over Osama bin Laden but Sandy Berger hangs up the phone on them? If that didn't actually happen, it's not my problem, but to whom do I hand it off? Do I give it to Melpomene, who handles Tragedies for the firm? She's got a fulltime job monitoring "The Young and the Restless," Lifetime TV movies, and Very Special Episodes of "Seventh Heaven." She wouldn't be able to get to it until after the October sweeps, at the earliest.You should probably read the whole thing.--The EditorsLook, I'm not a difficult muse. I'm pretty open about the uses to which my material can be put. You want to film Field Of Dreams and have Shoeless Joe Jackson batting from the wrong side of the plate? Hey, magical realism and all. I'm down with that. Alternative histories, the ones where Gettysburg goes the other way? Have at it. You want Anthony Hopkins as Nixon, or Jim Garrison as a Capraesque seeker of truth? No problem, Oliver.
I even let that earlier film treatment of the 9/11 events -- the one where George Bush starts intoning about meeting "tinhorn terrorists" back at the White House -- slide without comment. (I know where all the bunkers are, buster.) In fact, I had a good laugh over that one with poor Thaleia, but she's no fun now because she has to explain why Dane Cook has a career.