Everybody loves the working man until he makes a shitload of money

Okay, you jokers.

Who leaked the info on my new compensation package? I told you that in confidence. And now, thanks to you, I had to spend nine excruciating minutes in a jammed elevator, listening to some kid with a JD whine about how he had done everything right, gone 100k in debt, worked 70+ hours a week, never saw his wife and kid, and still only made 40k as a NYC ADA.

I explained to him that there was no reason for him to torture himself like that: the rich can solve their own problems, and let's face it, can the poor really be saved? But he just kept whining.

And then when I FINALLY made it to the damn lobby and went out to get in my car, my driver kept making snippy remarks about how for Christmas he was hoping he could maybe get his kid that new school backpack she'd been asking for.

So I guess it's MY fault he had to drop out of high school to help pay the rent after his dad's heart attack?

You make a lousy 30 million a year, people start giving you shit. Makes me fucking sick. Sick to my god damn stomach.

I NEED that money. My alimony package is very expensive. And I have a lot of teeth-whitening and hair appointments to pay for. And the rest of you (except for Jeff, fine) will understand me when I say that younger, hotter wives need some incentive to stick around, am I right? Heck, I'm lucky if I make it out of a fiscal year with more than 20, 25 million left over.

This whole thing is disgusting. You know what this is? Redstone is right, the crazy old coot. This is the Marxists trying to fuck with us. Trying to keep the successful man down.

I say to them: THIS IS CAPITALISM AT WORK. The market will pay what the market will bear, and the market obviously wants to bear Moonves. You've got a problem with that, take it up with Adam freakin' Smith.

Seriously, if I find out who leaked this, his ass is grass.

Les.

Beowulf was just a diversion

People keep asking: "Mr. Redstone, don't you want to enjoy your grandchildren?" or "Mr. Redstone, don't you want to retire to a private island somewhere?" or "Mr. Redstone, have I ever told you how much I admire your virility?"

The answers are "No, they're usually sticky", "I hate islands" and "Thank you".

You know why I'm in such magnificent shape? You know why I still look like I'm in my early 50s? You know why I still have all my own hair and internal organs? It's because I work hard and play hard. It's because I'm a visionary. It's because I've fully embraced modern technology.

I think we all know - except maybe you, Silverman - that the nonsense about internet residuals is just that, nonsense. I've revealed my ultimate plan to you all - again, except you, Silverman - over many weekends in The Hamptons and Vail, but to restate:

We must hold the line. We must hold the line for all upper-class white men everywhere. The Communist Menace is very real, and it lives among us, trying to get us to make movies about the Iraq war and global warming.

My scientists are hard at work on creating photo-realistic CG animation. And we're close. Very close. You thought 300 was real? Think again, pally. 99% of that was computer generated. Gerard Butler doesn't even exist! He's just a hologram, a composite of various features Mrs. Redstone enjoys in a man. ¹

THAT is the future. Think on that for a moment: a glorious golden era of film and television created by ever-cheaper computers. No actors to pay: fuck them and their ridiculous snack demands. Replace temperamental directors with easily controlled computer technicians with ponytails and Star Trek t-shirts. And best of all: no more WGA writers. Feature animation? Not covered. And the future, my friends, will be entirely animated.

The writers say: just give us a fair deal. All we're asking for is the ability to go the dentist once every six months and put 8% down on a fixer-upper in Culver City. They say: this is the line! We can't give you anymore, moguls! They say: we deserve fair pay for fair work.

It sounds reasonable. Seductive, even. But we know better, don't we?

And I say: this is the line. To here, gentlemen. No further. We must hold fast for eight more months. That's when the ANIMATRON 4000 comes online: photorealistic CG; 1400 actor modules, from "Hot jailbaity chick" to "Non-threatening black action hero" to "Shia LaBoeuf"; optional genre-scribe add-ons for everything from "Movie you think is a romance but that actually turns out to be about leukemia" to "Rob Schneider picture". All that in a package smaller than your BlackBerry.

It's the future, gentlemen. And it is ours.

Some of you, and I won't name names, are starting to get worried. Oh, I've heard you whining about your fall schedules, and having to return money to advertisers. That's fine with me.

In 1917, I held the line in a muddy trench in France. I will hold the line now.

Sumner




¹Through an offshore shell company, I own 99% of Virtual Studios. Sorry if that comes as a surprise, Silverman.

So sick of this bullcrap.

Are you fucking kidding me.

I had to sit in my office all day - and mind you, this is a corner office, with double the windows of a normal office - and listen to nerds drone on and on over bullhorns about how they were dropping off a metric ton of pencils. As some kind of statement.

Yeah, I went right down to the studio gate to pick them up. As you can imagine.

I'm so sick of this crap. I want to put out there, for the record: I don't even like any of you guys. Silverman, you're just flat-out a jackhole. Redstone, you need to retire before you die while on the phone with some poor schmuck. The rest of you guys: you're way too interested in your hairdos, and you have these ridiculous trophy wives that are fooling exactly nobody.

I'm going home. Don't call me. Don't messenger over any proposals for me to look over. Just stop it.

I'm sick of this strike, I'm sick of these goddamn PENCILS, and I'm sick of you.

Jeff.

Am I right?

RING A DING A DING, I just got the worst/lamest news: we've had to cancel the TCA press tour. Fuckin'-A, man! Talk about a target-rich environment... All those 40-something MILFs, away from the husband, talking to a slick H-wood producer... easy pickings. I'd usually keep two, three rooms upstairs, just in case. Sick, absolutely sick. Nothing tops that except 4 AM at Xenii and the liquor's about to run out.

I remember the year I came out with The Office. "It'll never work," they said. "Americans just aren't ready for this shit," they said. "Remember what happened to "Coupling"?" they said.

But I knew I had a humongoid hit on my hands. Everyone else was obsessing over Steve Carell (don't forget me when you hit the big time, Stevers!) and Jim and Pam, but there was one writer/performer on there who just really got me. Let's call him AJ, since he's "on the other side".

The other day I saw him on the picket line. I had to duck low in my seat, and I think I kind of swerved out of my lane. I heard some pretty loud honking. Anyway, it was so weird to see him out there, you know? I know the rest of you guys aren't totally plugged in to the creative community like the Benster, so it's probably pretty easy for you to do this. But some of my best friends are writers. Just for instance, AJ and I have had some good, good times. Don't kill me for saying this, but I kind of miss him: the late nights at exclusive clubs, doing rails off some chick's rack... that fucking epic Bright Eyes show... how we'd get lit and I'd tell him my ideas about adapting some telenovela for the US market, and he'd really listen, you know what I'm saying?

Fuck man. All I'm getting at, I hope we can get this thing sewn up. Throw the writers a freakin' bone. I say we all pitch in and get a bunch of girls to head out onto the lines and offer free body shots, then rat-tat-tat, ask the WGA to come back to the table while they're still dazzled. Wait a week or two to put out the release, just to seem like real hardasses, and we can all reschedule the TCAs and head up to Big Bear without this shit hanging over our heads like a fucking sword of Damascus or whatever.

Your moderate pal,

Ben

Reality: I Invented It

Boys:

Here are some titles I've considered and rejected for Fall '08. Not good enough for NewsCorp, but take whatever you want. You'll need the help.

Dancing With The Stars Who Portrayed Developmentally Disabled Youths On TV

My Child Drew This, What The Fuck Do You Think It Is?

Who Wants To Marry A Republican

I Accidentally Killed A Bum Two Weeks Ago

Guy Dangling From A Ledge


Your pal,

Rupe.

Gut Check

Bob--

You're an asshole.

Your pal,

Sumner

PS: I fired the biggest movie star in the world. I like to mention that at least once a day.

Artie O'Laughlin, Man's Man

True story! You know how I go by "Robert A. "Bob" Iger"? Well, the "A" doesn't actually stand for anything. Way back in the day when I started here at the Mouse House, my mentor Artie O'Laughlin took me aside and said "Bob, a man just can't get anywhere in this business with a name like Bob fucking Iger. What you need is an extra syllable. Something to stretch that stuff out on your letterhead."

He sent me away for the weekend to think about it. I came back with "Louis", and Artie took the time to explain that no one, not even a bunch of lousy imagineers, would take me seriously if I walked around calling myself Bob-Louis Iger. Then I mentioned my second choice, "Woody", and he punched me in the back of the head, poured me a shot of rye, and explained that I was a fuck-up.

You just don't see mentoring of the younger folks like that anymore. Why, even when I was second in command behind Eiser, you bet your ass I wasn't hanging on his words of wisdom, I was plotting against him. That's just how it is now. Only the strong survive.

But I do appreciate the time Artie took, all those years ago, to help me understand that my oddly squared-off head, without the help of a middle initial, would doom me to a lifetime of mid-level VP gigs, always reporting to some guy with better hair and a hotter former-model trophy wife.

It's in Artie's memory that I took the phantom "A".

Just thought you guys might get a kick out of that.

Your pal,

Robert

Hey Asshole!

Early this morning my second assistant Carl was parking my car (a jet-black hybrid Lex. Actually, it's not so much a hybrid as it is a regular Lexus that I made Carl stick a "hybrid" logo on.) when he almost hit some guy wearing a JESUS SAVES sandwich board.

Carl was totally shaken when he got back to the office. I overheard him telling Yeng (my first assistant) about it. He's a real whiner, that kid. Finally I had to go out and give him a talking to.

"Listen," I said. "If you want to succeed in business, you never lose a game of chicken. It's like Churchill said: never back down, never back down, never back down! Or like in that video where the girl from American Idol and Keanu Reeves are drag racing. You back down, they have your nuts in a vise!"

Carl whined a little bit longer about what he was supposed to do, traffic was crazy, he couldn't just hit the gas, blah blah blah, cry me a river you freakin' Yalie!

I told him what my old professor at Bucknell U (Go Bisons!) used to say: if someone's trying to stand between you and whatever the fuck it is you want, you look 'em straight in the eye and say: Hey asshole! Have you ever read a little book I like to call THE FOUNTAINHEAD?

That's what makes this country great. Guys like me, willing to put the pedal to the metal in pursuit of the bottom line. That's why I know two things:

1) We'll break this damn strike, boys!
2) China ain't got a chance.

Your pal,

Leslie