This book is a movie script turned into a short almost-novelization, so it falls somewhere between a story book and a full novelization of a film. Also, the book was written by my old drama workshop teacher from Marquette, the workshop that say the germination of The Courtship of Barbara Holt.
It’s a meta book about the film making industry: within the film adapted to prose, Ethan Burns, the son of a famous Western star, works at a cable game show after a lackluster direct-to-cable acting career as his wife and agent manage his father’s legacy. A student approaches Ethan Burns with a script for a proper Western, which Burns finances by selling his fathers famous guns to an Italian fan who agrees to finance the film. They and assorted other motley characters venture to Paintbrush Valley to film it amidst sabotage. Everyone gets a comeppance that needs one and all’s well that end’s well.
The prose starts out with a little depth and characterization that it loses as it moves. Perhaps that’s part of being very closely tied to a screenplay where the characters are established and then it rolls. I dunno. Being more of a novel reader, I thought it could have used a little more through the last half or third. Still, it’s a pleasant read.
On the other hand, it makes me wonder if I could write something like this. I’ve had a couple of ideas for screenplays in mind; perhaps I could first blat them out like this and then screenplayify them. But on the other hand, that sounds like work, and I’d rather sit down with a book.
Fun fact, maybe: The book features a bar called Hegarty’s. Is Balestrieri paying homage to Haggerty’s, a bar near the Marquette campus? Maybe!
