Brooklyn, shit. I'm still only in Brooklyn. Every time I think I'm going to wake up back in the sunshine. When I was home after my first pilot season, it was worse. I'd wake up and there'd be nothing... I hardly said a word to my wife until I said yes to a divorce. When I was here I wanted to be there. When I was there, all I could think of was getting back into an audition. I've been here a week now. Waiting for an audition, getting softer. Every minute I stay in this room I get weaker. And every minute Charlie auditions he gets stronger. Each time I look around the walls move in a little tighter.
Everyone gets everything he wants. I wanted a guest spot on a series, and for my sins they gave me one. Brought it up to me like room service.
It was a real choice show, and when it was over, I'd never want another.
I was going to the worst place in the world, and I didn't even know it yet. Weeks away and thousands of miles away in a town that spread like room temperature Jell-O being sucked up a straw straight into Sorkin. It was no accident that I got to be the caretaker of Aaron Sorkin's memory, any more than being back in New York was an accident. There is no way to tell his story without telling my own. And if his story is really a confession, then so is mine.
They had tapes.
“That’s great Tom, but your brother is standing in the middle of Afghanistan.”
“It’s like a Strindberg festival in the park.”
"Dolphin Girl."
There was more. Pedantic rantings against the religious right, the war in Iraq, and comedy references that were years out of date.
Aaron Sorkin was one of the most outstanding writers this country has ever produced. He was a brilliant and outstanding writer in every way and he was a good man too. Humanitarian man, a man of wit, of humor. He wrote A Few Good Men, The American President, Sports Night, The West Wing. After that his ideas, methods became unsound... Unsound.
He's crossed to Burbank with his WGA army, who worship the man, like a god, and follow every order however ridiculous.
In this business, things get confused out there, power, ideals, the old morality, and practical showrunning necessity. Out there with these actors and writers it must be a temptation to be god. Because there's a conflict in every human heart between the rational and the irrational, between good and evil. The good does not always triumph. Sometimes the dark side overcomes what Lincoln called the better angels of our nature. Every man has got a breaking point. You and I have. Aaron Sorkin has reached his. And very obviously, he has gone insane.
My mission is to proceed out to California. Pick up Sorkin’s path, follow it, learn what I can along the way. When I find him, infiltrate his cast by whatever means available and terminate Sorkin’s command.
How many people had I already terminated? There were those six P.A.'s that I know about for sure. Close enough to blow their last breath in my face as they took off their walkie-talkies. But this time it was an American and a writer. That wasn't supposed to make any difference to me, but it did. Shit... charging a man with bad writing in this place was like handing out speeding tickets in the Indy 500. I took the audition. What the hell else was I gonna do? But I didn't know what I'd do when I found him.
I went to the casting office. It was a good way to pick up information without drawing a lot of attention. That was OK, I needed the air and the time. Only problem was I wouldn't be alone.
The room was filled with mostly just kids, rock and rollers with one foot in their graves.
Next to me, the one they called Chef, was from New Orleans. He was wrapped too tight for show business, probably wrapped too tight for New Orleans. Lance, was a famous surfer from the beaches south of LA. You look at him and you wouldn't believe he ever auditioned for even a PSA in his whole life. Clean, Mr. Clean -- sitting directly in front of me tilted all the way back in his chair -- was from some South Bronx shithole. The light and space of Hollywood really put the zap on his head. Then there was Phillips, the casting agent. It might have been my mission, but it sure as shit was Phillip's plane
At first, I thought they handed me the wrong breakdown. I couldn't believe they wanted this man gone. After graduating from Syracuse University with a Bachelor of Fine Arts degree in Musical Theatre in 1983, Sorkin spent much of the 1980s in New York as a struggling, largely unemployed actor. He found his passion in writing plays however, which established him as a young, promising playwright. His stageplay A Few Good Men caught the attention of Hollywood producer David Brown, who bought the film rights before the play even premiered.
He has had his personal problems - cocaine addiction, trying to board a commercial flight with 'shrooms. Sorkin is an overcontrolling writer, who rarely shares the job of writing with his writing staff.
I'd heard his dialogue on the tape and it really put a hook in me. But I couldn't connect up that voice with this man. Like they said he had an impressive career. Maybe too impressive... I mean perfect. He was being groomed for one of the top slots of the corporation. Producer, studio head, anything... Castle Rock Entertainment hired Sorkin to adapt A Few Good Men for the big screen. The movie became a box office success. Two other screenplays at Castle Rock -- Malice and The American President. He worked as a script doctor on films such as Schindler's List and Bulworth. His television career began in 1998, when he created Sports Night for ABC. Sorkin's next TV series was the multiple Emmy-award-winning political drama The West Wing, this time for NBC and things started to slip. By the third season, and in the aftermath of 9/11, he ratcheted up the didacticism. Storylines stopped and shows became a string of self-important monologues. The report to the network was restricted. Seems they didn't dig what he had to tell them. After more than a decade away from the theatre, Sorkin returned to write The Farnsworth Invention, at La Jolla Playhouse. Then, in 2006 he wrote Studio 60 on the Sunset Strip. He was 44 years old. Why the fuck would he do that?
