By Joe Janes

Unprecedented Studios Online Producers Meeting

Zoom.com              

Various homes in and around Hollywood, California

Attendance: CEO Beverly Notch, Melvin Furburn, Harry Wang,

Wanda Teasdale, and Peter Beater

Recorded by Zoom

without anyone’s knowledge but it’s in the terms of agreement, fool. 

 

Beverly – Thanks for meeting, everyone. I hope all are safe and healthy and staying home and making many other people risk their health to bring you food and services, like me. So, as soon as the shelter-in-place restrictions are lifted, all our films will go back into production. What I want to get ahead of are movies about the Coronavirus experience. After a war, great movies come out about the war. I want movies about this. (gestures around seemingly at everything) So, give me your ideas. I want big stars and small, isolated ideas.

Melvin – Here’s my pitch, Beverly. Picture on the marquee…Jean-Claude Pandemic! This time it’s personal space. 

Beverly – Catchy. What’s the story?

Melvin - Someone at the hospital is selling PPEs on the black market while the rest of the doctors and nurses go without. One doctor,  Jean-Claude Pandemic, is going to take matters into his own unprotected hands and make sure everyone is standing six feet apart and not making things worse. 

Beverly – His name is Dr. Pandemic?

Melvin – Destiny. He was born to shine during this difficult time. Of course, we can get Jean-Claude Van Damme to play the role. Unless you think he’s too old to play himself.

Beverly – We can CGI his looks. Let’s put a pin in that. Who else has something?

Harry – Right here, Beverly. Picture Denzel Washington, a rogue former bouncer for a shut down night club, evens the score between careless virus carriers and the elderly by standing at the door of a nursing home and respectfully telling people to peek in the windows or go away. People call him…The Sanitizer!

Beverly – I sure would like to rub my hands in that.

Harry – Shall I put a pin in it? 

Beverly – Place it under a heavy rock. I don’t want that idea blowing away. 

Wanda – I have one to die for, Beverly. Schindler’s List 2 – List Harder. That’s it. Liam Neeson reprises his role as Oscar Schindler and he spends his days at home and makes lists of what to do each day. Some days he does the list. Some days he doesn’t. Lives are saved because he’s not going out.

Beverly - We could also call this Schindler Listless. We’ll focus group the title. Impale this. Wait. Is Oscar Schindler still alive?

Wanda – I’m going to say yes. 

Peter – Maybe we can increase the odds of securing Neeson by offering him a two-picture deal. Mine is called Misplaced! With an exclamation point.

Beverly – I always assume an exclamation point.

Peter - Liam Neeson, again, but as the guy from Taken, whatever his name was. This time he uses his “particular set of skills” to find his bottle opener. He hasn’t left his house. It’s there somewhere. He lives alone, now. He has to reach behind couches and search under beds. 

Beverly – Sounds dangerous. Plant a flag in that. I’m hearing a lot about dudes. Anything for the ladies?

Melvin - The Dirty Dozen or So Dishes…The dishwasher is broken and so is divorcee Sigourney Weaver. In order to keep her place clean while self-isolating, she has to put on the rubber and become a scrubber…By rubber, I mean gloves. Not condoms. 

Beverly - That’s our tagline. 

Melvin - It’s a story of survival. Female empowerment stuff. Chicks like that. Guys, too, because it’s Sigourney Weaver. She’s still hot.

Beverly – What about family?

Harry - The Slow and the Sedate starring Vin Diesel. It’s all about family. Everyone has to stay in their own room and avoid one another because one of them is showing symptoms of having the virus. 

Beverly – Make sure they end up dying so everyone can have a good cry. 

Harry – Note taken. Also, to relax and get away from others, Vin goes for leisurely drives once a week alone while listening to Ted Talk podcasts.

Beverly – Love it. Nail it to the wall.

Wanda – I have something more topical. A political thriller. Olympus Has Fallen Asleep. Everyone surrounding the president has COVID-19. Everyone. To keep him safe, the president has been quarantined in the White House and has to avoid contact with others. He spends his days watching television, napping, yelling at the television, napping, calling TV news shows, and napping. Gerard Butler stars.

Beverly: As the  president?

Wanda - As COVID-19.

Beverly – Peter, do you have anything else?

Peter – Yes. This one has a lot of action and adventure. Indiana Jones and The Quick Trip to Get Toilet Paper. Toilet paper’s value has gone sky high. Indiana Jones, who, somehow, is still alive, risks his life to find the last four-pack of two-ply in the labyrinth that is Costco. Other people are after the same four-pack and will go to great lengths to either prevent Indy from finding it or steal it from him once he does. Those are two different groups of people. Nazis and communists. Also, he escapes in a submarine. 

Beverly – I like it. Staple it to your forehead. I hope we can get the rights. Costco is very protective. 

Peter – If that falls through, I also have The Spy Who Came in from What Could Be A Cold. The Rock stars as a secret agent of, I don’t know, Istananapakin, on a mission deep undercover in America. He has the sniffles and a dry cough and tries to escape to Canada where they have better health care. He has to find a way to scale over the Canadian border wall before he gets too sick. 

Beverly – These are all great ideas. I’m glad you’re still working hard and not treating this pandemic like a staycation. By the way, I can’t continue to draw a salary and still pay all of you, so you’re all fired. Stay safe!

(Beverly leaves the meeting.)