So You Wanna Write a Screenplay?(award season attention on actors, not screenwriters)

Recently, I spent a few hours arguing with an actor friend of mine over who has it worse in Hollywood, actors or writers. He told this story:

He is on an audition for a small part on a top-rated comedy series. He is, by way of background, a nice-looking guy and not untalented. He has, as we say around here, "comedy chops," which means, as we say around here, that "he knows his way around a joke." He can be funny, in other words.

Halfway through his audition, the producer of the show turns to the casting director and says in a loud voice, "I told you to bring me some good-looking people!" The audition is over. My friend slinks out. What could I do, after hearing this tale, except mumble a few supportive comments and pick up the check?

In my own experience of the War for Industry Respect, however, it's usually the writer who loses. This is on my mind because it's awards season right now in Hollywood. We're making our long, not-so-stately march from New Year's to the Oscars, and the traditional Hollywood battle lines between those in front of the camera and those in front of the word processor are being redrawn in bold. No paparazzi besiege the lowly writer as he saunters along the red carpet on his way into the Golden Globes or the Oscars. No Hollywood scribes clamor to ask who designed his clothes. Jewelers do not compete to bling-blingify the guy up for best screenplay adaptation.

It's unnerving, believe me, to walk into one of those ceremonies a bit behind a famous face. The flashbulbs stop flashing, the reporters stop calling out questions, the buzz and the noise and the excitement just stop dead--until the sad, anonymous writer passes. Then the electricity starts up again as the next famous person behind him comes into view. On the other hand, writers don't have to go on auditions.

Still, actors ask for that kind of abuse. For all ...