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Funky Winkerbean, 5/7/20

OK, I am ashamed to admit this, but: I genuinely do not have a handle on what is happening in Funky Winkerbean today. On the one hand, what we know most about this quixotic second-time-around attempt to turn Les’s maudlin book about his dead wife into a movie is that Les, whom the strip assumes is good and noble, is afraid that Hollywood is going to bastardize it in some way, probably by making it interesting or watchable, and so far his meetings have confirmed his darkest suspicions. Today, he and Mason are talking to a personified cluster of Rich Hollywood Asshole Signifiers, with the giant desk and the smug face and the “Amaze me!” and such, and the dude reacts to their pitch by saying “Creating art isn’t a business model,” which one might expect to mean “I’m in the business of greenlighting profitable entertainment products, and creating art — beautiful, tragic art like Lisa’s Story — isn’t how you do that.”

BUT! HOWEVER! Mason’s pitch isn’t about making some intimate, art-house film that can be made on a Netflix budget and maybe get limited theatrical distribution. He’s throwing all sorts of business-y jargon out there. Box-office appeal! High-concept four-quadrant movie! Maybe the big twist is supposed to be that our Rich Hollywood Asshole has a soul after all. Why are you coming to us with business models, Mason? Creating art isn’t a business model, and we thought you wanted to create art. You ought to be ashamed of yourself.

Between Friends, 5/7/20

Meanwhile, let’s check in on the gently neurotic middle-aged Canadian antics of Between Friends. There, uh, seems to be a gas leak of some sort? More on this situation as it develops.