Writing TV is a collaborative course of, which regularly implies that seeing a author’s credit score on prime of a TV episode is not as robust an indicator of their writing fashion as you’d suppose. They could have written many of the script, certain, however plenty of what occurs is commonly determined by the showrunner and the opposite workers writers. Throw within the normal chaos that comes with attempting to make a profession in Hollywood, and the result’s you typically get writers who veer off in a surprisingly completely different path after a significant undertaking is completed.
For instance: Alec Berg, David Mandel, and Jeff Schaffer had been all writers for the hit sitcom “Seinfeld,” which went on for 9 seasons and have become one of the crucial critically acclaimed and standard reveals of all time. When the collection wrapped up in 1998, did these writers proceed writing for Emmy-nominated, boundary-pushing sitcoms? Effectively, kind of, however in addition they wrote for 2003’s “The Cat within the Hat,” starring Mike Myers because the titular Cat. The film has a whopping 4.0 on IMDb, a ten% score on Rotten Tomatoes, and was thought of a field workplace disappointment.
The film was so poorly acquired, in reality, that it looks like its director, Bo Welch, was by no means allowed to direct a film once more. Since “Cat within the Hat” he is solely directed a handful of episodes for the enjoyable Netflix present, “A Collection of Unlucky Occasions.” As NYT movie critic A. O. Scott wrote on the time:
“First-time director Bo Welch has put collectively a vulgar, uninspired lump of poisoned eye sweet that Common has the temerity to name ”Dr. Seuss’ The Cat within the Hat.” It’s nothing of the sort, regardless of voice-over narration that often tries to mimic the cadences of Seussian verse and units that sporadically evoke Seuss’s antic draftsmanship.”
The excellent news is that “The Cat within the Hat” was not the brand new regular for any of these “Seinfeld” screenwriters. Alec Berg would go on to do nice work on the HBO collection “Barry,” David Mandel would write for HBO’s “Veep,” Jeff Schaffer would write for FXX’s “Dave,” and all three of them would write for Larry David’s “Seinfeld” follow-up, “Curb Your Enthusiasm.” The Razzie-nominated “Cat within the Hat” was unhealthy, however not fairly unhealthy sufficient to damage their careers. The opposite excellent news is that, as time goes on, extra individuals are beginning to surprise if “The Cat within the Hat” was truly kind of good, perhaps?