Exclusive: Miley Cyrus and the Case of Hollywood's Most Hacktacular Screenwriter
By Dustin Rowles | Posted Under Trade News | Comments (16)
I mention Alan Loeb’s name a lot around here, not because I really want to, but because like no other cockroach in the Hollywood infestation, this man will turn down no screen-writing opportunity. Right now, most of you only know him as the guy who wrote Things We Lost in a Fire and the guy who managed to woefully fuck up 21, the big screen version of Bringing Down the House: The Inside Story of Six M.I.T. Students Who Took Vegas for Millions. How you manage to turn a compelling story about counting cards and making millions into that piece of shit is a mystery only Allan Loeb’s tiny brain could crack.
But this is also a screenwriter who has no interest in a particular genre — he excels at nothing. He’s a fill-in-the-blank company man, the worst kind of screenwriter because he shits them out in a week’s time and moves on to the next one. How else could you explain how he’s got five scripts in production and nine others in development. And that’s not including the ones we know about that IMDb does not. He’s the go-to-guy for “as generic as you can make it.” That’s the only way I can explain how he can script The Switch — a romantic comedy with Jason Bateman and Jennifer Aniston — in one week, and turn right around and pen the Escape From New York remake. He also doctored an Adam Sandler/Happy Madison script, Just Go For It, which is coming out soon. And yet the same man wrote the screenplay for Oliver Stone’s Wall Street sequel. He’s working on a Ryan Reynolds cross-dressing movie; a terrible-sounding Bradley Cooper movie, where he plays a minor league baseball player forced to live in a nursing home; an Ang Lee comedy about a perfect couple who fake breaks up only to find out their friends never thought they were a very good couple to begin with; and even a remake of a French film, La Doublure.
Do you think he pays any attention to detail, or do you think he throws up on the page and just prays the director can line up his digested giblets in a row? The man apparently enters two movies names into a computer, and it spits out a crappy, watered-down hybrid. This shit is going to catch up to him. Mark my damn words. Allan Loeb’s career will flame out like a lit fart in about two years. People will wise up to his mediocrity. It’s a creatively bankrupt system, and this guy is passing bad checks.
He’s like the Nic Cage of screenwriters; he has no filter. You want more evidence that this man will has absolutely no discretion when it comes choosing assignments? How about this: He’s working on a script called, I’m Like Sooo Undercover. That’s the real title, people, and it sounds every bit as bad as it looks. It’s a teen action comedy about a young, female private eye who goes undercover at a Florida college sorority in order to protect the daughter of a mob accountant.” How is it being described? As Mean Girls meets Miss Congeniality, which probably gives Loeb carte blanche to steal lines and scenes from both movies and throw in a few “likes” and call it a goddamn day.
I should also mention that Miley Cyrus is in talks to star in the film. Because of course she is. Because only Allan Loeb could write a script for Miley Cyrus and Oliver Stone in the same year. Because only Allan Loeb could alternate a Happy Madison production a the Escape From New York remake.
Oh, and also, he’s working on The Charm Artists for Columbia and Neal Moritz (who is the Allan Loeb of producers), about a divorced cop who teams up with a pudgy Casanova to take down a gang lord, while the pudgy Casanova helps her to get her husband back. It’s being described as a cross between 48 Hours and Hitch, which is exactly what it sounds like. Only it’ll be 30 times more derivative and 100 times less funny. Thanks Allan Loeb.
Seriously, someone needs to corrupt that man’s screenwriting software.
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Comments
Posted by: caro at July 7, 2010 11:39 AM
LOL article!!! someone is in a good day!!