It's 122 pages long, it's sitting on my nightstand, it says "Intolerable Cruelty" on the cover.

Tuesday night, Carey and I went to visit a friend of ours in Burbank, Ben Bays. (Some guy with whom we used to go to school in years past. Directed a film awhile back.) Now, Ben is all about movies. No, really, he's ALL ABOUT MOVIES. He's out there raising the money, borrowing the equipment, making the deals, meeting the right people, writing, plotting, directing now and then. Ben's a filmmaker. The man bleeds celluloid.

So, we battled through about an hour and a half of LA rush-hour traffic (which is its own story), to finally arrive at Ben's humble apartment on Elm St., in Burbank. Near Studio City. We caught up for a bit... talked movies, jobs, commute times, life in Southern California... and so on. We decided to go to Bob's Big Boy in town (which, for those who didn't know, happens to be the historical very first Bob's Big Boy ever. Apparently, it's a big screaming deal and a local favorite among Burbank folks and the occassional celebrity).

On the way there, Ben told us the story of The Time He Saw Tom Hanks At Big Boy. Aparently, Tom enjoys a burger, fries, and cherry pie as much as the next guy. As it turns out, we ended up sitting in the very booth where the Hanks had sat (Carey sitting in Tom's seat, which delighted her to no end). After a delightful dinner, Ben graciously picked up the tab and took us on a short driving tour of the studios.

And it's really amazing, if you've never done it: Scrubs, ER, Friends, Frazier... all shot in the same little building off to the left. A block away was the Warner Bros. lot, where movie magic was being made. Across the street, ABC. Another block, Disney studios and the Disney Channel. There's Paramount. There's Universal. All right there, wedged in together. It was all terribly fascinating. Probably the most influential 4 block radius in the world. To be perfectly frank, I'm surprised it wasn't the #1 target on 9-11.

We returned to Ben's crib to find his roommate, Aaron (who also happens to be in showbiz, as a freelance production assistant). While Aaron may not be rich, he's hobnobbed with some of the bigger names in The Industry. (He had a conversation last week with Frances McDormand and a few months ago, Michelle Pfeiffer bought him a beer.) Over the last few weeks, though, he's been working on the set of a Coen Brothers film.

It's difficult to describe how much envy I have for Aaron right now. If he weren't such a nice guy, I'd probably punch him in the neck. Joel and Ethan Coen are easily my very favorite filmmakers of all time. Fargo. O Brother Where Art Thou? The Big Lebowski. Raising Arizona. Anyhow, he was giving me the skinny on the latest Coen flick, starring George Clooney and Catherine Zeta Jones. He mentioned, in passing, "oh, and I have the screenplay in my bedroom. Do you want it?"

I don't usually blubber, but this was an original on-set copy of an in-production Coen Brothers Movie. I managed to finally stammer out that, yes, I really would like to have it. Aaron handed it to me and also gave me a call sheet and several storyboards drawn by Joel Coen himself. It's difficult to describe how exciting this is for me.

And, I've read it. And, of course, it's absolutely hilarious. I can't reveal any details, however, or I'm sure the Hollywood mafia would somehow descend upon me. It's called "Intolerable Cruelty" and it'll be out Christmas time of 2003.

And it's sitting on my nightstand.

Hah.