Why I Fired The Book Writer
December 15, 2002
Hey guys, this e-mail was to me from the guy who was supposed to be the "ghost writer" for my autobiography. I was appalled by the "matter of fact" way that he made it so clear that he has no interest in writing a good book and is only interested in doing it for the money. I'm still going to persue a book deal, by the time it happens, I'm sure there will be more rad stuff to write it about. I don't even need to write a check to express to this motherfucker- YOU'RE FIRED. He's not even a good writer in the first place, check it out:
hey steve--I've emailed Nick. The Ann Arbor date for the 12th isn't on that itinerary; not sure if it's still on or what. regardless, I hear what you are sayin and agree I could have been doing more. The key thing here for me is to work with some kind of contract, not becaus i think anybody is going to screw anybody over or anything, and frankly, I think if it came down to it, you would give me another cash retainer. You were right when you said a lot of the work is on me and i just want to make the most efficient use of the time. I already have, shit, like three chapters worth of at least background material. Our dilemma, according to the agents, is that we don't have the right chapter. For conversational purposes, especially amongst the book/entertainment industry, you;re steve-o from jackass so we gotta give them that. now's the time to move forward and sell this thing, because once i;ve got a contract and I know what the beginning, middle and end is, I work a whole lot better. to me that;s part of the discipline. my grandfather had a saying that his nurse had put on a pillow; "the bullshit is fine but when they express it in a check, then you can believe it" and, as I said, I have no doubt you will come through, I just want to make sure our efforts are focused on what is going to get the bullshit industry to start writing checks, which, as i said is a behind the scenes of jackass chapter. We need to start thinkng of some kind of opening scene, some tell all, you know, some crazy shit that mtv rejected or the real story of jackass. Something like that. The "oh shit..." factor, if you will. You are a great story teller, I just think we have to hone in if we're gonna sell this thing. Right now we're selling as much as writing. So a lot of the work is editing right now, getting the best bits and making it happen right, instead of geting so far ahead of ourselves some slick agent asshole is like yeah great but where's the dirt on knoxville? that's what, at least at this point, they want, is you as first of all participant but secondly a witness to an American entertainment phenomenon. Let me know your thoughts and how you want to proceed. If you're coming to Ann Arbor, we can get a few hours of tape done, or we can try to make a trip happen out your way after the Holidays. Whatever works. Talk to you soon.
