[ChuckElias]

I just watched the movie "Comedian" last night. For those of you who haven't heard of it, it's a documentary of Seinfeld's development of a new act. After his last HBO special, Jerry "retired" everything he'd ever written. And this movie shows him writing new stuff and trying it out, and talking with other comedians about what works and doesn't etc. It was also pretty interesting.

Part of the movie also deals with a young up-and-coming comic who is trying to get his break. He comes across as a real jerk, but his story is a great counter-balance to Jerry's. Here's a guy trying to make it big, and Jerry is trying to make it big again.

Anyway. . . why is this on-topic? Well, b/c a lot of what they say is stuff that we as officials say. The kid is "trying to get to the next level". Then he gets his shot on Letterman and it doesn't go exactly as he planned. He's cocky b/c he's convinced he can make it, but he's insecure b/c doesn't see it happening on his timetable.

They talk about working, working, working so you try out things and know what works and what doesn't in different situations. Working to perfect the small things; the inflection, the gesture, etc.

It shows the guys after the shows sitting around having a drink and talking about how things went that night.

At one point, Jerry meets Bill Cosby and it's a great scene b/c we see that even the top guys have their idols that they look up to.

I think all of that reflects a lot on what we do as officials. We always tell new guys to work games. Work, work, work. Perfect the small things; appearance, mechanics. We sit around on Friday nights and talk about how our games went. What went well, and what didn't. We're all thinking about that "next level" and feeling that maybe we're not making progress fast enough.

Anyway, things are slow in hoop-land. So I thought if you like Jerry Seinfeld at all, you might check out the movie and see some of the similarities of what those guys do and what we go through.