At one point in his career, Jerry Seinfeld could have sold ice to a penguin; sand to a camel; smoke to a fire. Then came the short-lived Microsoft ads that he did with Bill Gates and suddenly it was anathema to be seen with him on film.
"Cop Rock?" Really, what was up with that show, Steven Bochco? A drama-musical-whatever hybrid that nearly wrecked Mr. Bocho's career after the genius of "Hill Street Blues," and more quality television writing than you can imagine.
How about all the "Saturday Night Live" alums who can't seem to make one decent film or tv series between them when they leave the show to pursue their "genius?" Dana Carvey, Amy Poehler, Chris Kattan where art thou?
I have to admit that I love success stories - those seemingly larger than life real life tales that make you feel that anything is possible if you just don't quit. But even more I love those stories about those who reach so high at times they forget they can't really fly and they crash and burn. Why? Because its a sobering realization that we can't always believe "our press." The kicker is that most of those stories are also accompanied by a story of redemption and success - not alway but enough times to make me think that failure is just simply another phase of success.
The truth is, even geniuses fail - we just don't focus on those failures - unless they're spectacular - as much as we remember the successes. Scratch any career in Hollywoodland with a light fingernail and you'll uncover more failure than anyone wants to admit.
The difference is that those who succeed:
1) Aren't afraid to fail.
2) Aren't permanently devastated by those failures.
3) Learn and get stronger from failure. In fact, anyone who succeeds almost must fail either first or second or at some point in their career.
There's a famous "sophmore jinx" that bands go through. After years of struggle, they make that 1st album which becomes a huge success and then wham - the 2nd one is so bad you can't even give it away. If they recover, sobered and enlightened by their disaster, they usually turn out a great 3rd album.
Writers have that too. We sell something hot and the production companies want more. So we go into our war chest, find that one stinking mess that we've always loved and no one else did, and give it to them. They (all of "they"), calling us genuises and not being able to back away from that appelation, buy it, make it and...never call us again.
Writer Diablo Cody, for example. "Juno" - huge success. "Jennifer's Body" uh...not so much.
How about "Mallrats," Kevin Smith's 2nd feature after "Clerks?".
"Anatomy of Hope." "Cloverfield," "Six Degrees," and "What About Brian" and the lukewarm "Fringe" - all J.J. Abrahms productions before he killed with perhaps the best reboot ever "Star Trek" in 2009.
In fact, in general, how many disgusting masses of celluloid have we had to sit through called "sequels" that completely failed to live up to the promise of the originals?
Failure is great (in hindsite) because it forces us to step back and re-evaluate - not take things for granted. Not believe our press clippings.
We simply cannot get too wrapped up in the buzz. It's like the high diving scores at the Olympics - toss out the high score and the low score and you've got a good idea of where you actually are in the world.`
Failure is also perception - one man's floor is another man's ceiling. I remember getting into a heated argument with a person who tried to say that a film that cost one million dollars and grossed seven million dollars was a failure because it made less than most blockbuster films' kraft services budget. Once I pointed out that the film to which he was referring which grossed 150 million dollars on a budget of 130 million dollars lost money he conceded my point. It may have been a failure to him but it was a huge unqualified success to the producers of the small film who happily sextupled their investment. Had the big budget film he mentioned done the same it would have had to gross nearly a billion dollars.
Failure is a force for good, not ill. No one succeeds without some failures. And no failure is the end of the road unless you allow it to be. The surest way to fail is to quit. Try to remember when you've been knocked down and you're a mewling pile of "why me" that most failures are transient. There's a statistic that states that most people who get fired go on to better (!) jobs.
Don't be afraid to fail because that means you're at least trying - and that says a lot about you no matter what else others may think.
