Years ago, a young woman sat across from me on a near-empty train. She looked like she had been crying. Pulling her sweatshirt sleeves down over her hands, she leaned her head against the window, a distant look on her swollen and scarlet countenance.

I was listening to the Ramones at the time, and took a chance. I moved over to the seat next to her and said hello. She seemed shocked by the abrupt intrusion, but very quickly recovered and managed to make some small talk with me. After a few moments, I offered my headphones:

“You wanna hear something?” I asked.

She took my measure for a long moment before, against what was surely her better judgment, slipping the headphones on. I pressed play and Cretin Hop poured into her head. After a second she put her hands over the phones, drawing the music further in. Beat on the Brat followed; she listened for a minute, then, mirabile dictu, her lips unfolded like tiny wings and a smile took flight on her face.

“I’ve never heard this,” she said, too loud.

“I know,” said I.

“Who is it?”

“The Ramones.”

“What are you, their agent?”

“More like an ambassador,” I smiled. I skipped ahead to the song I really wanted her to hear. “It’s gonna be OK,” Joey Ramone sang to her, “It’s gonna be alright….yeah, yeah, yeah.” I handed her the player, and – here is the amazing part – she turned the volume up. Her eyes closed, her head bobbed almost imperceptibly, a chewed and unpolished fingernail tapped ever-so-lightly the side of her leg.

—–

When the song was over, she took the headphones off and opened her mouth, as though about to ask me a question (Who the hell are you? would have been a good one). I noticed we had arrived at my stop, however, and so scooped up my player, bid her farewell, and skipped off the train just before the doors shut. Apparently it was her stop too, though she must not have noticed ’till it was too late – I turned to see her standing behind the closed doors, bag in hand, laughing, as the train pulled away.

A smile, a laugh. A temporary respite from the pangs of heartbreak. The wonder and beauty and joy of life crammed into two-minute bursts of electricity. This is the genius of the Ramones.

*****

Prior to 1974, few would have seen genius in the future Ramones. In fact, the original lineup included a mental patient (Joey spent time in psychiatric institutions), a right-winger (Johnny), and a dope addict and sometime prostitute (Dee Dee). All were misfits at best, delinquents at worst. And yet…

The Ramones are given a lot of credit (though not enough credit in England) for starting punk. But the band originally had no such revolutionary intent. Indeed, their aim was devolutionary, to return rock and roll to its roots, to strip it of the overindulgent impulses it had acquired by the 1970’s; the endless and tuneless solos, bloated production and ostentatious concerts that characterized so many bands in that era.

—–

The Ramones wanted to make the kind of rock they loved when they were growing up in the late ’50’s and ’60’s – short, melodic tunes, heavy on attitude and harmony, and -most importantly – FUN. The Ramones wanted rock and roll to be fun again.

By all accounts, it was at first hard to know what to make of these strange boys who could barely play their instruments, and who were prone to arguing with each other like ten-year olds on stage. Legendary music journalist Legs McNeil described the Ramones’ first performance in New York City in 1974: “They were all wearing these black leather jackets. And they counted off this song. And they started playing different songs, and it was just this wall of noise… They looked so striking. These guys were not hippies. This was something completely new.”

Indeed, and that is the irony at the heart of the Ramones – in trying to resurrect something old, they inadvertently created something entirely new. Viva la devolucion!

*****

Johnny Ramone has not been given nearly enough credit for the success of the band. Partly, I suspect, because of minimal contributions as songwriter. And then there is the tricky subject of his politics – a self-professed Republican, Johnny Ramone was a Nixon man in his youth; in retirement, he proclaimed “God bless President Bush” at the band’s induction ceremony to the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame.

That Johnny’s politics were so at odds with those of band-mate Joey (a sucker for left-wing causes his whole life), to say nothing of the industry as a whole, no doubt contributed to Johnny’s strangely maligned reputation in Ramones lore. Yet the truth is – Johnny held that band together, often through sheer force of his will. Everyone involved with the Ramones saw Johnny as field marshal; when Dee Dee was strung out, Joey crippled by OCD, and Marky falling over drunk (all three regular occurrences), it was Johnny who made sure that studio time was booked, tour dates set, personnel hired. “Someone had to make those decisions,” Johnny dryly remarked in retirement.

—–

Joey was caretaker of the band’s image and legacy. He insisted they never stray too far from the simplicity of dress and sound that was the Ramones’ hallmark. When band members quit, or were fired, it was Johnny who insisted they could – must – go on. The Ramones’ mission, Johnny understood, was bigger than any one of them.

And then there is that guitar sound. Johnny single-handedly put paid the notion that expensive equipment or virtuoso talent are necessary to make rock and roll. Passion and will – that’s what Johnny brought, and it was more than enough. Critics scoffed that he only played three chords, maybe only knew three chords. Johnny’s response – what else do you need? He played the hell out of those chords, and did more with them than other bands did with all their jazz scales and sitars combined.

*****

Short and celebratory, Ramones songs don’t waste your time – they come on like the laugh of an old friend, sound somehow both comforting and thrilling. For those unacquainted with our friends, allow me to suggest the following gems as an introduction:

1) Blitzkrieg Bop – The perfect rock song, and therefore the perfect song, this was the opening shot in the punk revolution, the first track from the first album. Nothing was ever the same again. They’re forming in a straight line…

2) Danny Says – One of the great songs about being in a rock band, this track from the Phil Spector-produced “End of the Century” chronicles both the excitement (Joey hears one of his songs on the radio) and boredom (whiling away hours in a hotel room watching TV) of being on the road.

3) The KKK Took My Baby Away – Written by Joey after he had just lost his girlfriend (to Johnny, no less). His loss is our gain – funny, sweet, and sad, rock and roll, punk, and doo-wop all wrapped together, KKK is an eminently hummable slice of pop perfection.

4) It’s Gonna Be Alright – From the underrated “Mondo Bizarro,” this was the band’s response to critics who wondered if the departure of bass player and primary songwriter Dee Dee would be the end of the Ramones. The answer: Not a chance. “Got good feelings, about this year,” Joey sings, sounding better than he had in years. “All is very well, C.J. Is here,” he continues, introducing Dee Dee’s replacement. “It’s gonna be alright, it’s gonna be OK,” he roars in the chorus. The message – every ending is also a beginning. The Ramones live, and so does rock and roll.

5) What’s Your Game – Many people think the best pop music ends up on the radio. Then they hear (if they’re lucky) the Ramones. What’s Your Game, like all exquisitely wrought pop tunes, sounds familiar the first time you hear it. That it was never a Top 40 smash is a crime.

—–

6) I Wanna Be Your Boyfriend – Sweet and simple, Joey wears his heart completely on his sleeve in this lilting paean to first love. Hey little girl, I wanna be your boyfriend…

7) Cretin Hop – Go ahead, try not to dance. I dare you.

53rd & 3rd – The question is not: How could the Ramones write a song about male prostitution and murder? The question is: How could the Ramones write a song about male prostitution and murder that is so damn catchy?

*****

Last year the Ramones belatedly received a Grammy Award for “lifetime achievement.” That the industry chose to honor them only after three of the original four members had passed away surely counts as some sort of sick joke. When alive and in their prime, making some of the best popular music ever conceived, or later when they continued to plow around the world nearly year ‘round, keeping a performance schedule that would have killed bands half their age (the Ramones played an astonishing 2,300 shows in some 20 years), the music industry ignored them. Radio ignored them. Legs McNeil put it best when he asked: “Those songs were classic American pop songs. Why weren’t they played on the radio? Why weren’t they?”

The Ramones themselves wondered the same thing. Joey, for one, never gave up hope that the next record, the next single, the next tour would be the one that broke them into the mainstream. Widespread acceptance was always just around the corner for Joey. Johnny, with a classic conservative pessimism, realized very early that it wasn’t going to happen for them, that the best they could do would be to make a living (hence their brutal tour schedule).

Part of the problem was the band’s own lyrics. Frequent themes of mental illness; Nazi references that disturbed even the band’s most ardent supporters; flavors from ‘50’s horror comics and movies – all were guaranteed to spook Top 40 radio programmers.

But some of it wasn’t their fault at all. Tagged as the godfathers of punk, the Ramones suffered from the nasty reputation of the bands that followed and imitated them. The Sex Pistols spit on their audience, American programmers knew. The Sex Pistols are a punk band. The Ramones are a punk band. Therefore, the Ramones must spit on their audience. Better not book them. That the Ramones never displayed the anger and violence of their British contemporaries, that they were more interested in making party music than revolutionary music, was lost on the mainstream music press. The Ramones created punk, which soon became a cage that stifled them creatively and commercially.

*****

In the last decade, Joey and Johnny were lost to cancer and Dee Dee to drugs. The music, thankfully, cannot be taken from us so easily. Music, Joey, said, was his salvation. He wasn’t the only one. There’s me of course, and somewhere out there there’s a girl who, for a brief long-ago moment, found solace on a train from five strangers…

.four of them named Ramone.

From the late 70’s to early 90s I made my living as a Hollywood screenwriter. I’m best known as co-writer of cult film Rock ‘n’ Roll High School, which features the seminal punk band The Ramones. 

My writing partner and I worked every day on the set of the film, and we spent a lot of time with the band, including a 22-hour marathon Ramones concert at the Roxy on the Sunset Strip. As a souvenir of that day, I still carry around a 40% hearing loss and white-noise tinnitus in both ears. 

Over the years, I’ve been approached by many Ramones fans wanting to know what it was like to work with band members Joey, Johnny, Dee Dee and Ringo. Of the four, the most interesting, approachable and, yes, intelligent glue-sniffer was Johnny Ramone, and my partner and I would often spend time talking with him about his film collection and our shared affection for Buster Keaton movies. 

One thing Johnny and I didn’t talk about, however, was our shared dislike of liberal politics. I’m not sure exactly how conservative or how socially constrained Johnny felt at the time, but I never heard him say anything of political consequence on the set. And certainly, for most people in the rock music scene, conservatism was the political love that dare not lip-sync its name. 

It was the same way in the movie business, of course. Social networking (of the pre-Facebook kind) was key to finding work, and at a Hollywood party you never deviated from the Hollywood party line or you would be frozen out. Whenever President Reagan was vilified or unilateral nuclear disarmament praised, often in the same breath, I said nothing and let others do the heavy breathing. In my silence, they simply assumed I shared the Hollywood groupthink. I discovered that, even if you don’t believe in modern liberalism, it’s still possible to make all of Hollywood your oyster…but first you need to clam up. 

Johnny Ramone famously came out of his own political shell in 2002 during the Ramones’ induction into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. While on stage receiving the award, Johnny leaned into the microphone and proclaimed himself a conservative Republican shouting “God bless President Bush and God Bless America!” – a rebel yell in the heart of the (Musicians) Union. 

It must have been a liberating moment for him. 

I not-so-famously came out myself as a radical capitalist a decade earlier when I wrote a politically incorrect screenplay called Global Village Idiot. For me, too, it was a liberating moment, as it freed me from the possibility of making a living in the only business I ever loved. 

The great liberal sin of Global Village Idiot was that it made fun of the environmental movement, and for that I was cast into the Hollywood wilderness, which is roughly east of Normandie Avenue. At the time, environmentalism had officially replaced the “peace” movement as the official religion of Hollywood. This was unsurprising, as the high priests of both religions – such as John McConnell and Hellen Caldicott – were exactly the same. 

At that particular moment, however, Hollywood had just suffered its first defeat in their religious war against the State of California with the electoral failure of Proposition 128, the “Big Green” initiative. 

Cobbled together by environmentalist groups and state legislators such as former SDS radical Tom Hayden, Big Green was a grab for power by leftists who yearned for control of California business and industry by passing the nation’s most stringent environmental regulations. 

Big Green would have included the creation of an Environment Czar with the power to sue any polluter, even the government itself. It was thought by many that Hayden was angling to be the Czar. Unconfirmed sources reported that he appeared giddy at the prospect. Apparently Hayden special-ordered a top hat to wear on the job that said “Czar” on it, but became disillusioned and lost interest in the position when his hat was delivered and the letters mistakenly spelled out “Tsar” instead. But, again, this is unconfirmed and quite possibly invented a few moments ago for comic effect. 

The usual Hollywood celebrities and movie moguls campaigned for the proposition. Chevy Chase, Ted Dansen, Meryl Streep, Jamie Lee Curtis, Jack Lemmon, Susan Sarandon, and dozens of others made the rounds of fundraising cocktail parties, or shot commercials for Prop 128, or crafted their TV show storylines to support the message of Big Green. 

The Hollywood effort to pass the initiative was spearheaded by Jane Fonda, who was recently divorced from Hayden. It was rumored that, as part of the divorce settlement, Fonda was awarded custody of the hat. 

My screenplay had its own version of Big Green called “Blue Skies,” and it mocked the politicians and Hollywood celebrities who rallied ‘round its cause. 

So yes, I knew the subject matter of Global Village Idiot was a little “touchy” for Hollywood. But I felt I had established myself as a writer; I was selling regularly and for the last 5 years I was represented by a William Morris agent. And it was, after all, just a low-budget comedy film, full of sight gags and dumb jokes. Moreover, the script itself was so good-natured that I was sure Hollywood would take the subject matter in stride and accept it as impish, amiable joshing and all in good fun. 

Yeah…I’m just that stupid. 

The screenplay I handed into my William Morris agent turned out to be a 110-page pink slip. 

I knew I was in trouble when my agent didn’t take my phone calls. Well, actually, even in the best of times he never took my phone calls. He was, after all, a Hollywood agent. But when I finally did connect with him, his terse assessment was that the screenplay stunk and he refused to show it to anyone. A few days after that, I was officially notified that I would no longer be represented by the agency. In later months, I learned that William Morris happened to be of the biggest financial backers of Big Green. 

The reaction of my Hollywood friends was no better. They uniformly hated it, thought I was crazy to have written it, and argued vehemently against its underlying philosophy. 

For more than a year, I attempted to find new representation. My resume opened doors to other agencies, but after I insisted that Global Village Idiot be the script they showed around, the same door was swiftly slammed shut, and they didn’t bother to express the traditional concern about not letting it hit my ass on the way out. 

A good friend of mine, who was also an agent, hated the script as well and refused to handle it, advising that I forget all about my 3-brad bundle of Hollywood Kryptonite and write something else. 

But the damage was done. As a writer, whether you get the next job or not depends in large part on whether you got the previous job. 

It works like this. If you’re a producer, you want a reason to believe that the money you spend on a screenplay will result in financial success. But success relies on talent, and talent is intangible, mysterious and hard to judge. As a result, fear runs rampant through the industry because, as screenwriter William Goldman accurately wrote, “Nobody knows anything.” As a result, few people in Hollywood trust their own judgment. 

Success in the movie business is not only uncertain, but it often seems random and maddeningly ephemeral. So if nobody knows anything, how can you judge whether to take a risk with a particular writer, or actor or director when there are thousands of similar, equally talented people vying for the same job? 

Easy: you depend on the judgment of somebody else. 

If you’ve got talent and someone else has recently spent money on your services, you’re golden. Money changes everything. Executive “A” doesn’t have to justify the reason he hired you because Executive “B” has already given him the best reason there is: somebody believes they can make money with you. So one job leads to the next and that’s how careers get hot. 

Over the next few years, my agent friend kindly represented me on new projects, but the magic mojo power of steady work was gone and I never worked in Hollywood again. 

That was the end of the story for fifteen years, until October of 2005, when I got word of a screenplay contest sponsored by American Film Renaissance. AFR is a film institute that was created by founders Jim and Ellen Hubbard to “promote inspiring and enduring American principles in cinema.” 

Every other year, AFR runs a film festival showcasing films that celebrate the American Spirit, and in 2006 the fest was held in Hollywood. As part of the festival, AFR sponsored the screenplay contest. 

As it happened, Global Village Idiot reflected exactly those enduring American principles. It was pro-capitalist, pro-individualist, pro-freedom – in short, it was pro-American, which is precisely why Hollywood hated it. So I submitted the script. 

On January 1st, 2006 AFR announced ten finalists…and I was one of the Hollywood Ten. 

Two weeks later, I attended the festival for the announcement of the winner. Among the judges were Academy Award nominees Lionel Chetwynd, John Milius and Roger L Simon. Am I allowed to say “man-crush” on this blog? As a bonus, Milius pledged to personally slaughter an ox for the winner. 

That evening, at a theater inside the Hollywood and Highland Center, Ellen Hubbard announced to the crowd that Global Village Idiot won first prize. I received applause and a check for $2,000 which, when pro-rated over my time on the new Hollywood blacklist, worked out to about 35 cents per day in exile. 

Dalton Trumbo did considerably better, and he was a communist. 

For three years after winning the prize, I didn’t do much to promote the script or try to get it produced. What was the point? When it comes to the environmental alarmism, Hollywood is still Hollywood, only more so and with an extra helping of hypocrisy. In a time when they give Academy Awards to Al Gore films and talent agencies boast of their commitment to the environment, what agent would represent it? What studio would make it? 

But the worries and passions that aroused me enough to risk my career all those years ago have only enlarged with time. 

Not letting the current economic crisis go to waste, the Obama administration has plans to regulate business that go beyond Big Green’s wildest dreams. As expected, the EPA has found global warming to be a threat to the public, setting the stage for the regulation of all greenhouse gases, which means a “devastating effect on the economy.” And what Tom Hayden couldn’t get for California, Obama got for the entire nation – an Environment Czar. Surprisingly, she’s a socialist, one of the leaders of a group that called for shrinking the economy to control climate change. When it comes to shrinking the economy, she’s doing a great job! 

No word yet on the hat. 

It wasn’t until I stumbled upon Big Hollywood that it began to dawn on me that other avenues to getting the screenplay seen and produced were opening up. There were like-minded people inside the business raising their voices who might be receptive to the script. And the established Hollywood gatekeepers of agents and script readers, who had been so effective in keeping me out of their offices and off the back lots of Hollywood, might be eluded by going online. 

So the same day I discovered Big Hollywood, I grabbed a domain and started my own site called globalvillageidiot.org. I threw my screenplay online for anyone to see and started blogging about it. 

Things have changed since I was banished from Hollywood. Newspapers such as The Seattle P.I. and the Rocky Mountain News no longer get to decide the news.  And talent agencies such as The William Morris Agency, which claims to be green while servicing the egregious carbon-burning, corporate-jet-and-limousine besotted clients of Hollywood, no longer gets to decide who can read Global Village Idiot. 

We’re at a tipping point now. By growing margins, the public is beginning to see through the global warming alarmism promoted by government and the media. And yet the present administration is on the cusp of pushing through radical changes to our way of life based on that global warming alarmism. 

I’d like to think that a world premiere of Global Village Idiot in the heart of Hollywood might help tip things in the right direction. 

Yeah…I’m just that stupid.