True Story©… Wrist Twistin’ Kitchen

 

     Sometimes my boredom takes me to WILD places…

Y’all remember back in 2020, when I got furloughed from work and snared the information of and finagled some time on the phone with a TV exec?

[link]
What about now?

     Well I am not saying all of that to say that I have been furloughed again.  I have actually made a pretty good go of life since that furlough ended 7 weeks early, but no need to get all off into that.  I have, from time to time, called or received calls from the same guy about ideas he or I might have for television shows.  I swear, I think I am just his release to break up the monotony of his daily life because there is no way in hell he can be taking the shit I come up with seriously.

     Anyway…
A couple of weeks ago, my FB memories dragged me back to an idea I had posted on Twitter (I ain’t calling that shit ‘X,’ like ever) wherein I proposed a new game show idea…  Rather than sit here and explain in excruciating detail what the game and show will consist of, I will walk you through the actions and phone call(s) that took place.

As I am often unwilling to do, I made a phone call...

Executive: “I’m hoping I won’t regret answering this call.”

Me: “Good afternoon to you too, sweetheart.  What a grumpy way to greet an old friend.”

Executive: “Sorry, it’s just--…”

Me: “…  look, I know the WGA strike just ended and you have a LOT of shit on your plate waiting on the outcome of the actors’ one.”

Executive: “Sheesh, tell me about it.”

Me: “Well know that I have not stopped writing.”

Executive: “I’ve been following True Story©, you are a wild man.”

Me: “You could be employing that wildness if you really wanted to.”

Executive: “I can’t employ much of anyone right now.”

Me: “Anyway…  I have a new idea for you, and I even recorded a test run for you.”

Executive: “B-but…  how?”

Me: “Because no one I know well enough to get on board with this is a SAG actor, and we recorded this shit with our phones.”

Executive: “Oh boy…”

Me: “Show some excitement.”

Executive: “Well I am morbidly curious now.”

Me: “Check your email in a few minutes.”

Executive: “Sure thing.”

     The video started with some happytime-sounding music that I threw together on an online music-creation website I found and tinkered with, then panned across a "kitchen" set with two stoves at each cooking station, not dissimilar to what one might see on one of those cooking or baking competition shows. 

Camera finally settles on me standing on a soapbox in my hood finest clothings…

“Hello and good evening, everyone and welcome to The Wrist Twistin’ Kitchen, where we take three rappers who spend a lot of their time and effort rapping about selling crack and we put their skills to the test.  Is this a rap battle?  NO!!!  We have devised a special test of these men's skills, but first let’s meet today’s contestants!”

 

     The camera slowly pans to each cooking station, now manned by the contestants in the game…

“First up, we have Lil’ Dookie Smoak, whose debut mixtape ‘Blick Flair’ has been downloaded sixteen times since debuting in 2020.  Give him a round of applause, people!”

The five crackheads I found outside of Home Depot a mile from my house clapped as hard as one would expect when they’ve been promised their chosen vice, free of charge, if they just judge a game.

“Next, we have Jericho ‘Jiggaboo’ Jackson, who is more than willing to remind you that he ‘ain’t no rapper, he a real n**ga’ . Let’s hear it for Jiggaboo!”

     More applause from my captive audience looking to score their fix and not much more.

[Phlip note: I should be ASHAMED of myself]

“… and last up, we have Lil’ Fuqboi Da Xan Gawd, who wants to remind the children to make sure they ‘grow up and get their GED so they don’t have to grow up like he did’ and to ‘quit hating and get money’.  Say hello to Fuqboi!”

     One last round of applause and now it is time to get into the teeth of how the game goes.

“As you gentlemen know, we have chosen you for your specific self-proclaimed talents in the kitchen and today we’re gonna put them to the test.  Each of you will be placed at a cooking station and cook up a batch of rock to be tested by our panel of ACTUAL crackhead judges.  The winner gets to keep his record deal.  The losers?  Well, they have to go to a predetermined-by-us corner in an unfamiliar neighborhood and attempt to SELL their wares.”

This is where shit almost went off the rails…

Xan Gawd: “You mean this shit ain’t for, like, free studio time or beats or nothing”

Me: “No Sir, you are cooking for your very CAREER in here today…  Good luck, gentlemen!”

     I am beyond amazed that EVERYONE in this studio (my garage) has kept a straight face for this shit.  But now I have to lay out the specifics…

“Gentlemen… You have handed over your phones on the way in so as to maintain genuine-ness of your product.  If you say you can cook it, then you won't be searching for the recipe on Google.  In front of you, you have an eight ball of cocaine, a box of Baking Soda From our sponsors Arm & Hammer, distilled water from Poland Springs, a mason jar and a pot.  You have 90 minutes to whip up the product here in the Wrist Twistin’ Kitchen and then your fate is in the hands of our judges here.  You clock starts…  NOW!!!”

     It was immediately clear that these boys had ONLY been repeating shit they had heard as it relates to narcotics.  I would be more inclined to think that their relationship to the game was more about USE than it ever was about distribution, but here we are.
It was clear, however, that Jiggaboo Jackson was the oldest of the group because he started to mumble what sounded like song lyrics…

Cohost: “what’s he doing?”

Me: “He clearly didn’t have a fucking clue how to do this, so he is reciting C-Murda’s verse from Master P’s classic ‘GhettoDope’!”

Cohost: “But…  Why!?”

Me: “Because it contains EXPLICIT instructions on how to do this, that’s why!”

Cohost: “Wow!”

Me: “Wow indeed…  That’s thinking on your feet!”

     My cohost, who I informed to tell the contestants his name was ‘Fap Fappington’ as an attempt to throw them off their concentration as they do the crime equivalent of faking one’s way through an Excel spreadsheet in the MIDDLE of a job interview, went to each station and questioned the contestants on where they’d learned their techniques and none was particularly chatty.

Me: “No worries, Fap…  These gentlemen all have Gen-X parents.”

Fap Fappington: “What does that even mean?”

Me: “We grew up around crackheads and that made us NOT want to be one, so they do not have the useful point of reference that we had.”

Fap: “Makes sense…  Time check?”

Me: “THIRTY SIX MINUTES REMAIN, GENTLEMEN!!!”

     It was becoming immediately clear that Jerich--…  err…  Jiggaboo Jackson was in this shit to win it, STILL repeating that verse to himself as he cooked up his product.

     The remaining time went by like it was nothing…
As expected based on the way the situation had played out, we all know who the winner was.

In a montage over VERY sad music, we sent Dookie Smoak to MLK to attempt to hand-to-hand his product and Xan Gawd got what one might see as an easier draw in that he was made to ATTEMPT to sell by the Home Depot.  That would be an easier draw because it is not sitting NEXT to downtown with constant cop traffic, like MLK is.  The fact that two of our judges came from this same block and would already know his work is schitte notwithstanding, of course.

The episode ends with Jericho ‘Jiggaboo’ Jackson in the booth recording some such nonsense about being the best cook in the city, we faded out in the middle of the verse so we wouldn't need to pay anyone any extra down the road.

     I called the exec back after giving him time to digest…

Me: “So…  When can we go to production?”

Executive: “We can’t.”

Me: “Why not!?”

Executive: “Are you insane?  We can’t put a show on TV about cooking crack!”

Me: “But they can RAP about it?”

Executive: “Touché…  I am not in that business, though.”

Me: “Well can’t we, like, present it in a shorter form in like a sketch comedy?”

Executive: “You sent me a whole detailed and produced reality game show wherein you sent two men out into the wilderness to commit felonies--…”

Me: “… but--…”

Executive: “ON CAMERA!”

Me: “Yeesh…  So back to the drawing board?”

Executive: “Back to the drawing board.”

 

Fuck…  Back to the drawing board.