Fletch Lives On?

Back in 2000 or so, Kevin Smith was signed to working on a third Fletch movie. And many rejoiced. 1. It was Smith not doing something involving Jay and Silent Bob (love 'em, but we need to see you do more, bud) and 2. He wasn't going to do a Chevy Chase-Fletch, he was going to do a Gregory McDonald-Fletch. See, the movie Fletch was based on very clever and well-written novel by the same name. And then for some insane reason, Chevy Chase was cast and it became...well, that movie. The two had about as much relationship to each other as the 60's Batman TV series and Batman Begins, or Pat Paulsen and Alan Keyes.

I encountered the "real" Irwin Maurice Fletcher in the novel Fletch, and then spent a few years hunting down and devouring the rest--am pretty sure that was my first "adult" mystery series (after graduating from Encyclopedia Brown, The Three Investigators, etc.)--no, wait, Gardner's Perry Mason novels were first. Close enough. I still re-read the books with a good deal of pleasure. That man can write wonderful dialogue.

It was a while before I could watch the movie--my father had a ban on Chevy Chase movies in his house at the time. Can't describe the disappointment with what the movie did to the book. But, it was insanely funny (if you didn't think of it as the same characters)--Fletch Lives less so.

So you can imagine my personal joy when I heard things like this from Smith:

We're going to do a real character with no disguises and s*** like that. Yeah. It will be close to (the book). I loved that book. I don't even think we're going to do a pass on the script. I'm just going to hand everyone the book and highlight the dialogue because it works perfectly.

and

We're going to stay very true to the book, as it has all the makings of a terrific story, and needs very little input from me....I actually learned to write dialogue by reading McDonald's 'Fletch' books. If you read his stuff, it reads like one of my screenplays. They're very dense with dialogue, and spartan in descriptive passages (just the way I like 'em).

and

So that's all there is to possibly know at this point. We're all pretty pleased about this very recent yet somehow familiar turn of events. Hopefully, when the flick's done, you'll dig it as much as you've dug the other flicks we've made. There's a certain personal, kharmic symmetry for me in making this flick, as the book is one of my all-time favorite things ever written, and there's a debt I feel I owe Mister McDonald as far as my own writing goes...The whole d*** affair couldn't be more perfect, to be honest.

But then the studio and Smith couldn't agree on Fletch. Smith wanted Jason Lee (this is before My Name is Earl, so nobody wanted to see Lee try to carry a movie), in fact Smith demanded it. And well....things didn't work out and Smith ends up off the project. I give up all hope of seeing Fletch anywhere but in my mind's eye, and forgot about this.

So this week, the Net's abuzz with the announcement that Bill Lawrence was tapped to take it over, speculation's running rampant that Zach Braff will be the man. Now Lawrence is clearly a fan, Scrubs has had at least one reference to JD and Turk loving to watch Fletch, and he's saying, "Not only can I recite the original 'Fletch' movie line for line, I actually read all the Greg Mcdonald books as a kid. Consider me obsessed, - I'm going to try as hard as I can not to screw this up." Promises promises...I sorta recall reading that Chase read all the books, too.

Now, Zach himself says

don't know yet. There are many things up in the air. Most important to me is directing my adaptation of "Open Hearts," which I had planned to shoot next summer...We'll see what happens. But for now, I am very happy for Bill, cause he is the perfect man for the job. Not only is he one of the funniest people I've ever met, but he is a die-hard Fletch fan.

So, who knows what's going to happen. But as a huge Gregory McDonald fan...I really, really wish they'd go back to the Kevin Smith/Jason Lee idea of a strict interpretation of Fletch Won. Bill Lawrence--with or without Zach (who I love)--is going to give us another film like Fletch Lives or Fletch and that's just a cryin' shame.