[I apologize for the wretched formatting. Blojsom strikes again. I had something that formatted beautifully in pure HTML, but Blojsom's preprocessor rejects styles and block-element markup.] 
 
Here’s the deal. It’s 2006, and one of my improv heroes, Tina Fey, had created a new show, 30 Rock, based on her experiences as an improv artist and as head writer on Saturday Night Live. This was great, but it was on at the same time as Jericho, another show I particularly wanted to see. 
 
I’d had good luck with keeping up with shows like Battlestar Galactica by subscribing to them on iTunes and watching them on my iPod. Given the choice between downloading an hour-long epic to my iPod (a two-and-a-half inch screen in those days) and a half-hour sitcom, I’d rather have downloaded 30 Rock. But NBC had not released the show to the iTunes store. The alternative was to watch it on NBC’s website, but in those days web video was extremely poor, and it’s still the case that it isn’t portable. 
 
I wrote to Tina Fey, in care of Silvercup Studios, where the show is taped (please don’t take my word on whether that’s a good address for her — nobody ever answers my fan mail), and asked that she exert her influence to get it onto iTunes. I claimed acquaintance on the basis that (1) I had once stood in line behind her at the Old Town Arby’s; and (2) I had been on friendly, if very casual, terms with Jeff Richmond, her husband. (He had been exceptionally kind to my sister when she visited the Second City Training Center.) 
 
A few weeks later, 30 Rock was available on iTunes, and it had been rescheduled so I had no conflicts. I was very happy. 
 
The conceit of the following poem is that this was all my doing, having urged Ms. Fey to heroic lengths to meet my needs. 
 
I already know it’s very silly, and idea behind the second act is a cliché. 
 
The changes in meter are mostly intentional. 
 

Tina Fey Gets Results

 

An Heroic Epic in Twelve Cantos

 
 
Argument 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 

Muse, I pray urgently, answer my needs.
Only a goddess can tell all the deeds
that Tina Fey wrought with her memos and phones,
battling desk-jockeys, dullards, and drones.
Hear me, O goddess! Retell and take stock	[5]
of the new distribution of Fey’s 30 Rock.
Make my tongue nimble, to dance and to bob;
forfend it be thought that I cadge for a job.

 
 
Canto I 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 

Chicago was home to a programmer, who
had trifled at improv a season or two.	[10]
Piñata and Paradigms were his delight;
the one about Gates upon opening night.
A child of the Cold War, bereft of a mom,
the crux of his life was the threat of the Bomb.
Took Physics at Kenyon, to Georgetown for Law;	[15]
atomic destruction still ate at his craw.1
CBS whelped in the fall of ’06
a tale of post-nuclear life in the sticks.
“Hot puppies!” he cried, “Just like Herman Kahn!
The social disruption! The green-glowing dawn!”	[20]
But the sons of Bill Paley chose eight Wednesday night,
to screen Jericho, which he felt like a bite:
For NBC set the same place on the clock
for Tina Fey’s masterwork of 30 Rock.

 
 
Canto II 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 

In search of solutions, he ventured a bet	[25]
on a plausible áddress he found on the net.
He put his predicament to Tina Fey,
and ‘fessed to his conflict on 30 Rock day.
“Grant to me, lady, this smallest of boons:
Suffer your show to go out on iTunes.	[30]
Two dollars a pop would enrich NBC,
and I’d iPod your program, and watch it ad-free.
“A consummate video program is clear,
with crisp color palettes, and sound you can hear
in stereo; not jumped-up fingerpaint shows	[35]
with cotton-wool sound wrapped in sponsorly prose.”
She wondered, “If he’s such an all-fired fan,
what keeps him from framing an alternate plan?
iTunes has Jericho on it already —
that should suffice him for keeping him steady.”	[40]
Grasping her knees, he pled, “That is not all!
Behold Tuesday’s Newsday: The Office appalled
in earliest ratings; scant viewers before it.
Remun’rative iTunes built audience for it!”

 
 
Canto III 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 

Matchless Fey uttered broadcastable oaths:	[45]
“By cracky, this lunatic Anderson clothes
his ravings with reason! Yes, now is the season
to draw forth my lance! Now comes the Big Dance!
No more my guise as Mistress Nice!
I’m on this quest like white on rice!”	[50]
On the lot of Silvercup,
Mrs. Richmond jiggered up
weapons needful, weapons made
to fortify her on crusade.
Arrows made she of desire	[55]
Made a chariot out of fire.2
Set the dogs of war at large;
put her cell-phone at full charge.
Crafty Adsit,3 wise in counsel,
kept intruders out of bounds, till	[60]
all was past the pow’r of those
apt to cavil or oppose.
(Naught sufficed to draw upon
Rachel Dratch’s4 Myrmidons.
Fearsome Myrmidons were pent	[65]
while brilliant Rachel kept her tent.)

 
 
Canto IV 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 

Sure her cause was just in essence,
crost th’East River’s iridescence,
stoked for teaching baleful lessons
to Phílistines now in charge	[70]
of GE, paid in hundreds large.
Eyeless in their corporate Gaza,
Thirty Rockefeller Plaza,
patzers gaze through double glass,
each the guardian of his ass;	[75]
brood in silence, brood in horror
lest writers raid the cookie jar, or
actors jinx their plans to sell:
For weekend heaven, they reign in Hell.
From the findings of the spreadsheets,	[80]
eldritch focus groups on spreadsheets,
founded they a viewing model,
counterfeit from fulsome twaddle.
Blindly said, “We see no need for
iPod shows on broadband feeds; nor	[85]
Market Research is discerning
iTunes download lust a-burning.
(We did not put the question to them,
nor did they write it in, so screw them.)”

 
 
Canto V 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 

Despite Fey’s heart’s essential purity	[90]
network-minions of security
balked her at the building’s entry.
She saw she needed stronger gentry.
Sent she Dorff to beg dispatch
the Myrmidons of grey-eyed Dratch.	[95]
But in her tent she’s fuming, pissed
(but that’s another rime, not this).
At the front door Tina pounds, till
crafty Adsit, wise in counsel,
has a brainstorm: Deft Scott Adsit	[100]
found a push-cart of fruit baskets
destined for the dressing rooms
of guest stars, every one of whom
from table read through dress rehearsal
flacked for Peacock - Universal.	[105]
Adsit’s plans ape Escher’s plumbing,
but Tina Fey saw what was coming
miles away, yet suffered him to have his say:
“Rent-a-cops will surely pass
these tokens meant for kissing ass.	[110]
Ironic, then, to use this barrow
to evade them and to harrow
functionaries in our way!
Displace some fruit and stow away!”
In among the basket-load	[115]
was matchless Tina 5 thus bestowed.
And in that fragrant, cramped condition,
held a fetus-like position.
Soon the testing-time arrived:
Network henchmen came to drive	[120]
the basket cart into the tower.
Were there room, she would have cowered:
Did the watchmen stay alert,
she’d be in dutch, a world of hurt.
Never fear! The odds were steep,	[125]
but salutary gods made sleep
the guardians’ powers of oversight;
their watch that moment was not tight.

 
 
Canto VI 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 

Through corridors the barrow trundled,
bringing Fey midst favors bundled	[130]
till the moment came at last
when no more baskets could be passed
without revealing where she hid.
She knew what must be done, and did.
In passageway on six or seven,	[135]
Tina Fey appealed to Heaven
(or something like it) — but the point is,
access to the network joint is
hers, and knowledge that she’d done it
sped her to the building’s summit.	[140]
Lest her progress be discovered,
floor-plants gave her secret cover.
‘Neath yucca plant and pink clematis,
she gained the top floor (whichever that is).
On that floor her cunning instinct	[145]
showed her to the bigwigs’ precinct.
Mangoes mashed into her hair,
she fixed them with her flashing stare.
“You owe me big-time!” thundered Fey,
“Those Myrmidons are pay-or-play!”	[150]
She put her case before the Suits;
she spoke truth to high galoots.6
She played them like so many lutes.
She danced on them with hobnailed boots.
She ate the one who called her “Toots.”	[155]
She proved the iTunes veto moots
the worst decision since their hoots
at buying Alex Haley’s Roots.7

 
 
Canto VII 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 

Car service costed Fey nary a cent, to
Silvercup (nobody knew where Scott went to).	[160]
Thousands accorded her improvised triumph:
jubilee games, with the discus and high-jump.
Multitudes, gathered for tribute and fun,
bade her recount to them what she had done.
“Exploits so fabulous must always live!	[165]
Mrs. Jeff Richmond must tell us — so give!”
Reticence over her story were false;
modest belittlement nothing but schmaltz.
Middle-class upbringing frowned upon pride,
But love for her coworkers threw her heart wide:	[170]
“I showed them what’s what! And
I beat them so soundly,
I’ve a Thursday-night spot, with
a hammock around me!
iTunes? No problem! We’re lacking no more!	[175]
Met I the bosses, and now they are mine!
Effective this Tuesday, it’s all on the store!
Make free the flow of the wine… dark… um… wine!”

 
 
Canto VIII 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 

While casting about for distractions from work,
Anderson opened up iTunes in Turk	[180]
(he always found localizations amusing),
then summoned th’American store for perusing —
and what should he find on the TV show page:
30 Rock offered, to quiet his rage!
Further he learned from the promos that night	[185]
NBC massed all its comedies tight
on Thursday night early, from eight until ten
So Jericho never could balk him again!
“’Tis all through my efforts these things came to pass!
For does not the sun rise and fall on my ass?”	[190]
You see at this canto the epic has died.
Twelve cantos I’d promised (or threatened); I lied.

 
 
 
 
The companion to this epic is forthcoming,
 
under the title
 
Adsit Has a Hell of a Commute. 
 
 
 

1 [16] This is not strictly accurate. I could never write autobiography; I lack a protagonist. 

 

2 [55] Truth be known, chariots of fire get lousy mileage, and the pavement melts, which is embarrassing if you’ve been at a light for a while. Also, who needs a flaming chariot in New York? Where would you park it? [Dear Sirs, I herewith return Stock New York Joke #7, slightly soiled. Any consideration you could give me on the deposit would be much appreciated.]

 

3 [59] Scott Adsit has a regular role on 30 Rock as TGS’s producer. He, Tina Fey, Scott Allman, Jenna Jolovitz, Rachel Dratch, and Kevin Dorff, were the cast of Piñata Full of Bees, the groundbreaking show on the mainstage of The Second City in Chicago, in (as I remember it) 1996. Jolovitz, by the way, is the best bullshit artist (term of art) since Severn Darden. I'm sorry not to see her anymore.

 

4 [64] For ten years, I’d had a crush on Rachel Dratch. I was thrilled when she was cast as Jenna for 30 Rock; alas, NBC replaced her with Jane Krakowski. A fine comedienne, but not the same. Rachel appeared in various roles throughout the first season.

 

5 [116] This is an epithet. Gotta have epithets in Heroic Epics.

 

6 [152] With this, I have exceeded my month’s quota of “galoots,” but it’s too much fun to drop. Say it with me: Galoots.

 

7 [158] This is ostinato. I hope you relish it as much as I.

 

@ August 30, 2010 11:57:09 AM CDT ( )