NYTimes had a humorous Op-Ed article last Saturday (11/2)in which they asked six novelists to "try their hand at starting GF IV." I can't begin to tell you how funny this stuff was. The Times hasn't posted this column on its website, so I'll just reproduce the first submission, by Christopher Buckley, author of "No Way to Treat a Lady" (which was made into an excellent film starring Rod Steiger):
The black Lincoln Town Car slowed as it approached the rain-soaked curb. The headlights illuminated the face of the man standing there.
Don Michael Corleone, sitting in the car's back seat, looked out through the window and saw the recognizable features beneath the homburg hat: the thick moustache and eyebrows, the cruel eyes. The man was holding his trademark rifle, firing it aimlessly into the air as Michael pulled up. Just as well, Michael thought, that it was late and that there were no pedestrians.
Michael opened the door. Saddam Hussein got in.
They drove north in silence, up the West Side Highway, toward to George Washington Bridge.
The low-yield thermonuclear device that the CIA "technical services department" had given Michael to put in Saddam's penne arrabbiata felt hot and uncomfortable inside his jockey shorts. He prayed that it woud not leak radiation and render him impotent. He wanted more sons, though Kay was as usual being difficult.
Michael leaned forward and spoke to the man in the front passenger seat. "I'm going to talk Arabic with Saddam," he said. Kofi Annan, the elegant Secretary General of the UN, nodded and went back to reading his copy of Foreign Affairs.
A second later, Michael's driver violently turned the wheel. The car jumped the median, narrowly missing an oncoming van carrying antiwar demonstrators.
"I thought we were going to New Jersey," Saddam said, firing his rifle through the sun roof. "Don Soprano guaranteed my safety."
Michael Corleone bit off the end of his Montecristo No. 3 cigar and spat it through the shattered sun roof.
"Soprano is finished," he said. "He couldn't guarantee a garbage pickup in Parsippany."

I love this.

Give us more!

Please more Turnbull!!!

Giorgio Luigi Gambino

Who says there aren't creative writers out there hu?? Great story Turnbull!!

TIS

OK! Here's the second of the six NYTimes scenarios, contributed by Mark Leyner, author of "The Tetherballs of Bougainville":

Mobopolis, the most popular new attraction at Epcot Center, features a false-fronted Mulberry Street, including a glass-enclosd reconstruction of the old Gambino Family hangout, the Ravenite Social Club. Here, actual Cosa Nostra dons and underbosses, driven to seek alternative employment by a faltering economy, are paid to engage in the interminable kibitzing, coffee-drinking and card-playing that characterize a typical mobster's day.
In a bank of specailly outfitted vans parked outside the diorama, kids don headphones and listen to the conversations picked up from eavesdropping devices hidden within the mob redoubt. Among the listeners is a 10-year-old Inuit boy on a class trip from Rankin Inlet on the shores of Hudson Bay. Like a baseball fan visiting Cooperstown for the first time, the boy's eyes widen as he takes in the thick baritone colloquay, rendered almost incomprehensible by the fractured syntax, antecedent-less pronouns and a stream of expletives.
From this moment will be born an arctic crime lord whose domain will span from Nunavut to Greenland. Someday, this raven-haired child in a Mickey Mouse cap will achieve a stranglehold on seal-fur products, meat processing and the lucrative soapstone sculpture business. Someday, his life will be chronicled by Zacharias Kunuk, director of "The Fast Runner," whose epic "The Godfather IV: Black Snow" will post the biggest opening-weekend box office in history.

Mobopolis!!! Black Snow!!

No, maybe it should be "The Godfather.....The Next Batch"!!

TIS

Both stories were great!

Here's the third of six GFIV scenarios that appeared in the Times--this one by Sarah Vowell, author of "Take the Cannoli":
On the day of Angelina Corleone's commitment ceremony to her long-time life partner, film producer Heather Lippi, her father, Don Vincent Corleone, accepted an embrace and a thick envelope of cash from his consigliere, Tom Hagen III. Hagen pulled a list of names from his jacket pocket and handed it to Corleone. The people on the list had requested private meetings with the Don, taking advantage of the old custom that no Sicilian can refuse a request on his daughter's civil union day. The two men watched the widow Neri blush as the usher asked
her, "Bride's side or bride's side?"
Corleone shrugged at Hagen, then winked, whispering, "Hey, it could be worse. At least my daughter's marrying an Italian."

Where do these people come up with these storylines!! Can you imagine this one??

TIS

Btw, Turnbull, look on the Michael Corleone's birthday thread please. Deathkiss and I and others are wagering (more or less) his month/day of birth. If anyone knows, I figure you do. You can settle it once and for all!!! Thanks Piasano!!

Here's Scenario #4, called "A Humble Pensioner," by Neal Pollack, author of "The Neal Pollack Anthology of American Literature":
Michael Corleone stretched his legs and gazed out the bedroom window at the Florida surf. After faking his own death many years before, he could finally live in peace, except for the his guilt about the murders of his two brothers, his daughter and the only woman he'd ever truly loved.
He took a sip of brandy.
The phone rang.
It was Michael's son, Anthony Corleone, the president of the United States.
"Dad, I need you," Anthony said. "We've received word that at midnight, Eastern Time, terrorists are going to blow up Nobu, Knott's Berry Farm, the offices of The New Republic, and all the dolphins in Vegas."
"So what's that got to do with me?" Michael asked. I'm a humble pensioner."
"Please. You're the only man I know who can stage four assassinations in four different cities simultaneously."
"Not anymore."
"You don't understand," said Anthony. "They're holding your grandchildren hostage."
Michael brooded briefly. Then his eyes blazed with tragic rage. An aria began to play. From his sock drawer, he took a stiletto, a pistol and a fingerprint-obscuring handkerchief. This time, he would do the job himself.
For the family.

damn this is some great shit... can't wait forthe next 2 scenarious

Thanks Turnbull, excellent, I really needed a laugh, but this, was hilarious.

An aria began to play. From his sock drawer, he took a stiletto, a pistol and a fingerprint-obscuring handkerchief. This time, he would do the job himself.

LMAO

Cheers FH

Number 4 is my favorite so far. Hilarious!!!

TIS

mine too! "Dad, you're the only one who can assasinate four people at four different places at the same time" brilliant!

OK, fiction-fans, here's #5 in the NYTimes GFIV scenarios. This one's by George Meyer, writer for "The Simpsons," and is called "The Family Man":
Pipo Corleone gazed into his glass of Barolo, lost in the ruby deeps. As the last remaining grand-nephew of Connie Corleone, he could feel the awful burden of family pressing on his chest, like a monstrous cappuccino machine. His brooding, Tom Cruise-like face winced at the flashback-like images: Moe Green getting shot in the glasses, then all that blood glooping out; Don Altobello, brought down by poisoned cannoli, when so many assassins had failed; that poor horse, who had his head cut off, and then barely survived the operation to reattach it.
And now in this, the newest of milleniums, Pipo's own had tasted tragedy. His wife's dream, the dancing school, lay in ashes. Not literally ashes: A water pipe had burst and buckled the floorboards. And on a Sunday--God's day. (Unless you're Jewish, which Pipo was not.)
But the saga was just beginning for this hot-blooded renegade, the most electrifying Corleone ever. For Pipo would soon embark on the most challenging case of his detective career!

For some reason, I don't get this one!! Am I missing a punch line? I'll have to read over again!

Am I the only one?

TIS

I think the author intended to mix "The Last Don" with the GF Trilogy (Pipo was the "Last Don" character played by Joe Mantegna, and was a hotshot dancer).

Paisani, here's the last of the six NYTimes GFIV scenarios, this one courtesy of Garrison Keillor, the "Prairie Home Companion" guy. It's called, "Classical Corleone:"
"Listen," the old Don said, "when your father went away to avenge your uncle after your aunt Helen was stolen by the nutso Trojans, this other guy fell in love with your mom, and when your dad came back, this guy was waiting and he killed your dad, and your mom cut your dad's head off with an axe, and then she and the guy got married. OK?" He looked away toward his grape vines and the pool, and the two men standing by the gate. "I want you to go whack that guy. Orestes."
"I was talking to an oracle today. She said it won't be easy."
"Sacrifices will have to be made," the Don said in a commanding and omniscient voice, poping a grape in to his mouth, thinking darkly comic thoughts.

As Funucci would say, "Too violent for me!"

Thanks for explaining that last one TB. I did see The Last Don, but didn't make the connection.

Now I think you should write the GFIV script and send it in for them to consider.

Thanks for taking the time to post all those great stories!!!

TIS

Thanks very much for those Turnbull..what a laugh The last one is good too, classical Corleone, I can just imagine the Don in his toga with a laurel leaf thing round his head giving out his orders
I think 4 remains my favourite though

FH

WHat did Michael go as for Halloween this year?

I wanna see Jim Carrey play Michael Corleone!

Stop leaving us,Ricardo.Stay awhile.