More than just a documentary about comics

by Brian McKim & Traci Skene on March 21st, 2008

Documentary filmmaker R.J. Cutler has purchased the rights to Richard Zoglin’s “Comedy On The Edge” book, says Variety.

While the film is in the very early planning stages, Cutler said Zoglin has access to several decades’ worth of archival footage as well as relationships with many of the key comics examined in the book. Cutler is also working on ways to make the film more than just a history lesson, though he wouldn’t get into specifics about whether he was planning a reunion of some sort to serve as a focal point for the pic.

A reunion of some sort? That’ll be just the beginning.

Time-Warner, owner of Time magazine, for whom Zoglin was a senior editor, also owns:

AOL LLC.
Time Warner Cable
Home Box Office
Turner Broadcasting System
New Line Cinema
Warner Bros. Entertainment, Inc.
Time Inc.
UBU Productions

Time-Warner board chairman (and former CEO) Richard Parsons has been famously quoted as saying that “synergy is dead,” but this is going to be a mini synergy orgy! A “Syn-orgy!TM” And at the heart of it all will be the comedians that millions of boomers grew up on. This documentary– and all the hoopla and promotions and events that surround it– will further cement standup as a huge and necessary part of the entertainment industry and of the culture at large.

And Bloomsbury, the publisher of Zoglin’s book is doing pretty well for themselves lately. They published those books about the wizard kid.

And the movies they made about the wizard kid? They were made by Warner Bros.