What do Hollywood screen writers think of Texas?

C

CarolfromTX

Senior Member
Location
Central Texas
Not much, apparently, and certainly nothing accurate. On one show, supposedly set in Austin, they show a guy driving to Austin from New York. And he is driving through desert landscapes. Unless he went via Los Angeles, that's ridiculous. East Texas is Piney Woods. The land around Austin to the east is farmland.

Then last night we watched an early episode of a show called Bull. Basically a lawyer show. They are supposedly having to try a case in a "small west Texas town" population 25,000. They showed folks driving around in a red pickup with a Texas flag flying and hollering Yee-Haw! And the hotel clerk "conveniently " on purpose lost their reservation, so they had no where to stay. It was at that point I quit watching. It's been my experience that small town folks in west Texas (and all over the state) are very friendly. So stuff it, Hollywood. You have no frikkin' idea. And as far as I can tell, the dominant color for pickups is white, followed by Aggie maroon, or gray.
 

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C'est Moi said:
I imagine that most people who've never been to Texas have a preconceived notion of desert landscapes, tumbleweeds, and long horn cattle. šŸ¤ šŸŽ
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Well, that would be true for some of Texas, but it is a big and varied state.
 

Pecos said:
Well, that would be true for some of Texas, but it is a big and varied state.
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I'm well aware of that since I live here. My point was that a lot of people who don't live here imagine this to still be wide-open prairie. And as Carol said in the OP, east Texas is piney woods so the movie was perpetuating the myth.
 
CarolfromTX said:
Not much, apparently, and certainly nothing accurate. On one show, supposedly set in Austin, they show a guy driving to Austin from New York. And he is driving through desert landscapes. Unless he went via Los Angeles, that's ridiculous. East Texas is Piney Woods. The land around Austin to the east is farmland.

Then last night we watched an early episode of a show called Bull. Basically a lawyer show. They are supposedly having to try a case in a "small west Texas town" population 25,000.
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That emergency rescue show, kinda/sorta set in Austin, with Rob Lowe, is embarrassing to watch, because it's so hilariously inaccurate. The dialogue is a scream, as well, in spite of itself. How Lowe ever decided to be in that abomination is, well.......$$$$$$.
 
treeguy64 said:
That emergency rescue show, kinda/sorta set in Austin, with Rob Lowe, is embarrassing to watch, because it's so hilariously inaccurate. The dialogue is a scream, as well, in spite of itself. How Lowe ever decided to be in that abomination is, well.......$$$$$$.
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I haven't come across that one. Having lived in NY, NJ and Los Angeles, I'm familiar with lots of stereotypical depictions in TV and movies. You either laugh them off or they make you crazy.
 
Nothing that the press or the media put forth is accurate.

There was an article about hospital workers being pissed off because the local news station got hospital management to make the workers get in their own cars and line up at the entrance for the cameras as though they were patients, in order to fabricate a story about it being overcrowded. Meanwhile, there are actual patients inside to be attended to.

Here's a great example. Watch the real rescue workers call her out on camera:

 
It's not just Texas .... Movies and TV have always liked to exaggerate, for the sake of making it seem more interesting.

Example, while living in Arizona, I remember movies showing Phoenix, with Monument Valley being a northern suburb of the city.
That happened often.

Old cowboy movies really distorted the western states!
 
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This is not limited to Texas. Ever since movies began, Hollywood has been playing fast and loose with local geography, no matter where they are shooting. They do it to enhance their story, sometimes it's because of property rights, weather problems, etc.

When I lived in the Seattle area, the locals there were very amused by some of the "locations" in Sleepless in Seattle. Some of those locations were totally impossible.
 
In The Sticks said:
Nothing that the press or the media put forth is accurate.

There was an article about hospital workers being pissed off because the local news station got hospital management to make the workers get in their own cars and line up at the entrance for the cameras as though they were patients, in order to fabricate a story about it being overcrowded. Meanwhile, there are actual patients inside to be attended to.

Here's a great example. Watch the real rescue workers call her out on camera:

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The video you noted , doesn't seem to be there ?
 
fmdog44 said:
"Hollywood", the name says drug addiction, alcoholism, suicides, sex diseases, broken families, divorces, cosmetic surgeries and great weather. God bless Texas.
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And here you are, doing the very same thing - perpetuating unfounded stereotypes.

I hate to break it to you but the overwhelming majority of those who live or work in Hollywood have lives that look a lot like everyone else's. No more addictions, suicide, divorce, STDs, cosmetic surgeries than most.

The weather is pretty great though. I'll grant you that.
 

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