WRITER: Screenplays and Publications

George R. Flowers has written six original feature-length screenplays: a series of five sequential screenplays and a well developed spin-off television sitcom, and another completed but unrelated screenplay.  A seventh original screenplay is nearing completion.

The completed screenplays are:  

1 - 5.  THE BARKLEY FILMS 

6.. BREAKFAST IN BEDLAM

Loglines and Synopses Follow

The BARKLEY FILMS are a series of five completed, sequential feature-length original comedies, all of which are set in the first half of 2001, and take place primarily in New York City and on Long Island.  

1. STILL IN THE GAME (107 Pages)

LOGLINE:   

To make retirement more enjoyable, two elderly widowers - a comic and a salesman – become roommates and business partners. The comic wants a sex life again, and the salesman wants to sell. They enjoy success, but not as they expected.

SYNOPSIS:

Widowers Robert “Barkley” Barkoff, a handsome, bushy-haired and energetic 75-year-old former comedian (who used the name “Barkley” in his act), and Murray Geller, 78, a bald salesman, meet at a nursing home after interviewing there at the insistence of their sons. Neither man is happy in retirement. Barkley fancies himself still attractive to young women and wants a sex life. Murray wants to enjoy again the challenges and satisfaction of selling. They become friends, and decide to live together as roommates, supporting each other in their endeavors. But after various attempts, Murray fails to find any suitable sales opportunities, and Barkley is repeatedly rebuffed by young woman.  Barkley becomes intrigued by the heavy metal scene as a possible place to meet women. He goes to a record store to buy a heavy metal album and meets a teen-aged musician, who mistakes him for a druggie from the 1960s and invites him to the heavy metal club where he fronts a band. Barkley and Murray go, dressed as “punkers” -- with makeup, colored hair, and the appropriate clothing.  At the club, Barkley sees the young musician, who introduces him to the club-goers as his friend, and invites him to perform on stage. Barkley ad-libs a nonsensical rap in time to the band’s music and the kids are moved by it. One young woman even propositions Barkley, but he refuses because she’s too young. Barkley soon concludes that his goal of cavorting sexually with young women is unrealistic, and opts instead to restart his long-dormant comedy career. Murray will manage him and sell his act, which features Barkley entertaining the elderly in nursing homes, beginning with the one at which he and Murray met. The 59-year-old social worker at that nursing home, Arlene Sachs, becomes his implied sexual conquest after his first comedy show is a big hit.

Note: In 2015, STILL IN THE GAME was submitted to a number of Film Festival Screenplay Competitions.  (STILL IN THE GAME is the only one of Flowers' screenplays that has been submitted to festivals.)  The results were as follows:

1. DEPTH OF FIELD INTERNATIONAL FILM FESTIVAL, 2015: 2nd Place – Script Writing (Comedy) 

2. COLORADO INTERNATIONAL FILM FESTIVAL, 2015: 3rd Place – Feature Screenplay Competition; and,

3. COLORADO INTERNATIONAL FILM FESTIVAL, 2015: Award of Excellence 

4. SENE SCREENPLAY COMPETITION, 2015: 3rd Place – Feature Screenplay 

5. YOSEMITE FILM FESTIVAL, 2015: 3rd Place - Feature Script Competition

6. L.A. NEW FILM FEST, 2015: 4th Place – Screenplay Awards

7. CAPITAL FUND SCREENPLAY COMPETITION, 2015: Number 6, Screenplay “Hot 100” List

8. WILDSOUND WRITING AND FILM FESTIVAL, 2015: First Scene Winner

9. ATLAS & AERIS, 2015: Reviewed (Rated: Six Stars)

10. CANADA INTERNATIONAL FILM FESTIVAL, 2015: Award of Excellence recipient

11. INDIE GATHERING, 2015: Honorable Mention

12. HONOLULU FILM AWARDS, 2015: Honorable Mention

13. MOUNTAIN FILM FESTIVAL, 2015: Honorable Mention

14. INDEPENDENT INTERNATIONAL FILM AWARDS, 2015: Bronze Award

15. OAXACA FILM FESTIVAL, 2015: Selected for “Global Script Challenge”

16. SOUTHEAST NEW ENGLAND FESTIVAL, 2015: Finalist – Feature Screenplay

17. COURIER AWARDS, 2015: Finalist – Feature Screenplay 

18. BACK IN THE BOX COMPETITION, 2015: Finalist - Screenplay 

19. ALASKA INTERNATIONAL FILM AWARDS, 2015: Official Finalist – Screenplay Competition

20. AMSTERDAM FILM FESTIVAL, 2015: Official Finalist – Screenplay Competition

21. MARQUEE LIGHTS COMPETITION, 2015: Finalist – Feature Screenplay

22. PEACHTREE VILLAGE INTERNATIONAL FILM FESTIVAL, 2015: Finalist – Feature Screenplay

23. AUSTIN REVOLUTION FESTIVAL, 2015: Semi-Finalist – Feature Screenplay

24. BARE BONES FILM FEST: TOP 40 FEATURE SCREENPLAYS, 2015: Quarter Finalist

25. FILMMAKERS INTERNATIONAL SCREENWRITING AWARDS, 2015: Semi-Finalist

                                                                    ###

2. WINTERS RUN  (102 Pages)

LOGLINE:

An elderly comic becomes the spiritual leader of a group of young punk rockers, which threatens his business as a nursing home entertainer until a crisis brings to two sides together. 

SYNOPSIS:

Barkley becomes the spiritual leader of a group of young punk rock enthusiasts following an ad-libbed musical performance at a heavy metal club.  They dub him “Sugar Pops,” and he is invited to record the song by a music promoter, after which his popularity expands.  More demands are placed on his time and he is forced to curtail his comedy performances, causing Murray disappointment and embarrassment.  Murray demands that Barkley choose between entertaining the elderly with him, or leading the young without him.  At that moment, a huge storm is bearing down on the region, threatening with high winds and massive flooding the nursing home where they met.  A frantic Arlene calls Barkley seeking help in getting 45 patients to high ground.  Barkley enlists his back-up group, the Sugar Poppers, who travel around in a pink school bus, and they rescue the nursing home residents.  The youngsters and the elderly clearly get along well, and Murray sees potential in merging Barkley and the rock ‘n’ rollers into one act, thus saving the partnership.

3. NAKED FAT GUYS  (105 Pages) 

LOGLINE:

The president becomes jealous of a geriatric comic for getting too much publicity while trying to bridge the generation gap and orders that he be blackmailed into obscurity. The plot is foiled, the president is in hot water, and the comic prevails.

SYNOPSIS:

The President of the United States is jealous of Barkley for getting too much press in his role as Sugar Pops in an upcoming concert called “Punkstock.”  He and the vice president decide to scandalize Barkley by bribing a young pregnant woman to accuse him of having an affair with her when she was underage, and a handsome, young-looking special agent, who is also a gifted singer and guitarist, is given the assignment.  The young woman he enlists for the scheme turns out to be the fiancé of the Sugar Poppers’ lead singer, Stevie, and she and Stevie report the plot to the manager of the club where he and Barkley perform.  The manager is an ex-marine who recognizes the agent as someone he served with in Iraq, and they tell Barkley.  The day the agent meets the woman at the club to pay her for her written and recorded incriminating statements, Punkstock tryouts are being held.  With the help of a police officer, a judge, and a tech wizard, they devise a plan to derail the plot: Audio and video of the agent’s meeting with the young woman are captured on surveillance video, and the audio of a phone conversation the agent has with the vice president is recorded. The agent is convinced to tryout for Punkstork.  He is chosen to perform at the concert, where he intends to play the woman’s audio accusation against Barkley, after which Barkley will be arrested.  The incriminating tape is played for the concertgoers and the media, but it is followed by the surveillance recording of the agent’s meeting with the young woman and his phone conversation with the vice president.  The vice president calls off the arrest.  And Stevie and the young woman marry.

4. SPIDERPLOTZ  (118 Pages)

LOGLINE::

Two elderly roommates, one of whom has been transformed by a magic spell into a spider with a man’s face and magical powers, travel a bumpy road into the past and back to the present to reverse the spell. 

SYNOPSIS:

Barkley and Murray have had an argument, and Murray has left his apartment in a huff.  He has gone on a date, been kissed by a sorceress in the form of a “black widow,” and been turned into a spider with magical powers.  To break the spell, he must be kissed by a pig, which proves to be a challenging, but eventually doable task.  Barkley feels guilty about the argument and is committed to helping his friend rejoin the ranks of Homo sapiens, while having a little fun in the process.  The film tracks the series of often bizarre events associated with patching up the friendship, breaking the spell, and finally restoring Murray to his human form.  Through the spider’s magical powers, the friends travel back and forth through time, and experience their share of both enjoyable and harrowing escapades.  Although Barkley is the stand-up comic with an often searing wit, for whom Murray has always played straight man, with his transformation to a spider, Murray’s wit has developed a potent sting of its own, especially when he is inebriated (which he often is, thanks to the penchant both men have for beer), and the two friends verbally joust throughout the film, until the spell is broken and they return home to the 21st century..

5. GONIF WITH THE WIND (122 Pages)

LOGLINE:

In a Sherlockian spoof, a geriatric detective and his elderly associate foil the efforts of a deranged scientist (who emits distinctive colonic gases at crime scenes) to blackmail businesses worldwide using bizarre science, black magic and Santa’s reindeer.

SYNOPSIS:

An elderly super-sleuth named Barkley and his slightly older associate, Murray Geller, investigate a mystery surrounding the instantaneous disappearance of patent pending marks all over the world. Barkley suspects his old nemesis, Professor Gnarly Bitters, a brilliant but diabolical inventor who emits distinctive colonic gases at every crime scene. Barkley learns that a bearded man (who turns out to be Santa Claus) has apparently been murdered, as has a toy-making elf, and that a certain reindeer named Rudolph is missing. As he and Murray unravel various clues, Barkley deduces that the two men are not dead, but really under a magic spell. Barkley is lured to a deserted warehouse, where he is captured by Bitters, and learns that Rudolph is in an adjacent room. Bitters explains that he drugged Santa and cast a spell on him and his elf because he needed to use their sleigh and reindeer, especially Rudolph, for his plan to hold patent protection hostage all over the world until he received ransom money. He had erased the marks with one of his inventions, a nuclear-powered pencil eraser, which also has a time-travel function. Bitters tells Barkley that the spell lasts for exactly three days, and gives him the time when the victims will awaken. He is about to permanently erase Barkley when Murray arrives with the police. Bitters is arrested, and Barkley is freed, after which he rescues Rudolph and takes him to Santa and the elf, who revive shortly thereafter. Everyone is safe, Santa, his elf and Rudolph are reunited, and Barkley and Murray have solved the mystery.  

A cross between “The Odd Couple” and a male version of “The Golden Girls,” the STILL IN THE GAME television sitcom would feature two widowers living together, and alternating between their homes in Manhattan and on New York’s Long Island.  It would follow as a natural hand-off from the films, and feature many of the same characters.  One new supporting lead will be introduced in the sitcom’s first season finale, Murray’s hippie-type brother-in-law, Dave.  Twelve episodes have been storylined.

Episode Storylines

1) Period of Maladjustment – Murray and Barkley have difficulties adjusting to living with another person again, after having been on their own for a while.  They finally conclude that their friendship is more important than their differences.

2) The Understanding Woman – Barkley has spent the day lamenting the loss of his wife, Georgia.  He goes to Arlene Sachs’ house for dinner.  She attempts to seduce him, but he is un-receptive because he is not over Georgia’s relatively recent death.  Arlene is understanding.

3) Love Stories – Murray and Barkley reminisce about their wives and marriages. 

4) Barkley of Hollywood – Murray promotes Barkley’s comedy act vigorously to nursing homes and other retirement centers and they start doing regular shows. 

5) Planet Murray – Murray and Barkley feel disconnected from America at the onset of the 21st Century.  

6) Thoroughly Not Modern Murray – When they start their manager/partner relationship, they invest in cell phones and laptop computers and try to be modern.  Barkley makes the best of it; Murray does not.

7) Too Funny – Barkley learns that an old friend has died.  He retreats into comedy as a psychological defense, and becomes more intensely comical with each passing hour.  Finally, he crescendos and breaks down, and allows himself to feel the pain of the moment. 

8) Paint the Corner First – With much difficulty, Barkley and Murray help Mel paint the interior of his house.

9) The Love Coach – Barkley takes his grandson, Brandt, under his wings and gives him lessons on meeting and pleasing women, which results in a newspaper column that doesn’t work out as planned.

10) Field of Schemes – Murray wants to invest some money, and he and Barkley find a “business opportunity” listing in a newspaper.  They meet with the inventor of a product that doubles the quantity of beer: Beer Helper.  It uses water, and they're not interested.

11) The Fight of the New Century – Murray’s sons, Jeffrey and Howard, have a fight over a long-lost ring.  After much fuss and bother, the ring turns up in a dresser drawer in the bedroom Barkley is using. 

12) Hi, I’m Dave – Murray’s brother-in-law, Dave, needs a place to stay for a while and asks if he can stay with Murray, who says yes.  Dave turns out to be a long-haired country bumpkin who has spent his life making maple syrup on his upstate New York farm.   The cultures clash.  And clash.  And clash!

LOGLINE:

Shortly after a lottery win gives a young father the resources to run for Congress, his wife inadvertently becomes the leader of a Mafia family, which could undermine his campaign. The two worlds collide during a badly-timed breakfast, but everything turns out well in the end.

SYNOPSIS:

A lottery win puts a young New Jersey couple on the road to mayhem. Husband Louie will use the money to run for congress; wife Tina worries that their newborn daughter, Samantha, might be the target of kidnappers, so she has bought a gun. During dinner at an Italian restaurant, a Mafia Don and his lieutenant threaten her baby and Tina kills them. By so doing, she inherits the Don’s crime family (whose members are not the sharpest files in the cake). She also inherits the Don’s mansion. The morning after their first night in the mansion, Louie finds that a campaign planning breakfast he was to attend that day with the governor, mayor, police commissioner, and the chairman of his political party, has been moved to the mansion. Due to the bumbling of one of Tina’s gang members, a meeting of the local crime bosses will be held there that morning, too, with Tina hosting. The Dons arrive first and are led to a conference room, where a breakfast buffet has been set up. Louie’s guests arrive next, led by his mother, who has been babysitting Samantha. The Dons are on one side of the house; Louie and his guests are on the other side, and they need breakfast, too, so food is smuggled away from the mobsters. Louie discovers there is too little orange juice and asks a member of Tina’s gang to stretch it with water. He uses vodka instead, creating very potent screwdrivers, and most everyone except Louie and Tina become inebriated (they avoid the juice because they have problems with stomach acid). Louie has some success keeping the two sides apart until two policemen arrive to notify Tina that she is entitled to a reward for killing the Don and his lieutenant. The police are taken to the meeting room where they arrest the drunken Dons. In their own way, Tina’s gang members turn out to be decent, endearing men, and Louie suggests that they work on his campaign. They accept, and a few days later, Louie is introduced as a congressional candidate.