Odd option deals, posted partly to amuse Jo and Harriet

[redbird]

Neil Gaiman and Terry Pratchett have sold Terry Gilliam the film rights to Good Omens—for a groat. The deal requires an actual groat, not the equivalent in other coins.

And I don't believe they've actually made groats, which is an old English coin worth about fourpence, since about the 1780s. Which means he is going to have to go to EBay.

RU [Sirius, interviewing Gaiman]: He's going to have to do some searching… a magical quest.

GAIMAN: I mean frankly they're really cheap. We figured out we were going to need Farthings to pay the agent commission on a groat. I went to EBay and picked up a farthing for practically nothing.

An eBay search found groats from Edward III through Victoria, as well as a "hammered silver half groat" of Elizabeth I, and lots of baseball cards.

Comments

[purpletigron.livejournal.com]

Awesome!

[adrian-turtle.livejournal.com]

Did the contract specify a silver groat, or just a groat? I bought a whole box of groats at the supermarket a few weeks ago for about $3, and there must have been thousands of groats in there.

[volund.livejournal.com]

Kasha as Cash ... an interesting concept.

[redbird]

I haven't seen the contract.

Gilliam being a comedian, I wouldn't be surprised if he presented them with a box containing one silver groat nested in some kasha.

[calimac.livejournal.com]

Which means he is going to have to go to EBay.

Yeah, it's not as if there's any other place in the world to buy old coins except EBay.

[xiphias.livejournal.com]

I think Neil Gaiman is using "go to EBay" figuratively, as a shorthand of "find and purchase an unusual object." I know there's some literary term for that -- using an example of a thing to stand in for the whole class. No clue what it is.

[brooksmoses]

Synecdoche. I find it a very pleasant concept to have a word for.

See also metonymy -- substitution of an attribute for the thing it's an attribute of (e.g., "crown" for "king"), which figures prominently in this John M. Ford anecdote.

[caprine.livejournal.com]

Yes. Harlan Ellison got his funny ideas from a post office box in Synecdoche.

[calimac.livejournal.com]

Synecdoche it is, but surely a good writer wouldn't use one when it makes him sound lazy or ignorant. And Gaiman is a good writer, therefore ...

[xiphias.livejournal.com]

"Being a good writer" doesn't mean that "everything one writes is written well." 'Specially stuff that's basically thrown together for, well, basically a press release. Although a much, much more interesting and amusing press release than most. . .

[calimac.livejournal.com]

He's a good enough writer, even off the cuff (see his blog) that, on either interpretation, this is a notable irritant.

[redbird]

I have two thoughts. First, an interview is often effectively first-draft: R.U. Sirius may have offered him the chance to check it over, but that would most likely be "yes, I really said that, and I'm willing to stand by it" than a serious second pass at the prose.

The other is that he may have been thinking either in terms of amusing the readers, with the pairing of "magical quest" and "eBay," or of the quick-and-easy way that Gilliam could do this, rather than thinking of quality old coins, given that "a groat" doesn't require a specific era or that the coin be in good condition. Sure, Gilliam might save a few quid by going to a coin shop and not paying shipping, but that might not be a net win by the time you allow for the time invested and maybe paying for transport if it's not in easy walking distance.

For that matter, for all either of us knows to the contrary, Gilliam may have no need to embark on any sort of quest: he might have a coin collection from which he can extract a silver groat to pay for this, or one silver groat that an eccentric great-uncle gave him when he was a lad. Does that break your disbelief more or less than the idea that someone might think in terms of shopping on eBay rather than going to a numismatist's shop, when he's not going to be keeping the coin.

[callunav.livejournal.com]

I think I love these people.

[bibliotrope.livejournal.com]

Here's a groat from the reign of Henry VII (http://www.cngcoins.com/Search.aspx?IS_ADVANCED=1&ITEM_DESC=groat&SEARCH_IN_CONTAINER_TYPE_ID_1=1&SEARCH_IN_CONTAINER_TYPE_ID_3=1&SEARCH_IN_CONTAINER_TYPE_ID_2=1&mm_ITEM_ADD_DATE=10&dd_ITEM_ADD_DATE=6&yyyy_ITEM_ADD_DATE=2006&image1.x=31&image1.y=19&VIEW_TYPE=0), metal not mentioned, for $245. (That's apparently U.S. dollars, the company being in Lancaster, Pa.)

[juliansinger.livejournal.com]

Wait, this actually means it might get MADE. Blink.

[pir-anha.livejournal.com]

yeah. and by terry gilliam. *wheee*!

[mneme]

Sure -- though he's been talking about the GO movie for a good long while. But seems much more viable than a lot of other options.