Ask the Writers - Infinite

This month we asked our writers, "If your life was going to be remembered forever, which format would you like it to take and why?"

Joe Lipsett

While I would love to be remembered in TV format, I doubt the entertainment value of such an exercise. I think a short story would be worthwhile because you can pack a significant amount of information into a small space, so it becomes more poignant, memorable and (hopefully) interesting.

Lauren Cheal

My instinct here is to go with TV show (think a Murder She Wrote knockoff where my witty older-person insights on the world garner huge, if canned, laughs), but I am hesitant because TV is a very temporary medium. Will the anthropologists of the future even have cable? They may not.

It seems to me that the real lasting power of television is its ability to live on through the people who love it. I would most like to be immortalized in a quote from my show.  I am currently obsessed with Phil Dunphy (Modern Family) saying, "Good times, She Wrote" about his and Claire's attendance at a Bowl game parade marshalled by none other than Angela Lansbury and Jon Hamm yelling, "This racket is a fart!" as Liz Lemon beats him at tennis. But there are older TV quotes that I repeat with much more frequency. Frasier Crane saying "I know what the rules of my game are, and they do not include this nacent migraine!" comes up more than you would think. As does, "It's time to Grab that Dough!" (with hand motions) from the Golden Girls. 

Yes, the key to my immortality is a well-crafted television quote.

Taryn Cheal

There is little question in my mind about how I should be commemorated: a musical! I have always loved music and over the top costumes, and I cannot think of a better way to be remembered than a snappy tune accompanied by a finely choreographed dance number. That is really everything I stand for in life. I would, naturally, played by a young Barbra Streisand from the Funny Girl era with the sassy bob. There are really no limits to the topics that can be covered by a musical, so any potential situation can be depicted. Did I murder someone? Yes? Well, then we can use Chicago, Sweeny Todd or Evil Dead: The Musical as a template. Am I charismatic and my life's accomplishments need to be remembered? Yes, well then let's look to Hairspray or Hello Dolly. Song options include "If I Could Turn Back Time (And Punch You)," "Do Ya Think I'm Punny," "Happiness is a Warm Cat," and "Taryn Up My Heart."

April Yorke

Though my instinct is to go full biopic, I don't have the kind of upbringing or addiction issues that those tend to depict (witness . . . my blandly middle class childhood!). I'd move over to my other favourite medium, but a TV show, no matter how genius, tends to lose its cultural fluency after a few years (which explains why Spaced was so obsessed with The Matrix and Star Wars: The Phantom Menace). You know what never goes out of style, though? An epic story song. Regardless of what's au courante, people will always tell stories through songs. Of course, it occurred to me that the best story songs tend toward the tragic (cf. Bob Dylan's "The Hurricane" and Gordon Lightfoot's "The Wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald"), so I can hope something that's only tragic on an interpersonal level, à la Joni Mitchell's "The Last Time I Saw Richard," or perhaps something that ends well:

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