A census taker tried to quantify me once. I ate his liver with some Fava beans and a…

a) Nice Chianti.

b) Cheeky Lafite.

c) Big Amarone.

The answer is c).

It is. Go on, look it up.

No, not in the movie. In the book.

For reasons far too dull to go into, I’m currently reading The Silence of The Lambs. It follows the movie pretty closely (or rather vice versa), but there are some interesting changes, including that most famous line (it is also not followed by the sentence, ‘Lecter then sucked in air like a starving man gobbling up an unruly oyster’.)

I know, I know: that’s interesting enough. I have already rewarded your kindness in visiting ITIABTWC with that little tidbit alone, but hang on, there’s more:

The process of adaptation is a fascinating one. Many people have told me that No Country For Old Men is a virtual carbon copy of the book (The Road certainly was, although they left out the bit about babies cooking on a spit). Whereas Schindler’s Ark is a very dry read with very little narrative, unlike the tear-stained movie it inspired.

The reason I point this out is that no one ever really explains how the process of adapting a movie is actually very similar to that of ‘adapting’ your ad script.

Both go through many layers of approval, budget strictures, eye-watering research and lots of witless, talentless, tasteless cunts poking their noses and oars in to the detriment of the final product.

And both involve changes that can make the initial script look unrecognisable.

For example, I heard the the initial script for Levi’s Running Through Walls (I can’t call it Odyssey; I’m not quite enough of a wanker) had a man waking up in a box, then breaking out of it before doing some other stuff that sounds a bit too on the nose. The Glazer read it and basically came up with the ad we all know and love.

Of course, the creative process can also take things in the other direction, but it’s worth remembering that what’s on the piece of A4 is just a starting point.

Will it be massaged to brilliance or rogered to oblivion?

Well, unlike in Hollywood, advertising writers do get some say in the process.

Whether that say makes any difference is up to you.

(Of course it fucking isn’t. It’s up to the client’s wife.)