Premise 1
Fourth and Forty
John Nance, the master of the fourth quarter comeback, won an unprecedented three superbowls in a row then retired at the age of thirty-five. Five years later, at his hall of fame induction ceremony, he is approached by his former college coach about mentoring a troubled young franchise QB. The NFL is cracking down on players who have off-field brushes with the law with their new policy “four downs” – four arrests leads to a mandatory forty day suspension. The young QB is one away. He needs someone who is part mentor, part probation officer, but the rules are strict about how many hours that a coach can spend with a player. The rules are not so strict about players spending time with other players. John can be the kid’s shadow, all he has to do is return to the active roster of the team that used to be his arch rival.
People who matter
Rissa Lassen has lived her entire life in the rural desert town of Influence Nevada pop. 1959. She has no goals beyond keeping the town drunk from baking in the tin storm drains, plugging the main street meters to keep the bitch meter maid from writing a single ticket and seeing her archrival Lara leave for college and never come back. They were once friends but a vicious rumor sparked a vast divide with an intensity that only teenage girls seem to be able to manage to keep up. Rissa discovers that Lara has a meeting with an admission counselor from Harvard. She would be the first person in town to ever get into an Ivy league school. Rissa stalls Lara and hijacks the interview. She pretends to be Lara, but the interviewer sniffs out the deception. He was so entertained by the show, however that he suggests that she apply to Harvard. Rissa is a B student. She asks what it would take to get her into Harvard and the admissions counselor tells her the way to get around personal flaws and shortcomings in Ivy League society: get recommendations from people who matter. Rissa decides to dedicate herself to getting the three most influential living Americans to endorse her application. The fact that getting in will most likely block Lara makes Rissa work harder than she ever did in school and learn something about herself even as she creates elaborate lies about who she is.
People who matter
Rissa Lassen has lived her entire life in the rural desert town of Influence Nevada pop. 1959. She has no goals beyond keeping the town drunk from baking in the tin storm drains, plugging the main street meters to keep the bitch meter maid from writing a single ticket and seeing her archrival Lara leave for college and never come back. They were once friends but a vicious rumor sparked a vast divide with an intensity that only teenage girls seem to be able to manage. Her best friend, Tunes, is a desert slacker who dresses in all black and carries around a white ipod which has been hacked to "carry every song in the world on it." Tunes and Rissa hook up (literally) as Tunes transfers underground gems to her ipod every day on her lunch break. Rissa discovers that Lara has a meeting with an admission counselor from Harvard. She would be the first person in town to ever get into an Ivy league school. Rissa stalls Lara and hijacks the interview. She pretends to be Lara, but the interviewer sniffs out the deception. He was so entertained by the show, however that he suggests that she apply to Harvard. Rissa is a B student. She asks what it would take to get her into Harvard and the admissions counselor tells her the way to get around personal flaws and shortcomings in Ivy League society: get recommendations from people who matter. Rissa decides to dedicate herself to getting the three most influential living Americans to endorse her application. The fact that getting in will most likely block Lara makes Rissa work harder than she ever did in school and learn something about herself even as she creates elaborate lies about who she is.
Lara hires Tunes to help her with video blogging. They become a couple (a bit freaky, but solid). Rissa doesn't have anyone to turn to. Her father is an emotional amputee who heads to the caves every night to relive the days when Rissa's mother, a restless soul, lived with them. Her boyfriend Charlie is a diminutive illegal immigrant who speaks to her soul, but doesn't like the fact that she is lying to get ahead.
Rissa knows that the only way to get ahead, when one doesn't have power, is to lie. Society is built on lies, and she crafts one so well that she gets her recommendations. She puts those together with some essays she stole from the Internet and has it all ready for the admissions counselor.
Her mom, Haley shows up for Christmas Day. It's the day that's the best for quitting smoking, she says. And she gives her last two packs to Rissa as a Christmas gift. They have dinner together, but when she pops out for some fresh air, the cigarettes are gone and so is she. Rissa is left with only the faint smell of nicotine and deception mixed with the faraway scent of nog.
Charlie convinces her to make an alternate application and even pays for it to be sent in. In this application she is herself. Her recommendations come from the drunk in the ditch, the meter maid who seriously dislikes her, and her father, the man who never says more than two words consecutively. This application makes her feel good, it makes her connect with her life in a way that advances what is good about humanity. She gets rejected.
Lara becomes such an Internet sensation (she accidentally lights a bum on fire during one video blog and it blows up on the blogosphere) that she doesn't mind when her rejection letter comes. She has an invitation to attend film school in LA.
The fake application comes back. And as she reaches into the mailbox to get her answer, her life changes.