Vanity Cards
“They’re like little gifts with purchase, and I love them,” says Nicole Bugna-Doyle, commenting on the brief messages writer Chuck Lorre posts following each episode of his hit sitcoms, reports Katherine Rosman in the Wall Street Journal (5/14/08). Chuck’s sitcoms are “Two and a Half Men” and “The Big Bang Theory,” and his messages are delivered in “what many in the industry call ‘vanity cards’ — an image flashed on the screen at the end of a TV show.” Vanity cards typically “just identify a show’s creator or production company.” But Chuck uses his card to publish personal essays of up to 200 words, which you can catch on CBS, Monday nights at 8:29 p.m. and 9:29 p.m., Eastern.
Sometimes Chuck vents about network executives, as in: “I received a phone call from a mid-level CBS exec who began the conversation by saying he wanted to give me a head’s up. Having been in this business a while I knew ‘head’s up’ is code for ‘we’ve decided to s—— you.’” Then there was the vanity card he wrote hours before marrying his second wife: “I’m riddled with fear to the point of mind-numbing disassociation.” In other cases, Chuck simply comments on society in general: “Don’t hug men while shaking their hand … The shake/hug (shug?) is probably something Roman guys did when their empire was in decline.”
Chuck has been posting these messages since 1997, starting with “Dharma & Greg,” with his early offerings mainly featuring “existential wonderings and explanations of his personal beliefs.” He has since “written more than 200 cards,” (archives here) a total of four of which have been censored (including this reference to bad behavior by a Catholic priest). Most of the messages are too long to be read in the two-seconds afforded to vanity cards, but Chuck’s fans simply record them and hit the pause button (naturally there’s a Facebook group dedicated to this). Says Chuck: “These vanity cards have tracked couple of nervous breakdowns, a divorce … You can watch my psyche collapse, rebuild itself and collapse again.” [via reveries]
