Today’s strip was done better some 36-and-a-half years ago by one Charles M. Schulz. Les is echoing the more-likable Sally Brown’s Hark! Hark! Hark! Hark! from Christmastime 1983…
Unlike Lisa’s Story, those strips were worked into an actual film, It’s Christmastime Again, Charlie Brown, which I got on videocassette for the price of a tank of gas in my parents’ Mazda at a Shell filling station back in 1993.
And frankly, “Les says things and bothers innocent bystander(s)” is not new ground even within the history of this strip either. Let’s move on.
Son of Stuck Funky 
Getting a small cameo role in a film based on his book is just another gym rope to climb for poor, poor Les. The indignities never end for poor, poor Les. Hollywood, movie stars, the glitz, the glamour, all just annoying burdens to shoulder and endure for poor, poor Les. With The Universe ever stop throwing haymakers at poor, poor Les? Check in tomorrow to find out!
Or don’t as this couldn’t possibly be more well-telegraphed. Obviously poor, poor Les will get all nervous and cock it all up because poor, poor Les never, ever gets a break. Maybe next week he’ll do an arc where poor, poor Les gets a blister while trying to mobile deposit his enormous movie check. Because every upside comes with a downside, unless it’s all downsides, which happens a lot too.
Can a big light crash down on Les and put us out of our misery?
But then they would have to figure out who cut the rope holding it up. So many suspects, so little time to retirement.
Nah, this is Act III. Les will get some random piece of advice that makes his walk-on part a smashing success, with zero effort on his part. An entire studio full of famous actors will give Les a standing ovation. Ten months later, Les will win the Academy Award for Best Walk-On. He will roll his eyes and say woe-is-me the entire time.
He needs the script every time to say that one line? Is that Les or Bull?
Speaking of Bull, this has been driving me crazy: is the character in the SOSF banner an actor in the role of Bull Bushka?
There was also the scene in 1994’s “Ed Wood,” on the set of “Bride of the Monster,” where the would-be actor whose meat packer dad put up money for the film is seen rehearsing and re-rehearsing his line “Janet, I want you staying away from the old Willows place.” If only Ed was directing this film…and playing Lisa.
Meanwhile, Les shouldn’t be confusing the chef in panel three. I’m still waiting for the reveal that he’s actually a disguised Frankie, lurking on the set for any sort of “dirt” he can sell to that tabloid TV show he works for.
At least Les understands why all his acquaintances will laugh at him: there he is, playing the world’s oldest waiter in a one-half star restaurant.
Can Les’ character be named Norman Maine? That might give him the appropriate motivation.
A better Peanuts example might be the earlier Christmas arc (shown in the TV special), in which Lucy pressures Linus to take a speaking part. Linus, freaked by the amount of words, says “Give me two good reasons why I should do this.”
Lucy says, “I’ll give you five” and balls her fingers into a fist. Then she spins around and smashes Les Moore in the face, breaking his glasses and driving his nose into his brain.
And of course, Stupido Mask is making a meal of his bit part. He can’t simply have fun doing something whimsical because he’s why they say that “Serious is just stupid sent to college.”
Now I get it… Giving Les a line in the movie to obsess over and repeat a hundred thousand times was Masone’s way of getting Les off the set and out of his hair for a bit… And meanwhile they’re shooting the REAL restaurant scene without him!
He then comes back, they shoot a meaningless scene which will mysteriously end up on the cutting room floor in post production, and nobody is the wiser…
And does Marianne have any fuckin’ lines in her
title character’s own story? Are there any other characters at all, or is this based on a minimalist two-person stage play? Who’s playing all of Les/Lisa’s Funkyverse friends? Is there even going to be a hint of sexiness or a love scene with Marianne’s skin involved? Because right now what I’m seeing is too dull for even the Hallmark Channel… And where is Darrin? Isn’t he the least bit curious about seeing the hottest it-girl in Hollywood portray his bio mom? How much movie revenue is going towards the Lisa’s Legacy Foundation? And where the fuck is Summer? Didn’t she request some kind of involvement, or did I imagine that? And where the hell is Cindye? Or Cayla? Or any of Lisa’s surviving relatives? After all that research and backstory, how is this set with elementary school stage props and a stationary camera the best Masone and Martin could come up with? Why hasn’t Martin walked off the set in disgust? I mean besides the $10+ million payday he’s cashing in?
Seriously… Can anybody point me to a movie in the past 20 years that has two A-list actors in such a bullshit work setup?
I mean seriously — lest we forget, during the Starsuxxx shoot, Masone literally got the bright idea in his head that because Superman’s creator was from Cleveland or whatever, they needed to move the entire production and shoot the moon battle scenes there just so all the nerdy comics geeks could have their geekgasm right there in the theater… And of course a wayward school bus drove through the set in the middle of the take and the director still decided to use the take because reasons…
My point is if Masone has the power to do that on a whim, why hasn’t he rotated Lisa’s Story between Ohio, Manhattan and Paris??
Oh, Marianne has lines. Don’t forget “I love you, Les!”
See the short-order cook? Guess which six words he’ll speak to Les, thereby inspiring and informing his Oscar-worthy performance.
“Get the f*** out of here?”
Again, let’s compare today’s Funky Winkerbean to the same point of Calvin’s part in the school play.
https://www.gocomics.com/calvinandhobbes/2016/11/16
It’s much better, isn’t it? By the way, Calvin & Hobbes is on day 3 of on 11-day arc. This shitshow been droning on about Lisa’s Story: The Movie for months.
Panel three: Less’ disturbing presence induces Henry to evolve a mouth and speak!
“These pretzels are making me thirsty!”
Ooooo! Oooooooo! I know! Les will meet up again with Queen of Hearts at the lunch counter where she will counsel him with wise, sage acting advice.
Or he’ll mope around before turning his cameo into a raging dumpster fire.
I’m just amazed none of us have congratulated Bull Bushka’s successful flight from his old identity to take up a new job as a Hollywood short-order cook like that. Can you imagine how much danger Bull would be in of being recognized, if Les were aware of people who weren’t himself?