"The Office" writers add their two cents to 'The Game'

By Sarah Sluis

I guess it's no surprise that the sensationally titled The Game: Penetrating the Secret Society of Pickup Artists has been picked up for adaptation as a movie. As the title suggests, the book centers on the author, who infiltrates himself into a posse of women-gaming men and moonlights as a PUA (pickup artist...it appears that the tribe is keen on acronyms). In fact, besides its intriguing subject matter, the Fox Searchlight project taps into a number of development trends in Hollywood.

1) The self-help book turned feature movie. The romantic comedy He's Just Not That Into You is the perfect example, offering fictionalized relationships drawn from a nonfiction book. Little-known fact: Mean Girls was based on a Queen Bees and Wannabees, a guidebook for parents and kids dealing with the friend drama that occurs to girls from middle to high school. There is no way the dated self-help book Men are From Mars, Women are from Venus would be lifted from its grave had it not been for the success of self-help-inspired movies.

2) The male-centered romantic comedy. Romantic comedies about career women finding love are booooring. The best work has come from male-centered takes on romance, be it Judd Apatow movies or (500) Days of Summer. Even among non-quirky movies, the mainstream Hitch (domestic box-office: $179 million), starring Will Smith, also centered on someone receiving help in the dating department. These movies are successful because they are enjoyed by both men and women.

Which raises a curious inconsistency: The Game is a guy book, but one with a decidedly misogynist attitude. The studio will have to temper the author's jaw-dropping objectification of women (well, this IS a book on pickup artists), or else go the way of adaptation a la the very offensive book by Tucker Max, I Hope They Serve Beer in Hell (domestic box-office: $1.4 million).

Currently, The Game is getting a reworking from "The Office" writers Lee Eisenberg and Gene Stupnitsky. The duo also scripted the Universal misfire Year One, the upcoming comedy Bad Teacher, starring Cameron Diaz, and are working on Ghostbusters 3--not a bad slate of films. They seem the ideal partners to give the material the once-over that makes "The Office" appeal to the masses, offending without alienating.