Paul Guyot originally wrote the following column for e-Nink, the e-version of the Novelists, Inc. Newsletter. Paul will speak at the Novelists, Inc. Conference, Ninc Goes Platinum, 20 Years of Excellence, to be held in St. Louis, September 30-October 4.
After attending the University of Arizona, Paul Guyot immediately put his education to use by going to work as a waiter. That was followed by liquor store clerk, shoe salesman, and driving that little golf ball-swallowing cart around at the local driving range. But after an unfortunate incident involving a snap hook and an occipital lobe, Paul was told, "You'll never play golf in this town again."
He then hitched a ride to Los Angeles with a band of misfits and circus freaks filming the epic motion picture, HARLEY DAVIDSON & THE MARLBORO MAN. As the personal stand-in for Don Johnson, Paul had hours upon hours to hone his writing skills while waiting for Don to come out of his trailer.
Awards, accolades, and women throwing lingerie toward the screen whenever his name appeared soon followed as Paul's career as a television scribe took off. Paul has written for such epic television series as: LEVEL 9 - created by bestselling author Michael Connelly - where a bunch of socially-disabled computer nerds battled cyber-crime... how was that not a hit? SNOOPS, an ABC show about female private eyes who tended to lick whipped cream off each other during Sweeps week (yes, this is true); and that mother of all crime shows FELICITY. Contrary to tabloid gossip, Paul is NOT the person who suggested Keri Russell cut all her hair off, though he was there when it happened, and was the first person to remark, "Hey, who's the little French boy?"
But Paul Guyot was just getting started. He soon went on to write and produce the Emmy-winning drama JUDGING AMY for three seasons, and managed to survive being fired by the studio's head of production after Paul and another writer pal commandeered a studio golf cart and drove it out onto the public streets to a coffee house two miles away. When you need a grande white mocha, you need a grande white mocha.
Now hiding out, er, living in St. Louis, Paul has become what his agents refer to as "That doughy white guy in flyover country." Um, I mean he's known as "The pilot guy" because since moving, he has created and executive-produced pilots for TNT, Showtime, Sony Pictures, Warner Brothers, and currently has a development deal with FOX (they know nothing of the golf cart incident). He is also the creator and executive producer of CRIMES AGAINST PERSONS, a pilot for the A&E network to be filmed in St. Louis. On the movie front, Paul is adapting the Miles Corwin nonfiction book HOMICIDE SPECIAL for 20th Century Fox studios.
He's published short stories in numerous anthologies and his story THE LAW AND THE ORDER was chosen as one of the Notable Stories of 2006, and nominated for the Million Writers Award. Paul lost out to an old man's story about his dying goldfish. You've got to know your audience, people! His latest story (Paul's, not the old man's) WHAT A WONDERFUL WORLD is in the Michael Connelly edited anthology THE BLUE RELIGION (Little, Brown, 2008).
Paul's personal writing philosophy can be summed up in three words: I'm a fraud! But it's the deception and manipulation of people in order to convince them he actually knows what he's doing that is the true art to writing. He rarely reads romance novels, though he considers himself a romantic. At least he did back in college when he answered to the nickname of Sweet Chocolate Muldoon. Actually, that was the name of a pimp Paul was accosted by in between college and that Don Johnson movie. The emotional scars still linger, and to this day Paul cannot enter a Godiva boutique without convulsing, and will scream like a horror movie teen if he sees anyone wearing a fuzzy purple hat.
As of 2009, Paul has decided to adopt the late Robert Goulet as his mentor, and is currently living his life by Mr. G's personal motto of "Check it out!" It's going so-so.
More prosaic information and semi-nude photos of Sebastian Cabot may be culled from his website.
