Empty Suits

Empty Suits is a double entendre. It’s the character-driven story of businessman Joe Strate, from his beginnings as a brash young advertising man surrounded by empty suits, through six other jobs and ending years later with the courtroom drama of his age discrimination suit. Along the way, there’s action aplenty as Joe chases a sneak thief across downtown Chicago, fends off a hungry gator on a Florida golf course, mocks a company physical, has a barroom brawl and other adventures. There’s the pathos of Joe forced to admit failure on the witness stand and shouting down a lying defense psychiatrist who would destroy his marriage in open court. There’s the untold, inside story of what plaintiffs are subjected to in our legal system – the grueling pretrial interrogatories, psychiatric examinations, depositions, a mandatory mediation tribunal and judicial pressure to force settlements and keep cases from trial – all a guide to those who don’t know what’s really involved in filing suit so they can fight on. And throughout, there’s Joe’s innate humor, complete with his original song parodies, humor that slowly becomes the defense mechanism of a tragically depressed man. His intolerance of bullshit and uncontrollable sense of humor make him a fish out of water. Only his talent allows him to survive.

-- Frederic Thomas Selak