'The Promotion'

Screenwriter Steve Conrad likes his protagonists to suffer a little en route to finding a better place and not in the usual sitcomic ways. He writes distinctive dialogue -- tart, off-kilter, full of odd little details (as in his offbeat script for the Nicolas Cage starrer "The Weather Man" and in the more conventional, true-life tale "The Pursuit of Happyness").

By Michael Phillips

June 6, 2008