General Meetings

• Prologue
• What Is a General Meeting?
• Talking About Yourself and Positioning
• Zoom General Meetings
• Staying Current and Avoiding Free Work
• Follow-Up After a General
• One Cool Thing
• Bonus Segment

Prologue

John August: Hello and welcome. My name is John August.

Craig Mazin: My name is Craig Mazin.

John: This is Scriptnotes. It’s a podcast about screenwriting and things that are interesting to screenwriters. Today on the show, Craig, thanks for coming in.

Craig: Oh, great. Great to meet you.

John: It’s wonderful to finally meet you. I’ve been a big fan for years. Did they offer you anything to drink on the way in?

Craig: They did. They offered me a water, but I’m all good. Thank you.

John: That’s very good. Alternately, sorry I’m a little bit late. I couldn’t find the link. Oh, is that your dog in the background?

Craig: Yes. Actually, that’s my friend’s dog. We’re dog-sitting. He generally will not bark, but if he does, just wave your hand and tell me to mute, and I’ll mute.

John: All right. We have now just done the first 30 seconds of every general meeting.

Craig: Horrible.

John: This is a compendium episode about general meetings. We’ve touched on various topics about general meetings over the course of the podcast, but Lauren Loesberg, our amazing intern this summer, pitched doing a compendium episode specifically talking about general meetings. She has gathered up all these pieces and put them together into this compendium episode. In our bonus segment, we’re going to talk about our own personal best and worst general meetings over our years working in this industry.

Craig: This is very meta because you’ve basically taken all these pieces and turned it into a general meeting because that’s what general meetings are. Just a big blob of stuff.

John: It’s like the scrap bin, the yarns that are being assembled into a quilt here. Lauren, welcome to the podcast. Talk to us about your instincts going into this compendium and why you pitched this as an idea.

Lauren Loesberg: Yes. New writers hear the term general meeting and typically have the same questions. What exactly are they? How do you get them? What are you supposed to do once you have one? This compendium pulls from eight different episodes to answer all of these questions.

John: Great. Eight different episodes is a lot, so let’s break this into little chunks. Why don’t you start us off with two of these conversations?

What Is a General Meeting?

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Lauren: We’ll start all the way back in Episode 9 where the two of you break down what a general meeting is. Then we’ll go to Episode 439 where you walk us through how a general usually goes and what’s typically discussed.

John: Great. Let’s start with those two, and then we’ll pop back here to the present to set up the next few clips.

[music]

John: Your agent and your manager are going to send you out to meet with a bunch of people. A lot of those are people who they have other clients working with, people who they know socially. They’re going to basically send you out on a ton of meetings. They’re just going to throw you against a lot of walls and see what sticks. The basic reason behind this is people will have read your stuff, but no one is going to feel comfortable hiring you to do any project unless they’ve sat with you in a room and seen, like, “Oh, she’s this kind of person, this kind of writer. I could see calling her on the phone and talking about a specific project.” You’re very unlikely to get hired for any of these early jobs unless you’ve actually sat in a room and met with these people.

Craig: It’s true. Sometimes there’s a magical little thing that happens. Inevitably, these meetings have some context. They say general meetings, but there’s no such thing because everyone that’s having a meeting with you has something they need, and they’re going to mention it. We would love to have somebody write a movie like this. Every now and then you have one. You have that thing they’re looking for, even if it’s just the germ of an idea, and you might just start talking about it, and they might just get excited, and suddenly you’re generating a possible job. I always think of general meetings as specific meetings that just don’t know what they’re specific about yet.

John: I’ve talked about this in sessions like the Austin Film Festival, but I don’t know if we’ve talked about it on the podcast. Is that every one of these meetings has the same kind of template, which is that you will show up at the office. You’ll be a few minutes early. The assistant will offer you something to drink. You should ask for a glass of water or a Diet Coke or something that they will have so they can get you something and bring you something and feel like they’ve done some part of their job.

The meeting will start a little bit late. You’ll go into that person’s office. You’ll sit in whichever chair is appropriate to sit in. You’ll spend the first five minutes talking about nothing important at all. It’s just really general chit-chat about the most recent movies, about random stuff, where you grew up, when you went to school. Then at some point they’ll say to you, “This is what we’re working on. Tell us what you’re working on. Is there something together that we should be working on?” A lot of times, this is the same template for going in for a pitch where there’s the general stuff before it gets to the meat of it. In the case of a general meeting, it’s just like, I’ll show you some of what we’re doing if you’ll show me some of what you’re doing.

Craig: Exactly. Usually there’s some pretext for the meeting. Even if it’s just, “I love your agent. He insisted that I meet you. Then I read your thing, and I really liked it.” There’s always some pretext. No one really has a meeting with somebody that is a complete blank to them. There’ll always be a little something to talk about.

John: In the same token, you should be able to have a conversation about the kinds of things you want to write and the kinds of things you want to work on. You don’t have to be able to pitch specifically what it is you’re trying to do. If you’re the kind of writer who is working on thrillers, you might say, “I’m working on a thriller set in the Boston financial market,” which I’m not even sure makes sense. It’s a general enough pitch that describes the kind of idea you’re working on. Without having to give up all the details about what specifically you’re trying to do. If you just sit there and respond, just like, “Oh, that sounds good. That sounds interesting. They’re not going to have any more specific idea of what to pitch you when something comes three months down the road.

Craig: Yes. It’s an opportunity also for you to start showing them what you can do. They might say, “Well, we have this idea that we’ve been working on for a while. That’s the kind of thing we love. It’s this.” They briefly describe it. There’s nothing wrong with saying, “I really like that. When you pitched it to me, where I was thinking it was going was this or this.” The truth is, that’s what they’re hiring you to do. They’re certainly not looking for people to go, “Oh, okay, thank you for spoon-feeding me something.” They want people with an opinion, as long as it’s a smart opinion. It’s a chance for you to begin to show off the quality of your mind. I would say, take every meeting you can when it’s early on in your career.

[music]

John: You’ve arrived at this executive’s office. Generally, there’d be an assistant or somebody in the lobby who said, “Can I get you something?” By “get you something”, they mean a drink. That’s all they mean is a drink. I think the appropriate choices are water, coffee, Diet Coke, or I’m all good. Craig, would you add anything to that list?

Craig: Prime rib. Yes. No, it’s water, coffee, tea, or Diet Coke.

John: Yes, tea.

Craig: Generally speaking, over time, I’ve defaulted to, “Nope, I’m good because if I drink stuff in the meeting, I’m just going to have to pee. I don’t want to pee.

John: I generally bring my Arlo Finch water bottle with me to everything. I just have my water bottle, and therefore, I’m all good.

Craig: Advertising.

John: Advertising. While you’re waiting for the meeting to start, it’s worth studying the outer office. That’ll give you some sense of the vibe, the posters they have on the wall for the movies they’ve made, useful. Obviously, you’ve done your research beforehand, but just get a sense of the vibe. Also, if the assistant is talking with you, talk with the assistant. That assistant is probably in very much the same spot you are. Try to learn that assistant’s name. That may be a person that you’re emailing back and forth with in the future. That person will probably end up running the studio at some point. Just be friendly with those assistants.

Craig: For sure. Treat them well. Especially if you’re starting out and you’re young, they’re looking at you thinking, “Why am I not there?” “Why are you not in my seat, and why am I not in your seat?” Treat them well because sooner or later, they will be where you’re standing. Just talk to them like they’re humans. Notice that they’re alive. It will make a huge difference to them. It is human decency. We don’t really deserve points for doing what we’re supposed to do, but do what you’re supposed to do.

John: Agreed. You finally made it through the door. You are in the meeting. Craig, talk us through the protocol of that first minute or two of the meeting.

Craig: Usually, it’s going to be about the person that you’re meeting with saying, “Yes, I came across–” They’re going to basically give you a quick logline of why you’re there at all. They’ve seen something of yours, read something of yours. They talked to your manager. You have a mutual friend. Whatever it is, there was some reason they agreed to this. That’s the intro. It very quickly will turn into “Where did you grow up? Where did you go to school? How long have you been doing this? How did you get started here? Let me tell you a little bit about what we do here” is a very common thing. They will explain. I always laugh. It’s a little bit like when you go to a restaurant, and the waiter says, “Have you eaten here with us before?” “No, but go ahead.”

John: It’s tapas, which are small plates.

Craig: Oh, God. Literally, if they don’t say, “Here, what we do is we load the food into a cannon, and we fire it into your face.”

[laughter]

Craig: If they don’t say that, I’m like, “Guys, yes, okay.” Just say, “We’re small plates, family style, small to large on the menu,” whatever it is. It’s that thing of, let me explain a little bit of what we do here. Then they’re going to start talking. A lot of times, this will be boring to you because what they’re not doing is telling you how specifically money is going to end up in your pocket, which is probably what you’re imagining or hoping for when you’re starting out, at the very least. You just have to nod and be engaged and feign interest as best you can in how their production company came to be. Ask questions. Everybody likes to be shown interest in.

John: Agreed. In that first minute, you are really trying to establish some pattern of mutual interest. I really liked that thing you made that just came out. I have that saying that you’re trying to find areas of commonality just to ground you a little bit. It’s important to remember that it’s not an audition. It’s not a job interview. It’s not a first date. It is really more like imagine you have a mutual friend who said, “Oh, you two should get together and talk.” It’s that vibe. There’s a transactional quality to it. You’re both looking for how you can help each other.

In that listening that Craig describes, I actually find it really useful because people will stake out a very general area of the things they’re looking at and, more importantly, the things they’re not looking for. When I moved over to Verve, I went out on a bunch of general meetings for places that I just had never met before. I met at Working Title. I thought I had an idea of what a Working Title movie was, and I was basically right. Even within the Working Title framework, I got a much better sense of, okay, they’re very much looking for this kind of thing.

I met at TriStar. TriStar was a different mandate than what it was when I was a reader at TriStar, definitely. I got to hear what they’re looking for. I had a meeting at Monkeypaw. It’s a really specific mandate of what the kinds of things they’re trying to do. I was then meeting at a studio, and they said, “We’re looking for non-IPIP, which is like, okay, that’s weird.

Craig: Public domain stuff.

John: Public domain stuff. Did they want unicorns or Greek mythology? I was like, “Oh, okay.”

Craig: Why are they looking for it? It’s there. It’s all there.

John: They want people to come in with non-IPIP, basically, or they’re trying to develop things based on that stuff. If you had a Medusa story, that would be a place to do a Medusa story.

Craig: I do not. That is good. You’re getting a sense of what they want, and you’re listening to them, because it is a two-way evaluation process. You don’t want to say it in the moment, but you may walk out of there thinking, “I have no interest in doing non-IPIP. That’s what I’m interested in right now.” Then, “Okay. I guess not them for now.”

John: You’re also getting a vibe on, “Would I want to work with this person?” I would say, trust your instincts there. If they give you a bad vibe, maybe you’re not going to really enjoy working there. Maybe that’s not the right place to take that pitch down the road or to-

Craig: Oh, yes, you won’t.

John: -go after that open writing assignment, because if you’re not going to be up for it, that’s cool. Now, let’s talk about open writing assignments, because at some point in a meeting, they may pull out a buck slip, which is a narrow card that lists these are the things we’re looking to hire writers for. These are the projects that are open for discussion. Listen to those. That’s great, but this is also opportunity to pitch broad areas of things that you’re interested in.

This is not your elevator pitch. This is not your concise pitch. This is just, I’ll often describe sort of a general area. If I wanted to say, “I’ve been doing a lot of research on Outward Bound programs, and I think it’s a real opportunity to do a horror movie centered around the Outward Bound experience,” that’s not a pitch, but it’s describing an area. If what they told me was that they were looking for a horror movie, and I pitched that back, I can see in the room, okay, are we on the same wavelength there? If we are on the same wavelength, then I could come back in later on with an actual prepared pitch for it, but I’m just getting a sense of, is this the kind of thing that we should be talking about?

Craig: That’s exactly right. It’s good to also listen in that list. If they do pull out the buck slip and they give you their– be aware of two things. One, what you’re hearing are slightly distressed properties. The first question is, with whom am I meeting? If I’m meeting the president of something, okay, and they pull out that list, that’s a real list. That’s real. If I’m meeting with anybody under that, that list is their list. That is a list of stuff that they are in charge of that they want to get going because it will move them up internally. It doesn’t mean that any of those things will ever actually get made at that company. That said, sometimes they do.

When you hear that list, if you do spark to something, engage on it. Just start talking about it. What will happen is they will hear in you maybe the ability to be smart. It’s really what they’re like. Like, “Oh, this person said a lot of smart things. They’re smart. My boss will literally never let me make this movie. Now I have a writer who I know is smart, who, if I vouch for something else, will not embarrass me.”
To that extent, when you are in there with these people, if you’re vibing, if they’re NG, then beat it. It’s never going to happen. If you’re vibing with them, try and have some way to express that you were excited to be there in the first place. That you didn’t drag yourself there because your manager said, “Go here, go here, go here, meet a person, go home.” You wanted to meet them. You were interested in them because of A, B, or C. It will make them feel like this isn’t just one of those things you have to slog through. Yet another reminder that they are not in charge and have to take general meetings with the likes of you.

John: Craig, what is your opinion of giving them your email address or getting their email address? Do you do that after a good general meeting?

Craig: Yes. I just assume that if they want my email address, then they can get it from my lawyer. If you have a manager, they’ll get it from your manager. If you are at one of the code of conduct agencies, they can get it from your agent. Yes, no, of course. My feeling is that the privacy of contact information, talking about how do you grow old in this business, that’s gone. There is no privacy of contact information. Everyone is contactable at every moment. The thought of withholding that would be, I think, the most offensive possible thing ever. “No, you may not have my email address. Good day, sir.”

John: Good day, sir. I would say that in this last year, I’ve been much more forthright about just giving them my email address and to say, like, “Oh, you can email me that directly.” I’m not trying to cut my reps out of it, but it’s basically saying you don’t have to go through the reps for every little thing anymore, and that we have a relationship that is independent of my relationship through Verve or through my attorney.

Just because if it’s somebody I actually do spark with, and he’s like, “Oh, you know what? Actually, I could see myself working with her on projects.” Just emailing directly is nice. Also, if I have the email, I can do the etiquette thing of following up, saying, like, “Hey, I really enjoyed meeting with you about this thing,” or “We talked about this thing. I’d love to come in and talk with you more about that.” I traditionally did not do those follow-up emails because I didn’t have those emails, and now I tend to do them.

Craig: For whatever reason, I have always been someone that everyone thought they should just talk to directly. I have actually bemoaned this. I would say sometimes people just call me directly. Even about stuff that isn’t great, they’ll just call me directly. I’m like, “Shouldn’t you be talking to someone?” Never mind.

John: Never mind.

Craig: Never mind.

John: Craig, I have this new invention. Let me pitch this for you. It’s a bell that you have in your house, and it has a 9-digit number, or I think maybe a 10-digit number, and anybody with that 10-digit number can make that bell ring at any time. Would that be good?

Craig: Yes, I would be okay with that.

John: The idea that we have phones is crazy. The idea that any stranger can call me on the phone at any point, so that’s why I don’t answer my phone anymore. I’ll answer it if you were to call.

Craig: Every phone call was a roll of the dice. Now, none are. The worst comes to worst is you get a number; it’s unknown number, or from some town you don’t know, because somebody moved out here and didn’t change their number, and then they leave a voicemail, and you go, “Oh, that was that person. Let me add them to my contacts.” That won’t happen again. That’s basically, but yes, we always know who’s calling.

John: Wrapping up the general meeting discussion, I want to say that my first 10 to 15 general meetings were kind of terrible. I was not good at general meetings. It took a while to get used to them.

Craig: Define terrible.

John: I would say, take our advice–

Craig: What would happen?

John: They just like, they weren’t productive. I wasn’t getting to the next stage after them. I was awkward in them. I just didn’t feel comfortable about it. I wasn’t comfortable in my writer self skin, but I did get a lot better with practice. I would say, take our advice, but also don’t be hard on yourself if you find it weird and uncomfortable being in those meetings, especially at the start, because it is a weird thing to be doing.

Craig: As it happens, this is one of the few jobs where you can actually be weird and awkward. It’s just that you have to be that much better at your job, but you are allowed to be weird and awkward. Some of the greatest screenwriters out there are weird and awkward. What happens is the executives will go, “Yes, I’m working with so-and-so.” I’m like, “Oh, he’s a genius.” I know he’s weird. God, he’s weird, but he’s a genius, so it’s okay. Or she is a shut-in. She’s a recluse. She doesn’t actually leave her house, but the page has been amazing. It’s actually like the legend grows of this weirdo lady that’s pumping out these great scripts. They’ll do that all the time because this business loves a narrative. They love to characterize everybody. The danger zone is when you’re fine, and you’re also super boring or awkward or weird in a room. That can be an issue.

[music]

John: Okay, so we’ve gotten the general vibe. Lauren, where are we headed next?

Talking About Yourself and Positioning

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Lauren: We are jumping forward to Episode 699 where you and guest Pamela Ribon answer a listener question about how to talk about yourself as a writer. This is a crucial skill for success in a general. Then we’ll go back to Episode 381, which comes from a panel discussion you hosted at the WGA. You interviewed writers Tess Morris, Christina Hodson, Nicole Perlman, and Jason Fuchs. I like this episode a lot because you talk about how you can use a general meeting to position yourself as the right person for a future project.

John: Craig, so many voices from the past, folks we’ve had on the podcast several times. It’s nice. Time traveling.

Craig: It is. It’s also a bit terrifying.

John: Well, let’s start with Pamela Ribon and then do the panel discussion.

[music]

John: All right, let’s get to our main topic, which is the topic you brought us. We actually have a question from a listener that sets this up perfectly true. Charles writes, “I’ve written a pilot, and I’m fortunate enough to have gotten some general meetings from it. For all intensive purposes, I’m no one, and they know nothing about me. What are the best practices or tips for starting a meeting? You sign on to Zoom, and you’re suddenly met with a face, and now you have to be interesting. When you’re no one, you can’t count on them knowing anything about you, and it’s weird if you know too much about them. What are some general tips to ease into the general meeting?”

Pamela Ribon, you’ve actually done workshops on this, like how to talk about yourself as a writer. I’d love to seed this conversation to you if you want to direct us here.

Pamela Ribon: Sure.

John: What is your best advice for someone in Charles’s situation, and really any writer who’s going into a situation where you have to talk about yourself?

Pamela Ribon: Yes. I like to talk about this topic whenever it’s like film festival master classes or whatever, because this is the thing that you have to do first. Sometimes, before you’ve even written something, you have to talk to people about writing and if you want to write, or that you have written, and what are you going to write next. I find a lot of people start by apologizing for even feeling this way, for having a dream, or for having accomplished a script. They’re like, “It’s just this thing. I don’t know. It’s sort of whatever. I don’t know. It’s dumb.”

Even in this question, it’s weird if you know too much about them. No. You’re having a meeting, so knowing a lot about them shows that you did your homework, you’re excited to meet them, you’re equipped. I know we talk about it’s a first date, but it’s not. We’re not going to keep dating.

[laughter]

Pamela Ribon: There’s not like, am I attracted to this person, or is that how they always dress? It’s more about: how does this flow fit? When they ask me a question about myself, do I feel comfortable answering it? When they answer a question that I have, do I feel like they’re looking at me and talking to me? Do I feel like a real person in this room? These are basic questions that, in a general, you can get yourself too hyped up to even bother to look for.

John: Somebody said there, I really want to pull apart, is that you think back to a first date. If someone asks you about yourself on a first date, you’re going to come up with a set of answers that make you look good along a certain axis, but you’re not going to get the same answers in a general meeting that you would on a first date. It’s kind of a positioning thing you’re trying to do. You’re trying to explain to them who you are, what you like to write, why you wrote this thing, why you’re there. It’s good to practice this. If you’re giving a master class, you’re talking to people about this: what are your first bits of advice for the things they need to come into the room ready to say?

Pamela Ribon: What I usually do is we just have a general in front of the rest of the class. Someone brave enough to go first, I say, you’re going to walk in here, and I’ll already be seated. You’re going to come in like you’ve walked into my office. Then you just do it because they figure it out. You walk in, you’re like, “Hey, how are you doing? Do you need anything? Do you want some water? Did anybody get you coffee?” You sit down and then you small talk. “Was it hard getting here?” “Oh, it’s hot today?” All the things we do at the top of a general, which at the top of a Zoom, just so I’m also modern, it’s the same way.

John: It is.

Pamela Ribon: You make sure that you’re looking at the green light every once in a while so that you know you’re making the closest eye contact as you can make. You make sure that you’re comfortable, that you have water, that you have all the things you need. You start with whatever, like we did when we first logged on, of here’s what traffic situation I was just in and here’s how things are going. Then you gradually find yourself moving into the topic of why are we really here? Sometimes they start it where if they’ve read something of yours or someone recommended they meet you, that’s a kindness that they may do. You may start because you know a lot about it, and you can start with, “I just saw this. I loved it.” That’s enough to get things going.

If they’re not giving you anything back, this isn’t a great room. You can learn very quickly, I don’t have to sweat here. We’re not going to work out. Like you said, you’re not going to give the same answer as on a first date. I know enough that when people go, “I don’t know anything about you,” I can do that, like, “I moved around a lot. I went to 13 schools. Then I moved my way into the early internet and the older net. Then that started me getting into rooms. I did comedy rooms and sitcoms for a while until I got the call from Disney.” I just did so many years.

John: You did some good heavy lifting there. What I liked is it showed a journey, and it showed, oh, if they’re curious about any bits of that, they can jump back to talk about that. What were those early rooms like? What were you doing in those places?

Pamela Ribon: Yes, what shows or where did you end up? What was your last school? We can start by Austin. People in LA really like to talk about Austin.

John: They do.

Pamela Ribon: You can do that. Sometimes you’re talking about people you know in common. That thing of “Someone said I should meet you” or “I saw that thing, and it was great.”

John: Or “I see that you’re working with this director. I had a great experience with them,” or what this is. In some cases, it’s the subtly coded, like, “That director’s challenging for these reasons. I hope you’re having a great experience.” “I love them, and it’s also challenging on this thing.”

Pamela Ribon: When you have found your mutuals, you learn a lot about them too. “Oh, I love her. She’s great.” “No, I haven’t met him.” Or even just the things you’ve seen. They often ask, “What are you reading right now?” It’s not quite small talk. It’s medium talk because it’s small talk with cues of: do we think that one day, when we’re arguing over a plot point, we’re going to get to a place together because we actually are on the same wavelength?

Sometimes that just flies by, and all of a sudden an hour has happened because you ended up talking about anything from Taylor Swift to some new app you’re playing with. You never know where it’ll go. Being flexible with the time, or just being free to explore wherever this conversation is going to go and not get nervous about what you did or did not talk about. You don’t need to put that pressure on yourself. You can have an agenda of, “I really want to make sure I mention this one thing,” but you can’t script it.

John: Many episodes ago, Craig and I were talking through this article, and we’ll try to find a link to the actual original article. The writer was talking about how good conversations have doorknobs and handles. Basically, there’s ways you can open and keep going. It’s about making sure that you’re providing them things like your bio of like all the schools you went to, all the things. You’re giving them handholds that they can pull on and actually keep the thing going. In some of the early general meetings I had, I just didn’t get the flow of it quite right. I’ve answered questions without lobbing it back so that they could do the next thing, or really that I could ask questions about what it is that they are looking for.

If the meeting is going well, at a certain point, it does transition into, here’s what we’re working on, and here are things that might be a good fit for you. That’s the dream situation. In other cases, it’s just: what are the general areas in which we might have some overlap there, things that they are looking for. If it’s an actor’s production company, what is that actor seeking? If it’s a director, what things never cross the line for that director? Those are the places you’re hoping to get to in these conversations.

Pamela Ribon: Yes. I used to always have prepared screenplays I wish I had written because that lets them know– Let it be varied if it’s varied. Now I know myself well enough. Please forgive me if I’ve already said this on this podcast, but I will say I just am not into dragons, politics, or when people pay money out of a pouch.

[laughter]

Pamela Ribon: That’s it. I know it. It doesn’t matter. You could put other things in that pouch, jewels maybe, or secret, but not farthings.

John: Nimona had dragons in pouches for sure. Yes.

Pamela Ribon: I turned it down the first time it came around. 100%, I was like, “It checks every box I don’t like.” Then they came around again, and they were like, “The thing is, you don’t have to come all the way out to Connecticut anymore because of Zoom. What if we come to you?” They were like, “They’re punk rock dragons. I don’t think we have to have any pouches.” I was like, “Okay, let’s try it.”

John: My list for that, it’s not a thing I would often say in meetings, but I would definitely tell my reps. It’s like, no gnomes, elves, dwarves, or Christmas. It’s just like, no. People will still come to me with Christmas, but it’s like, “No, I don’t care about Christmas as a concept.” Even there was a good documentary that was about Christmas trees in New York and the whole business of Christmas trees in New York City. It’s like, it is actually fascinating, but it’s also, no, it’s Christmas. No, it’s just bah humbug. I just don’t want to do those. No.

Pamela Ribon: Really does help them immediately go, “Oh, well, we’re going to put down a number of these things.” It may make them say, “What is it that you like?” I think with me in particular, they’re not always assuming what it is that I like because now that you have produced credits, they’re like, “Oh–” There have been times when I’m like, “Do you think I’m a cartoon person? Is that what you’re doing?” They’re like, “Yes, sorry, I don’t know why I’m doing that.” People have a way of learning about animation that is limiting. You’re always having to show your other sides and the dynamics of you.

Often, I’ll tell you what, we end up talking about roller derby. We end up talking about what I do when I’m not writing and your hobbies, your family, whatever it is. In those generals, I’m always talking to this person until we find that thing that lights them up and then I know we got it. Sometimes he’s like, “I collect trains.” I was like, “Tell me more.” Then you watch them become the person they want to be in front of you because they’re talking about their passion.

John: Absolutely. You may not give a rat’s ass about trains, but the fact that it is interesting to them, there’s going to be something there that’s fascinating. There’s something that’s driving them about that.

Pamela Ribon: Yes, and they have stories because of that. That’s when you see the storyteller come to life.

John: Again, I’m forgetting exactly where I learned this, but Rod Stewart apparently is a big model train builder and collector. I appreciate Rod Stewart so much more now, recognizing that he has an obsession, a hobby that has nothing to do with music or songwriting. That’s fun. That’s nice. Let’s talk about part of the general meeting is talking about what you’re working on right now, which could be a delicate subject because it could be in flux. It could be there’s a director on, there’s directors not on, there could be an NDA. How do you best do that? Sometimes in animation, we’re under NDAs a little bit more than we are in live action. Talk to us about that.

Pamela Ribon: For a while, I would be like, I’m working on things I can’t tell you about for years. That would be enough. It depends on the room. Sometimes you can realize you’re at a Disney meeting, or you can be like, “We’re all in the family here. I’m working on Moana.” If you’re in a position where you can’t really– let’s say, right now, I’m working on Emily the Strange for Warner Brothers Animation with Bad Robot. That’s all I can say about it.

John: That was announced in the trailer, so you’re safe there.

Pamela Ribon: Yes, I’m safe there. I’m talking about who I’m working with, and I focus on the great things about it because we have hard days. I try not to launch right into where it hurts and just talk about where it’s working and what’s great and what we’re still excited about. Really, the NDA is often so that you don’t talk about stuff that they wouldn’t want in a press release. You know that in your heart. There’s things that are set up that aren’t quite happening yet. I have a spec that went out this week. Here’s something, you guys. I’ve never sold a spec before, ever.

John: I sold exactly one. It was Go. That was the only spec I’ve ever sold.

Pamela Ribon: Good for you. That’s amazing. Tell me what it’s like. I’m excited, but I don’t know what’s going to happen, and maybe nothing will happen. I have a little piece of news this week that I have a spec that’s going out, which if I were in a general, they’d be like, can you tell me about it? Can I get it? Can I get it on that list? Can I read it?

John: Yes.

Pamela Ribon: That’s the mystery. You can use an NDA to your benefit of a mystery. You’re working. I’ve got a project at FX. I’ve got something going on at Disney TV Animation or whatever. Because these things take forever and they all have their own timeline, you bounce around to being like– I genuinely like to balance a bunch of projects at once. I try to talk about the one that either is the closest to next that anybody could see, but you also know that a lot of stuff you work on maybe no one will ever see. You try to talk within what is the you of it, not the all of it. Working on this project, it’s really fun. We’re putting some stuff together. You can sometimes say where you’re at in it, but I just try not to get into what’s not my business.

John: Yes. If I can bring it back to my process, that’s also a useful thing, too. I can say I’m writing this movie right now for this company, and it’s under NDA, but I can say it was one of the rare cases where I needed to write the outline first, and it’s just actually such a luxury to have a really big, fat outline because as I go to my daily work on doing the scene, it’s like, “Oh, what happens in this?” Oh, exactly. This is what happens in this. So many of the fundamental questions have actually been tackled in the outline form. It gives me a chance to talk about myself as a writer, which is nice.

Pamela Ribon: Oh, yes.

John: Another point of commonality, I’m thinking, is business affairs. We say, “Oh, there’s this thing. It’s like business affairs is so slow. I don’t know when it’s going to happen.” Everyone will just nod because business affairs is crazy, and it just takes forever to get contracts done. Something will be sold at a place, and then eight months later, you’re allowed to start writing because the contracts are finally done.

Pamela Ribon: Yes, sometimes you are. The deals are taken. There’s a lot of heavy hitters in here, so we’re waiting on some stuff. Lawyers, you can also say lawyers. These things take time, but your excitement stays the same, and so even talking about how you got that job or how you met everybody, how you ended up with it. That’s a good one.

John: If you can sell the enthusiasm that once you’re excited to write this thing for them, and they want to see writers who are excited to engage, I can imagine. Charlie Kaufman is a great writer, but I don’t imagine he’s great in a room in terms of being really enthusiastic about this thing he’s doing. If you come in as a curmudgeon, maybe that’s true to your authentic personality, but it’s not going to be like, “Oh my God, I can’t wait to work with him.”

Pamela Ribon: That being said, you do not have to fake. Some of us like going outside and meeting other people. Some of us do not. I think sometimes the pressure is on of, like, do I have to be someone else in this general? Do I have to lie and be a fundamentally different person? Sometimes you have to fake a little bit the confidence to be yourself, and then that’ll get easier. The more that you’re like, “Oh, I was myself and nothing bad happened.” Yes, you just do that again and do that again and get used to.

Sometimes it takes them a minute to get used to me. Even as the extrovert that I am, I can tell that I’m like, “Hey, I’m very excited.” I can say, “A little bit too much coffee, a little bit haven’t been outside in a while. Give me a second to settle.” I’m not so much nervous as I am jittery. I think all of those things of, “I am shy. I’m really happy to be here, but you should know that I haven’t had that many generals. I’m a little shy.” Just be a person. Be a person. That makes everything easier on both sides.

John: Yes, 100%. I was on a pitch this week, and usually there is the ramp, the warm-up, getting into things. Everyone logs in, and they’re like, “Great, let’s go.” It’s like, “Sure.” I’m there. I’m pitching away. It went fine. It went great. You also have to be prepared. Sometimes there’s just not that on-ramp, and you’re just like, “Go.” “Okay, great. I’m doing it, so be ready for it.” That’s why I think if you are actually pitching a project, really rehearsing that first minute or two just so you feel really comfortable with how you get into it is going to be a huge help because it could just suddenly happen.

Pamela Ribon: I don’t record myself and watch it again. I do record myself sometimes for the pitch so that I don’t have to do that part.

John: You’ve talked about this on the show, I think, before, where you actually will send them a link to a prerecorded pitch.

Pamela Ribon: Yes. People now are more able to be in the Zooms, or you might be pitching knowing it’s being recorded for someone else who’s not in the Zoom, so you do have to be your game face on. If they do say, “Go,” like you just did, you’re like, “Oh, yes, this is happening. Okay.” It’s totally fine to do that and be like, “Here we go. Hold on, let me pull up my draft, and I’m ready.” I’ll do disclaimers at the top of, “You can totally stop me for questions. I hate pitching to mute buttons. Whatever you want to do, we’re all people here,” and I’ll just get through this pitch together. I find that they, in the Zoom room, when you’re pitching, they do sit back like, “Here’s a little TV show.” In a pitch where you’re with people, they are probably more likely to go, “Oh, wait, did you–” or “That’s funny,” because you’re people.

John: Yes, they’re people, rather than being little boxes with faces in them. Post-pandemic, how many pitches have you done in person where you’ve gone in? How many general meetings have you been across one person, and then pitches in person?

Pamela Ribon: One?

John: Yes, one or two for me. This one studio has wanted me to come in person twice. I’m looking to Drew see if he can remember other times.

Drew: Two or three times.

John: Yes. Basically, everything has been a Zoom since the pandemic. I’ve talked to some friends who are, “I don’t know that I could pitch in person anymore because I’m so used to having my slideshow deck, and so I share a screen, I go through my slides. To do that in person, I wouldn’t know what to do.”

Pamela Ribon: One of my friends said, “This is terrible because I’ve learned a key component of liking me is the third dimension.”

[laughter]

Pamela Ribon: All credit to Don Todd. That one that I did in person, it was like really early pandemic. It was literally the first time I had gone into a room with someone. I said to her when I sat down– She’s a big, important person. I sat down, I was like, “I can’t believe it.” We’re taking masks off, and I’m like, “What is happening? Look what I’ll do for my career.” That’s still it. I’ve had a room where we all got together for a kickoff. I’ve done some of those, kickoff in the room, but not this type of thing that we’re talking about. They’re all different–

John: The kickoff stuff, I was in a room and started meeting everybody in person, but the initial things have basically all been Zoomy situations. This one that I did this week, I didn’t have a deck. There was no images, and so I just talked for 15 minutes and described it. It went great, but I’m so used to having the fallback of “Here’s the next image, here’s the next image,” and to not have that. I’m sure we’ve said this on the podcast before, but if you do have notes and you’re doing it on a Zoom, move your notes to the very top of the screen, up by your camera, so you’re not looking down: you’re looking closer to the lens, just so you’re making more eye contact.

Pamela Ribon: I actually put the Zoom in the tiny little bar with the people I want to be pitching to under the green light, and then my pitch notes are right below that, so I have no choice to be looking into that little corner. I can read how they’re doing if they’re listening.

John: Yes. It’s good. Another hint is if you have somebody, and if I can hear from somebody else who’s on your side that you can talk with after the fact, you can see how are people actually responding because people’s faces are small; it’s a little harder to read the sense of the room afterwards.

Pamela Ribon: They can also do the flipping for you if you want, so that you are only doing your talking part.

John: Yes, all good choices. All right, this is helpful. Any last wrap-up on introducing yourself, how to talk about yourself, how to not be a jerk?

Pamela Ribon: We have on here, yes, how to not be a jerk, but we have what is too personal and how do you feel confident about your work that you don’t sound apologetic for being in the room. I just want to say that my first general happened the day after my father passed away. I was like, “I’m not canceling this general. I’ve never had one before, and I’m not going anywhere today.” My dad had entered hospice. It was like, “I’m going to go outside, and I’m going to go do this career thing.” It was the very beginning of all of this trauma, and time have made me not remember everything.

I remember it was the Disney old animation building, and I sat down, and she liked the script, which is about my family, different family members, but about generational trauma and such in a comedy. I don’t know. We just, at some point, started talking about families, and I told her what had happened last night, and she ended up talking about her dad. I do remember that we both, at some point, were just crying a little bit, sharing stories with each other. Then that was it. I think that was a really good general. Even though most people are like, “No, Pam, you take the day off. What is wrong with you?”

[laughter]

I know that, but I also know that that’s what I wanted to do, and that’s what he would have probably suggested I do, just go out there and talk. Sometimes you bring the day in with you in that general, is what I was trying to say about what’s too personal and what’s not. If there’s no getting around it, that your day is with you, you end up having some pretty profound general sometimes because you’re not doing this checklist of things and you’re just some people talking to each other. If they didn’t get around to the thing they wanted to talk to you about, they’ll call you again, and you’ll have a follow-up, or it becomes the beginning of something.

The too personal, I think the line is you don’t owe anybody your story. You don’t owe anybody the worst things that have ever happened to you in order to validate being able to talk about whatever you want to talk about. I think sometimes we get worried that we have to spread our hearts open and then give everything on that first try. You’re learning what they deserve too.

John: True.

[music]

John: I think we need to define some terms. Sometimes you’ll be going in to talk about a specific project. They’ve read your script, and maybe they’re talking about making your script, or the meeting is about representing you if they’re a manager or an agent. Sometimes it’s a general meeting. A general meeting means that they just want to meet you. There’s not a civic agenda here. Even in a general meeting, there becomes a moment at which you stop talking about the weather and the most recent movies, and it becomes like, “What are you working on?” or they have this little card like, “These are the things we’re working on.”

What I didn’t realize in my first 15 meetings, probably, that my responsibility was to say which of those things sparked for me, and if there was one that really sparked that I felt like, “Oh, I know exactly how to do that,” that it was my responsibility to tackle that and I come back with a take on how I was going to do that. That was going to lead to the next meeting where I’d be pitching on that project. Sometimes it would be just a very general story idea. There are areas where we really want to do a movie about clog dancing. If I had it the way, like, “Oh–”

Tess Morris: John, you’ve got a movie about clog dancing.

John: [crosstalk] I know how to do the clog dancing. If that sparked to me, it was my responsibility to say, “I know that, I grew up clog dancing and here’s what people don’t know about clog dancing,” and then show my enthusiasm and then be able to come back in.

Tess Morris: Come back wearing clogs at the next meeting.

John: Come back in with a plan for– be able to pitch the clog dancing movie.

Christina Hodson: I just have to say this because it was one of my favorite general meetings ever. Somebody had one of those lists. At the top were movie reboots and normal things. Then it descended into words, one of which was cloudy skies, and the other, which was my favorite, was sweaters.

Tess Morris: Sweaters.

[laughter]

John: You could kill the sweaters movie. I want to see your sweaters movie. Jason, you are an actor. You’re used to going in and auditioning. Can you compare and contrast what auditioning is like versus these early meetings?

Jason Fuchs: They’re sort of similar. Auditions are very specific. You’re going in for a specific role on a specific show. There is an adjustment to the general type of meeting you take, particularly when you’re starting out, where you’re realizing, I went through a very similar process to yours where I went, “Oh, I’m supposed to jump on these ideas. I’m supposed to build on these. I’m supposed to follow up.” If you go in for an audition, generally speaking, you should not follow up with the casting director the next day and go, “Hey, I’m really interested in this role. I haven’t heard from you, but I have some thoughts.”

Writing is not that. I think a lot of times in acting, you’re rewarded for seeming aloof and not wanting things. Writing, I find to be the opposite. The more passionate and enthused you are, the more you follow up, the more you engage, the better the outcome is. I also think that early, you’re also balancing your creative instincts with what is available to you. I had exactly the way you described it. I had a script last first time, didn’t get made, bounced around, ended up being read by an agent at WME, then Endeavor. He read it, said, “I want to rep you.” He didn’t tell me until a year into repping me that he was, in fact, an assistant when he signed me.

A year in, he calls me, goes, “Great news, I got promoted.” I said, “To what?” He said, “Agent.” [laughter] I said, “What have we been doing for the last year?” He said, “Don’t worry about it. The point is, I’m an agent now.” He is still my agent, by the way. He’s probably had the most significant impact on my professional life, if anyone. That resulted in a meeting on Ice Age: Continental Drift, the fourth Ice Age movie. That meeting was– again, I like animation, I like family films. Ice Age was not the thing I set out necessarily to write. In fact, when they called me about it, Ice Age gets treated like it’s a Marvel or a DC film. Or at least back then, it was like, this is big stuff.

They call you, and they go, “We couldn’t tell you what your meeting is until now, but it’s for the next Ice Age film.” They go, “Have you seen any of the Ice Age movies?” I had not. I said, “Yes, I have.” [laughter] They said, “Do you like them?” I said, “No, I love them.” The executive said, “That’s great. What do you love most about them?” The only thing I think is, anytime anyone from one of these movies is on Tonight Show or whatever, they say the same thing. “Oh, the comedy, it’s accessible for grownups, but appropriate for children,” so I said that. She said, “That is the thing we are the most proud of.”

[laughter]

That night, I had the meeting the next day. I watched all three Ice Age movies back to back to back, which, in isolation, each of those are wonderful, charming family films. Three in a row, it’s Guantanamo. [laughter] I went in the next day as passionate about Ice Age as anything in the world, and that was ultimately the first movie I had made. It changed my entire career. I owe a tremendous amount to the people who hired me for the movie.

Tess Morris: I think as well, it’s really important to remember with general was that. You sometimes have a general that you think, “Oh, fine, it was great,” and then a year later, they remember you for something else. I think of them as just like, I go in and just talk about my life because most of the time, they’ve read something of yours and they like it, and you’re there just to chat, really. If they think that you’ve got some interesting things to say, then they might say, “Oh, we’re thinking about you for this or that.” I think that you can never really be fully prepared for anything in this job.
When I got interviewed, I was working on a show called Casual, which is on Hulu. I had to binge-watch 36 episodes of it. The entire first three seasons in the space of maybe four days or something before. I didn’t lie. [laughs] I did actually watch them. I think you sometimes just have to be a bit flexible on that [crosstalk]

John: It’s like improv. You’re saying yes.

Tess Morris: Yes, you’re saying yes. Yes and.

John: Yes, and I think we can do even more.

**Nicole Perlman: **I think one of the things that really comes through too with this is that when they meet you in the generals, it’s your life experiences as much as your talent. You’re already in the door. They’re already interested in you as a talented writer. It’s about what have you done other than write or, in addition to writing, that might make you the perfect fit for the untitled glass bead thriller that they’re writing.

Tess Morris: Clogs 2.

Nicole Perlman: Being able to talk about experiences that I’ve had throughout my life was really what got me a lot of jobs, honestly.

Christina Hodson: I think that, and also not being a dick. Like Tess was saying, it is so much like dating. You have to work with writers fairly intimately. If they’re annoying– When I was a development executive at Focus, there was a British writer who I loved. He was so talented. I had read everything he’d ever written. He’d made some TV shows. I made my boss read everything he’d ever written. We were so excited to meet him. He came in and was just the worst. He was arrogant and annoying and angry and bitter and just all kinds of bad. Both of us just said immediately, like, “We’ll never hire–” Even though we would be lucky to have him and he was great, just couldn’t do it.

[music]

Zoom General Meetings

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John: Most of these clips, Craig, are coming from a time before Zoom.

Craig: Yes.

John: Maybe it’s worth acknowledging what’s changed in the era of Zoom general meetings. Have you had general meetings during pandemic, post-pandemic, where it’s like, you’re meeting an executive for the first time?

Craig: Not an executive. I’ve had a couple of meetings where it’s been like a matchmaking between me and an actor, for instance, something like that.

John: Or maybe somebody you’re going to hire on in a production role-

Craig: Certainly.

John: -on your series.

Craig: Yes, which I don’t think of as a general meeting because that’s more–

John: Yes, that’s better project.

Craig: Yes.

John: Let’s think through what’s different than the other stuff because there’s going to be some chitchat, some, “I like your work, tell me what’s interesting,” but there’s not the in-person stuff. There’s not the– you’re not reading the body language. You’re not getting a sense of your space, their space. What do you find that’s been different since we’ve moved to Zoom for some of these things?

Craig: Well, there’s a convenience factor that works great. The worst part of general meetings was the drive, and you and I remember even pre-Waze and Google Maps where driving was just a crap shoot. You don’t really have to worry about being late anymore, and you don’t have to worry about wearing pants, and you don’t have to worry about how you smell. [chuckles] A lot of the convenience factor is great, but also, you are missing the only thing that positively would come out of those meetings, which was that weird thing that happens between human beings in a room. You just get a vibe with somebody. I am reminded constantly that in Zoom meetings, we are all mushed down flat into the same thing, same view, same vibe.

John: Yes. What’s also, I think, different in the age of Zoom meetings is that it used to be clear who was in the room. Literally, I’m facing across from you and sort of where the conversation is, and so I’m making eye contact with you because we are the most crucial people here, and if there is an assistant in the room or somebody else in the room, you want to include them but not over-include them.
On Zoom, there’s additional people in the room. Sometimes they have their cameras off, and so you’re just not quite clear what’s happening here. I find I’m a little less open in a Zoom general meeting because I just don’t know if it’s– not that I think it’s going to be recorded, but sometimes talking to a person in person, I will be a little less cautious than I am on Zoom.

Craig: Yes. I think you can pick up on some things. Also, there’s just stuff like the space you’re in makes a difference. The fact that you are going to somebody for a general meeting, I think, in a weird way, it also helps them because they are receiving somebody into their space, and it makes them feel good, and it makes them feel like you’re coming to the mountain. Zoom, everybody’s just sort of, again, leveled. Everything gets very flat and leveled on Zoom. You trade a lot of the potentially positive nuance of an in-person general meeting for convenience.

John: Certainly, one of the bonuses of a Zoom meeting, though, is we get to see Lauren’s cat who wants to keep walking in front of the camera, which is great.

Craig: That’s fun.

John: I know from other meetings that Lauren has a cat who loves to be on camera. That’s great. It’s a thing to talk about. One thing that has not changed is the importance of general chitchat as we sort of start into a general meeting. We have, I think, two clips here that are about the chitchat of us. Lauren, help us out.

Lauren: Our next clip from Episode 517 comes from a bonus segment where a listener asks about staying up to date with current shows and movies. This is actually a very underrated part of generals. I think I’ve been asked about what I’m currently watching in every job interview I’ve ever had. People are trying to get a sense of your taste when they are considering you for a job.

Craig: Which is silly. Like, “Oh, yes, I really like Christopher Nolan’s work.” “Oh, cool. Can you do that?” “No.” [laughs] It’s so sily.

John: At the same time, it’s a thing to talk about, and so it’s better than the weather.

Craig: I mean, honestly, marginally. Marginally better than the weather.

John: One thing we’ve talked about on the podcast, Craig, is that conversation needs to have doorknobs. It’s a doorknob. There’s something to hold onto that you can then hand off to somebody else. It’s a way to talk about a thing. What else do we have, Lauren?

Lauren: Then we go to Episode 417, where Scriptnotes VIP, Aline Brosh McKenna, brings up a good point about how much you should share about your ideas in a general. Off of that idea, we go to Episode 395, where you both address the dreaded topic of free work that can often come out of a general meeting. You meet with someone who’s excited about an idea but wants you to develop it further without committing to anything. What do you do?

John: Wow, I want to know what our advice was. Let’s take a listen to these three clips.

Craig: I’m sure we said that would be great.

Staying Current and Avoiding Free Work

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[music]

Lauren: Owen asks, “On the podcast, you and your guests often discuss and reference contemporary shows and films. It seems as though despite your incredibly busy schedules, you’re always up on what’s being released and what’s coming soon. My question is, do you make an effort to ingest new content in order to stay current on what’s being written, or do you end up watching new releases simply because you love watching them? Finally, does that content ever make you feel pressure in regards to your own work, or are you beyond that as creators?”

John: You’re never beyond the feeling of pressure, like, “Oh, I wish I would have done that,” or, “I’m not up to that level.” You never get past that. I would say when I was back in film school, I would try to watch every new movie that came out. Variety would publish each week the 60 top-grossing movies, and I’d mark to see how many of the top 60 I’d seen. I would at least have seen 20 out of 60, but generally 40 out of 60. I’m nowhere near that level now, and so I don’t keep up with everything. In terms of television, I keep up with just like, what are the water cooler shows? What are people on Twitter or people that are on my Twitter are talking about? Because I want to be able to engage in that conversation.

I may not watch everything, but I’ll certainly watch an episode or two to see what it is so I have some sense of what’s out there. I think that is an important thing for anybody who’s trying to write this medium, is to get an understanding of what other folks are doing out there and what the conversations are, because those are the things you’re going to be talking about if you’re going into a general meeting someplace. It’s like, what are you watching? What are you loving? What are things that are working for you? Yes, you’re going out on some meetings now too. Do you find you’re often talking about the stuff that you’re watching?

Lauren: Yes. I think even before going out on generals, just living in LA, you have to be up on that. Otherwise, you can’t socialize with people.

John: Well, it’s like if we were in DC, you would be talking politics. If we were in Nashville, you’d be talking country music. It’s just the thing that we talk about here, and so it’s natural. Even in this lockdown year, the conversations still somehow gravitate around that.

Lauren: Yes, I guess because it’s the only thing people are doing.

[music]

Aline Brosh McKenna: One thing I would say for aspiring writers, when you are breaking in and you start to get those round of general meetings, they’re going to say to you, “What do you want to write? Is there an article? Is there an idea? What do you have?” Wait a second. Get to know this person. Have a nice general meeting. Just chat in general about their movies. Hope you bump into them. Don’t give your babies to gazettes in the beginning.

Anybody who wanted to meet with me, I’m more a reticent person, so I would meet someone and five minutes into it, they would say, “What is something you’ve dreamed of writing your whole life?” I would think, “I just met you. I don’t know if I want to entrust you with that.” I’ve seen young writers often, they’re just so excited to be in a meeting with someone that they take one of their idea babies out of their suitcase. Not a good place to keep babies. They give it to someone, and then that’s where it loses its momentum. If you have something that’s near and dear to you, in the beginning, you might want to write it or wait until you find someone who’s truly a champion.

The other thing I was naive about is people who take these general meetings with you, they actually haven’t read your work. One of the funniest, I don’t know if I’ve told this story on this podcast before, but I was in a meeting, my very first round of general meetings, and while I was sitting there, an assistant walked in and said to the executive, “I have that coverage on Jersey Angel you wanted.” I was so dumb that I didn’t know that she hadn’t read it and was taking the meeting as a favor to my agent. That was a person saying, “Gee, what are your hopes and dreams? Give me those things that reside in your soul,” who hadn’t actually read my script. Just, you know.

John: I’m taking a lot of generals right now because there’s just a bunch of folks who, over the years, I’ve never met, or people, all executives moved from one company to another, so I’m just taking the generals now. I’ve found that, granted, I’m not at the beginning of my career, but I will generally go into those meetings with some sense of, okay, these are the kinds of things they might be looking for. I might not pitch a specific story, but I’ll pitch like, “This is a story area that I’m really interested in. I just read an article about this thing and I think there’s probably a great movie to be made that is looking at the reality of this, but also pushes it into this fantasy aspect.”

Those are helpful things to have as you go into those things. Just give them a sense of what your taste is and what’s interesting to you. A lot of times, I really am pulling some stuff out of the old idea suitcase. I’ve always wanted to do something with this place, or this old idea, I realize now in 2020, it’s actually more about this and that is a point of discussion. A deal I’m making now was out of one of those general meetings where I had an old thing, but I realized, oh, actually, the way you make this story now in 2020 has a whole different valence.

[music]

Craig: Nicole asks, “I had a general meeting at one of the big animation studios and they ended up loving one of my ideas and they went so far as to say that it was exactly the kind of thing they are currently looking for. They asked,” here we go, “that I write out a treatment. It’s an idea that I love too. It would have been my next script anyways, but since the meeting went so well, I’ve been working on the treatment instead of jumping into my normal writing process.

When I finish, I really want to show them, but I’m weary of leaving my work behind.” I think it means wary. “Is there something I can do to keep their interest without just handing it over? Do I request a second meeting to talk through it in person and then leave with it? My fear is that if I don’t hand it in, the conversation will be over with them. What would you do in my position?” You were the perfect person to ask this question, John, years ago.

John: We have this campaign in the WJ, No Writing Left Behind, reminding writers that when they go in to pitch on a project, when they go into those meetings, they might have notes for themselves. Don’t leave those notes behind. It hurts you. It hurts every other writer. Nicole’s situation is not quite that situation. Let’s talk through the distinction. Nicole has an original idea. She ended up half-pitching this original idea at this animation company. Now she’s wondering, “I’m going to write up this whole treatment.”

Nicole, you own that treatment. You own everything. You own 100% of this concept. If you feel like writing this up as a treatment or a full script, you can, you may. You own every little piece of it. Now, is the best choice for you to show them that treatment or to go in and pitch it to them in person? I don’t know. Animation does have a lot of stuff that ends up being written out, and that’s fine and good, so maybe that is.
I want to just distinguish it in a general sense. You own this fully, and that is not the kind of problem we’re trying to solve. The problem we’re trying to solve with No Writing Left Behind is when they’ve called you in for a project that they own, and they’re asking you to write up some stuff and leave it behind. That’s the real danger here. Craig, what do you think?

Craig: Another thing to point out, one of the big animation studios equals not WGA. It is either going to be an Animation Guild shop or it’s going to be a non-union shop. The Writers Guild can’t help you here. I think that the problem I’m having, Nicole, is that they asked you to do this. That, to me, feels like a weird one. They love your idea. They say, and they have asked you to write a treatment. You’ve written a treatment. John is correct. You own that treatment, meaning you own the unique expression in fixed form there. You don’t own the idea because people can’t own an idea. You may very well, if you consider your idea to be unique, you may find that they’re developing something with the same idea a year from now. These things happen.

I am also wary of you leaving this work behind for sure because you haven’t been paid for it, and you should be paid as a writer to write. I think pitching it might be the way to go. I think you could give them a tease. You can say, “Look, I can show you a little bit, and then there’s much more, but let’s formalize it. Let me come work here and write this script.” It costs them nothing to ask you to do this, and it costs you time and energy and talent to do it. Just keep that in mind. Their request has cost them nothing. They have no skin in the game.

John: This is where I jump in to remind everybody that just because most animation is not covered by WGA does not mean that all animation is not covered by WGA. Increasingly, there are shops, there are places where you can get WGA deals. Just don’t take it as a default assumption that you will get a non-WGA deal at a place. If Nicole has not worked any place and doesn’t know, it’s more likely than not it’s a non-WGA shop, but don’t assume that it has to be a non-WGA situation.

Either way, I think what we’re coming down to is, this is your idea. You own copyright on it, independent of anything else. If you feel like sharing it, you can share it. That’s totally your choice. Maybe they’ll look at that as a writing assignment. They want to hire you to work on some stuff for them. Okay. I’m also with Craig in the sense that they’re asking you to do something for free, even though you own it fully. Just always be aware of that.

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Follow-Up After a General

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John: Let’s wrap up our water bottle tour of general meetings by hearing from one of our most beloved Scriptnotes people, producer Megana Rao.

Lauren: Yes. In Episode 378, you interview Megana about her first water bottle tour as a writer, which should be a helpful perspective for our listeners. You also discuss what kind of follow-up is appropriate after a general.

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John: Right now, you’re at a phase that I remember very distinctly when I was first starting, because you were going to a lot of general meetings, and a lot of sit-downs, and, hey, how are yous, and you’re doing the water bottle tour of Los Angeles. I guess, actually, you’re not going to people’s offices. You’re meeting for coffees? How are you doing these general meetings?

Megana Rao: Some are for coffees, but I think because of the pandemic, mostly Zooms.

John: Mostly Zooms. A thing my first agent did, which I think was a smart choice, he just sent me out on like– he just shotgunned me out into meetings. It took way too many meetings. You just get better at taking meetings. It sounds like your meetings are going well, but you’re having a hard time figuring out what’s the next step, or how to go from like, “Oh, that was nice in the room but will I ever work with this person again?”

Megana Rao: Right. The thing that I am looking to decode is you know when you go on a date and you’re waiting to hear what the last thing the person says? Because it’s different if they’re saying, “Hey, it was really nice to meet you,” or, “I had a really good time,” versus, “Can I get your number? I’d love to see you again.” What does that look like in the entertainment industry or after a general meeting?

John: As you wrap up the general, there’ll be that sense of, it was really nice to meet you. It was just a very classic thing. We should look for things to do together. Great. That’s the generic version. It’s not a brush off. It’s just there’s not a specific next step that they’re looking to take. If they really were intrigued by you and was like, “Oh, I really want to talk to you more about this specific thing,” they’ll bring up that specific thing. If there’s something that you mentioned in the meeting and you were like, “Oh, we both really want to do something that’s based on Norse mythology,” but then like, “Oh, let me send you this stuff,” and we can keep up that conversation.

Sometimes those will happen at the end of a general or a first meeting. Other times they won’t. You just have to be comfortable with sometimes meetings are just, eh. When I went over to Verve, you were there for that and I went out on a bunch of general meetings and a lot of them were just like, so, we now know each other. If down the road something comes up, they actually feel like they can come out to me for a project. A lot of what you’re doing right now is sort of that.

Megana Rao: I guess also as a writer, what responsibility do I have to follow up?

John: I think your responsibility to follow up with the good ones. The ones who actually think you were like, “Oh, I would like to work with this person.” Yes, it’s good to reach out. That’s a case where it’s like, “Hey, can I have your email?” Or you can get your email from the agents to say like, “Hey, I really enjoyed meeting you about this. I wanted to talk to you more about these specific things,” or, “This is a thing I’m working on that I’d love to talk with you more about.” To me, and people can disagree. I don’t think you owe a thank you note to a general meeting or that kind of stuff. It’s just like if there was chemistry, there was chemistry on both sides. It sort of is like dating. You don’t have to send a thank you for dinner at the end of it.

Megana Rao: Yes. Okay. That makes sense.

John: Something you were talking about at lunch was when you have a meeting with somebody and they’ve read something of yours and they start giving you notes on it. That’s a weird situation. Can you describe in a general sense what it was like?

Megana Rao: I feel like in a lot of meetings, there’s questions and constructive feedback or nice– I’m trying to avoid the word saying compliments, but yes, it’s nice that they’ll compliment my work. Then a couple of times they will have specific notes or want to do a follow-up call with notes. The notes are great, but I’m confused about whether I should act on them and what that means, because we don’t have a clear plan forward.

John: Yes. That gets back into the dating. Are we actually trying to start a relationship here or are you just giving me constructive feedback because you think it could actually help this thing and help me as a writer? That’s a case where your reps, your agents, or your managers can help such that like, is this a person we really think could do this project? If so, then maybe it’s worth really investing the time with them and working through that.

If not, then it’s just great to get their feedback. If you’re getting consistent feedback on these things, you can consider making those changes. The stuff you have out there right now in the world is something that could get made, but it’s really there as a writing sample for you to get hired for other jobs. It should not be the primary focus is to be rewriting that stuff you’ve already been writing.

Megana Rao: Totally. Yes.

John: An experience I definitely had in those early meetings is they’ll pull out a box of like these are all the things I’m working on. Have they presented that list of the things that they are working on?

Megana Rao: Yes. People are just so good at pitching their projects. It’s the most fun part of the meeting to just listen to all of these great stories.

John: Sometimes they’re saying, “Okay, we’d like to consider you for this thing,” but other times it’s just like you get a sense of the kinds of things they’re looking for. You really get a sense of what things are going to spark for you that are really priorities for them and how you can keep that conversation going about like, “Oh, this is the thing we want to see happening together.” You’ll also be in some meetings where you’re just like, “This is not a fit.” The meeting should just end just like that date.

[music]

John: It is always so good to hear from Megana. Also because people grew up with Megana. Megana showed up in this town not knowing much about the industry and learned while she was a producer here and is now a writer in this town. This was her experience. Getting started as a writer during those general meetings.

Lauren, this was delightful. Thank you so much for putting this compendium together. You had to dig through a lot of transcripts to find all these things and find the clips and the ins and the outs. Thank you for that. Thank you for being an amazing intern. We’re so happy to keep you on Scriptnotes going forward to help us out.

Craig: Thanks, Lauren.

Lauren: Thank you so much for having me. Hopefully at the end of this episode, our listeners will feel educated, confident, and prepared for a general meeting of their own.

Craig: Oh, I’m so sorry.

[laughter]

One Cool Thing

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John: All right. It’s time for our One Cool Thing. My One Cool Thing is a quote from Salman Rushdie back from 2022, but I first heard it a few weeks ago at the Sundance Labs this summer. I’ll put a link in the show notes to the actual source of the clip or the transcription. Here is the quote. It’s long, so bear with me. He’s talking here about the role of writers in the state of world events.

He says, “How can we think of the future when the present screams for our attention? If we turn away from posterity and pay attention to this dreadful moment, what can we usefully or effectively do? A poem will not stop a bullet. A novel cannot diffuse a bomb. Not all satirists are heroes. But we are not helpless. Even after Orpheus was torn to pieces, his severed head floating down the river Hebrus, went on singing, reminding us that song is stronger than death. We can sing the truth and name the liars. We can stand in solidarity with our fellows on the front lines and magnify their voices by adding our own.
“Above all, we must understand that stories are at the heart of what’s happening, and the dishonest narratives of oppressors have attracted many. So we must work to overturn the false narratives of tyrants, populists, and fools by telling stories than they do, stories in which people want to live. The battle is not the only battlefield. The stories we live in are also contested territories.” That’s a great quote, a smart man writing about writing.

Craig: Yes, he’s a pretty good writer. That was pretty well done. Pretty well done, Salman Rushdie.

John: Not a controversial opinion. A smart person.

Craig: I’ve got nothing loaded up this week for One Cool Thing, but happily, Lauren is coming in to fill that space. Lauren, what do you got?

Lauren: In the spirit of Greek mythology summer, my One Cool Thing is The Silence of the Girls by Pat Barker, which is a retelling of the Iliad from the perspective of the women, and also just feminist retellings in general, authors like Philippa Gregory, Madeline Miller, Jennifer Saint, Michelle Moran. If you enjoyed The Odyssey but found it a bit male-dominated, I highly recommend checking out some of these authors.

John: I love it. Great. It’s been fun having Lauren in the office and other folks to have Zoom debates about different translations of The Iliad and The Odyssey. I was surprised how contentious it got in our staff meetings. It’s great to have this, and it’s great to have someone who’s reading the classics retold.

Craig: I just love that that’s what you guys are fighting about.

John: That’s what it is, yes. It’s not sports in this office. It’s all about The Iliad and The Odyssey.

Craig: No sports ball.

John: No, not a bit. Well, thank you for this compendium episode. The script is produced by Meredith Stedman, edited by Matthew Chilelli. Obviously, a ton of work this week by Lauren Loesberg.

Craig: Nice work, Lauren.

John: Our outro this week is by Nick Moore. If you have an outro, send us a link to ask at johnaugust.com. That’s also the place where you can send questions that we often answer on the show. You’ll find transcripts at johnaugust.com along with a signup for our weekly newsletter called Interesting, which has lots of links to things about writing. The Scriptnotes book is available wherever you buy books. You can find clips and other helpful video on our YouTube. Just search for Scriptnotes and give us a follow. We’re also on Instagram, @scriptnotesodcast.
We have T-shirts, hoodies, drinkware. You’ll find those at Cotton Bureau. You’ll find the show notes with links to all the things we talk about in the email you get each week as a premium subscriber. Of course, we love our premium subscribers. You make it possible for us to do this each and every week. That’s why we have back episodes that you can pull from to create these compendium episodes. You can sign up to become a premium subscriber at scriptnotes.net where you get those back episodes and bonus segments like the one we’re about to record on our own personal best and worst general meetings. Craig, Lauren, Meredith, thank you so much for a good show.

Craig: Thank you, John.

John: All right.

Bonus Segment

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John: Bonus segment. Craig, best, worst, or maybe even first general meeting. What do you remember?

Craig: Oh, my goodness. First general. Oof, I don’t know if I remember my first general meeting. I think they’re all the worst. I hate general meetings. I must have said this before. I find an agenda-less meeting to be such a weird thing. As if you went to a party, but there is no party.

John: Yes.

Craig: Just two people meeting in a corner, sipping chardonnay, talking to each other as if there’s a party going on, and then you both agree that after 45 minutes it’s over. It’s weird.

John: It is a weird form. My very first agent sent me out on a bunch of generals, I think just to get it out of my system. I think he deliberately picked the worst ones to start because he knew I would be terrible at it. He would just send me out. I did 15 in a row.

Craig: Why did he think you would be terrible at it?

John: Because I was terrible at it. I think he had a meeting with me. It’s like, oh, yes, he’s bad at this. Then he sent me out to do a bunch of these things. The first ones, I was never quite clear on when do we stop the chitchat, when do we start actually talking about real concrete ideas. There is that natural segue from, okay, we’re talking about weather and other movies and TV that we’re watching to, this is what I want to write, this is what I’m working on. They will have read something of yours before, but they’re not meeting you because they want to actually make that thing.

Craig: No.

John: I burned out on a bunch of terrible ones at the start. Some of those eventually became going back in to pitch on a thing. Then every time I’ve changed agencies, it’s been a whole new round of general meetings because you realize there’s people in the town who you haven’t met who want to meet you, so you do some of those things. I don’t know. I don’t hate a general meeting, but I don’t find them especially productive at this point in my life.

Craig: No. When I go to a general meeting, I have fun. I try and be fun and have a nice time. I’m always conscious of the fact that there had been many bad general meetings prior to my arrival, so maybe I could be a good one and just not be lame. Ultimately, what’s the point?

John: Let’s go back to your own experience. You were saying post-pandemic, you’ve had these Zoom general meetings. In some cases, you’re talking about hiring a person or getting a vibe check on a thing. What are you feeling? Because I do think they have some utility. Here’s an example for me. There was this management company who represents a lot of literary material. I’d said to my agencies, “It’s weird that I’m not on the list for a lot of big books that sell. That’s weird.” They’re like, “Oh, yes. This one company really wants to meet with you. Would you take a general?”
I took a general. It was on Zoom. There was a little bit of the chitchat, but then they’re basically like, “Tell us specifically, of this list, what things are actually interesting,” and so they could start to build filters for let’s find John August this kind of book to adapt. That was helpful and productive.

Craig: You had an agenda.

John: There was an agenda. That’s the thing. I think what you’re hitting on is there still needs to be some agenda behind the general meeting.

Craig: There has to be an agenda. Sometimes someone will say, for the longest time in my career, the general meetings where your agent says, “We think you should meet so-and-so. We think they would love you and they’re important.” Then you would go there.

John: They’re setting you up on a date.

Craig: Yes. Then that person would be like, “What’s your story? Where are you from? What are you doing? What do you want to do? What do you like?” Here’s some things that we’re working on. It just literally falls into that brutal pattern. There’s no purpose other than like, hey, they thought you were fun. Now sometimes it’s the other way where I will get pitched general meetings like, “We would like you to meet this person or that person. We think you guys would get along.” Again, it’s fine, but it feels agenda-less. I’m always trying to find a purpose to have that meeting. Otherwise, I just don’t know why we’re talking.

John: Craig, I’m thinking through. I don’t think this has ever been announced. I’m going to be a little vague on some stuff. There’s a writer-director who you’re now working with on a project. When you first met with her, was there an agenda of, this is a show she wants to do, or was it just, we think you guys would click?

Craig: That came from a conversation that she and I just happened to have. We met each other because we have the same agent. There was an award circuit, I don’t know, a confluence because she was out with her movie. I think that was the first season of The Last of Us. We would bump into each other. Then she just mentioned that she was working on this thing that had some connection to the stuff that I was working on. We just got excited about it and went from there.
There was actually an impromptu meeting that lasted five minutes because then it was like, and then you got to go there and I got to go here. Even in that short amount of time, you can think like, “Oh, I like that person. That person’s cool.” There’s something about a general meeting that puts so much pressure on it.

John: Yes, it is. Going back to the dating metaphor, it’s basically like you’re being set up by friends, like, “Oh, you guys will love each other, you guys are perfect for each other,” versus meeting at a bar, it’s probably a more realistic way that just like, is there a spark there or not?

Craig: Bumping into somebody. If there’s no agenda, then let it be fully no agenda. Let it just happen. You pointed out earlier in this episode, the Zoom thing has made it almost worse because now we don’t bump into each other at all. We click on a link on our calendar.

John: Yes, it’s the swiping right, swiping left world of dating versus in person.

Craig: Yes, a little bit.

John: All right, let’s wrap this up. I’m trying to remember my worst general meeting. There’s been times where I’ve gone and it’s like, oh, I don’t like this person. I don’t like this company. I don’t like being here. I feel like I’m coming here as a favor and it’s starting 20 minutes late. Those are the ones where it’s like, ugh. Then again, I did learn something. I learned I don’t want to work for this place, that I got a bad vibe off of it. It was informative, even if it wasn’t productive.

Craig: Look, if you walk away thinking, “All right, well, this isn’t for me,” you could assign some value to that meeting, but probably you would have been better off to just have never had the meeting.

John: Yes, that’s right. All right. Thanks, Craig.

Craig: Thank you, John.