John August

First Person

Assistants’ Advice to Showrunners

Assistants, First Person, Follow Up

We asked twenty current and former TV assistants what advice they would offer showrunners as they set up their writers rooms. Here’s what they had to say:

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RESPECT BOUNDARIES

“Setting a normal working schedule boosts morale and allows people to plan accordingly. It’s one thing if the room goes late because a pitch got thrown out, but that should be the exception not the rule. If people can expect that typically the room is 10am to 6pm, it makes a world of difference.”

“Don’t procrastinate and stay late and make your staff stay, too.”

“Don’t use your assistants as emotional support and therapy. Don’t overshare about your life and feelings.”

TELL US THE END DATE

“Let assistants know when they will be wrapped on the show. It’s extremely upsetting to find out with a week’s (or less) notice that you don’t have a job because the showrunner didn’t really know when they hired you what your end date would be.”

SET EXPECTATIONS

“Showrunners set the tone for the room. If they treat the support staff with respect everyone else will.”

“The showrunner I just worked under for my first staff writer position made it VERY clear how the writing staff was to treat the assistants from DAY ONE. He made sure we all knew to treat them with respect, to only ask them do things that were appropriate/show related, and to think of them as fellow writers right off the bat. He gently encouraged all of us to reward their hard work by offering to read and note their samples and reminded us that they’re paid very little, so the connections they make and the notes they receive are what they’re actually working for. As somebody who started as a PA, I respect this approach tremendously and would love to see other show runners do the same.”

“Make sure assistants know what they can and can’t do. Tell them if they can pitch, or go in the room, contribute jokes on punch ups, etc.”

“Before the room meets for the first time, discuss transparently what is expected of the Writers Assistant. Every room operates differently. For example, should the WA quote or credit specific ideas in the notes? What format do you want for the notes document at the end of the day? Deciding up front will save hours of work.”

GIVE APPROPRIATE CREDIT

“When the time comes to build outlines and beats documents, discuss beforehand who this responsibility belongs to. There’s a difference between copying off the whiteboard and writing.”

IF YOU ASK, LISTEN

“If there’s only one person of color, do not treat them like a token. And when you talk about things that the minority person can speak to, listen to what they have to say.”

SUPPORT TEAM-BUILDING

“Have an optional gathering that you pay for: a concert, a movie, an escape room. It builds team unity and allows you to see each other outside of work. Our bosses did this, and it made me love them very much.”

“Don’t pit the support staff against each other. It creates a very toxic workplace.”

HANDLING FINANCES

“Never put your staff in a position to use their own money for things. Asking for reimbursement causes a lot of anxiety.”

“Don’t complain about money in front of your support staff. We make a lot less than you.”

TELL US WHO’S IN CHARGE

“Make it clear on day one who to talk to about workplace issues.”

DELEGATE THOUGHTFULLY

“The number one thing for a new showrunner to understand is that there will suddenly be more than they can manage. They will be expected to put out constant fires, approve everything, and make sure the writing is getting done. Best practice is to deliver crystal clear game plans to the room, support staff and production. Delegate authority where comfortable, at least to the degree where a strong second or producing director or line producer can make an educated guess on something while they wait for an answer.”

“Hire a full support staff (showrunner’s assistant, writers PA, script coordinator, and writers assistant). Each one is a full-time job.”

“If you can’t hire full support staff, let your support staff know if they’re expected to do double duty on certain things. Clearly define the duties so there isn’t last-minute chaos.”

SEEK AND GIVE FEEDBACK

“Have an open discussion about feedback. Check in after the first week to break any bad habits or to make any changes. “

“Ask about assistants’ writing. Ask to read their work. If their work is not a fit to eventually be staffed, TELL THEM. It is more productive for them to know (and have the option to leave) than to stay in hopes of something that will never happen and eventually become resentful and frustrated.”

“If someone spends a season or two working as a support staffer and you’ve decided you don’t think they’re staffing material, you MUST tell them so they don’t continue holding out hope.”

KEEP PEOPLE HEALTHY

“Advocate for your assistants to have INSURANCE. First season shows often don’t have it and it doesn’t cost that much, but it’s life-changing for assistants.”

“Make sure they know they do not have to come in while they are sick.”

“Discuss time off and expectations. Allow for a system of coverage if someone has an appointment, illness, etc. Open this dialogue before the assistant has to ask for time off. Some people have weekly medical appointments they can’t miss. Work with them.”

KNOW HOW MUCH WE MAKE

“I also think understanding assistant pay is important. For example, my current boss had NO IDEA we don’t get paid over winter break until he saw a thread about it on Twitter and asked me.”

“Don’t ask your support staff to work for free. Ever.”

INVITE ASSISTANTS INSIDE

“Introduce your support staff to writers/producers at the beginning of meetings/when the writers’ office opens.”

“If your assistants have free time (which they often do), allow them to use it to observe in the writers’ room. Set clear expectations, such as if they are allowed to pitch or not (just letting them listen is okay!) and let them come in. Let us remember why our job is exciting, and what we’re aiming for.”

How murky rights keep movies in limbo

First Person, Follow Up, News

Following up on my conversation with Kate Hagen about why I can’t legally stream The Flamingo Kid and many other films, listener Matt wrote in with some helpful insight into the hurdles for re-releasing old titles:

Happy to hear you talk about digital distribution. I worked on that side of the industry for a major cable network for several years. Wanted to share some insight on the day-to-day realities of releasing catalog titles on the EST/DTO platforms (that’s electronic sell-through and download-to-own [interchangeable terms], and iTunes/Amazon/Google Play/Vudu, etc.).

I worked in TV, but I’d guess that a lot of what I experienced applies to film as well. My sense is that most movies or TV episodes still not available on digital platforms have some issue holding them back.

The decision to release these older titles all comes down to risk, and it rarely makes sense on an individual title basis to take the risk. The risk is either financial (spending money to clear a song or a piece of stock footage) or legal (when there’s an unclear chain-of-title, either for an entire TV series/movie or for licensed media within an episode or movie).

In my experience, new release titles drove nearly all of our team’s revenue, with catalog episodes bringing in comparatively little. So on a case-by-case basis, it’s very difficult for digital distribution teams to make the argument to their superiors that it’s worth spending money, sometimes a lot of money, to license music for home media use, or to release an episode or movie with an unclear chain-of-title and hope no one comes out of the woodwork with a lawsuit claiming they hold its distribution rights.

Older movies or TV episodes may only bring in a few hundred dollars a year to the studio or network, when new releases are making millions. Frankly, if you go to your Senior VP asking permission to spend $30,000 to clear a song so you can release a 25-year-old TV episode that’s projected to make $40 in a year, you’re an idiot. It’s much easier for everyone involved to not bother with the mess of issues surrounding some of these movies and shows, and instead to just let the money roll in from new releases.

From my experience, I think the only way we get every TV show and movie released digitally is if high-ranking executives at networks and studios decide it’s worth it in the long run to have full distribution rights to their entire libraries, and take a one-time financial hit to clear many episodes and movies at the same time. The cost/benefit rarely makes sense one at a time, but it would likely be worth the cost for networks and studios to have complete libraries of content they can license over and over again to different streaming services.

My abortion story

Citizenship, First Person

Last week, Slate ran a feature in which six women talked about their abortions:

We might better understand what abortion is, and what that right means, if we talked about it more. And so we asked the people who write and podcast for Slate if any of them have abortion stories they’d be comfortable sharing.

It’s a great piece. You should read it, listen to it, and share it widely.

Like every other cisgendered man on Earth, I’ve never had an abortion. I believe it’s not my place to tell a woman what to do with her body.

And as a gay guy, I never expected abortion to play any role in my life. But it did.

So in the spirit of talking openly about the subject, I’ve decided to share my experience of an unplanned pregnancy, and how it demonstrated why restricting abortion may constitute a moral crime.

My abortion story starts ten years ago in the suburbs of San Diego, where a young woman finds herself pregnant.

Katie is 17, living at home, about to graduate high school. Her grades are good but not exceptional. She plans to go to community college while keeping her job at the mall.1

It takes Katie a while to realize she might be pregnant, and longer still to tell anyone. She’s scared and in denial.

Part of the problem is the guy. He’s a classmate. They’d hooked up after a party, but were never dating. She doesn’t know how she feels about him.

Part of the problem is her parents. She is their only child, the light of their life. She knows they’ll be disappointed in her.

So she doesn’t say anything for months, even as the pregnancy becomes harder and harder to ignore. She finally tells a friend at work. They sit in her car discussing all the options.

You probably think you know what happens next.

You’re wrong.

Katie tells her parents. As she predicted, they are upset, and scared, but also supportive.

They talk it over, and together decide to contact an adoption agency.

After a phone interview, Katie gets a folder of “Dear Birth Mother” letters from families looking to adopt a child. Here’s how it works: After reading through the letters, she can choose a family to meet and decide if they are the right home for her kid. It’s all up to her.

Suddenly this pregnancy, which had seemed like a curse, feels like an opportunity. She can give a family what they want most. The dread has been lifted from her, replaced with a sense of hope and responsibility.

After sorting the letters into piles, weighing pros and cons of each family, she makes a choice.

She chooses us.

That’s how I enter this story.


At this point, we already have one kid: a daughter who is nearly three. This is one reason Katie picks us; Katie had always wanted a big sister. Her child will have one.

Plus, we live close enough that Katie can visit. She isn’t sure how much she wants to be part of the kid’s life — it is hard to think that far ahead — but she is excited to have the option.

Before we drive down to meet Katie, the agency schedules an ultrasound to check on the progress of the pregnancy. It’s her first checkup.

That’s when the story takes a second turn.


The ultrasound reveals feet and hands and a heart, but no brain. It’s missing. At top of the spine is a shape like a deflated basketball.

These types of neural tube defects are rare, but not as rare as you’d think. They happen in roughly 1 out of 1,000 pregnancies. They show up in an ultrasound. The back of the head doesn’t form properly, leaving the stem exposed.

There isn’t going to be a baby to adopt, because what is growing can’t survive. It will likely be stillborn, but even if it is isn’t, it will never be conscious.

Katie is devastated. She has just come to accept she is going to have a baby, and now she isn’t.

Her decision is straightforward. She terminates the pregnancy. That’s what the vast majority of women do when receiving this diagnosis.

We never end up meeting Katie. We send our condolences, and wish her and her family the best. She goes back to her life, and we go back to ours.

Very few of our friends know there was even the possibility of a second kid. Neither do our parents. It never comes up. But recently, I’ve been thinking about it a lot.

This could have been much, much worse

The procedure Katie had is an abortion.

It would be illegal under many of the laws proposed across the country — laws waiting to be enacted if Roe vs. Wade is weakened or overturned.

The most far-reaching of these bans are called “heartbeat bills” because they prohibit abortion beginning at the moment a fetal heartbeat can be detected, roughly six weeks.

Other abortion bans start at 20 weeks. Ohio’s Republican governor John Kasich signed one of these bills, calling it the “best, most legally sound and sustainable approach to protecting the sanctity of human life.”

But not if you’re Katie.

Katie had passed 20 weeks when she discovered what was growing inside her was certain to die. Doctors couldn’t tell her when. It could happen at any moment, or during birth, or immediately afterwards.

Under Ohio’s law, Katie couldn’t terminate the pregnancy. Like most of these laws, Ohio’s doesn’t make exceptions for fetal anomalies.

To be sure, some women in Katie’s situation do continue their pregnancies, bracing themselves for the grim outcome. If you Google their stories, you’ll see phrases like —

I had two options…
We prayed on it and ultimately decided…
For us, the choice was clear.

According to the Ohio legislature, these women shouldn’t have a choice. They shouldn’t pray over it. They should wait until they spontaneously miscarry, or until their due date arrives at which point labor can be induced. (Odd science fact: Natural labor is triggered by hormones in babies’ brains. No brain, no hormones.)

The end result will be a dead body without a brain, the same as if the abortion had taken place months earlier.

To me, forcing a woman to continue a doomed pregnancy is a moral crime.

It means forcing a woman to go through months of emotional and physical distress, along with potentially serious medical complications. It means forcing a woman to suspend her plans for no one’s benefit. It means her life is worth less than a collection of cells that will never be conscious.

I suspect that most legislators are not thinking about neural tube defects when they pass these bills. Nor do I believe that governors intend to inflict suffering when they sign them.

I don’t think these people are evil. But laws passed without careful consideration can do real evil.

It’s the responsibility of our courts, elected officials and citizens to tell them that. That’s why I’m sharing this story now. That’s why I encourage more people to talk about their experience with abortion, either publicly or with friends and family.

And as new abortion restrictions are proposed, I’d urge you to be skeptical of anyone proffering “reasonable compromises.”

They’ll say 20 weeks is the threshold of viability. But it’s not. Katie’s pregnancy was never going to be viable, if you define viability in any sensible way.

They’ll say that the woman needs to wait a few days, or see the ultrasound, or hear the heartbeat. But she’s not the one who needs to stop and look and listen.

Ultimately, the heartbeat that needs attention is the woman’s. She’s the one who is unambiguously alive. She has a past, a future and a family.

Katie will be 27 now. We haven’t had any contact with her. Wherever she is, I hope she’s well and happy.

I have to imagine this was a terrible experience for her. But I’m thankful it wasn’t worse. She didn’t have to spend months answering questions about her doomed pregnancy, knowing that at any moment she could miscarry. She didn’t have to go through the pain of delivery to give birth to a dead child.

Because abortion was legal, a young woman’s suffering was lessened. That’s something worth defending.

You can download the audio here.

  1. I’ve changed Katie’s name, but none of the other details. ↩

Starting a screenwriting career somewhere else, part two

Film Industry, First Person, Follow Up, Los Angeles, QandA

In episode 267 of Scriptnotes, we shared stories from screenwriters who managed to build careers while living outside of Los Angeles, New York or London.

We then did a follow-up post featuring tales from several more writers.

In the weeks since, even more stories have come in. Here’s a sampling.

Lynelle: I was writing and directing short films while living in St. Louis, MO. I did a two week summer film program in Missouri for women only. The program was run by a lovely gentleman and Missouri native named, Ken LaZebnik, who has worked as a TV writer.

I kept in contact with Ken over the years and when a position on the writing staff for the tv show ARMY WIVES opened up, he contacted me. He’d previously written on the show. Ken thought I’d be a good fit because I was prior military. I was living just outside of St. Louis when I hit send on some writing samples to Ken. He, in turn, forwarded the samples to the showrunner of ARMY WIVES and after I flew out to LA using frequent flier miles to meet with the showrunner, I got hired onto the show.

It was a Cinderella story. After ARMY WIVES was cancelled, I went on to work for a small zombie apocalypse show on SyFy called Z NATION.

But here’s the caveat to my Cinderella story. I hadn’t spent years in Los Angeles prior to getting staffed. I hadn’t been an assistant anywhere. I hadn’t been all over town on the water bottle tour. Nobody knew who I was so that makes getting subsequent jobs more difficult.

My agent was unable to get me any meetings so that’s when I decided to attend UCLA to get my MFA in Screenwriting. One, to further hone my craft but two, to make connections that I simply didn’t have because I was literally plucked from obscurity.

I’ve chosen to split my time between LA and St. Louis for my own personal sanity. I’m just not an LA person and probably never will be. Every individual must decide what’s right for them.

Alan from Connecticut: I am a produced screenwriter with screen credits for two Lifetime movies.

I have lived in Connecticut my whole life and attended an online college program through the Academy of Art based in San Francisco. I majored in Motion Pictures & Television with a focus on screenwriting.

After graduating, I worked on several spec scripts and began the long process of manual queries. I placed in a few screenwriting competitions, but they led no where. I finished a MOW Thriller and used IMDB Pro to get production contacts for niche low-budget companies. After getting a few hits, I used my spec to get my first assignment and it was produced into the film “Her Infidelity.”

All of my meetings, contracts, and contact has been done through phones, email, and faxing. It has worked out fairly well. I have other projects in development, but have not reached a point where I am screenwriting full-time yet. I also edit wedding videos and do a lot of freelance writing to help supplement my screenwriting career. I may not be a traditional screenwriter, but I am happy and proud of my credits and hope to have more in the future. I just wanted to let you guys know that I have had screenwriting success without stepping foot in California and am still in continual development on projects.

Sal Balharrie: I’m a screenwriter who’s based an improbable distance from LA.

Having written books for children and working in Adland, I decided to make the jump to writing for screen full-time about three years ago.

Right now, I am in the fantastic position of having an animated tv series for kids in production in Australia; a live-action for teens in Development with a UK/LA based Production Company; and a feature film in development with a third company also based in LA. I am the creator/writer of all fore-mentioned projects. I do not have an agent or manager in LA.

So I feel I’m proof that if you are prepared to think outside the box, break some rules and back yourself, it is possible to work with production companies in LA while living outside the bubble and actually, if you’re clever, turning it into a bonus.

  • Back yourself by attending conferences (MIPCOM, Kidscreen, Asian Animation Summit) and network so that people think you’re easily accessible.
  • Use time zones to your advantage. My producers in London think I’m the most efficient writer in the world because I have whatever they’re needing on their desk at 9am London time, which is my 5pm.
  • Never allow distance to be a problem. Down play it. Better still, don’t even mention it. If you believe you can add value at a meeting, make sure you’re there, even if it’s a 22 hour flight away.

Brandon Dickerson: Funny enough, I didn’t start getting paid as a writer until after I moved out of LA after being there for eight years (and the Bay Area eight years before that).

Long story short: my wife’s mom got cancer which moved us abruptly to Texas to care for her with six months to live.

As a DGA director of commercials, docs, and music videos whose childhood dream was to make features, it wasn’t until I got out of town and finally focused on writing scripts that I was able to jump into writing and directing films instead of having “good meetings” that went nowhere.

My first script with writing partners in Texas became my directing debut SIRONIA. When my mother-in-law passed, we moved to Austin where I went right into adapting an optioned memoir for my second film VICTOR. I was then paid to adapt the novel Benjamin Dove for the screen, and now my second solo writing effort has become my next film WHEN JACK WENT GLAMPING — currently wrapping up post production.

These are all indie films financed in Texas in the under $2 million range, so maybe this isn’t truly “in the system.”

Tim Carter from Vancouver: I’m from Vancouver, Canada but had to move to LA to get any kind of traction at all. So to a large degree I echo your assessment that proximity is important and the hill for an aspiring writer is significantly steeper if they’re not in a major entertainment hub.

That said, there are a couple of strategies your listener from the Midwest might consider.

First, expand your career search to include video games. The institutional barriers to entry are significantly lower and the industry is not geographically concentrated the way film and television is. The odds are still not great, but it’s worth exploring. Many games emphasize character and narrative and the skills you develop will be very useful in film and television. I sold several projects in LA before landing my first major game credit back in my hometown. It’s hard to say which was more useful to my career.

Second, find out if anything at all is being produced locally. It might not be big Hollywood features, but many big American cities still have something going on.

When I started out I wrote several terrible horror movies for local indie producers. I’m rather happy none of them saw the light of day, but they were invaluable learning experiences, I got paid, and they opened a few doors. These days you’re more likely to find opportunities on a web or digital series, as they are being made all over the place and will offer you a chance to get noticed.

Again the odds aren’t great, but they may be better than emailing unsolicited specs to strangers in LA.

Aaron and Jordan: We are Hawaii born and based professional screenwriters (and identical twins) who landed our representation and sold our first spec script while living in Hawaii, where we continue to live and successfully work. Which proves that it is possible to to be a screenwriter outside of Hollywood. But before we can recommend our absentee-ballot path to screenwriting, there are a few caveats to our story worth sharing.

Representation: Our manager flew to Hawaii to sign us after reading our first two spec scripts… something we have NEVER heard of happening to anyone else. Would they have flown to Kansas? We can’t say. Was the fact she got to write off her mai-tais on the beach a motivator… undoubtedly. Needless to say we got powerball lottery lucky. One in many millions odds. And we’ve stayed with that manager ever since.

First sale: Several years and many unsold scripts later that manager got one of our specs into the hands of an agent who agreed to to hip-pocket us if he sold it. The offer from Disney came in while we were in the middle of teaching an SAT prep class at Obama’s alma mater. And the first thing our agent asked us when the script sold was “When are you moving here?”

And for a time we did…

We lived in LA for three years. Took the usual round of water bottle meetings. Built a rolodex of contacts, fans and friends. And didn’t sell a single thing until we decided to move back to Hawaii.

And ironically, almost the moment our feet sunk back into the warm sand, our careers took off. The funny thing is, when we lived in LA, we were always available to take a meeting -— or more often than not -— have that meeting canceled while we were already an hour in traffic across town and half a day of writing wasted. In the three years living in LA, we probably took around 30-50 meetings. Now whenever we fly into town, we often take that many in a week. And none of them cancel. When they can’t have you, that’s when they want you. Such is the law of mating and meetings.

Sustaining a career: We find we are more productive creatively when we are away from the Hollywood hustle because we can focus solely on writing. But if you want to sustain a professional career, the business side of the career demands that, while you don’t HAVE to live in LA, you do have to travel to LA and pound the pavement, be present often and whenever needed, and at the drop of a hat. Otherwise you quickly drop off the radar completely.

We write from Hawaii but try to fly to LA at least once a quarter. Also we are primarily feature screenwriters. So BIG CAVEAT: if you want to write for television or animation… you NEED to live in Los Angeles. Last year for example, we had to relocate our families for seven months to work on “Moana” for Disney Animation.

In summation, it’s becoming easier in a video-conference world to be a working writer who lives anywhere in the world, and we are an exception to the rule that you must live in Los Angeles to be successful.

That said we’re a rare exception. And while we believe you can write and sell great material from anywhere, ultimately you have to recognize the odds are even more stacked against you living outside the hub of Hollywood.

But if that’s what brings you joy, fuels your passion and creativity and makes you a better writer then follow that bliss. And work your ass off harder than anyone. That’s what we do.