Scriptnotes Transcript

The original post for this episode can be found [here](https://johnaugust.com/2021/smart-people-talking-about-tv).

**John August:** Hello and welcome. My name is John August and this is Episode 517 of Scriptnotes, a podcast about screenwriting and things that are interesting to screenwriters.

Today’s episode is a clip show. Now, for most of this program’s ten years on the air Craig and I have been largely feature writers, but we’ve been fortunate to bring on a lot of guests who are very smart about TV. So today we are going to hear from them.

We will start with Mindy Kaling. She’s talking about her experience joining the writer’s room of The Office and what she brought from that experience to her shows The Mindy Project and Champions.

Then we’ll hear from Alison McDonald and Ryan Knighton with their advice for new staff writers.

Finally, we’ll meet up with Aline Brosh McKenna and Rachel Bloom to discuss later seasons of Crazy Ex-Girlfriend, all this from a conversation we had with John Gatins.

And in our bonus segment for premium members I will be talking with Megana about some of the leftover questions from last week’s 10th Anniversary show. I will be back with you at the end for a little bit of wrap up. Enjoy.

***

**John:** So, you have written Matt and Ben. It’s gone great. And did you also do it in Los Angeles? How did more people discover it?

**Mindy:** Yeah, so then what happened with the play was it had enough people – off the success of the Fringe then like little producers in New York who they can do Off-Broadway plays, they put up money for that, put it up at PS122.

**John:** Great.

**Mindy:** Which is a great venue in Downtown New York. And we got more and more people. And that was when – when it was PS122 that’s when like Steve Martin came to see it and Nicole Kidman came to see it. We got our photos taken with them afterwards. And it became like a hot ticket. And we would do it six or seven times a week. And then from that they’re like, you know what, this would probably do well in LA.

And so I was so excited to go to LA because I knew that my future as a comedy writer – at that point I knew I wanted to write for TV. I felt that it was in Los Angeles, not in New York. And so I was really excited to go out there. And we went out there – this is how – I’m actually amazed at myself sometimes, because I already had an Arrested Development spec I had written.

**John:** Amazing. So you watched the show and you just guessed on sort of what a script of that would look like? Or had you read a script?

**Mindy:** So I had gone to the 67th Street Upper West Side Barnes and Noble and they have books on how to break into TV writing. So I bought like two books and they all said you need a spec script of a show. And then because this is like pre scripts being available online, I actually went in SoHo there’s this guy who sells TV scripts, printed out copies of TV scripts, on like a foldout table on Broome Street.

**John:** I’ve seen that guy. So you actually–

**Mindy:** Yeah. It was like Broome and Spring. He would set up his little – in a full circle moment I now like own an apartment in SoHo and I still see that same guy there selling his sitcoms and he has an episode of The Office that I wrote.

**John:** Amazing.

**Mindy:** I know. And I was like should I tell this guy? He’ll be like, “Fuck off, it’s not interesting to me. Who cares?” But I was like my full circle moment! You’re part of it, sir.
Yeah, so I got a copy of Arrested Development. And so I literally I was just like I don’t know about act breaks. I don’t know how long the script should be. I have a sense of it just from watching it on DVDs. So while we were doing Matt and Ben at night in New York, because I knew we were going to go to LA at that point. We had like two months before we were going to go. So I was like, OK, I have a couple of ideas for this. So I got an Arrested Development script ready to go.
So, I had that when we went to LA.

**John:** None of what you described so far sounds like luck. All of it sort of sounds like hard work.

**Mindy:** Thank you. You know, I’ve often – like you know, I think that hard work is two different things. Because like hard work is like, in America at least, it’s like good to be hard-working. But often it’s cool, particularly from some of my WASP-ier friends who maybe worked on the Lampoon where like you’re not supposed to show how ambitious you are. It’s just there’s such a bad look. And I’m like, well, if that’s true then I’m like living a perpetual bad look because I am like nothing without my panic fear, hard work like cycle that I go through.

But, yeah, thank you. I don’t think I had any luck either.

**John:** No.

**Mindy:** I mean, I definitely had supportive parents. And I went to a great school. So it’s not that – I had luck being born into a nice family who had enough money to send me to an Ivy League school for sure. But–

**John:** But to describe back a few things, you were talking about the panic and rather than just dwelling on the panic you actually started talking through stuff with a friend. You walked around. You recognized that this thing that you’re actually describing could actually be a good thing. You did the work to actually write that thing. And then the work to actually figure out a way that people could see this thing. And see that it was good. And while you’re having success, you didn’t take that, OK I’m going to stop here. You’re like I’m going to work extra hard to write the thing that will get me to the next place.

And so many people I think along the way they get to this thing and they’re like, “OK, when will lightning strike more? When are people going to notice me more?” And they’re not doing the thing to actually get them to the next place.

**Mindy:** Well it’s exhausting, right? Because that’s how you – just to keep going, it’s like you can never just sort of sit and be content for too long. It’s like constantly churning, especially as a writer, and particularly if you’re creating your own work it’s just a constant thing. But luckily I have enough panic for many lifetimes. So I think I’ll be OK.

**John:** So you come out to Los Angeles and you’re doing the play and you’re also meeting folks?

**Mindy:** So I’m doing the play. The play is going like spectacularly badly.

**John:** Was it at the Hudson? Where were you doing it?

**Mindy:** It was going so badly. It was at the Acme Theater on La Brea, which I think is still there. It’s going so spectacularly badly. Horrible. It’s like this is so not a theater town.

**John:** I remember reading a review of it in Variety which I think was a good review.

**Mindy:** Oh really?

**John:** But I remember actually seeing the physical, because I had the printed Variety at that point, and I remember seeing–

**Mindy:** Oh really?

**John:** The first time seeing a review of it.

**Mindy:** Oh my god. It was horrible. It was horrible, horrible, horrible. And there’s just something, in New York, because I like the play and I think it’s a funny play, and I think the performances are great. Not my performance. My friend. I just thought it was a good play. It was worthy of – I believed in it. Anyway.

And I think that in New York there’s just much more of a feeling of these little rinky-dink plays with something special in them. They have little venues. It’s like you can go on a date. Or you could do whatever. And it felt like here if you brought someone to go see a play in LA you were like “This is the worst date of my life. What are you, poor? Why can’t you take me to something nice?”

And so it just had a very different feeling about it here. So it went terribly and I, again, I was really panicked about that. But because of my spec script our agent, who started representing us when we went Off-Broadway, for writing was – I was taking meetings to staff on things. And actually that was going really badly, too.

**John:** And why badly? Because they would have already read you before you’d gone in. So, did you–?

**Mindy:** I can’t even, I just want to say, I can’t emphasize how much there was not this feeling of wouldn’t it be great to have writers in a writer’s room that don’t look like everybody else. It truly was like that wasn’t a thing at all back then. And I felt that it was – I had done this play. I had an Arrested Development spec. I really wanted to get into – I thought Will and Grace is such a great show. Couldn’t get a meeting on Will and Grace. Couldn’t get a meeting on – at that time it was Father of the Pride, was that animated show that was going to be after the Olympics. Couldn’t get into that room.

Couldn’t get a meeting with any of those people. But now if I think about it like an Indian-American girl who had like written a play that won the Fringe Festival who would come out to LA who had written a spec, like I’d be like of course I would take a meeting with that person. But things have just changed now, or maybe because I am Indian, where every showrunner would be like well of course you’d meet that person.

It seems like what a great person to put on your show. But it wasn’t that.

Or maybe my material just wasn’t good enough. But the doors were just completely slammed shut except for Greg Daniels who had seen my play with his wife Susanne and they–

**John:** Susanne Daniels at that point was running the WB Network.

**Mindy:** WB. Yeah. Or, you know, I think she just left the WB and was now an independent producer. But so Greg and she had seen the show and Greg wanted to – Greg and I met for The Office, which wasn’t a thing yet, and when I had my meeting with him I hadn’t even seen the original Office. I hadn’t even heard of it.

And so met with me. We had a really long meeting, which I thought went terribly. And then after he hired me as a staff writer for six episodes first season. NBC so did not believe in this show at that time. But I didn’t – it was not a job that anyone who wanted to be a comedy writer would have signed up for. Because who would sign for six episodes when you could do a 22-episode fifth season of an existing show?

**John:** So a general rule, I think long meetings are good. Has that been your experience since that time? Are most long meetings good meetings?

**Mindy:** Yeah, you know, at the time I had no idea. It was maybe my second or third meeting that I’d had. Yeah, I think long meetings are good. You’re totally right. Long meetings are good.

Greg, if you have ever met him, is someone who is completely comfortable with like long pauses and silences. He’s a very reflective person who can be thinking about something and you’re just sitting there nervous. It wasn’t like a chatty fun, “Oh I know that person, too,” like one of those kinds of meetings. He is just a – he will not just be like chattering away if he doesn’t think it’s worth saying, whereas I’m the opposite. I’m as my mom calls me a talkie-talkie, say-nothing.
So I’m like blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. And he was not. But I remember leaving thinking like oh my god if I could work for that guy. He’s so fucking smart. And I was at the King of the Hill offices because he was I think working on The Office while he was doing King of the Hill. So, it was very intimidating.

**John:** And when you were hired on did you know that you were going to be a performer as well? Or were you just hired on to write?

**Mindy:** I didn’t – I just thought I was going to be a writer. I didn’t know that there was a clause in there which is as a performer there was a pre-negotiated thing. And I think my agent so thought that was not a possibility that we didn’t even talk about it.

And it didn’t occur to me that being on a sitcom that was only picked up for six episodes was something to worry about. Or that there was something better than that. I think that looking back it was of all my professional success being hired on The Office was probably the most exhilarating.

**John:** Yeah. Because suddenly you really are being paid to do the thing that you want to be doing.

**Mindy:** Really getting paid.

**John:** Drew Goddard was on the show and we were talking about some of those early jobs, some of the best early jobs are sort of the underdog jobs or sort of the long shots, or shows that are kind of in trouble, or no one is really paying attention, because then as the new person in you sort of can just do new stuff. And The Office was really, even though it was based on an existing format, was really breaking sort of new weird spaces.

**Mindy:** That’s such a good point. That’s such a good point. I think that Drew was correct. Drew Goddard is smart for a reason. He’s successful for a reason.

**John:** He’s a very smart person.

**Mindy:** Yeah.

**John:** Because he was talking about sort of early on Buffy the Vampire Slayer and when things were just in chaos that’s a really great time to come onboard because they’re open to sort of new ideas. And you’re there while they’re figuring stuff out.

**Mindy:** Did you see the documentary about the Dana Carvey show?

**John:** No. I haven’t.

**Mindy:** OK. So it’s a great, great documentary about how could this go wrong, because the writing staff I’m sure you know was like Colbert, Carell, Charlie Kaufman, Robert Carlock. It was just like, Dana. So it has huge – and of course Dana Carvey was the star at the height of his powers. And it had this hugely talented staff, of all white men, but it did terribly and it got canceled I think in its first season or only lasted one season.

And it was so fascinating because here’s like how did that not go well? And I think maybe because there was so much scrutiny on it. Where everyone was like we can’t wait to see – they’re rubbing their hands together – we can’t wait to see what Dana Carvey does. And it was, probably because there was just so much scrutiny.

The Office was the opposite of that, which was I think that – I don’t want to speak out of turn here, because Greg knows better than me. I was like a staff writer so I truly didn’t know what was going on that much. But my sense of it was that The Office was like, “OK, six episodes, like let’s just let this run its course.” And frankly our first season we did terribly. I still love those first season episodes. I think they’re so funny, but I also think I was particularly attached to them because it was my first experience writing in TV. It was just completely intoxicating and it was such a small room. And I was like, “Oh, Mike Schur is so cool and mean. And B.J. Novak is so cool and mean. And everyone is so cool and mean. I hope they become my friends.” And it felt like we were just doing like such – by the way, now they’re going to be like, “Why’d you say I was cool and mean on the podcast?”

I was going to say they’re both very nice, which is also not true, but they’re both perfectly nice and have since become my good friends. But I just remember being like I’d never been around this level of concentrated comedy, of people who just like knew what they were doing. And I was just trying to keep up.

**John:** So talk to me about know what you’re doing, because I’ve never written half-hour and I don’t really have a good sense of what the process is like in the room and I’m sure it’s different for certain shows than other shows. But as you guys are breaking an episode, so you have a general sense of the ideas of the episode or the big things that are happening. How many days are you there figuring out, OK, this is the episode before someone goes off and writes it? The Office or your later shows.

**Mindy:** The Office or later shows. Well, I just took the way that we had done things at The Office and brought that onto The Mindy Project. And I did it at Champions. And then now at Four Weddings and a Funeral. We just do things the same way.
And the way that we did it – the way that Greg did it – was that we would kind of blue sky or talk about the entire series for several weeks, maybe two weeks. And sort of like we would take a couple days and talk about each character and what made them funny. What was their wound? How would they react in different situations? Their backstory. And that’s when, those first couple weeks is when you figure out like, OK, Dwight Schrute has a beet farm. That kind of thing. Michael Scott, you know, he talks about his mother and his step-father but we never really know about his dad. I don’t know how far we got with it.

But we just – and then we just went through all the main characters on the show and did that.

**John:** And at this point had a pilot script been written? Or this was before the pilot script was written? Because it was kind of a special case on The Office right?

**Mindy:** Yeah, well no, Greg adapted the pilot. They had already shot the pilot, when I came onboard. So then when they’re hiring a staff that’s when like Mike, me, Paul Lieberstein, that we came onboard. And B.J. was in the pilot, but he was in the writer’s room as well.
So we had this small room. And so then after the second week of talking kind of blue sky about the characters then it was like, OK, we have these six episodes, let’s like go – one of them is already written, so we have five episodes. What would be great or funny things? And that was all like well above my pay grade. That was kind of Greg deciding what he wanted to do. And then us pitching jokes on how that could be funny, or twists and turns in the story.

**John:** So what’s happening in the room, are you pitching jokes like actual dialogue jokes? Or are you pitching conflicts or little bits of like this scene would work like this? How much to dialogue are you getting into in the room?

**Mindy:** In the room?

**John:** Before someone goes off and writes the script?

**Mindy:** I think at The Office the first season it would be, like if Greg or Paul Lieberstein who were like the co-EPs and EPs on the show, if they had like a turn of phrase or a piece of dialogue that they thought Michael could say, or Dwight would say, then that would go into the script. I mean, I don’t really know how many even usable bits of dialogue or jokes I even contributed. But not that much. In later shows, like what we did at The Mindy Project, which has a completely different rhythm. Because what happened at Mindy was – it was a couple Office writers, but not that many because they were all still working on The Office. Because my first season of Mindy was the last season of The Office. So those guys were still employed.
Actually, I don’t know if I had any Office writers my first season. I don’t think I did. I had a couple 30 Rock writers. A couple Simpsons writers. And then the other writers – I’m sorry, one Simpsons writer, and then everyone else was from late night TV, from like Jimmy Fallon and Colbert.

So, the style of that show was very different from The Office for a lot of reasons. It wasn’t a mockumentary. But the joke rhythm became a little bit more – The Office has tons of jokes, but it was more of a hybrid. It had a real like more 30 Rock/Simpsons joke dense type of show. And that became a show where there was a lot of dialogue in the outline, because I was in the room, and I was the lead. So it felt like, OK, if I said something and it made people laugh, or I liked it, it would just stay in the final script.

**John:** So, Rachel Bloom, Crazy Ex-Girlfriend, she has a similar situation like you have on Mindy Project where she’s in the room for breaking the stories and sort of figuring stuff out, but then she’s ultimately the star of the show and has to go off and be the star of the show. Something like Mindy Project, how did you split your time between “I am the showrunner” and “I’m also the star of the show?” How were you switching back and forth between those roles?

**Mindy:** It was incredibly time-consumptive, particularly when we were at Fox. It was just a real seven day a week job. So I would go to work, my call time would be like 5 or 5:30. We’d do that first season thing where on a show you do like 13 hour days.

**John:** And why the first season? What’s different?

**Mindy:** Because on the first season scripts are longer because you’re not sure what’s going to work and what’s not going to work. So you need to just shoot longer things. And you don’t know yet. The characters, you don’t know who they are yet. So things are a little bit overwritten. And by the end of Mindy we were doing I think 11 hour days, which was great. But at the beginning it was like 13 or 14 hour days. And then I would come and then once if there was a lighting setup at Universal our writer’s room was really just like across the way, so really close. There’s a lighting setup for 45 minutes, I would go to the writer’s room and check in, see what they were working on. And then I would go back over and just do that.

And then when I wrapped at night, 6 or 7, I would edit to about 10, then go home.

**John:** Brutal.

**Mindy:** So it was tough. And then on the weekends I would just go over my lines for the next week, but then also on Saturday probably go into post. So the thing that gets really kind of held back is post. Because they can’t cut an episode without me. The director will do a director’s cut, but they can’t really do that final pass without me there. So on Saturdays I’d be there for like four or five hours doing that.
But, it was a lot of time, but it was also like I wasn’t married and didn’t have kids. It was my only goal in life was to have my own TV show. So, for me, it was like, eh, this is fun.

**John:** Your life is being inside the show.

**Mindy:** Yeah. My life is being on the show, so it was fine.

**John:** The one TV show that I did show run, I did find myself, like I would go through life and everything was just being sorted into two bins. Is that part of the show? Is that not part of the show? A song will play on the radio. Could that in the show? I felt like I was just constantly grabbing at things out in the real world and trying to put them in my little basket.

**Mindy:** It’s fun though isn’t it?

**John:** It is sort of fun. Anything that can happen out there you’re like, oh, this could be a thing. But I found myself, there was like a little red light that would come one. If we’re having this conversation it’s like, oh this kind of conversation could be in the show, which is – I’m not sure it was actually emotionally very healthy to do that.

**Mindy:** Oh interesting. You know, my character was so out there and it was all dating stories and I wasn’t dating at all, so I didn’t get a lot of that. But I would see would be like, “Oh, my assistant loves Workaholics.” I’m like, “Oh, that guy Anders Holm, they love him.” And like, “Oh, he should be a boyfriend on the show” and then he would be.

Or I would see Seth Rogan at an event and be like, “Oh, Seth should be on the show.” That’s fun to just find actors. And for a serial dating show it’s really fun to be like, oh, this guy is big on a Broadway play. And when you have a show, a TV show for theater people is actually like kind of fun and glamorous for them to come be on a TV show. Or Mark and Jay Duplass, I met them–

**John:** Oh my god, they’re great.

**Mindy:** They’re great. And they set a meeting with me because they wanted me to like either be in or – it was for me to be in a movie that they were going to produce. And nothing happened with the movie, but after meeting both of them I was like, oh, I want them to be on the show. And then they became the midwife brothers on the show. I only did this because Jay Duplass has said this many, many times that he credits me with kicking off his acting career, because he had never acted before then. And so that always fills me with pride.

**John:** They have such a weird Penn and Teller vibe as those characters. It was so disturbing.

**Mindy:** Penn and Teller vibe. That’s so funny. Yeah, that was – I always loved when those guys could come be on the show. They were so funny.

**John:** So, as you’re learning your lines over the weekend though, if there’s something you’re like, “Oh, this isn’t really working for me right,” could you just rewrite your lines?

**Mindy:** I could rewrite it. So in some ways it’s easy. It’s easier when the star of the show is also the showrunner, because it’s not one of these things where you’re like I hope, you cross your fingers and hope at the table read that the lead likes it/gets the joke. It made rewrites easier because for the most part I like knew what was going to happen. And so when we would rewrite things, we’d have to rewrite me a little bit, but it was mostly the other characters.

What became hard was that, at least when we were at Fox, it was like the notes we would get would be just – like that would keep us there for overnight Sundays/Saturdays. Because we would hear something and be like, “Oh, they don’t like this one character.” And you’re like, “OK, so we’ll write them off in a fun, believable way.” And they’re like, “No, they can’t be in the next episode.” So, you would say like you want us to get rid of that character without a sendoff? They’re like, yeah, they just – I don’t want to say the person I’m talking about, but they just don’t want to see them again.

And so we would get knocked a lot because there was a lot of characters that we were kind of – the edict was to just not see them again. And who would believe that the head of a network or development execs at a network would just say, “Yeah, they just can’t be in the next one. Our boss is going to freak out.” That that would actually be the case. So it just looks like, oh, Mindy didn’t like that person and wanted them off the show. And most of the time you’re like I hired this person. I would never want them to just to be off the show in this kind of way. It makes no sense.

**John:** So again, and we won’t talk about specific actors, but having watched I think almost every episode of your show, there were best friend characters or other friends. And so Mindy would have friends sometimes and not friends other times. And there was probably a focus question of like is this a work show or is this a Mindy’s home life show? Is that the kind of stuff that would come up?

**Mindy:** Well, you know, it was interesting. It was two things. If you look at 30 Rock or Parks and Rec, like Liz Lemon and Leslie Knope have no girlfriends accept for the people that they work with. And at the beginning of my show I was like, oh, it would be great if she had – I mean, I love Sex and the City. I would love for her to have girlfriends. But what ended up happening is we were at work so much, so you would end up having this thing of like how do we get the best friend at work.

For the record, I really loved having that – I liked that challenge. And we’ve always had great actors who would play my friends on the show. And then what would happen was that the network would say, “That stuff isn’t working. Cut it. We don’t want to see them.” But what it always felt like, and you have these fights where you’re like I don’t think people necessarily understand this when they watch a show. You have these fights of like I don’t want to do that. I want to write them a sendoff or I want to keep doing that. And it’s just like, “Do you want your show to continue on the air? No.” You have to like – and so you learn like, oh, things don’t work the way where you know it’s going to be better creatively.

And so I don’t know that other streaming platforms or cable networks don’t do that the same way, but I think there’s a reason why the comedies that most people are really enjoying are not on networks. Because I think that there’s these panicky edicts to get rid of things or change things up that make sometimes shows not work at the beginning.
So we were so lucky we came back after there was – I liked so much of the first season, but it was so rocky. Like some inconsistency, particularly the first 13 episodes where it was like this feels a little bit out of control. That kind of evened out in later seasons.

**John:** I don’t think this is true of your show, but there have been definitely shows I’ve seen the first season where it was clear they aired them out of order, or they just rejiggered the plan. Because a character is introduced in episode five but they actually showed up in episode three. It’s always so weird as the viewer to see–

**Mindy:** Well, they fall in love with an episode and they’re like, “Ooh, we want to air this now.” And I’m like a character has a broken arm in this episode that doesn’t have a broken arm in the previous one or something. It just doesn’t make any sense. And sometimes it’s coming from a good place. And it’s always a development exec who is just like, “We want to save the show. So we want to put the very best one next.” And you’re like “But it doesn’t make any sense.”

So, often it’s really coming from people who are, because there were so many big champions of our show at Fox. And a lot of times they’re like, “But we think this will help keep the show on the air and isn’t that the whole point?” So then you would do something, because yeah, I don’t want to have a six-episode show of a show that I really believed in that I didn’t make any compromises at all. And ultimately it was worth it that first – it was even just the first 13 episodes. Because at the end when we were in like Season 6 at Hulu they were like, hey, do you want to come back and do another season? And at that point I hadn’t realized like, oh, that’s such a rare thing, because I had gone from The Office to then Hulu, which was like you want to keep doing it?
And Craig Erwich is such a feeling of supporting it. It was like, yeah, you can do it as long as you wanted. And I was like, no. I was like, no, I want to go be in like A Wrinkle in Time and Ocean’s 8 and go do movies for a while. Being like, oh yeah, that will be done in like a year. But it is nice to see what other kind of characters I can play.

**John:** Can we talk about Champions, because I tweeted at you because I loved Champions so much.

**Mindy:** Oh, thank you. I loved it, too.

**John:** I was really impressed by the pilot because I’ve never written a half-hour pilot, but sort of the density of what a half-hour pilot has to do in terms of establishing the premise, the characters, the unique voices for the characters. I felt like every line in that pilot had to do like five jobs in terms of establishing these guys are brothers, they own this gym, their father died. He had a kid by this woman he hasn’t seen all this time. Now she’s dropping—
It was such a–

**Mindy:** It was so dense with plot and things.

**John:** It was like a full two-hour movie that had to be crammed into this little 30-minute thing, but it felt – everything was just nipped and tucked just so delightfully.

**Mindy:** Oh, thank you. That’s so nice.

**John:** So it was you and Charlie–

**Mindy:** Charlie Grandy.

**John:** And so what was the genesis of that pilot?

**Mindy:** I think with Charlie and I, because we had worked together for so long on so many different shows, I wanted to do – because I came to him with the idea. I think we both – we wanted to do something different than Mindy, but I wanted to do a young gay character. And I wanted to write for a guy. Because I’d been writing for Mindy for so long.
It’s crazy, because J.J. Totah who played the lead in that show–

**John:** He’s just remarkable.

**Mindy:** He’s so remarkable. But we didn’t know he existed before we wrote that part. So we wrote this really specific part of a half-Indian like very theatrical confident but with some vulnerabilities, this character, which is so specific. And then we found this young kid who played the part completely, but it was one of those things when we were auditioning we were like what the hell did we do? It’s not just a young teenage kid that’s a great actor, and singer, and dancer, which is already so hard to find. We’re like he has to be half-Indian, or look half-Indian. So that was incredible.

And writing for that voice was really fun because I love characters who want to come to New York and be strivers and are chatty and enter a room and they kind of like download their entire deal. And so he was like Mindy in some ways, but he had this vulnerability because he didn’t have a dad. So it was a really, really fun show to work on.

**John:** The other character I thought you had a great original voice for was the Andy Favreau character whose name I don’t remember. Dim-witted, but in a very different kind of dim-witted than I usually see in these shows. He was so good-natured and Canadian in sort of an odd way. And that brotherly dynamic is a thing we don’t–
**Mindy:** That’s funny. Matthew. Andy is so funny. And Matthew was just like, yeah, in some ways he could have seen just kind of stock, but he was smart about certain things and he was super moral. And also like really ambitious about the gym. And I remember he would always talk about like we thought it was really fun that he thought the most important familial relationship was between uncle and nephew. He’s like that’s the most valuable relationship. He didn’t really come alive until he discovered he had a nephew. That really fulfilled him. He was just a really sweet, funny character. And I mean Andy was so funny playing that part.

**John:** So writing with Charlie on this pilot, what is the process and what’s the give and take of figuring out like who wants what and sort of who is responsible for what?

**Mindy:** I love writing with another person. That was kind of the first time since I’d written Matt and Ben that I’d written with a writing partner. And what was great about writing with Charlie was I was shooting Ocean’s 8 at the time in New York and he was in LA. So we spent two or three months meeting, because Mindy was still happening. So we would meet on the weekend and then before work.

So we broke the story and carded it onto a board. And then what we did was – I think this is what we did. I took the blue cards and he took the red cards. And we just outlined it. We wrote what each scene would kind of be. I moved to New York. We’re in the middle of our outline. We had our respective assistants. Mine was in New York and his was in LA. Like Frankenstein them together, the cards. And then we had this kind of rough document that didn’t – it made sense, but it was tonally all totally different and all over the place. And you got to see like, oh, he really like sparked to this aspect of this guy’s character and I sparked to this. And you learn a lot. And it’s so much fun.

And then what we did was we massaged the document tonally into one thing. He would do a pass on it, and then I would do a pass on his pass. And so we had this outline which we then submitted–

**John:** How many pages long was this kind of outline?

**Mindy:** So, towards the end of Mindy we started doing really long outlines that were really detailed because it took the edge off of that horrible feeling you have of a blank page when you’re writing a script. So our outlines were often like 27 pages long.

**John:** Oh wow.

**Mindy:** And a script is like 32 pages.

**John:** So suggesting the dialogue but not really having blocked out?

**Mindy:** Sometimes we would write the dialogue to begin with. But it was like a Microsoft Word document. And then what’s great is then we would just when you put the Microsoft Word outline that has dialogue but just like in block form and you put that into a Final Draft document you’re like, “This script is like written.” It’s like 31 pages already.

And then that to me always makes me feel better. And the great thing about breaking everything together to that level of detail is that when you’re looking over it with your writing partner you’re like, “Oh, I kind of think that they shouldn’t make this decision and this beat should be two beats later.” So that when you’re actually writing the script it’s kind of really fun. Because you’re fleshing out the thing that’s already been really, really established. You can’t mess up. You can just make it better.

That’s something that we kind of figured out at The Mindy Project which is why when we were at Hulu it just made everything so efficient and no writer came in with a draft that was like bad because we had done so much room work on the actual outline.

**John:** Cool. Now, you’re in the room right now. What are you working on?

**Mindy:** I’m working on a miniseries, a ten-episode miniseries that’s an adaptation of the movie Four Weddings and a Funeral.

**John:** Holy cow. That feels exactly in your wheelhouse.

**Mindy:** Yeah. Well, you know, Richard Curtis is such a genius and has such a distinct voice. And it wasn’t until I was adapting someone else’s distinct voice that I was like, “Oh, I think I have a distinct voice and it’s not the same as this person’s voice.” So it’s been interesting being like, well, people are really – if they wanted to watch Four Weddings and a Funeral as an adaptation into a miniseries what would that look like? And what did they want knowing that I’m doing it?
So I’m trying to fulfill the promise of people who want to see that while also being like, OK, this is through the eyes of Mindy Kaling. And the biggest change that we made is the lead is an African American girl. And the male lead is a British Pakistani man. And so already I’m like, OK, I feel like I can get onboard with these two leads.

**John:** And so right now are you just blue-skying, or you’re breaking episodes? What happens in this part of the room?

**Mindy:** We just finished blue-skying which is the most fun period of preproduction and now we’re going into breaking the first episode. I mean, the first episode is actually written, so we’re doing episode two, which is a little bit harder. Less fun.
***
**John:** And so I want to get into this and I want to sort of talk through the process of getting on a show and sort of what it’s like to be writing on a show versus writing features independently, because Alison you’ve written independently, too. So I want to compare and contrast those two and really dig into it, because I’ve had no experience writing on the staff of a show.

**Ryan:** Oh really?

**John:** I’m literally just going to ask you questions. And not knowing very much about what it was like I went out to Twitter and I had a bunch of people tweet in their questions for you guys about sort of what it’s like to be a TV staff writer.

**Ryan:** Oh cool.

**John:** So, Alison, it’s been a while since you’ve been a staff writer, but can you time travel back and talk us through getting that first job writing on television, and how you got the job and sort of what it’s like that first, those first few days, that first week getting settled.

**Alison:** Oh boy. It’s a triggering question. But I do – I want to preface what my response is by saying that if you polled a hundred different writers with this question you might get anywhere from 25 to 99 different responses. So, this was my experience.

I am somewhat unique in that I did not set out to have a career in television. I went to film school wanting to write and direct independent films. And then the bottom fell out of indie features. There just was not a career to be had in them. So it was both necessity and somewhat fortuitous that I fell into my first TV job. So that’s the preface.

I was newly out of film school and had worked as an intern at Jim Jarmusch’s office in New York. It was a wonderful experience. And I met a UPM, a unit production manager for anyone who doesn’t know, who is essentially in charge of finances for production. That’s true in TV and in film. And she left her job with Jim, the production ended, and she went to work on a feature and offered me a job as a PA, which is a step up from an intern because you actually get “paid,” although I came to find out that she was paying the male PA more than she was paying me.

**John:** Oh.

**Alison:** Yeah. Lots – have me back on, John. So at any rate, so I was working that job initially as a PA and was bumped up to production secretary at some point. And then our production offices moved to Kaufman Astoria, so all this was in New York.
And next door to us the Whoopi Goldberg sitcom was starting to set up their production. So this was before the writers were actually there. Most of the writers, I think perhaps all them except for the Turners, were Los Angeles based. So the room wasn’t up and running yet, but their UPM was setting up the offices and starting to hire local crew.

So I just walked down the hall one day, poked my head in his office, and said, hey, if you need a writer, you know, in that way that speaks of one’s naïveté but also you have to be ambitious and why not. And I had, again, just being out of film school I had written and directed two shorts that had gotten some attention on the festival circuit and also had some writing samples. So I was armed and prepared and that’s the best piece of advice that one can give anyone, because nothing else is in your control. And he explained to me the way writers’ rooms are staffed and how writers have long since been hired, the point of which the UPM is setting up an office, but he was very kind and said, “Leave me your card and I’ll let you know if any positions open up, specifically like a writer’s assistant.”

So I went back to my office and asked the other PA who was in the office at the time “What’s a writer’s assistant?” because obviously if you aren’t in this world and you aren’t introduced to the various levels of support staff that these shows have you have no idea. I mean, even if intuitively you know, OK, this is someone who assists the writers, in what way? And it affords one very close proximity to the process. And there’s no greater apprenticeship than that job. So at any rate, long story short, I was ultimately hired as the writer’s researcher for that show.

**John:** So not quite an assistant, but you’re in the mix.

**Alison:** Do you know what’s interesting about it, I don’t know that those jobs exist on most shows. Whoopi wanted someone who could keep an eye on topical subjects for the show to explore. And that’s what landed in my lap. So I was only too happy to do that. So I didn’t have the administrative tasks of a writer’s assistant, i.e. you’re being the court reporter and you’re typing down contemporaneously what everyone is saying, and then having to cull all of those notes at the end of the session. I was just working autonomously and, again, you try and observe what’s happening in this room around you, and I saw, OK, I’m not in the room with writers the way the writer’s assistants are, so I don’t have the proximity. But they can read my writing. So I was going through the newspapers on a daily basis and culling things that I thought might be topical, you know, appropriate for the show, but then also writing a paragraph, no longer than a paragraph, satirical take on what that particular story was.

**Ryan:** That’s a cool job.

**Alison:** You know, and it’s one that I was able to craft on my own. Nobody said this is what we’re expecting. It’s just give us some news stories. So the idea popped into my head to attack the task this way, which if you could look at through jaundiced eyes, so it feels like a menial task, you’re just cutting and pasting newspaper stories, but make it an opportunity. Do it with purpose. So, what came to pass is that more writers would approach me and say they thought today’s edition was really funny. I got other people – they were passing this around, so other people in the production would request me to put them on the distribution list. And eventually caught the attention of Whoopi’s producing partner who once the show got its back nine recommended me for a writer’s gig.
So I actually moved up the ladder faster than any of the other writer’s assistants.

**John:** So were you given one of the freelance gigs or what was it?

**Alison:** The way that happened is there are two options and they went with option A was to make me a staff writer as opposed to just paying me for a freelance script. So I was on staff. I did wind up getting a script. But it was more satisfying, because then I was in the room and I became a colleague. The funny coda to that story – and this is something you wouldn’t know if you were entrenched in the culture – is that in writers’ rooms typically the upper level writers tip their assistants. So the showrunner tips his or her assistant and then all of the writers combine, and it’s all based on seniority, so depending on how big a wig you are.

**John:** Tip? What do you mean?

**Alison:** So the way one would a server in a restaurant. Just a service tip, you know, because it’s Hollywood and everyone loves to give gifts. And these jobs don’t pay well, so let me state that. So, as part of the support staff I was tipped, and then suddenly I’m now in the room working with them and it’s like I hope you all don’t want your money back. I had bills to pay.

**John:** So you were in your early 20s or how old?

**Alison:** Yeah. And we’ll circle back around and Ryan can give his experience, but being fresh out of film school I was not prepared to read the room the way I was even a year later. It’s like, oh, this isn’t a free for all. This is actually a highly choreographed exercise in controlling chaos, to distill it into something that you can put on the air a week from now. So, again, coming from a classroom environment where there is a free exchange of ideas was both good preparation, because when you’re on a film set you learn the art and skill of collaborating, but also poor preparation into think that everyone on staff is encouraged to speak with equal volume.

**John:** Yeah. I want to get back to that because that’s a crucial thing I’ve always heard about TV writers’ rooms. So, your experience, while unique, was also kind of typical in that you got hired on as a very low level entry level job. You proved your merit. You proved that you were someone worth watching. And you got tapped on the shoulder to come into the room and become a staff writer.

Now, Ryan, your experience, you’re not a young woman in your 20s.

**Ryan:** I’m 85.

**John:** You’re 85 years old. And you’re a feature writer. But I would say actually a considerable number of feature writers are also writing TV now. So I think your experience is probably not going to be as atypical as a person who has mostly written features who after writing a bunch of features is now being brought into a room and having to adjust to that whole experience.

So, can you talk us through your early days, sort of entering into a writers’ rooms and sort of what your expectations were and what you were actually doing once you were there?

**Ryan:** Well, I mean, I came in as a bit of a spy. You know, I was actually in Portland doing a speaking gig and my agent called me and said that there was this show and the main character is a blind woman and Michael Showalter had shot the pilot and Corinne Kingsbury had written it and it was great and it was funny and it was very much my tone. Is it kind of too on the nose for me to want to do a show with a blind character?
And we hadn’t talked about me staffing on a show before. And the reason I did it in part was because I had a number of pilots in development elsewhere I thought I should really get inside a room and just be in one for a while and see how they really work and what works in them and what doesn’t. So I kind of came in both to roll up my sleeves but also very selfishly to spy.

And when I walked in the showrunner is John Collier and he had been on Bones, and Monk, and Simpsons. And the first thing he said to me in the kitchen is a lot of feature writers get really disoriented when they get into a room. It will rewire your brain. And after 15 weeks it’s completely true. Like it’s just a completely true statement.

And like Alison just said, I did not know that it was such a militarized think tank. That there is a real structure and it’s a deep structure. And from the outside you would think it’s an expression of status, or something very superficial like that, but it is a way of funneling the chaos of ideas towards moving forward. So, it’s not arbitrary. It’s not done out of a sense of pride like I have more experience than you, etc. etc. There really is a rationale underneath it, because you have too many people with too many great ideas and you have to somehow create a substratum to organize them.

So, I walked in and I knew enough to just listen, which is kind of the first job is doing a lot of listening, and as they say read the room. And being a blind guy I had the disadvantage of not being able to read the room, so I was just sort of listening to like just geographically in the room where the talking was coming from. And if you do that you can kind of get a sense of the way the room is organized. Like more comes from over here, less from over here. Right?

And it was really interesting for the first few weeks for me because I’d never been in such a boiler room sort of environment of pitching. I mean, I’ve pitched a ton of stuff over the years, be it features or radio or books, whatever. So pitching isn’t new to me, but pitching in the speed and in a constructive way in the chaos of other people also pitching, so you’re building on top of them, and also having to think like as fast as you need to. That was really disorienting.
But my favorite thing I discovered was I did not anticipate the level of memoir that goes into making a TV show. Like you get people in a room who ultimately at some point and at some level are drawing on their personal lives. And so you’re kind of in a collaborative memoir that is being repurposed as fiction. And so it’s pieces of people’s lives being stitched together into these Frankensteins. And I started as a writer doing memoir, like my first book was a memoir. So, after a couple weeks I found this really comfortable place where I’m like, oh, I remember what it was like doing this. You just tell people all you’ve ever done and that you think might be remotely interesting. And then somebody else puts a different head on it and somebody else puts wings on it and suddenly it flies and it’s not yours anymore.

So I found that whole experience really – like really interesting. And it requires a level of trust in the room, too, that you feel comfortable admitting things about yourselves because you don’t want to make characters that are saints as well, right?

**Alison:** That was so incredibly eloquent. That sounds like a place I want to be.

**John:** Ah-ha.

**Alison:** I want to engage in that experiment.

**Ryan:** You should try it. It’s called TV.

**John:** Now, Alison, you have the benefit you’ve been on multiple shows. So you’ve seen the whole range of how a show can work and how it can function. Probably some that function really well and some that do not function well at all. But for a person who is a new staff writer, what’s some general advice you can offer in terms of listening and then eventually speaking and how do you find the place and the time to speak up and to actually contribute something versus reading the room that Ryan was describing?

**Alison:** I would say that the best fallback position if you’re brand new to the room is to listen. To listen with the intensity that you would speak in other instances. And you may not know initially because every room is different, the way the personality of every showrunner can’t be boiled down to any one predominant trait except megalomania. But it will service you well in every room in which you ever enter, because even as I’ve made my way up – even as I’ve clawed my way up to the top I have not had the security that a lot of different TV writers have where you’re on The Office for seven seasons, or you know anyone of those shows, or like Frasier. I worked with a writer who had been on both Cheers and Frasier.

**John:** Wow.

**Ryan:** Wow.

**Alison:** Right. So I can’t even imagine what kind of not just financial stability that gives you but also a level of comfort in knowing that your best ideas – your worst ideas rather won’t define you or limit you on a moment to moment or hour to hour or season to season basis. And that you have the freedom to make mistakes with impunity. That you just don’t have on a show that – you know, where you have to start over again every season.

But the ability to read the room and to be strategic about when you speak and what you say is crucial. And perhaps that serves you in every facet of show business and life. But a constant, and I’ve written on both comedies and dramas, and I would say that Ryan said this very, very succinctly. I won’t be as succinct because there are years of trauma attached to this advice.

**Ryan:** It’s my soft belly. It’s my soft belly that made me succinct.

**Alison:** You have no idea how much I envy your calm – none of this is triggering for you. But in a comedy room, for example, the pitching is fast and furious. And people are practically falling all over themselves to speak, but that doesn’t necessarily suggest aggression. It’s that, especially on a sitcom you just have to feed the beast of jokes, like there has to be a joke every two lines, every three or four lines. And so that kind of velocity certainly creates an environment that may feel like a mosh pit.

And on dramas there’s obviously a different, depending on the drama, like I’m on a legal thriller now, you may be pitching story arcs and it’s not that you don’t have to be able to pivot quickly, but pauses are encouraged. You know?

**John:** If there’s a silence that lasts 15 seconds that’s not the end of the world in a drama room. Whereas a comedy room that could feel different.

**Alison:** It’s almost death. It’s almost like unleashing a virus.

**John:** So I’m going to go to a question from Twitter. Michael Tull asked, “Which is better, to be able to come up with unique dialogue/stories on your own or to be able to go with the flow and have random bursts of input for other people’s ideas?”

So as a staff writer, which do you think serves you better? To be able to contribute in the room and to add on to things, or to be a person who can draft a whole idea and present it?

**Ryan:** You know, it’s interesting. From my observation anyway, I don’t know if that is – I don’t know if it’s an either/or question. In some ways one of the things that seems to make a room really work is the composition of the people in that room. So, you might have somebody who has a different skill set than somebody else. But there’s also this under sung value of a difference of personalities. There’s some people who are just great cheerleaders to keep things going forward when it feels pretty down. There’s some people that are just work horses, that just get up there and they hold the board together, and they’ve got the best handwriting in the world.
So, you know, it’s not like there’s a very narrow bandwidth of skill set you can specialize in. I think the strength is to know what you can contribute and to see its contribution to the whole in the way that people are kind of arranged around that table and what they bring. And I have different skill sets, I think. And in this particular room it took me a few weeks to kind of figure out, oh, this is probably the best thing I can bring to the table because I can’t bring everything I want to. You know, there’s just not room to try and do everything.
So, knowing what you can bring and how it would complement who is there is more I think valuable.

**John:** Alison, what’s your take on that?

**Alison:** I would concur 100%. And it changes from room to room. What the showrunner is doing at the outset of any room is assessing skill sets. She or he may have hired you thinking that your area of specialization was going to be X, but in this constellation of writers and experiences and levels you may be more useful doing Y. And the best example of this is comedy rooms, which they’ll often split into two. I once on a staff of 18 people. And they’ll often split into two for efficiency sake. You just can’t be in a room with 18 people pitching jokes. You really shouldn’t be in a room with 10 people pitching jokes. But one room will just be on story and the other room will just be the joke room, which I found to be no exit. Like I cannot stand it. Pitch one liners for six to eight hours every day.

**Ryan:** Comedy is such an unfunny business.

**Alison:** Oh god. Again, that’s another episode. But I was surprised, but depending on the room, depending on the show in question I was either in the joke room or in the story room. And it was just how that particular showrunner assessed my ability. And that goes back to the you need a full set of skills because any one of them may be called upon or required more in any particular room. And I think what most showrunners would probably say is that if you can get a couple of people who can give you really solid first drafts that’s invaluable. Because that’s where most of the time suck comes in having to rewrite. And the rewrite may not be because of anything you can necessarily control. Like you may get studio notes–

**John:** They blow up the episode.

**Alison:** Exactly. They blow up the script and suddenly it has to be rewritten in two days. That actually happened to me on my first Whoopi script. So somebody who can write quickly and write well quickly. You know, like in comedy rooms it’s almost like you can add the jokes later, you can add them on set, but structure you can’t piece together on a set. So, that skill set I think is certainly – help me out here, Ryan.

**John:** It’s important.

**Ryan:** It’s the thing.

**Alison:** That’s the brass ring. If you can do that. But again you may find that you’re better at doing that on a procedural than you are on a legal thriller. But I think to answer the person’s question, perhaps in a different way, is there’s no way to predict on a daily basis what you’re going to need to do in any given situation. So I think having an open mind and being courageous in that way, you know, if that doesn’t sound too precious.

**Ryan:** I could add, too, that part of it is, and I wasn’t really aware of this prior, and hadn’t really thought about it, was that as you go into production people start peeling away, right. So there might be a writer off on draft, there might be somebody out on outline, there’s somebody on set, there’s somebody in post. So the composition of the room isn’t stable either. It’s changing all the time.

So you might have had a particular role that you sort of fell into for a while, feeling it was your comfort zone, but as personalities in the room shift you might get called upon for other things that you didn’t do before.

I love it when people ask questions and you say the question is wrong. It’s the classic advice column move. But that’s just the nature of the beast I guess.

**John:** Let’s segue to a question from Victor Herman who is asking about that shift of the room. “Once an episode’s story is broken and a writer leaves the room for any number of days to write a script, what does it feel like to come back in the room now that the story has progressed without you? Are you vocal if there is something that’s happened that you don’t like?”

So, Alison, let’s pretend that you are off writing your script.

**Alison:** Right.

**John:** Now you come back in the room and they’re working on another episode. Things have changed. If you see something on the board or the episode is going in a way that you sense is going to be trouble do you speak up? How do you address that?

**Ryan:** You walk in the room and you’re like who is Victor? There’s these names on the board you don’t recognize.

**Alison:** Here’s a quick anecdote. I once was sent off on outline and got a call day two that the network had decided they didn’t want to kill off this character that I was killing off. Come back in the room. We have to rebreak the story.

**John:** Let’s clarify. So, to be off on outline means that you are writing the outline or you are writing the script?

**Alison:** It means that you’re writing the outline. Now, there are extraordinary circumstances where you’re writing both simultaneously. And that’s when, yes, the network has blown something up and you have to – there’s so many extraordinary circumstances that you talk to enough TV writers they’re like, oh yeah, that’s happened to me. Where just bureaucratically the network will demand an outline, even though the script has already been written. So you’re trying to distill a script into outline form. It’s ridiculous.

But I would say you always have to bear in mind the value of diplomacy. You’re off on script so you’re siloed and you’re focused on, you know, you have this myopic focus on the task at hand, these 28 to 55 pages, while the room is going on without you and they’re discovering other things about season arc and perhaps even series arc that you weren’t privy to. So they have information you don’t have. And you have information they don’t have because you’re discovering something about the character as you’re writing it. Jokes that weren’t pitched in the room or layers to the character that weren’t discussed in the room.

And depending on the room you may have a great deal of autonomy, or you may have very little. So I think if you come back into the room and something doesn’t jibe with you it’s just how do you go about farting in an enclosed space?

**Ryan:** That’s it. Next question.

**Alison:** I mean, depending on your dynamic with the showrunner it’s something you might want to have a sidebar on. And the showrunner can weigh in on I think that’s a valid concern, we’ll raise it in the room, or I hear what you’re saying but we’ve moved in this direction and I’ve called it. Like we’re heading on. And I’m sure that – this is something that does apply across all genres, across all rooms. You have to learn not to be precious of your writing. You won’t survive if you don’t.

And it’s actually a very good skill because even if you’re writing a play at some point someone is going to tell you that they can’t – this is impractical, we can’t get this set, or whatever it is and you have to adjust. But it’s constant adjustments in a writers’ room. So, if the showrunner has decided that they’re moving on from your idea, they’re moving on. And you need to let it go.

**John:** A question from Bob who asks, “How much is done or expected to be done at the office versus at home? So, are you working all the time? How long does it take to write an episode for a 30-minute show versus a 60-minute show?” Talk about the workload and how much of that work takes place over the course of ten to six or ten to whatever in the room versus not in the room. Ryan, what was your experience with work at the office versus work at home?

**Ryan:** I know it changes for every show, but you sort of get the schedule and the rhythm of the room pretty quick. And in our case we usually start at ten each morning. You know, your hope is to leave by 6:30 or seven. And often you don’t. Often you stay later. Just depending if the network blew something up or if you’ve fallen behind, whatever.

I would say the room can have a rhythm in the day where it’s like we’re all together at the beginning and sort of mapping out something large and then we might split into smaller rooms and somebody is doing episode eight and another one is doing episode nine. You’re running back and forth in between them because it’s a serialized show so you have to make sure everybody is speaking to each other and they’re not moving the story away from where it needs to be.

But workload wise, I mean the thing I found quite weird was how little I actually wrote for a long time. Like you’re really in a room talking a lot. And eventually you’ll go to outline. Eventually you’ll go to script. But that’s more the exception than the rule of your time. So, you’re in the room for the most part. You’re in there with people. It’s like you’re in the belly of the yellow submarine. And depending on your showrunner, when you go to outline or episode they may want you to stay around the office. And I can see advantages for that, especially if you’re doing a serialized show, because things might be changing and hot in the room and it might affect your episode so it’s good to be nearby so you can be pulled in, so you can integrate those changes.

You know, we might be on episode five and they’re shooting episode three and we need to do something in episode six that actually requires they change something back in episode three, so you might be tapping something that’s already almost going into production, just to make sure that something can be serviced further ahead in the story.

So, you know, it really depends on the show because in our case it’s sometimes helpful to be around the offices because it’s such a live worming show as far as the story and how it moves and shifts. But our showrunner has also been really great about if you want to write at home and you feel better and that’s good for your practice then go do it. And he’s cool with that. So we’ve been sort of given a lot of leeway that way.
I like staying in the office just because I kind of like to keep my finger on the pulse.

**Alison:** I would add only that having been a number of different shows and shows that are very room reliant and shows that aren’t, one of the disciplines that I didn’t value way back when but I certainly do now is the ability to write anywhere. Whether it’s actually on set, where you’re rewriting jokes on a sitcom, or if you have to quickly do triage on a script that the network has blown apart, and you’re shooting these scenes the next day, so you’re absolutely going to be writing in an office, or in a production vehicle.
The more you can test your ability to endure those extreme circumstances, the better off you’re going to be. Like how nice it is to sit home and write in your pajamas, all you screenwriters out there. John, I’m looking at you. For the most part you don’t have that option. I’m currently on a show where the showrunner will sometimes specify I’d like you to be around in the office should something change, or you know, it’s fine, go ahead and write at home. But I usually force myself to do half and half.

**John:** An important question from Gary Whitta who asks, “Sweats in the writers’ room? Acceptable?” So, it is different. As feature writers, I don’t have to get dressed. I can wear anything. But you are actually going into the presence of other people. So what are expectations for how you should dress in a room? Alison, in your experience what are the levels of dressed-up-ness in a writers’ room?

**Alison:** Comfort is key. I mean, I won’t be tongue and cheek with my response. Comfort is key. Because as Ryan said, depending on the room you may be there for eight to 14 hours. And I’ve seen it all in terms of attire. But writers on the whole, I think you’ll forgive me for generalizing, but are pretty casual folk. So, I worked with some dandies and that’s always a bit strange, but there is no code. I think that the strange thing about Hollywood, and surely you’ve found this even as a screenwriter, is writers tend to be the worst dressed. And agents the best. And then the network execs, you know, it’s like business casual for all of them. But agents definitely in pearls or suits and ties. But writers, yeah.

**John:** So Ryan Knighton, I see your dress code. It was already described as a red and black flannel. It’s the only time I think I’ve not seen you in a black t-shirt. That seems to be–

**Ryan:** That’s my uniform.

**John:** That is your uniform. So, can you offer any insights on the wardrobe of your–?

**Ryan:** Oh man, I’m a blind guy. I don’t know what they’re wearing in the room. I have no idea. They’re all naked for all I know. There are certain running jokes. And I’m sure he’ll be happy I say this. There’s an EP on our show who I just love. And he’s just a great veteran comedy writer. And he spent so many times eating lunch out of plastic takeout containers that he just refuses. So he has his plate and his fork and he does his dishes and he’s always dressed to the nines every day. And it’s just like he’s really committed to the idea. I’m here a lot. I’m just going to make it good. And apparently on a show he was on years ago people started people ribbing him about his fork and knife and his plate and all that kind of stuff. And eventually they noticed that he just kept adding to this. And so he brought a napkin. At a certain point he had a candle.

**Alison:** And a Ganymede to serve him.

**Ryan:** And I think that is just the best. And I think there’s something great about that variety in the room that everybody just sort of takes control of their own little micro environment of themselves.

**Alison:** I would say the one exception to the casual workwear code is on sitcoms where on show night if you’re always the person in a t-shirt and jeans you bring the sport coat. It’s a fun ritual, actually, because there’s an audience there and you’re filming a little half hour play so you dress up a little bit.

**John:** Brendon or Brian asks, “What’s for lunch? How early in the course of the day is the decision made about what the writing staff is going to eat for lunch?” And that is whole thing. And so even here, like Megan will run out and grab lunch for us sometimes. But it’s nothing like what the PA servicing a writers’ room is doing with like these giant lunch orders that are coming in. So talk to us about lunch. Ryan Knighton, this is your first time experience.

**Ryan:** I have so many thoughts about lunch. The thing about lunch, because I had heard about this before I came down, like it became sort of this weird cultural trope about the writers’ room and the lunch. And the thing I didn’t realize was it’s also because it’s like your own holiday moment in the day. It’s like the middle of the day. It’s the one moment where you sort of feel like you’ve stepped out of the room, even though you’re not in the room. So what you eat and sort of arranging that sacred time where you’re not on task is really important to people.
And in our case the menu goes out the night before. So we actually get it the night before.

**Alison:** That’s so smart.

**Ryan:** Which is great. Because it’s on the table. It doesn’t take up time in the morning. And it’s not a big to do. The only difficulty is deciding at 11 o’clock at night what you want tomorrow. But I can live with it.

**Alison:** I just want to say to anyone whose impulse might be, oh, I can’t believe these spoiled Hollywood writers are complaining about a free meal, it’s not a free meal people. Like they feed you so that they can keep you in house. It’s to keep you close by.

**Ryan:** How about we just work while we’re eating.

**Alison:** That’s most rooms. And what’s become quite standard
now is there is a very hard rule about budgets. So try and be in Los Angeles or New York and find a lunch that you can get for like $11.25. Again, we’re not talking pampering and flying in sushi from Alaska or something like that. But I would also say that Ryan is right. There can be cultural wars over lunch.

**Ryan:** Oh yeah.

**Alison:** There can be holy wars waged over lunch. I worked with this one guy who was so obsessive and even if someone is trying to institute like a democratic process, like each person in the room gets to pick, like I’ve been that writer. I was a staff writer on a show and not knowing LA I just looked at the menu of some place and said this is fine. And everybody complained about the lunch, so of course you feel like you’ve got the scarlet letter A.

But I’ve also been in rooms where as Ryan just said the showrunner likes to work through lunch, which is torture. And it’s not just torture because you don’t get that decompression in the middle of the day. It’s because you have to watch other people eat. And then the room just smells. You know, the more rooms that you’re in the more contemporaneous mental notes that you take, like I will never do this when I run a room, I will never do this. You have to give people lunch and you have to enforce the no eating in the room edict because it needs to be a pure space in all senses of the word, except for the fact that we’re writing television. But yes.

**John:** Let’s talk about money and sort of the financial aspect of it all. Two questions that came in. Daft Kid wrote, “Is the pay enough to live off in LA?” And then Anthony Kupo asked, “Please give us a ballpark on salary.”

So, it’s always awkward to talk about money, but I texted a
friend who is on a network one-hour and he polled staff writers on a network one-hour. And they said that after taxes and agent, but not counting a manager, it’s roughly $2,200 per week for a 20-week guarantee. And so for a 20-week guarantee that’s $44,000, which seems good, but is a challenging amount. If that’s the only money you’re making for a year in Los Angeles that’s a challenging amount.

So, when you got brought on to be a staff writer on Whoopi’s show, that was probably – you were just out of college. That was really good money for you.

**Alison:** Yeah. It was more than I could count. And by the way I just finished paying off my film school loans six weeks ago.

**John:** Congratulations. That’s nice.

**Ryan:** Wow. Yeah.

**Alison:** Maybe it’s been eight weeks. I can’t believe that I don’t have hash marks on my arm. The amount of time and just the amount of mental space of that debt took up. But it did feel like a lot of money in that very naïve sense, because you’re just used to seeing a negative balance. But, you are talking about living in New York or Los Angeles and if that is the one job you have, like 20 weeks you work out of a 52-week year, then that has to stretch quite a long time. And you have no idea of knowing whether you’ll work five months from then, one year from then, two years from then. So you have to learn to budget your money and live very modestly I would say.

**Ryan:** The rhetoric around it reminds me a lot about the way anybody talks about any kind of well-paying seasonal labor. Like you can be a rough neck on oil rigs and it’s a very similar kind of culture where it looks like you’re being paid just a ridiculous amount of money, but then when you think about 25% of it goes to your agent, manager, lawyer, a bunch goes to taxes, it only gets paid out over six months, and then you’ll find out six months later if you get to work again for another year, you have to sort of save with an anticipation of disaster all the time.

So it’s not even like you really can enjoy that feeling of security because on the other side of it is a big unknown question mark. And so everybody sort of squirrels away anticipating the worst, which it kind of creeps into your psyche.

**Alison:** Absolutely.

**John:** The example I gave was on a network show that is a 20-week show, but like so many shows these days are for streaming, they’re for cable, and there’s no guarantee you’re going to be that many weeks, you’re going to be at that rate. And one of the sort of WGA negotiations that has happened was about options and exclusivity. Basically when you finish a show how long can they hold onto you without paying you in case there’s another season of the show coming up? And so that is a huge factor in your ability to make a living as a TV writer.
And so what was great money for Alison coming out as a first time staff writer would be a challenging amount of money for somebody with a young family. It’s a lot.

**Alison:** It’s why I don’t have a family. [laughs] No, I mean, the truth is I have friends who have kids and when I say to them I was up until three or four finishing a script, you know, they look at me slack-jawed. And then I think of oh my god what if I had to feed a kid, too. What if I even had to walk a dog? So, perhaps the most useful piece of information to someone listening to this podcast, and god I wish podcasts existed when I was first starting out, is that if you’re uncomfortable with the notion of instability, and Ryan just spoke to this, this life isn’t for you.

It just – I mean, Linda’s story is a perfect example of that. Because you would think no one has greater stability than someone who has a $50 million deal, with this proven track record, who was in demand. But she was yoked so severely by Les Moonves. And that was an exclusive deal I have to assume. So obviously that’s an extreme example. She had been very well paid for a long time. She earned all of the money from her shows that had been on the air.

But television is predicated on failure, even more specifically than any other area of show business. Perhaps theater. But you just have to assume that you’re not going to work for a long time. And that’s not catastrophizing. That’s being a realist.
So, you have to be able to weather that storm emotionally, psychologically, and financially. And it never ends. You know, I’ve been doing this now almost 15 years. And when my room wraps in two months, less than two months, I don’t know what my next gig is going to be. So.

**John:** Crazy. Ryan Knighton, you’ve been doing this less than a year. On the whole how would you compare the experience of writing in TV versus writing in features? Did it make you want to do more TV or did it make you feel better about what you can do in features?

**Ryan:** It has really given me a taste for TV. I will say that. And I was joking in the room quite often that like there’s elements of working in TV that remind me of radio. And there’s elements of writing features that remind me of writing books. I mean, there’s that solitary isolated thing of novels and feature scripts. Whereas there’s such a much more social element in television and the process is incredibly social. It’s not just the nature of being in the room with the people, but the work gets done in a very socially collaborative way.
And it’s kind of refreshing to be yanked from my basement after ten years and be put in front of people–

**Alison:** What were you doing down there?

**Ryan:** You know, just like doing the laundry and just hoping there was another gig around the corner somewhere. So, you know, I think like a lot of people in the business right now because there’s such a seismic shift in what’s being made in terms of features and that there is so much more being made in terms of television, and streaming and cable, that everybody has got their eyes on both sides.

You know, so many companies that I met with in the past that used to be just features all have TV sides now. So, I’m looking at it more. And the thing that I find is that it just asks a different kind of brain around your writing. And there’s a lot of really interesting puzzles that I just never encountered before. Like I was saying to my assistant this morning that with features you start with a blank page and a concept and a pitch or a piece of IP and you just sort of sky’s the limit go for it. You know, what is your best version of what this story could be if it was up on a screen.

And there’s so many decisions that have already been made about television before you start writing. You know, you have certain actors for a certain number of episodes and so you got to plan out a season that makes somebody drop away for three times and make sure if you can at least have two of those episodes back to back so they don’t have to fly back and forth. And you’ve got four standing sets and you’ve got only four days on those and four days out for every episode. So you can write the most amazing episode of that show but it can be completely unproducible. And so you’re writing with all these interesting constraints already in place.

And that’s not a thing I’d had to do before. So, it’s a cool new puzzle in that respect. So I would say I’ve got a taste for it now.

**Alison:** That’s maybe the greatest gift that TV gives you is it forces this discipline that you never would have been able to describe had you not been in it. But I think having a producer’s brain is something that most writers don’t have to have or adapt to if you don’t write TV, precisely for what Ryan said.

But once you have it, I think it makes you a better writer. It certainly makes you a more efficient writer.

***
**John:** But today enjoy. This is Aline Brosh McKenna, Rachel Bloom, and John Gatins.

We’re here to talk about the third season of Crazy Ex-Girlfriend. And so I remember about this time last year, I follow you on Instagram, and you had taped over the windows because you were getting started to figure out this season. So my question now is what were you guys talking about in that room with the papered-over windows? What was the plan?

**Aline Brosh McKenna:** What were the things that really stuck through?

**Rachel Bloom:** The thinking was how quickly do we get to the full revenge episode. We knew very quickly we wanted to do – in the pitch five years ago at this point it was always inherent that she was – we were going to play the promise of the premise somehow. She was going to become full fatal attraction crazy ex-girlfriend. The question was how long did that last and how long did we take before we got to that point. And I think that was the thing that we were talking about.

**Aline:** That was the main. And then balancing – you know, the thing about revenge, and I don’t know if you guys have ever tried to write a revenge movie, or if anyone has tried to write, revenge makes no sense. It just doesn’t make any sense. And then what?

**John Gatins:** It felt so good though.

**Aline:** But then it’s like Wah-Wah. So we were building towards that but we knew that there needed to be something else going on in the season beyond that. And also we knew we had owed for a long time figuring out what was really her issue and the diagnosis. So that was something that we were also talking about then and starting to do research. And our writer’s assistant at the time, who is now going to be a writer on the show, Alana is here, she was with us – and there’s usually a few songs that are like born in that first breaking room and there’s some that change a lot from there. But there’s usually a few things that are like “Oh that’s done. We’re going to do that.”

But I would say every year we’ve had like a midseason thing where some of the things were set and then some of the things needed to be re-broken. And we usually do a little bit of re-break, like a little bit of a retreat halfway through to kind of calibrate, recalibrate.

**Rachel:** Yeah, and the big thing, and usually there’s a point in every season, midseason, where Aline and I will go to her house and get naked and get in her hot tub together. This is 100% true. And we’re usually drunk or—

**Aline:** Something.

**Rachel:** On something. And we’ll come up with like, “Oh no, this is the kind of shot in the arm the season needed.” And so in season two that was she and Josh full on – spoiler alert – I may not, if you’re here, sorry, but the shot in the arm was, “OK, Josh is going to leave her at the altar.” Because there was a world in which – the way we always pitched season two—

**Aline:** Was that Josh was about to marry Valencia.

**Rachel:** And she was going to then – oh god, was this two or three? The original pitch was that he was about to marry Valencia. She didn’t stop him from proposing and then she was going to do some big grand gesture, like Say Anything gesture to win him back, but it was going to backfire and it was going to hurt – at the time we didn’t know his girlfriend’s name was Valencia. It was just his girlfriend and she’d break her uterus. That was in the pitch. It was like season three Rebecca breaks Josh’s girlfriend’s uterus.

**John G:** I’m trying to picture that in the hot tub naked.

**Rachel:** So we re-broke it. And then last season I remember
being in the hot tub with you, naked—

**John G:** We’ve got to do this.

**John A:** Our writing process has been wrong this whole time.

**Rachel:** It’s great. Our bodies are so different, so we’re also both very fascinated.

**Aline:** I need parts that I waited for and never got.

**Rachel:** Oh yeah, but what I was going to say – sorry, I was thinking about Aline’s nakedness – the thing that we re-broke in your hot tub after – usually it’s hot tub after pasta, so we’re really not judging each other. It was last year was – we knew something was going to happen with – we had to get her – she was going to get in trouble with—

**Aline:** She was going to get in trouble and get in prison. She was going to be obsessed with Josh and Josh’s new girlfriend and that somehow was going to lead to her being in prison. But then in the middle of the season once the Josh thing had sort of burned brightly it seemed like it was over and we switched to Nathaniel. And then this idea of Trent as her id coming back and that that was the thing that really symbolized that she had, you know, burned through her revenge scheme, she was on her road to redemption, and then her mistakes come back to haunt her even though she’s actually doing the right thing. And there was an irony in that.
And one of the things that you guys as feature writers will relate to is we pitched it in four parts, the series. The first season really is act one. The second season really is the first half of the second half. And last year as you guys know, we’ve talked about this on Scriptnotes, the second half of the second act is the rocky shoals. It is the hardest thing to right. It’s the cumulative thing to write. It has the most plot in it. So that gives you a sense of what season three is going to be, or season four is going to be which is the third act. So we have a lot of plot in last year, like more than we ever had.
And there were times where Rachel came into the room and looked at the board and was like, “What’s happening?”

**Rachel:** Well because there’s always a point—

**John G:** The lowest point.

**Aline:** Yes. Bringing your character to its lowest point.

**Rachel:** But it wasn’t in those as much, I mean, that’s also a separate issue with me, the work schedule, which is I am in the writer’s room for the first two months and then we start filming and Aline is still running the writer’s room. And so then I’m reading outlines but also it’s on me to – I’m one of the three songwriters and it’s one me to – I’m the main person who supervises the edit of the music videos. I script out the music videos. So, around episodes let’s say six through 10 are when stuff is changing in the room rapidly. And so I’ll walk in and be like, “Whoa, Josh is a DJ? Oh, cool. Good for him. That sounds really cool.”

**Aline:** And it was hard because there was so much plot stuff that was happening as you said to bring her to her lowest point and how do you construct that. But there’s a very hectic part in the middle of the season around seven, eight, nine where we’re really tired and confused. And then it starts to – as the last few scripts are written we start to come up for air a little bit and there’s a song in the very last episode that Rachel and I wrote very calmly that first draft of, I mean, when I say wrote she wrote and I said half sentences, that ended up being one of the last songs in the last episode.
So, that was a very long answer.

**John A:** So really broad strokes, and these are sort of like the fat marker on the whiteboard, the overall map. Now, you knew you were going to get to a revenge plot and eventually she was going to go full Glenn Close in it. But her first instinct after the wedding gets broken off she’s at a very low place, then she decides like, “Oh, I’m going to use my super power. I’m going to sue him.” And so there’s this idea at the start of the season like, “Oh, there’s going to be a lawsuit.”

**Rachel:** That was the hardest thing actually. I remember, I mean, I think what’s interesting in looking back at what we were doing exactly a year ago was the lawsuit was a great idea that we knew we were going to do that you had early on but the question was right after the wedding what is she doing.

**Aline:** Right.

**Rachel:** And can we share what originally happened?

**Aline:** They went to a diner?

**Rachel:** No, but then.

**Aline:** Oh yeah.

**Rachel:** So originally she goes to this diner with her friends and she’s like mad and they’re like, “Oh my god, what is she thinking?” And she’s like, “Will you just excuse me for one second?” And then she knocks on Nathaniel’s door and they fuck. Like literally the first second of the season. And then that’s part of the reason he’s been on the hook is like she came and fucked him and then left. And then there was this whole runner of like she got really freaky and she comes back to his apartment. She’s like “Take a shower. I need a clean work space.” And it was really dirty.

**Aline:** So that was in there for a long time and that was behind that newspaper. And I got to say the writers really hated that because they felt like it cut off all the opportunity for like the first time they slept together building to that. And there was a lot of resistance to that in the writer’s room. And I clung to it for a while. But there were so many other things going on in the beginning of that episode that we let go of that.
She does a lot of awful things in the first third of the season. And then when they start to come out, she also has this giant dip so that the characters later will forgive her for that.

**John G:** So you guys create a show called Crazy Ex-Girlfriend. When do you have this idea to explore BPD as a thing that’s going to arc itself out? And what was that conversation like?

**Rachel:** BPD didn’t come – BPD started to come kind of organically. I remember we started talking about it really in the second season. I definitely – I remember thinking it a lot in it was the third episode of the second season where she thinks she’s pregnant for a scene and goes in between these extremes. And BPD is very difficult to diagnose and it’s a very interesting disorder. And so we kind of knew that that’s where it was going. I mean, a lot of the things that we had the character do were kind of emotionally heightened versions of things that both Aline and I had gone through in our lives but very, very, very heightened and just kind of yes-anded.
And the interesting thing about BPD is that’s what it is. It’s emotions that we all feel, it’s thoughts that we all have, just multiplied by a million. I mean, they say that if you have BPD it feels like you have emotional third degree burns all over your body. You literally have no emotional skin because your sense of self is not present, so you rely on the outside world to define who you are which is inherent in the premise of the show of someone who imagines themselves in different musical numbers to define who she is.

**Aline:** So what’s interesting though is we didn’t know that that’s what she had. We wrote it by feel. And the same thing happened with figuring out that Greg was an alcoholic. We just were writing that character, it was a thing that we had a pattern that seemed like it adhered to that character. And then we realized, oh, when we go back and do the checklist for alcoholic, Greg’s him. And when we went to do the BPD checklist it was stunning how much we had done that, but we hadn’t done that intentionally.

And I didn’t know anything about BPD until – Rachel knew stuff about it and had been talking to me about it sort of lightly for a while, but we didn’t really—

**Rachel:** I know people who have it.

**Aline:** And then we kind of delved into it and that’s what we had written. And I actually think it’s interesting because I think if we had written it knowing that that’s what we were going to do it might have been more forced and programmatic. But BPD people are the people who like – you know the friend that you have that does “crazy shit” and you call your other friends and you’re like, “You are not going to believe what this person has done.”

If you – the people that you know who tend to be – people call them crazy because they’re always stirring up stuff and they end up in weird – that’s her thing. She ends up in very weird situations because she’s lying and she’s freaking out and she’s over-dramatizing things, but not realizing these are all connected to one place.

**John G:** Was it scary or kind of exciting to be able to kind of push the tone really hard? You know, because it’s a show that like when you see the first season it’s so funny and so full of life and the music is amazing, the performances. It’s like you’re constantly laughing. And then as she devolves into this spiral it’s intense. Some of those–

**Aline:** Season three is—

**Rachel:** The show was always really dark to us, though. I mean, and I have spent a little bit of time rewatching some episodes of the first season, which is very weird to rewatch a show that you worked on but it seems like a new show because it’s been a couple years since I’ve seen it. And she’s quite ill. I mean, in that first season, in ways that I think at the time I didn’t even realize, but she’s really, really, really sick. And then the fact that Greg wants to fuck her and that’s like the only thing he can think about is like fucking this sick person. It’s really dark and disturbing.

And so I never thought of – the darkness of the show has always been inherent for both of us.

**Aline:** Yeah. I mean, I think because it’s a deconstruction of romantic comedies and you look at how people behave in romantic comedies, it’s psychotic. No, that’s a thing that we connected on which is the guy is outside in your yard and he’s got the boom box on. Like this is not OK. Stop fucking running to the airport. If you love somebody, you know, don’t lie about – and I had written obviously a lot of stuff where people are lying and scheming and it’s supposed to all be OK if you end up kissing. And in our very, very first conversations about the show that’s what we talked about which is like – and for me it’s rom-coms and for Rachel it’s also Disney princess stuff where what we sell to girls and women as appropriate behavior if it ends up with Prince Charming or in a kiss is like we excuse very crazy behavior.

So what’s interesting is because the first season is the first act it’s that rom-com cute stuff. And we always – you know how you guys when you write something they’re always like, “Make her likeable.” We always had it be someone else’s fault. And basically what happened over the course of the three seasons it’s like, “No, no, it’s her. She’s driving it.”
And I will say when we wrote episode four of this year which is the full-on revenge episode we laughed and laughed. It was such a release.

**Rachel:** Ah.

**Aline:** It was such a relief. We wrote that.

**Rachel:** It was the episode we wanted to write.

**Aline:** Yeah. We wrote that over the weekend at my house and it was such a release to actually have her be stalking him and really go for it, because we had sort of been putting kid gloves on it, you know. And there is something – but a lot of the stuff people do, you know, if you go to people’s weddings now and you hear the toasts of how they met it’s like, “Well that’s not OK. He slept outside her house for – I think that might not be legal.“

**Rachel:** If you didn’t think he was hot you would have called the police. Because you were attracted you’re like, “That’s fine. That’s cute.”

**John A:** Talking about premise of the show, so it’s a woman who wants something so desperately she’s willing to uproot her life and move across the country. And the first two seasons we see her pursuing her wants. What’s so interesting about this season is she’s kind of stopped wanting and she just goes on defense. She’s so terrified, and so what we just saw with Paula is she’s lashing out at Paula and she’s using her special skills kind of for evil and for vengeance.

**Rachel:** She’s very smart. Yeah.

**Aline:** But she’s bouncing off the mound. It is late act two
stuff. She’s grabbing at vines.

**Rachel:** Even in moments of being a villain she doesn’t know how to be a villain. She’s just trying to get her pain out. And I think that that’s been something very interesting to write for all these characters that even at their worst Aline and I we come at it from a place of empathy and compassion. And so it’s the reason people calling the show My Crazy Ex-Girlfriend really bothers us because it other-izes her. And unlike in Fatal Attraction where you know “the bitch must be killed,” that’s an example of someone with borderline, you know, the original ending of Fatal Attraction was her killing herself. And the audience felt unfulfilled because it made you feel sorry for her and you want the world to be black and white. But when people are acting villainous they’re terrified. They’re insecure and they’re upset.

**John A:** So reaching all the way back to, I think it was season one, I’m the villain of my own story, which was sort of the fairy tale version. And she imagines herself as that sort of dark villain. So she has some insight. She’s able at times to realize that this is a thing that I’m doing that is the wrong thing. How much does that factor into your decisions on a scene like this, her to understand what’s really happening in the world and this is her own feelings?

**Aline:** You know, I think it’s the special pain of her character, but it’s also the thing that makes you like her is that she knows she’s messing up. She always knows. No one is harder on herself that she is. And so when she’s doing awful things she is aware always. And if you know anyone who has a disorder, not even just BPD or something like this, when they are aware that they’re acting out and they can’t help it there’s just a special pain and empathy that you feel for that character because she does know that she – and that’s why I think in some ways one of the signature songs of the whole series is You Stupid Bitch, where she sings this very lacerating song about herself because she knows what she’s capable of.

**John G:** How many episodes? 44.

**Aline:** Yeah.

**John G:** And how many writers from the beginning?

**Aline:** All from the beginning. We’ve had the same writers since day one. We promoted two people. We have a very cohesive group. And one of the things that’s amazing about it is we have such institutional memory on our show. It’s incredible. It’s like this is a room that remembers every – they know and remember things that I don’t, that we don’t. They just know it so well. And when you have shows where people come and go you can’t create that as coherent a story. And they’ve just been steeped in it from day one. And everyone there will bring in bits and pieces of stuff or point out, “Hey, we can’t do that because we’ve done this already.”

And we work alone. You know, screenwriters work alone. We’re hermits. And John and I are friends because we hated being hermits and we created our own little writer’s room on the telephone when people used to talk on the telephone. We still do. But having that community of writers that understands this show and is helping us to guide us and give us feedback and say that’s crazy. And this suicide episode that Jack wrote, I mean, Jack brought such tremendous humanity and depth to the draft that he wrote. And we wept in the room, many of us, very frequently. You know, for me – Rachel is like a daughter to me, but Rebecca is, too. And the thing that always gets me about her is that she has hope. She’s a very hopeful character. It’s like, you know, she has a spirit of wanting to live and wanting to survive that like really, really moves me. So we wept a lot in the writer’s room.

**John G:** I’ve been to see you both in your room a few times. And I’m only now remembering that, yeah, it was exactly the same people every time I went. And I’m just thinking like that’s a really long season. No, it’s been many seasons. I just keep thinking like, “Oh, it’s Wednesday,” but you’re on another season. It’s this continuous thing. And the feeling in the room was very open. Like I didn’t know who was the boss. I didn’t know anything.

**Aline:** Well, it’s funny, I didn’t know. I think because I never ran a room before, so there are things that I learn. Like I don’t care who has the idea. And I didn’t obey any hierarchy. I didn’t think like, “Oh, if you had this title you should speak more or less.” That doesn’t make any sense to me. Why would you – so there were a lot of things about the way shows are run I didn’t know because I’ve never been on staff. And the staff taught us how – Rachel actually had more experience than I did. And the staff taught us really how to run the room. And some of the senior writers really helped inform that. But it’s just a glorious lucky thing to have a group of people that is so – you know, just to be in a room with ten intelligent, hilarious people while you’re creating something is – it’s so hard to go back to writing solo. It’s crazy.

**John G:** But I think it’s really unique that you have this writer’s room, as a guy who has been there, and you guys are there, and then you’re shooting the show on the other side of a wall. And you’re the star of the show. You’re in the writer’s room. You’re there. The writers go there. You’ve directed three episodes, right? It’s a pretty rare–

**Aline:** Also we really give the writers custody of their episode, like during the breaking and the writing of the draft obviously, the rewrite, the going onset, it always goes back to them. It’s their episode. And they guide it and they’re responsible for really keeping track of it. I mean, I’m thinking of the writers that are in the room, like Alana did episode six for us. It was her first episode. She was our writer’s assistant. The one right after this which deals with her diagnosis. And, I mean, she is like a Ph.D. level expert in Borderline because she read absolutely everything.
And so when a writer is entrusted with an episode we take that very seriously. That is their episode to curate and they’re there for every second of it.

**John A:** You know, I think that merlot joke was so crucial because it’s a reminder that like the rest of the universe is still functioning, even though she’s pulled herself out of it the rest of the universe is still functioning. And in the next episode or the episode after we sort of see what the office is like without her there and how they’re all sort of desperate to reinsert her. But they’re just being crazy madcap the way they always would be and the universe is cycling on, which is also a factor for someone considering suicide is like either they want the universe to stop because they’re not going to be there or “No one is going to miss me if I’m gone.” And you’re able to sort of answer that question by seeing what the office is like without her there.

**Rachel:** Yeah, and I have to say in talking about the writing of this I – there are certain things that if I – if we’re talking about a certain idea and I don’t know about it, Aline will get a conviction in her eye and I know that her gut is right on a certain thing. And I have to say like it was her idea, the idea of that help sign turning into hope, and I couldn’t – on its face I was like I hope this isn’t schmaltzy. And then she was fucking right. It’s what you needed in that moment. And so things like that, things like tone, yeah, you can talk about them intellectually but I feel like the tone of the show in many ways is an emotional thing for us and is an instinctual thing for us.

And we wrote the pilot, we set the tone. The way we wrote that was basically kind of just line by line together in a room. I mean, we had an outline and we had songs. And so I think that it’s the reason we try to maintain the idea of humanely going beneath stereotypes is because this show is, yes, it’s intellectual but it’s very emotional. Sometimes it comes from our gut. And I want to point out a moment where Aline’s gut was just spot on and it really was a wonderful tonal thing for that episode.

**Aline:** And one thing I would say if you’re going to write with somebody, it’s great to have somebody who has – we have a lot of overlap in many things, but the skills we bring to the table are different. You know, I’ve been doing long form storytelling of a certain type for a very long time and Rachel’s background is different. The funny things is we both have – like I have an allergy to expected things on a story level because that’s what I’ve been practicing for a long time. And Rachel has an allergy to expected things because she’s a comedian and a sketch comedian and a songwriter and comes from animation. And she doesn’t like any stale or expected thing. And I would say if there’s one thing that we overlap on that is our most shared thing is the zigging.

You know, we really try to – and sometimes it’s hard to either get other people onboard or even to get each other onboard, but we both have a very strong – and in here the zig I felt strongly about taking was towards some celestial feeling of like this can be OK and that’s why we have the clouds and that’s why we have the blurry hope. But, you know, being partners and having a writer’s room is like listening to the conviction and sort of hearing like well that’s important but we’re going to continue to zig there.

**Rachel:** I also think it’s a testament to what technique is and what understanding – you have to understand structure and tropes and technique before you can break them. I mean, Aline comes from oftentimes writing these romantic comedies and she knows the structure so well. I come from musical theater knowing all of those tropes. And sketch comedy, when you learn sketch comedy, the way I learned it it was almost mathematical where it’s like, OK, well then there’s this beat and there’s this beat. There’s a weird – [cell phone rings] you should get that. I’m joking but I’m not. There’s a weird like rigidness sometimes, especially when you first start to learn sketch comedy. And so I think that knowing those structures and what’s expected and what’s trite and what you’ve seen and what’s stock has given us a real allergy to anything that feels like stock.
But even then that’s a – because that’s why I thought maybe the help turning into hope might have been and it 100% wasn’t. And so it’s always this back and forth and this debate.

***

**John:** OK, it’s John again, back in September of 2021. In lieu of a One Cool Thing this week I want to give you a One Thing You Should Read this week, which is an article I’ve seen passed around a lot on Twitter and I think just a great conversation starter. It’s by Hannah Giorgis writing for The Atlantic. The title is Most Hollywood Writers’ Rooms Look Nothing Like America. What I love about this is it’s really looking back at the history of Black characters on television and the Black writers who were or too often were not writing those characters. It speaks to both how we got here but also the present day pressures of writers in these rooms who feel like they have to stand up for themselves not just as writers but for a whole group or class of people.

Just a really great overview. Definitely check it out. And that is the show for this week. As always Scriptnotes is produced by Megana Rao and edited by Matthew Chilelli. Our outro this week is by Owen Danoff. If you have an outro you can send us a link to ask@johnaugust.com. That’s also the place where you can send longer questions. For short questions on Twitter Craig is sometimes @clmazin. I am always @johnaugust.

You can find the show notes for this episode and all episodes at johnaugust.com. That’s also where you find the transcripts and you can sign up for our weekly-ish newsletter called Inneresting which has lots of links to things about writing. And this week’s newsletter is especially good. So, do check it out.

We have t-shirts and they’re great. You can find them at Cotton Bureau. And of course you can sign up to become a premium member at Scriptnotes.net where you get all the back episodes and bonus segments like the one that Megana and I are about to do with leftover questions from our 10th Anniversary. Thanks. Enjoy.

[Bonus segment]

Welcome premium members to the bonus segment of Scriptnotes. I’m sitting here with Megana Rao. Last week on the 10th Anniversary show we got a bunch of questions in. We answered some of them on the air, but a bunch more could not fit. Megana how many questions did we get in from premium members?

**Megana Rao:** Oh, the last time I counted we had over 150 and some more who have come in since then.

**John:** It’s always that flood of riches, where Megana will say like oh should we Mail Chimp out to the subscribers and we’ll get some good questions, but then so much comes in that it’s sort of hard to sort through it all.

**Megana:** But these were short and sweet, so they were pretty easy for me to sort through.

**John:** Yeah, they weren’t the – I’ve seen some of the novels that Megana gets in. So these were easier. But these ones were ones that I thought you and I could answer, so I figured without Craig being here this week you and I could tackle some of these. So let’s start with this first question from Lizzie.

**Megana:** Great. Lizzie asks, “I always wonder considering how busy your schedules seem to be how do you manage to record every week? How long does it actually take you to prep and research for each show?”

**John:** Great. So our schedule for Scriptnotes classically has been that we would record on a Thursday or a Friday. And to do that if a show is about an hour long our recording session is not much longer than that. Not a lot gets cut out of a show. But the prep has really increased over the years. I would say those very early episodes we were doing I was really kind of producing them myself and I would do 20 minutes, 30 minutes of work to sort of get stuff up and running, whereas you are doing a lot more prep leading up to one of these things. So talk us through the kind of prep you’re doing on a normal episode versus one that is a Three Page Challenge.

**Megana:** So for anything like a Three Page Challenge or How Would This Be a Movie or that Pitch or Spec segment we did with Ryan Knighton a few weeks ago that usually takes me about three days of work after we get all of the submissions in and sorting through them. And then I’ll try to come in with a list for you to then cull down beyond that. And then I’ll try to send that to you guys a day before we record.

**John:** Now we should stress that Craig has done very little work for this. So he will read all of the Three Page Challenges, but he’s not really looking at the document ahead of time.

**Megana:** Correct. But he does print them out and mark them up which I respect. And then whenever we have guests or do a deep dive and we’re going to be looking at pages or their scripts typically that’s actually you who will pick out the things that you’re really interested in and want to highlight.

**John:** Yeah. Whenever we have a guest on a lot of it becomes scheduling and figuring out whether we can make it work and what we’re going to talk about. And so I will have an hour or two of work to sort of get stuff prepped and sometimes it’s really just figuring out what is this episode even kind of going to be about. But then it really falls on Megana to get all those pieces together and make sure that we have the show that will actually fit together hopefully in an episode.

We should also talk about that’s the prep, but the post on an episode is really kind of more of your job. Because Matthew gets all of the audio and cuts it into an episode. But then you have to listen to the episode and prep it to be released and that’s a lot of your Monday generally.

**Megana:** Correct. Listening, writing the blog post descriptions, putting the chapter titles in. Yeah, putting it on all our different platforms. And then doing the premium feed and the standard feed.

**John:** The premium episode is really just the normal episode, but with the extra stuff on the end. We do that for simplicity so it’s just really the same thing with an extra thing. So you’re just getting the same normal episode with the extra stuff at the end because you are an awesome premium subscriber and thank you for being a premium subscriber. Next question we got.

**Megana:** Christine asks, “My question is about programming. How do you program what goes into each episode? Is there a master list of future episode topics that’s calendared weeks in advance? Or are you guys more on the fly and improvisational with programming so you can cover the news of the day? Maybe it’s a little bit of both?”

**John:** So right now we’re looking at the Workflowy and the Workflowy is our sort of master organizing document. And there will be a category of potential topics coming up. And so things like we should do an episode about this topic. But more often or not it’s just like Monday or Tuesday I’m talking with Megana like what should this week’s show be about. And in our staff meeting we’ll bat around some ideas for what the show should be about. And if we haven’t done a Three Page Challenge for a while or a How Would This Be a Movie we’ll cycle back to one of those. But if there’s stuff in the news that will tend to be a jumping off place. What happens a lot is something I’ll be working on, like some sort of craft situation I’m running into it’s like, oh, we haven’t done a show about this thing that I’m facing and that will become a centerpiece craft topic.

On your side what makes you excited about a given episode or a given thing? What works for you?

**Megana:** The only thing that I would add to that also is that we get really great listener questions in and so sometimes that will be the genesis of an episode or an idea. And then I think similarly if I’ve read something interesting in the news or if I’m running into an issue and I’m like I want to hear the two smartest guys I know talk about this I’ll try to incept an idea.

**John:** So the two smartest guys are like two other folks, but if you can’t get those two–

**Megana:** Exactly. Then I turn to you, to John and Craig. Exactly.

**John:** You’re also I know listening through the back catalog and sometimes that becomes a springboard for you were talking about this a zillion years ago but what is your take on this now.

**Megana:** Totally. Or like we recently rebroadcasted The Worst of the Worst and I was doing a revision on one of my projects and was like trying to create more conflict, and so I listened to it and when we needed to re-air something I was like this episode is great.

**John:** Cool. Question here from Matthew.

**Megana:** Matthew asks, “Do you find that recording the podcast and discussing the craft each week helps keep things fresh in your own writing?”

**John:** It definitely keeps me thinking about the writing. It keeps me aware of the fact that I am writing which is good. The struggle I’m having in the middle of this sentence is a common struggle shared by all writers doing their thing. But I don’t know that it necessarily changes too much of the work of it. I don’t feel like recording the podcast has had a big impact on the actual words that are down on the page.

Now you’re newer to writing, so do you think you find more influence between what we talk about on the show and what you’re doing?

**Megana:** Absolutely. And I think I’ll choose listener questions and things sort of based off of that, or colored by that perspective. But I guess I have a question for you. So you don’t have a writer’s group and when you write something I guess I’m usually your first reader, right?

**John:** Yes.

**Megana:** But do you find talking it through with Craig helps unlock anything from you? Or are you kind of beyond that?

**John:** Well I’m not talking about the plot of it.

**Megana:** I guess not specifically.

**John:** I’m not talking about the plot but I’m definitely talking about the challenge I’m facing or a scene in which characters are in this weird place and that sometimes can be a thing that we would talk about on the show. So, yeah, I do think that helps a little bit because you’re recognizing like all the different ways you can address a certain situation. I do feel like there’s some benefit from that.

We often describe the show as being writer therapy and sometimes we’re just talking through the things that we’re facing. And Craig is probably even less explicit about the stuff he’s working on, but I do get a sense that there are times where he’s grappling with figuring out the overall arc of bigger things and all the conversations we’ve had about long form TV which he was not doing until recently, I think that has seeped into his brain somehow.

**Megana:** Interesting. I keep trying to pull the curtain back on your process and it’s like, no, you just spit out a fully formed beautiful idea every time. All right, so 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. And so Variety would publish each week the 60 top grossing movies and I would mark to see how many of the top 60 I’d seen. And 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 sort of keep up with everything, but in terms of television I keep up with what are the watercooler 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. So, 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. And I think that is an important thing for anybody who is trying to write in 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. What are you watching? What are you loving? What are things that are working for you?

You’re going out on some meetings now, too. Do you find you’re often talking about the stuff that you’re watching?

**Megana:** Yeah. And 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 you were in Nashville you would be talking country music. It’s just the thing that we talk about here. And so it is natural. Even in this lockdown year the conversation still somehow gravitated around that.

**Megana:** Yeah, I guess because it’s the only thing people are doing.

**John:** Yeah. Thank you for these questions. Thank you for everybody who wrote in and overwhelmed Megana’s inbox.

**Megana:** Yeah, thank you for these thoughtful questions.

**John:** And it’s always nice to be able to reveal a little bit of the behind the scenes work here on the show. Thanks for being a premium member.

**Megana:** Thank you.

Links:

* Mindy Kaling on [IMDb](https://www.imdb.com/name/nm1411676/) and [Twitter](https://twitter.com/mindykaling)
* Alison McDonald on [IMDb](https://www.imdb.com/name/nm1037485/) and [Twitter](https://twitter.com/shegotproblems)
* Ryan Knighton on [IMDb](https://www.imdb.com/name/nm3716988/) and [Twitter](https://twitter.com/ryanknighton)
* Aline Brosh McKenna on [IMDb](https://www.imdb.com/name/nm0112459/?ref_=fn_al_nm_1) and on [Twitter](https://twitter.com/alinebmckenna)
* Rachel Bloom on [IMDb](https://www.imdb.com/name/nm3417385/?ref_=fn_al_nm_1) and on [Instagram](https://www.instagram.com/racheldoesstuff/?hl=en)
* John Gatins on [IMDb](https://www.imdb.com/name/nm0309691/?ref_=fn_al_nm_1)
* [Scriptnotes, Episode 362: The One with Mindy Kaling](https://johnaugust.com/2018/the-one-with-mindy-kaling)
* [Scriptnotes, Episode 368: Advice for a New Staff Writer](https://johnaugust.com/2018/advice-for-a-new-staff-writer)
* [Scriptnotes, Episode 350: Limerance](https://johnaugust.com/2018/limerence)
* One Thing You Should Read: [Most Hollywood Writers Look Nothing Like America](https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2021/10/the-unwritten-rules-of-black-tv/619816/) by Hannah Giorgis writing for The Atlantic
* [Get a Scriptnotes T-shirt!](https://cottonbureau.com/people/scriptnotes-podcast)
* [Gift a Scriptnotes Subscription](https://scriptnotes.supportingcast.fm/gifts) or [treat yourself to a premium subscription!](https://scriptnotes.supportingcast.fm/)
* [Craig Mazin](https://twitter.com/clmazin?lang=en) on Twitter
* [John August](https://twitter.com/johnaugust) on Twitter
* [John on Instagram](https://www.instagram.com/johnaugust/?hl=en)
* [Outro](http://johnaugust.com/2013/scriptnotes-the-outros) by Matthew Chilelli ([send us yours!](http://johnaugust.com/2014/outros-needed))
* Scriptnotes is produced by [Megana Rao](https://twitter.com/MeganaRao) and edited by [Matthew Chilelli](https://twitter.com/machelli).

Email us at ask@johnaugust.com

You can download the episode [here](http://traffic.libsyn.com/scriptnotes/517standard.mp3).

**UPDATE 9-22-21** Transcript for this episode can now be found [here](https://johnaugust.com/2021/scriptnotes-episode-517-smart-people-talking-about-tv-transcript).

The original post for this episode can be found [here](https://johnaugust.com/2021/ashley-is-back).

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

**Ashley Nicole Black:** I’m Craig Mazin.

**John:** And this is Episode 515 of Scriptnotes, a podcast about screenwriting and things that are interesting to screenwriters. Craig often does silly voices, but he could not do a voice that unique and brilliant. That is Ashley.

**Ashley:** I want someone to pause right there and be like wow Craig really perfected his woman voice.

**John:** We are listening to Ashley Nicole Black. We’re welcoming her back. She has two Emmy nominations in the same category for her work on the Black Lady Sketch Show and the Amber Ruffin Show. You might also recognize her name on a little program called Ted Lasso. Ashley Nicole Black, welcome back.

**Ashley:** Thanks for having me. A friend of mine was like congrats on the Emmy nominations or whatever, but I get really excited when you’re on Scriptnotes.

**John:** Well because you get to carry around Ashley Nicole Black in your ears, as you’re walking your dog, or as you’re washing your dishes.

**Ashley:** In the shower. Yeah.

**John:** But we can also of course see you on the Black Lady Sketch Show because you are one of the featured performers on that show. So I want to talk to you today about writing on that show knowing that you’re going to be performing on that show and what that’s like. I want to talk to you about the experience of joining Ted Lasso in the second season and figuring out how you find your place within a writer’s room that already exists. We have a lot of listener questions you can help us answer.

But mostly I want to respond or celebrate this best headline, we’ll put a link in the show notes, “Ashley Nicole Black, the double-nominated Emmy contender taking over TV comedy.”

**Ashley:** [laughs]

**John:** You are taking over TV comedy, which I think is just remarkable. Because you look at the people who have done that before, but Larry David step aside. Ashley Nicole Black.

**Ashley:** It’s so funny because all of this work was done during COVID over Zoom in my apartment. And I just can’t imagine taking over anything from that West Hollywood apartment.

**John:** You’re busy managing your very cute dog and making it work. But what’s it been like doing press and also doing publicity for award stuff? It would be great if you got awards, if you didn’t get awards it’s absolutely fine, too, but it’s also kind of work, right? Just doing all of this press?

**Ashley:** It’s so much work. It’s like exhausting. It just adds so much time to the schedule. And a thing that happens, and I hope this happens to everybody listening, when something like this happens there’s a lot of press and then also at the same time everybody wants to meet you. So you’re trying to juggle your schedule of putting all these press things on the schedule, putting all these meetings on the schedule, and trying to do good enough work to live up to how people are talking about you, which is quite hyperbolic. Look, I can’t be late on this outline. There’s so many articles about how good I am. [laughs]

**John:** And then you have John emailing you at the last minute saying, hey, could you feel in for Craig this week on Scriptnotes. And so thank you so much for squeezing us in here. The last time we spoke with you I think you came on for the YouTube thing we did where we were talking through the ballot initiatives and trying to fill out our California ballots. So thank you for that. But we’re in an election season again, because there’s a whole bunch of WGA stuff happening. So let’s quickly move through this.

You saw that Fran Drescher was elected as president of SAG-AFTRA.

**Ashley:** Yes, I voted for Fran.

**John:** Yeah. Exciting for that. What I love about SAG is you always recognize the people who are in these offices. It’s like, oh, it’s the Nanny. And she’s now running this organization.

**Ashley:** Yes. I have to really discipline myself to look up their platforms and not just vote for the actors whose work I like.

**John:** It was kind of a contentious election where people were threatening to sue each other for libel and stuff. And, no, we don’t need that. But congratulations to Fran Drescher. As we talked about on the show all the guilds and unions seem to have some common issues that we’re all going to be focused on in these next round of negotiations. So, it’s great to have somebody in there who is at least talking about those issues. It’s exciting.

**Ashley:** Yeah. Very much so.

**John:** We have the WGA West elections are under way. So probably next week we’ll talk through some of the candidates for that. But we have follow up on the WGA East. So last week on the episode we talked about the WGA East election and the issues involved. And several folks reached out on Twitter and they did what folks on Twitter do which is have opinions based on things they saw on Twitter, which is just great. It’s a perfect system and nothing should ever change.

But two clarifications. They’re not really corrections but clarifications based on things we said on last week’s episode. Important to understand that digital writers, like the ones who are working for some of the shops the East is now representing, they’re doing work that it is not covered by the AMPTP contract. So when we talk about working for the studios and the big negotiations that we do with the studios these digital writers are not working under that contract. And because they’re not under that contract they’re also not part of the WGA health plan. So they will have health insurance through their employers which is different and negotiated separately. So I want to make sure everyone understands that they’re doing their own contracts with their own individual employers. It’s different than the big contract that gets negotiated every three years.

And then there’s this other question which I didn’t really want to weigh in on but people kept asking about which is could digital writers outnumber the traditional writers in the East based on how quickly they’re signing up new shops? Would writers working under individual contracts rather than the big contract outnumber the traditional writers? And it comes down to this question of how soon is soon. Eventually if you move forward in time it looks like the trends would go that way, but soon is a hard thing to define.

So, I think that’s really what this election is about. How quickly do you want that change to happen and do you think you need to restructure the organization? And that seems to be what the two sides who are running the two different slates are really discussing. So I want to make that clear that I’m not saying that it’s going to happen next year, or five years from now, but overall it seems like this election is about what shape we want the union to be in five years, ten years down the road. So I want to clarify those two things.

**Ashley:** Yeah. I think also it’s about do we vote for these things or does staff them unilaterally? And I think that that’s something that applies to more than just this situation. But I know that union members, we’re all writers. We’re busy writing. We don’t necessarily know everything the union is doing. And it’s like what things are worth us voting on as a union and choosing to do and what things are things that like the union can just do and we’re not involved in choosing it.

**John:** Such a great point. Because so much of what unions do is sort of day to day organizing and keeping stuff going. And it’s not things you’d be voting on regularly. And so be it individual members voting in these big elections or boards meeting, there’s a lot of just daily work that unions and guilds are doing and really picking a direction for where you want them to go. And so the choices that members make now in this election will impact what you’re setting as the agenda for these organizations.

**Ashley:** Yeah. I also want to point out, and sorry I didn’t listen to your episode last week, so maybe this is redundant, but when this election started I was really excited about some of the candidates that were running, like Lauren Ashley Smith, Greg Iwinski, who are both comedy variety writers, because comedy variety is really more heavily represented in the East than in the West. Comedy variety writers make way less money and now are also seeing their residuals disappear, and I’m not even being hyperbolic. It’s nuts how quickly. I mean, a $20K check has turned into a $20 check and that’s not even an exaggeration. And also of course we know there are so many gains that need to be made for writers of color, for screenwriters, all of those writers who are just not the typical television writer.

And we sort of started the election talking about those things, like how do we make gains for comedy variety writers, how do we make sure they’re making enough for health insurance, how do we get rid of some of this free writing that screenwriters are doing. And now the discourse has completely moved away from that. And I do feel like that’s a pattern in our guild that like there are certain types of writers, and screenwriters have been saying this for years and years, I’m not saying anything new, that their issue always gets pushed to the side when it’s time to have the conversation. So I do hope that we get back to sort of talking about our writers who need help making health insurance during a pandemic and how we’re going to make that happen.

**John:** Yeah. You’re really emphasizing the importance of kitchen table issues. The things that are really making a difference in the paychecks coming home. And your ability to sustain a career in this business versus the structural housekeeping concerns which, yes, they’re important, they’re 20 years down the road problems. But they’re not helping a member right now. So it’s great that you’re really emphasizing that we have to focus on what members need right at this moment.

**Ashley:** Yeah.

**John:** Cool. Now Ashley I have a question for you, because I see you on Twitter, and your Twitter is fantastic and you’re funny and you make smart points. And I feel like your Twitter is better than my Twitter, but I don’t know that to be true, and maybe it’s that silent evidence. I’m not seeing all the really annoying people who are coming into your feed. But I want to talk to you about this practice that happened to me this past week which is someone replies to something and says like “care to comment @johnaugust?” Or they tag you into a conversation that you don’t feel like you want to be a part of, and yet you feel like ignoring that conversation is perilous, too, or that by not engaging you’re expressing apathy or that you don’t care.

I struggle with this. Do you have any guidance for me?

**Ashley:** Oh man. I think that’s so rude and I hate it. I think people should not do it. I think on Twitter if you’re talking about someone’s work or whatever I actually think that’s fine. Don’t at them. There’s no need for them to see that. If you want to tell your friends I didn’t like this movie, or whatever it is, you can do that without adding that person and making sure you hurt their feelings. And the thing that I think is even worse than that is when someone has done that, politely said I don’t like this movie, I don’t like this song, whatever it is, and then someone comes along and is like let me start a fight between the two of you by tagging someone. I don’t understand what your goal is. Presumably you’re following one of those people. You want to make them have a bad day. It’s just bad practice. Don’t do it.

The version of that that I get a lot is I’ll tweet my political opinions quite often and people will take my tweet and quote tweet it into the thread of a republican politician or like some white supremacist radio host or whatever. And I’m like first of all you would have to be delusional to think that someone who has lived their entire life as a conservative, has gotten elected to office as one, is going to read my tweet and be like “I rethink it all.” In what world? So all you’re doing is bringing me to the attention of the people who love to swarm and send mean tweets to people.

So what I have done is multiple times I have tweeted don’t do this, please don’t do it, I don’t like it, and explain why. And now having done that I feel really confident just blocking people because I put work into curating a really positive feed and I have really positive interactions with my followers. I mean, part of that is because most people come to me because of the shows I’ve been on, and all of those shows are really positive and fun and loving, so it’s like cool, chill people. And if you bring negativity into that space I don’t feel bad blocking people for that.

**John:** So help me out here, because I go through periods where I will mute people who are just so annoying to me, but I don’t know if muting is the right approach or blocking, because I feel blocking is a more assertive action that they know that you have actually blocked them. Talk me through some philosophies on muting and blocking. Because it seems like blocking makes so much sense when you’re being quoted into somebody else, because that’s a way to stop them from doing that. But give me some guidance here. I’d love it.

**Ashley:** I tend to mute people who are just annoying but they’re not hurting anybody. They’re not necessarily doing anything wrong, it’s just I feel annoyance from looking at your tweets and I can stop myself from having that feeling by muting you. But there’s nothing wrong with you. You aren’t doing anything wrong. And blocking is like you’re actively doing something that is going to bring negativity my way or even sometimes when I see people being negative to other people. There are certain accounts that just spend all day being mean to fat people on Twitter. And you don’t even have to do it to me. If I saw that you did it to someone else, blocked. Because it’s just like why? Why is this how you’re spending your time? Please go outside and take a walk and enjoy your life.

**John:** That seems like good advice. So what I’m taking from this is mute the people who are just annoying to you. Block the people who are actively doing bad in the world.

**Ashley:** Yeah.

**John:** Great. I will take your advice and I’m going to move forward on that front. So thank you very much for that.

Next bit of follow up. So last week we had a guy named Ghosted who was really screwed over by these two WGA writers and Lance wrote in to say, “I’m a WGA member and in my experience the producers who have asked for the most free work have been WGA writers turned producers. On one particular project I did eight unpaid rewrites for an Oscar-nominated former WGA board member. The WGA talks a lot about producers who take advantage of writers, but I’ve never heard a conversation about WGA members taking advantage of other WGA writers. The WGA needs to have this conversation. There needs to be more internal accountability to have any credibility with non-writing producers.”

Oof. Yeah. And as I read this I can think of some writers turned producers who might have expectations that are not good or realistic, or might sort of have unhealthy numbers of rewrites and things that they’re asking for. Have you had this experience where you feel like sometimes WGA writers can be kind of crappy to other writers?

**Ashley:** Not in this context. This actually really shocks me that any writer would ask someone for unpaid rewrites because we all – well, I guess we didn’t all – I struggled on the way up. Some people maybe didn’t. But we all know what it means to need to pay the bills. But definitely I know a lot of writers have experienced, you know, bad experiences with showrunners, abusive behavior, stuff like that. And those people are our fellow writers. And it does make it hard to get redress sometimes because we’re in the same union, so it’s like who do you go to?

If you have a problem with a studio, if you’re not getting paid by a studio or a network you can go to the union and say they didn’t pay me, but when it’s another writer who is also in that union it is a problem that there’s kind of nowhere to go.

**John:** Yeah. On features there’s been one experience where I was a producer who was not writing on a project and the reason why there’s only been one of those experiences is because I didn’t love it. And I definitely knew how to talk to the writer and what I was looking for, but it was like being a pilot and not being allowed to touch the controls. I was trying to describe where I thought we needed to go, and if I could have just rewritten it myself I would have rewritten it myself. And to some degree I wonder if these WGA writers who are being dicks about other people’s writing is that they kind – they want to have the total control. They want to actually just be able to rewrite it, but they don’t actually want to do the work to rewrite it. So instead they’re just noting a person to death, or trying to get this other writer to write the way that they would write it. And that’s not healthy or good. That’s not how it needs to work. So that’s why you need to have contracts that you can actually enforce and you need to have – everyone needs to actually understand and remember that this writer who is doing this work for you is truly a writer and is truly trying to deliver their best work and you have to respect them for that and not ask for unrealistic free work out of them.

**Ashley:** Yeah. You’ve done this way more than me, so I wonder – ideally you would have a contract before you started writing, but between two writers I could see where you end up in a situation where you didn’t, be it felt rude to ask or whatever. But you should ask, right?

**John:** Yeah. In the Ghosted example there was a contract, but they were just ignoring the contract and asking for crazy, crazy stuff. But that sort of pre-contract stuff can be a problem where it’s like, oh, this is the WGA, the experienced writer is going to be overseeing this project, and here’s the newer writer who is going to be actually doing it. And in getting ready for the pitch the experienced writer might be asking for endless changes and dragging on, and on, and on before there’s actually a project being set up. That’s where I see some of the worst of this behavior because it’s not even really – it’s done sometimes with good intentions, like I really want this thing to get set up and so therefore I’m going to keep asking and keep asking and keep asking to refine this thing. But you always have to remember that you were once that writer who was doing the 19th version of this pitch document and that’s work that you’re not being able to do that’s actually paid.

So it’s remembering that. And I don’t know how the WGA enforces this any better other than just really establishing best practices for this is what free work is and this is why it’s a problem and how we stop it.

**Ashley:** Yeah.

**John:** So let’s move to happier topics which is you got started, I know you did late night and comedy variety writing, but I really want to talk about sketches and sketches you’re doing for Black Lady Sketch Show because you are a writer on the show but you’re also a performer on the show. You are so funny on the show. And I imagine that some of the stuff that you’ve been funniest in have been sketches that you yourself created. And in writing in it you’re just sort of writing for yourself, but you also know who the other cast members are. So, at what point in coming up with each sketch do you have a sense of like OK I’m this character and everybody else is this character? How is the pitching process working for the sketches?

Can you talk me through a given sketch on your show how it comes to be and how you come to write it?

**Ashley:** Sure. Actually on this show which I think is unique in this way 90, 95% of sketches we don’t know who the cast is and we’re literally just pitching. I mean, obviously we know who our cast is, but it’s not cast. And we don’t write for, like the celebrities that come on, we don’t write specifically for them. So you’re really just pitching what you think would be the funniest idea or most relevant to what’s going on in society, whatever your sketch idea is. And it gets cast way down the line long after the writers are done with the process.

Very occasionally I will pitch sketches that are specifically for myself. And most of those are things that truly only I could play. Like the Invisible Spy is so much about what my body looks like that nobody else could play that part, except for Nicole Byer who plays my doppelgänger in the sketch.

**John:** Nemesis and sort of compatriot there. So for people who don’t know the conceit of this character is essentially you are a secret agent who is so good because everyone just ignores you. People don’t even notice that you’re there and so therefore you can do these secret things.

**Ashley:** Yeah. And that was really based on my real life experience. I’m the person who – it was so funny, I had forgotten this and just remembered recently, Gabrielle who is on the show and I were on a plane together. And the flight attendant reaches over me to hand Gabrielle a drink and forgets to ask me. It’s just like, oh my god, it just happened. It happens all the time. I am just invisible. And so you can take that negatively, but I just decided this is my super power. I could get away with anything. If I wanted to shoplift no one would ever stop me. And so, yeah, that was one that I wrote for myself because it is me.

But most of them it’s just like what is a funny thing and it’ll get cast later.

**John:** Focusing on Invisible Spy. So you have this conceit. What is the pitching process for this? For the first season you were probably in a real room, but do you come in with the whole concept, or here’s the one line and you’re working on as a room? What was that like?

**Ashley:** Ideally you come in with a whole concept. A beginning, middle, and an end. And sometimes I do. Sometimes sketches come to me in that way and I know what the whole sketch is going to be. But we have to pitch – basically on that show you come in in the morning and you pitch until you get a yes. So you could end up racing through ten ideas in one day if your first nine are nos. So by the time you get to that fifth or sixth idea that you maybe weren’t planning on pitching yet sometimes you do just have a beginning. And that room is so good at jumping in and helping you flesh out your idea. What if this happens? And what if that happens? And some of the things that people love the most in sketches I’ve written were additions from other people, because their brain just works differently from mine. But then you also have to kind of be solid and know that just because that suggestion is funny does it actually fit in this sketch? And so for me I try not to pitch anything until I know what I’m trying to say.

Because if you pitch an idea that’s just funny it’s very easy for it to get off track and kind of be unset Jell-O. But if you have a funny idea and you know what you’re trying to say about the world, or what you’re referencing, then when people are throwing in other ideas it’s easier to say yes to that one, no to that one, because I have a thesis in mind.

**John:** So something like this sketch you’ve pitched it, the room has responded positively, what are you first handing in? And at what point do you know which episode that will go into? Because right now it’s just existing as a free-floating sketch. It’s not tethered into anything else in an episode. So when do you know that it’s like, OK, this is a thing we’re shooting. I’ll be playing the central character. When does it get crystalized as that form?

**Ashley:** So we write a first draft of the sketch to like a whole sketch, and then usually you get notes, you may write it again, the whole room contributes to it. But then because this is an HBO show, it’s not like SNL, the writers are gone. So if I was just a writer I would never know what episode it was in until I watched it on television.

**John:** Oh wow.

**Ashley:** But as an actor we get a huge packet of all the sketches and we kind of audition for all the sketches and sometimes you hear someone else read and you’re like I’m not reading this. That’s her part. Let’s move on. And then we just shoot them all. So we don’t know how they’re going to put the episodes together. The only time we would see a sneak peek is if we did ADR and they try to avoid even doing ADR. So we truly don’t know what it is until we watch it on TV.

**John:** So talk about alts. Because clearly in some of these situations you might think of other stuff along the way. Are alts part of the initial sketch packet? Like here’s alternate lines for alternate jokes, or alternate ways out of this sketch. Is that already part of it, or is that work that’s done on the set while you’re shooting?

**Ashley:** Mostly on set. And then we always try to leave room to do an improv run. And a lot of times that’s where the best stuff comes from.

**John:** Now, contrast that to the work you’re doing on the Amber Ruffin Show, things like her great monologues on how did we get here. That’s incredibly tightly written. I mean, it clearly is an essay before it goes into it. But is there a room working on that? Or is it really one person, one pitch, one idea? How does something like that come together?

**Ashley:** So, this is a little strange because I only worked on that show during Covid. And I was in LA and that show is produced in New York. So there was a room, but I wasn’t in it. So the room would meet on Zoom. I get to do that. I was writing all alone in my apartment. So I would basically take a piece from beginning to end because I was writing them alone and just sending them in. And then same thing. See it on TV. You see what jokes they replaced and it’s a lovely surprise.

**John:** OK, so that was really just you were a freelance writer slipping something under the door and you sort of see what happens.

**Ashley:** Yeah.

**John:** Wow. So it’s such a different experience. But talk to me about the experience of writing one of those pieces because it has to have a central thesis, a central theme, and it still has to be joke dense the whole time through. And are you thinking about what visuals go with it? If I were to read one of the things you submitted what would it look like? Is it just a column of text for Amber to be speaking or is it intercut with these are the visuals, this is the change, this is tone? What does that look like for a monologue like that?

**Ashley:** So, I still kind of work in the Full Frontal style, because that’s how I learned how to do it?

**John:** Full Frontal is the Samantha Bee Show you worked on, right?

**Ashley:** Yeah. You should clarify with that title. I still write without pants on.

So I usually start with a thesis statement or a hypothesis, something I think to be true, and then do a ton of research and make sure that it is true. And it is basically like writing an essay. Making an argument. Amber is very much an advocate for the way things should be more so than a complainer about the way things are. So it’s sort of like my thesis statement of like this is what’s happening and then me sort of projecting myself as Amber what should happen. Supporting that with research. And writing basically an essay, writing my way through it.

And we do pitch the graphics. I am not the best graphics pitcher. So I do put them in my script, but I know most of those are going to get replaced I am actually not the best visual thinker. But you do break up your text with where the graphics would be and what the jokes are. And the benefit to that is when you look at the full page you can really see how much room is between jokes because the graphics stand out so much. And you really try to do at least three, three to five jokes per page, and it’s very visually apparent where there’s a joke missing.

And if that’s the case I will put a joke there. I will shoehorn a joke because those pieces are so dense and sometimes they’re about such tough topics. You just have to have jokes to get through it. And so sometimes you’re like joking off of one word that was in the sentence before just because it’s time for a joke, no matter how hard it is to squeeze one in.

**John:** And to clarify when you’re say you’re breaking up the page to show the graphics, you’re just putting a description of the graphics? You’re not actually responsible for the Photoshopping of this is what the graphics would look like?

**Ashley:** Oh no, no.

**John:** So a whole other team does that. But I do find it interesting, if you even look at the progression of monologue desk bits from early on to where we are right now, and probably SNL was important to this, but you look at John Oliver, you look at Samantha Bee, and The Daily Show, the idea of we’re going to get a laugh right when that next graphic comes up, and it’s so prevalent now and you’re expecting that next graphic to always provide a punchline, to throw out a joke, or to set up that next thing.

And understanding the tension between OK these are the words but this is the graphic and the next pop has to be so different and it’s challenging to write because you don’t quite know what that next graphic is going to look like.

**Ashley:** Well you’re telling them what you want it to look like. And also the Full Frontal team, the graphics team, are also comedians, so they make the graphics really funny. And you also have the opportunity to go back and say, no, not that, do this.

But a lot of times it’s also clips, like news clips, and you’re writing the joke off the clip, so at Full Frontal they have a huge research team and they’ll send you a document of like 50 clips and you can pick one that has something you can make fun of, even if it’s like I’m going to make fun of the newscaster’s pony tail or whatever, just to get a joke off of something in this clip.

**John:** Great. So it’s almost like [unintelligible] you need something to plant your foot against so you can push up and get over that next little wall, that next point you’re actually trying to make. How challenging is it sometimes to remember that you’re trying to sell an argument and not just have it be joke-joke-joke? Because that would also be one of the problems I could imagine is that something could be so funny that you’re actually losing the thread. Does that happen?

**Ashley:** This is not a problem that I have because I started out as an academic and became a comedian. But I think it can be a problem that staffs have as a whole. And there usually is one person, either the head writer, or the writing supervisor who gets all of these jokes and then unfortunately sometimes has to reject some of them to make a point.

**John:** Great. Now so that’s writing for one performer, but you also got a chance this last season, since we last spoke with you I don’t think we even knew you were working on the second season of Ted Lasso. So can you talk to us about coming into a show in its second season? I think you were probably only in a virtual room? You never saw any of these people until the season had shot if I’m recalling correctly. So talk to us about the transition to coming into a real scripted normal show in its second season that was so successful and yet so delicate. What was that like? And what was the call for you to get in and work on the show?

**Ashley:** This is actually the second show – I also joined Bless This Mess in the second season. So I’m like a second season expert now.

**John:** Yeah.

**Ashley:** And it was actually pretty easy both times. I mean, with Ted Lasso there was that extra hiccup of it being Zoom. But the staff was just so cool and so friendly and inviting that whatever social nerves I had were released immediately. And the cool thing about being the only writer who joins, which I had that experience both times, is you’re the only person who only knows what the audience knows.

So in that beginning awkward period where you’re trying to figure out, OK, they added me to this room so they felt that they needed something. What is that thing? What’s the thing that I can provide? It takes maybe a couple weeks to figure that out. But in the interim the thing that you can provide is they have all of these memories of all these things they talked about or thought about doing or shot that didn’t make it in the show, and you only know what made it in the show. And it can actually be really helpful to be like, oh no, he said this. And I would find that I sometimes have a better memory for those things than them because I don’t remember all the things behind it.

**John:** Yeah. I can imagine if you were to enter The Good Place in the second season or middle of the first season and you didn’t sort of know the central conceit or where stuff was going it would be helpful in some ways because you just have that audience’s perspective and you’re just looking at it as a fan. And you’re going into it and sort of seeing like oh this is what I believe the thing is. And I don’t want to get into any spoilers of Ted Lasso, but we’re recording this as we’re midway through the second season. And it’s very clear that stuff is being set up for the second half of the season that probably was already a plan from the first season. But the rest of the people in that room knew that and you didn’t know that and that’s probably good for you and for them.

**Ashley:** Yeah. And the ability to be like as someone who didn’t know the plan this is what I thought when I watched that episode. This is where I thought this character was headed or what they were saying. And it’s not always exactly the same as what the writers were intending. So, it is helpful to have that kind of outside perspective.

**John:** What are hours like in a Zoom room for something like Ted Lasso? Traditionally a writer’s room could be eight hours a day. Were the Zoom rooms that kind of long schedule?

**Ashley:** Not quite. This was also at the beginning of the pandemic when everyone was getting used to Zoom and it was like Zoom is exhausting. I think we’ve gotten more used to it now. But we did work shorter hours definitely in the beginning. But also you don’t have any getting up and going to the kitchen and less small talk and stuff. So we actually got a lot done. But they weren’t very long.

**John:** And classically a room that’s getting together first you’re starting off talking about some blue sky, some goals for the second season of what you’re trying to do. And then start to break in generally looking at characters, figuring out what could fall in what episodes. How quickly did it come to a point where it’s like, OK, Ashley, you go off and write this episode. What was the process of getting you to OK now you go off and do this draft?

**Ashley:** Bill and Jason are really generous and some showrunners are not this way, but they will allow you to sort of be like I like this one, you know, if it’s possible. And one of the characters in my episode, which was Episode 3, is based on someone that Jason and I know both know. And so I asked for that episode so that I could write that character. But typically as joining in a second season I would never be so presumptuous as to ask for the third episode. But that one was like a particular case.

**John:** Because you brought it up, writing based on somebody that you both know a lot of people are listening and are like oh I didn’t know I could do that, or is it dangerous to write based on somebody you know. So what was it about that person who you knew that lent themselves to a character? What was it about them that you say like, oh, that’s the kind of character we should have in this episode?

**Ashley:** In season one they just talk about Nora but we never meet her. So in season two we knew Nora was going to come for a visit. And I wanted to write that character because Nora was like this really just like super smart, sassy, politically connected teenage girl. And I wanted to make sure to create a teenage girl who wasn’t the typical. Sometimes I think adult writers can be a little bit dismissive in how they write teenagers. I wanted to write a character who was like such a cool chick. And so I really wanted that episode so I could establish her way of speaking and how smart and cool she was.

**John:** Well that sounds amazing. And as luck would have it we have listener questions and the first one feels very much up your alley for the experience that only you would have. So Megana if you could help us out with Ben’s question.

**Megana Rao:** Ben from New York wrote in and said, “I’m currently working on a pilot that heavily involves basketball. And I’m having trouble making the gameplay comprehensible in the action lines. Most of my peers who have given me feedback don’t follow the sport that much, but they all say it’s hard to understand. I’m trying to find the right balance between making the action lines succinct and not alienating potential readers. A couple of terms that were pointed to were devastating dunk, which I assumed most people knew, and top of the key which is a spot on the court with no general term. I read some scripts of sports movies and shows and they all have terms you would only know if you’re at least somewhat familiar with the sport. Should I simply disregard whether or not the reader understands the game and just make story beats clear?”

**John:** Ashley, let’s help Ben out here. Because obviously you came into this and you were already an expert on soccer/football?

**Ashley:** That’s why I’m laughing. The idea that now I’m like a good sports person is hilarious. I did play soccer as an eight-year-old as is required by law in the suburbs of Southern California. The funny thing is both of those terms that he said I know and I am not a sport person at all, so I don’t think they’re that confusing.

**John:** I didn’t know top of the key at all. Devastating dunk I can just figure out what that is. I know what a dunk is. A devastating dunk, sure. Top of the key? I wouldn’t know what that is.

**Ashley:** That’s a place that you shoot from. But I think in Ted Lasso every time we’re showing sports it is to move story forward. I think of it the same way I think about writing action and stunts. Which is if you know a lot about the sport or if you happen to be a great jujitsu person or whatever you could describe every beat of the fight, like she punches him, he punches back, she jumps on top of him. But you could also say they fight, it looks like she has the upper hand, but then he turns it on her. And allow the stunt coordinator to figure out what that physically looks like.

I think it’s the same thing with sports. If it’s about, you know, in my episode a lot of the times that we showed sports it was about Sam and Jamie, where Sam and Jamie were in their relationship. And so I think I spent more time describing that than who kicks the ball or where it goes or whatever. It’s like Sam is playing aggressively. Sam gets the upper hand. And there’s someone on set in London who I have never met who will turn that into soccer.

**John:** Yeah. I think the analogy to action sequences is exactly right. Because we don’t count every bullet being shot. You don’t ever turn of the wheel in a car chase. You’re really describing what it feels like. And I’ve read sports movies that really go way overboard in terms of like every swing of the bat. And that’s just not interesting or good.

Really what we’re going to be tracking is characters’ reactions to what’s happening. And so it’s what the folks on the sidelines are doing. It’s what the players are doing. It’s how they’re reacting and it’s really what’s changed is the thing that’s probably most important to note. And, yes, we keep talking about how detail is important and specificity is important, but it’s really specificity of characters and intentions and motivations and why they’re doing what they’re doing is much more important than literally the choreography on the day.

Think about it like writing a dance sequence or writing a fight sequence. You need that level of clarity in terms of what we’re seeing what we’re seeing, but not exactly what those beats are.

**Ashley:** Exactly.

**John:** Megana, what else you got for us?

**Megana:** Objectified wrote in and she says, “I work as a writer’s PA at a wonderful, supportive writer’s room. As part of my job I’ve been able to proofread a lot of scripts. While doing this I’ve noticed a trend among the scripts written by older male writers. When they introduced female characters they always describe them by their level of attractiveness. Example: Susan, 30, sexy. Molly, 20s, pretty. Et cetera. Male characters are hardly ever described by their appearances unless they pertain to the story. I was struck by how reading these scripts have made me feel anxious about these writer’s perspectives of me. I’m a woman in my 20s and I can’t help but wonder am I instinctively rated by my level of attractiveness to them? Am I seen as three-dimensional as the male assistants I work with?”

**John:** Oy, OK. Ashley, let’s talk about this, because it’s really a two-step problem. One it’s sexist, misogynist writing on the page. But also the question of like, wait, are they actually seeing me this way. So I’m not sure where to start there.

**Ashley:** I do love that she framed it as like it’s not just about on the page but how it is in the room. I think especially for an assistant, but I’ll say also a writer there’s been times in the room where people have talked about – they’re like, oh, and then this guy comes in and he’s like a fat slob and he says this line. And I’m like why does he have to be a fat slob? But then also as a fat person I don’t want to be the one who says maybe we shouldn’t talk about people’s bodies that way. And it is a level of discomfort brought into the room for no reason. Because you didn’t need to say that character was fat to tell the funny line they’re going to say.

So I do think it’s something for people to think about. The people who are in the room with you are people. [laughs] If they share characteristics with the people you’re talking about that may have an effect on them. But I think in the script I will say as a writer-performer this is one of my biggest pet peeves. It’s like enraging and I’ve chosen not to audition for things because of things like this. As an actor – and I studied to be an actor. I didn’t really study to be a writer, so I’m curious how people who did are taught this. But as an actor we’re taught that those action lines are things for you to play. So if I’m reading a script to audition or to perform and it says “Ashley, 30s, really smart, really witty, loves to do karate,” then that tells me as an actor OK these lines are probably I should be saying them in a joking manner. Maybe I should move differently because this character does karate and her body is trained. You know, whatever, it’s something for me to do.

If I read a script and it says “Ashley, 30s, super-hot” there’s no way for me to do that. I’m going to have whatever body I have when I show up. It’s either hot or it’s not. There’s nothing I can do to play hot. If what you mean is that the other characters are attracted to her that’s useful information for them and you could say “Ashley enters the room. Kevin immediately thinks she’s hot.” That’s something for him to play. But it does nothing – you give an actor nothing when all you tell them is what they look like.

Like I’m imagining, let’s say the character is a waiter. And it’s like, “Kelly, super-hot,” and the first line is, “What can I get you today?” I as an actor just have to figure out how to say that. Whereas if you had described Kelly, “she is exhausted, he hates working here,” and the first line is, “What can I get you today,” I now know how to say that line. And it’s so frustrating when you’re auditioning when the script is giving you no clues about who the person is other than what they look like. And then you have to do an audition and it’s like well how could I possibly get the part because I don’t know what you want from you.

**John:** Yes. So I think Kelly our waitress, maybe she could be like – I’d like to see an audition where she’s just performatively hot. Like basically is she just trying to act hot? So she’s sweating, or she is fanning herself a lot, like she’s going through a hot flash. Or she’s taking hot as being one of those like she’s vain and she’s always pursing her lips or trying to do hot things while trying to take the order. That’s at least funny. It’s actually trying to play the line there.

So, yeah, let’s get rid of – again, specificity is great. So if you could talk to us about hair, makeup, clothing, the things that we actually can see that could impact character but could also change our read on who that character is, that’s awesome. But just what their body looks like is not going to be one of those things. That’s not going to give the actor anything to do. It’s not going to give any other department anything to do other than the casting department says I have to make some objective choice about is this person conventionally attractive enough or heavy enough or whatever the criteria that was listed in that script.

**Ashley:** And PS you can email the casting department. Like you don’t have to put that in the script. If you want a fat slob to play this part, email the casting director privately and say, hey, you know, Roy who I said is a funny guy in a wife-beater t-shirt, he should be an overweight guy. And they’ll call those guys in. There’s no need to insult that actor by putting it in the script.

**John:** You can sort of say this is the thing we’re looking for in this character, but it doesn’t have to be on the page there because it’s not helping the performer. It’s not helping the cast. And it’s not good.

So we’ve addressed some of the script concerns. Let’s talk to what Objectified might do in this situation they find themselves where they see this happening in the room and they wonder like, oh crap, is that how they actually see me in this space. What advice can we give her? I think we’re saying Objectified is a woman. What might be a best practice? My instinct would be it’s not her responsibility to stand up in the room and say this is gross and sexist, you need to stop doing that. But it may be a good choice to pull aside some senior person in that room at some moment and say like, hey, just so you know this is a thing that can make me and other people uncomfortable. And if you or somebody else could acknowledge that and sort of address it I think the room would be a better place.

Do you think that would help or work, or is that a bad idea?

**Ashley:** I think if she is to do anything that’s probably the best idea is to pull aside a senior person who you’ve already determined may be amenable to this based on other conversations. Choose the right person. And if that person doesn’t exist it may actually be safer to keep your mouth shut. Like in the position of being an assistant, this is why I think writers it’s so incumbent on us to behave as well as we know to behave because it’s so hard and so dangerous for assistants to speak up that I don’t want to even advise someone to speak up not knowing the situation they’re in, because it could go badly. But if you’re in a situation where you know one of the EPs is a feminist and has already talked about certain things in the room and you know that they’re going to be on your side, then yes, pulling that one person aside is a good idea. And letting them be the one to feel out the room and decide if this is something that they could address publically or talk privately to the writers that need to hear it.

**John:** Cool. Megana, what else have you got for us?

**Megana:** Sammy asks, “Hi, I know nothing about unions or strikes, but this idea makes sense to me and I need to get the idea out of my head so I’m sending it over. Have the writers working for the top streamers strike while allowing everyone else to continue working. Leverage the competitive power of the companies still producing content and gaining ground in the streaming war as the top companies’ subscriber base atrophies, while limiting the strike’s impact on guild members. Then you work your way down the ladder till everyone agrees to terms. If this is legal shouldn’t it be more effective than a full on guild strike?”

**John:** All right. So, again, here’s where I stress that I am not a union legal expert, so I cannot be offering advice on sort of like–

**Ashley:** You are my union expert, John!

**John:** But I can’t offer federal guidance on how union labor law works. But in some ways what Sammy is suggesting is kind of what happens with the companies and the guilds right now. Because the companies, the AMPTP decides we’re going to make a deal first with SAG, and then we’re going to make a deal with WGA, and then we’re going to make a deal with DGA. They’re going to find ways to tackle this one by one. And Sammy is asking couldn’t you just do the same thing with the companies. It’s also analogous to ultimately the agency conflict was resolved one agency at a time rather than dealing with the ATA, that whole big agency representing body as one thing.

The challenge is that there’s not a lot of incentive for those companies to split off and sort of do things separately because they recognize the guilds would love that but doesn’t behoove them to do that, unless it really were to behoove them to do that, in which case if you had one company that was especially worried about this you could make a deal with one separately.

What I’m pretty sure you can’t do under federal law is to say like, OK, we’re going to make deals with everybody except for this one company just to spit them. Because what would actually happen is I think the other companies would circle their wagons and say no you cannot do that and then they’d just lock us out. So basically you’d get to a situation where you’re in a strike because the companies have locked the writers out.

All this being said, there are new players that sort of come into the production universe. And so if Nabisco suddenly decided we’re going to start our own streaming network and they were not already a party to the AMPTP we could make a deal with Nabisco separately and we could all work for the Nabisco streamer while the other companies were stewing. But I think it’s more likely that we would make a deal with one company than keep a deal going with everybody else and shut out one company, because I just don’t think that’s actually possible right now with how things are structured. That’s my guess.

**Ashley:** The only one I think it might be, and correct me if I’m wrong, Netflix has a different contract, right?

**John:** Netflix has had a different contract, I’m not honestly sure where they are at right now. So, and Netflix is a great giant company. So something like a Netflix or someone else coming online later on, yes, that would be something that would make sense. But to make a deal with them separately rather than trying to shut out one place, because that’s not going to happen. We couldn’t say like we’ll work for everybody but Disney is unlikely I think to succeed. But then again I’m not a legal expert.

I get why Sammy is suggesting it though because it would make so much more sense to be able to set one aside and work for the other ones.

**Ashley:** Especially if one is exceptionally egregious. My read though as a lay person is that they’re all pretty much the same. But if one suddenly became the worst place to work I could see that happening.

**John:** And here’s the other exception. There are times where companies will receive a do not work order, where they’re actually doing bad stuff to our members, where we can be prohibited from working for a certain company. But that’s a different thing than what Sammy is really describing here.

But I think Sammy is anticipating what we are all anticipating is that this next round of negotiations is going to be important because we are going to be talking about the future of residuals and payment for these streamers which affects every single writer working. Because whether you’re a comedy variety writer, a screenwriter, a television writer, we’re all dealing with the same struggle which is what does our payment and residual structure look like in a world where there are not conventional networks anymore, where there’s not conventional theatrical releases, where there are comedy variety shows that are being made for these streamer outlets. What does that mean if we can’t even know what the residual value is of these programs?

So that’s going to be a thing that every writer and every other union member is going to be looking at in this next period of time.

**Ashley:** Yeah. And I think we’re already all feeling it in our bottom lines, so it’s going to be at a fever pitch by the time we get to the negotiation.

**John:** I think so too. These were great questions. Megana thank you for being our mailbox as all these questions come in over the transom.

**Megana:** Of course, thank you both.

**John:** All right. It’s time for our One Cool Things. My One Cool Thing is a new book by Simon Rich. Have you read any Simon Rich books?

**Ashley:** No, I’m a philistine.

**John:** Oh my god, I’m so excited for you because you have so much funny reading ahead of you. The new book is called New Teeth. Simon Rich is a short story writer, but he’s also a screenwriter. The new book is really good. The first story in it is a detective story but the central character is a toddler, like a pre-toddler, who is trying to solve this mystery.

**Ashley:** I’m in.

**John:** What Simon Rich does so brilliantly is take this absurd premise and really run with it within this carefully contained bubble. Something you may have seen, did you see American Pickle, the Seth Rogan movie where he falls in a pickle vat and he meets his grandfather who fell in a pickle vat. And that was based on a Simon Rich story. He takes these really absurd premises and just really runs with them. So, I recommend New Teeth, but if you haven’t read anything, Ashley, the thing I’m going to – there’s a link here in the show notes, I’m going to send it to you – is a short story called Gifted which is the first Simon Rich story I ever read which I still think is the funniest. I reread it this past week. The premise is this Upper West Side couple have a baby who is clearly a monster, like the antichrist, and they’re so excited and they really want to get him into Dalton. And it’s from the perspective of these parents who are – this mom who is so excited for her child and how much she will overlook everything.

I will send you Gifted. It will delight you. It’ll be fun for you this afternoon.

**Ashley:** That sounds awesome.

**John:** Ashley, what do you have for us for One Cool Things?

**Ashley:** So I have one serious one and then one [unintelligible]. A is For is an organization that I’m on the board for and we fight abortion stigma and raise money for abortion providers. And what’s call about it is A is For has done all the research for you. So if you go to their website and find a provider to donate to directly, maybe in Texas if that’s on your mind, that is a provider who you know has been doing the work for the while and knows what they’re doing. They’re not a popup, fly by night. So that’s a very cool organization to follow on social and they’ll always be keeping you up with what’s going on in the reproductive justice arena.

And then just something fun is there is this company called Estelle Colored Glass and it’s a Black woman who makes this gorgeous wine glasses and decanters and cake plates, just beautiful colored glass that will remind you of what was in your grandmother’s curio cabinet. And it’s just so pretty and if you just need a little treat you could buy yourself a pink wine glass.

**John:** So I’m looking at this website and they are absolutely gorgeous. And I have my eye on this purple glass cake stand. And how amazing would that be to have it in your house. I feel like I would want to make a white cake to stick on it at all times, because otherwise it’s just sitting empty. But these are truly gorgeous so I’m loving that.

But going back to A is For, for folks who are not looking through the show notes links, it’s AisFor.org. And what I love about this recommendation is I’ve seen all of these donate here to help support abortion rights in Texas especially, and I don’t know which of those organizations are real and which ones have just cropped up this last week. And so you guys have done the work to actually see which of these places are doing the work on the ground.

**Ashley:** Yeah. To the point where when we did a fundraiser the providers are there at the fundraiser, like I shook the man’s hand. Like I know that he’s real.

**John:** That’s great. This past week I also shared a blog post I’d done a few years back about my family’s abortion story. And I think one of the things that this horrible Texas law has reminded us is that abortion rights really do affect everybody. And obviously a woman facing the decision about her own body is paramount, but the ability to have safe and legal abortions is something that really does tough everybody.

And so I shared the story of how that impacted my family a few years back. So I really hope that whatever happens in this near time in Texas, remember how important it is for everybody to have this right.

**Ashley:** Everyone deserves the right to determine what their life is going to look like. And it’s the only way women can fully participate in society is if we get to decide what we’re doing with our healthcare and our reproductive care.

**John:** Excellent. That is our show for this week. So in our bonus segment we’re going to be talking about the crisis facing white male characters, so stick around for that. We really appreciate our premium members because they help keep the lights on and keep everybody paid.

Scriptnotes is produced by Megana Rao. It is edited by Matthew Chilelli. Our outro this week is by Zach Lo and it is a bop. If you have an outro you can send us a link to ask@johnaugust.com. That’s also the place where you can send longer questions. For short questions on Twitter I am @johnaugust. Ashley you are?

**Ashley:** @ashleyn1cole. Very late adopter.

**John:** Oh, but it’s great. And be cool or else we will mute or block you, because I have learned how to do this thanks to Ashley’s guidance here.

You can find the show notes for this episode and all episodes at johnaugust.com. That’s where you’ll find the links to things we talked about on the show. We’ll have transcripts up about a week after the show airs. We have a weekly newsletter called Inneresting which has lots of links to things about writing.

We have t-shirts and they’re great. You can find them at Cotton Bureau. And you can also sign up to become a premium member at Scriptnotes.net where you get all the back episodes and bonus segments like the one we’re about to record about white male characters and whatever will happen to them in the future of television.

Ashley, thank you so much for coming back. It is so great to talk with you and catch up and hear more about all the amazing stuff you’ve done this past year.

**Ashley:** Thanks so much for having me.

[Bonus segment]

**John:** So our jumping off place for this bonus segment is an article called TV’s White Guys are in Crisis. It’s in Vulture. Written by Kathryn Vanarendonk. And it’s looking at sort of the latest slate of premium shows and shows that people are talking about which have white male characters, but those white male characters are not the centerpieces, or they are being pushed to the sides, or they are frustrated by being pushed to the sides. And Ted Lasso is brought up in this so I thought Ashley would be a perfect person to talk about this with. Ashley, what are we going to do? How are we going to save these white men?

**Ashley:** [laughs] First of all, I think they’re doing fine. It’s really interesting because I feel like for such a long time of television history shows sort of revolved around one type of character. And it’s been like two years of a slight shift in that and people are like oh my god.

**John:** Oh my gosh. Everything has changed.

**Ashley:** You owe me a hundred years of weird black girls leading shows before we’re approaching a problem.

**John:** So, one thing, I liked this article and I think there’s interesting things to pushback against in this article. But one of the things at least noticed or addressed is that we’ve had white men in the center of our storytelling for forever, and then we hit a period in the last decade or so where we had these anti-heroes. So you had the Breaking Bad, you had the Mad Men, where we were starting to question whether this white man at the center was really a good person or a bad person. But they were still at the center of the story. They were still the main person you were following. And what’s maybe a little different in this last year or two is sometimes that man is being pushed off to the edge and is frustrated at being pushed off to the edge. So some of the shows that she mentions are Rutherford Falls, White Lotus, The Chair, Kevin Can F Himself as examples of this man who feels himself in a bit of a crisis. What are you seeing there?

**Ashley:** It’s interesting because I think now is a good time for this because a lot of people have – and actually I don’t know if a lot of people in real life have this. But a lot of people on Twitter have what Twitter has deemed main character syndrome, where people kind of assume themselves to be the center of life or of the story. And I do think that it can help to watch TV shows where there are characters like this who have realized they’re not at the center of the story. And even if they’re frustrated and trying to get back at the center it still is interesting, almost in an educational way, to be able to point to examples of like, yes, it can be frustrating to suddenly realize you’re not the main character. But also you never were, so let’s just process those feelings by watching television rather than by yelling at me on Twitter. I think that’s actually very healthy and good. [laughs]

**John:** And this phenomena is really new, because you look at a Parks and Rec, Leslie Knope is not a white man and she’s at the center of it. And she’s struggling against the system, but she’s not marginalized. And you have her boss character is sort of frustrated in his notion of masculinity, but he doesn’t actually really want to be in charge either. So we’ve been wrestling with this for a bit. But then it brings us back to Ted Lasso because in many ways Ted Lasso feels like the old kind of Ward Cleaver, he’s the good white guy at the center of everything, and yet it’s like he’s evolved to a state that the rest of men just aren’t quite there yet. Especially in the first season it feels like he’s just some sort of superhero who suddenly has all these abilities and powers and is already sort of beyond everybody else there and can actually speak a lingo that we’re still trying to catch up with.

**Ashley:** Yeah. I think it’s interesting because with Ted Lasso it’s almost structural, because Jason being the creator and star of the show also resists being centered, like as a person, and is really generous with us as writers, and I believe also with the cast, in hearing other ideas and wanting to incorporate other stories and other ideas. And we really started season two with being like what stories can we tell about all of these other characters who were also here. So I think you can only do that with the buy-in of that person, right? Like if Jason wasn’t that person we wouldn’t be able to write a show where we spend a whole episode talking about a side character’s deal, you know. So I do think that that’s part of it. It has to be a structural part of it.

But I also think people are coming to find that you enjoy those shows more because I think a lot of times we all find that little side character that we identify with maybe more so than the main person, and then when that character finally gets an episode it’s so exciting. It’s going to be your favorite episode of that show. And I think there is this feeling maybe among execs or higher ups that this guy is the star, he’s the celebrity, everybody only wants to see him, and I feel like the audience is really telling us, no, we want to hear from all these other characters, too. And you’re not going to lose your audience if you spend an episode on another character.

**John:** Well it’s a thing we’ve often talked about on the show, and a thing you notice especially in animated movies, wait why are the sidekicks stealing the movie?

**Ashley:** Always.

**John:** It’s because the sidekicks are not bound by the responsibility of what the classic protagonist is supposed to be doing. And they don’t always have to be moral and right and they can sort of express the real frustrations of not being in power more honestly. And I think that’s a thing we’re noticing more maybe in our conventional TV shows at this point, too, is that we relate more to the person who is not in charge and in power because that’s the real experience most of us have.

**Ashley:** Yeah. Because that’s who we are.

**John:** In Ted Lasso as you were coming in on that second season and you’re talking about this, do the things that are being brought up in this article are those part of the conversation in the room? Are you thinking about the role of a white man in society as you’re talking through story ideas and just talking through the arc of a season?

**Ashley:** I think not any more than any other show. I think whenever you’re writing a show with people of a bunch of different backgrounds you have to take into account how those different backgrounds would make them behave or rub up against each other. Like in my episode of Ted Lasso which aired weeks ago, so I am spoiling it, turn off your podcast if you somehow haven’t seen it, but Sam who is Nigerian is standing up and saying the company that sponsors the team has created some environmental and human rights abuses in Nigeria. And whenever there’s a press conference after the game in real life, but also traditionally on this show, they interview the coach, because he is the boss. So Ted sits down for a press conference and says when things like this happen to people like me you guys tend to write about it automatically, but someone like Sam had to get your attention, and so now I’m going to step away from the mic and you guys talk to Sam.

And it was important that we understand how these things typically go, didn’t have Ted speak for Sam, or instead of Sam, or sort of pat himself on the back for supporting Sam. So in that way we thought about their different backgrounds and thought about how, yes, they would want to hear from Ted because that’s what we’re used to. But Ted being a good man understands that it’s his privilege that makes him the person they want to speak to and instructs them to talk to Sam instead.

**John:** It’s about understanding privilege and also knowing when to use that privilege to yield space for other folks.

**Ashley:** Yeah. In that moment, yes. So that’s an example of like acknowledging that we know that Ted has this privilege and working from there, as opposed to being ignorant to it and creating a situation where Ted speaks for Sam or something like that.

**John:** Now, as we’re recording this we’re only halfway through the second season, but it feels like based on therapist interactions and things like that one of the important storylines for this back half of the season is going to be not even necessarily the origin story of how Ted becomes this way, but also the challenge of trying to be this paragon of good white guy moment at all times. Because he can seem so perfect that there’s inner conflict. And so I’m sensing that one of the things you’re talking about in that room is figuring out well what is actually underneath the surface of this seemingly perfect guy that’s driving him to do these things. And what are the interesting story challenges that we can face with him?

Because we can de-center him, which is great, but also the name of the show is Ted Lasso and so you’re figuring out what is making Ted tick inside.

**Ashley:** Mm-hmm. Keep watching. [laughs]

**John:** And that’s a good teaser for the second half of the season. Ashley, such a delight to chat with you about all sorts of things and congratulations on everything that’s happened this last year.

**Ashley:** Thank you so much. This was so fun.

**John:** Yay.

Links:

* [The Double-Nominated Emmy Contender Taking Over TV Comedy](https://www.insider.com/ashley-nicole-black-emmy-nominations-ted-lasso-comedy-writing-interview-2021-8)
* Industry News: [Fran Drescher, Leads SAG-AFTRA](https://www.avclub.com/fran-drescher-triumphs-in-bitter-contentious-sag-aftra-1847616962), [IATSE Contract Negotiation](https://variety.com/2021/film/news/iatse-contract-negotiation-update-1235052874/), [WGA East Elections](https://www.wgaeast.org/council-elections/2021-election/candidates/)
* [New Teeth](https://www.nytimes.com/2021/08/04/books/review-new-teeth-simon-rich.html) by Simon Rich [on Amazon](https://amzn.to/3yIvZsM) or [Bookshop](https://bookshop.org/books/new-teeth-stories/9780316536684)
* [Gifted](https://bookanista.com/gifted/) short story by Simon Rich
* [Highland 2 Student License](https://quoteunquoteapps.com/highland-2/students.php)
* [A is For](https://www.aisfor.org/)
* [Estelle Colored Glass](https://www.estellecoloredglass.com/collections/all)
* [TV’s White Guys are in Crisis](https://www.vulture.com/2021/08/tv-white-men-the-white-lotus-ted-lasso.html) by Kathryn Vanarendonk
* [My Abortion Story](https://johnaugust.com/2018/my-abortion-story) on John’s blog
* [Ashley Nicole Black](https://www.imdb.com/name/nm2730724/?ref_=ttfc_fc_wr24) on [Twitter](https://twitter.com/ashleyn1cole)
* [Get a Scriptnotes T-shirt!](https://cottonbureau.com/people/scriptnotes-podcast)
* [Gift a Scriptnotes Subscription](https://scriptnotes.supportingcast.fm/gifts) or [treat yourself to a premium subscription!](https://scriptnotes.supportingcast.fm/)
* [John August](https://twitter.com/johnaugust) on Twitter
* [John on Instagram](https://www.instagram.com/johnaugust/?hl=en)
* [Outro](http://johnaugust.com/2013/scriptnotes-the-outros) by Zach Lo ([send us yours!](http://johnaugust.com/2014/outros-needed))
* Scriptnotes is produced by [Megana Rao](https://twitter.com/MeganaRao) and edited by [Matthew Chilelli](https://twitter.com/machelli).

Email us at ask@johnaugust.com

You can download the episode [here](http://traffic.libsyn.com/scriptnotes/515standard.mp3).

The original post for this episode can be found [here](https://johnaugust.com/2021/10th-anniversary).

**John August:** Hey, this is John. Heads up that today’s episode has just a little bit of swearing in it.

**Julia Turner:** Hello, and welcome. My name is neither John August nor –

**Craig Mazin:** Craig Mazin.

**Julia:** But this is Episode 516 of Scriptnotes, a podcast about screenwriting and things that are interesting to screenwriters. My name is Julia Turner, and I’m a deputy managing editor at the Los Angeles Times, and a co-host of Slate’s Culture Gabfest Podcast. And John and Craig have invited me here today to mark the 10th anniversary of Scriptnotes, 10 years –

**Craig:** Whoa.

**Julia:** By interviewing them about their first decade in podcasting. Hi, guys.

**Craig:** Hi.

**John:** Hello. Hi, Julia Turner.

**Julia:** I’m so honored to be here. This is a dream come true.

**Craig:** Oh, well, I would imagine the honor should be ours as you’re a legitimate journalist, and we are not.

**John:** Not even close.

**Julia:** We’ll get to your journalistic similarities later on in this conversation.

**Craig:** Hmm.

**John:** Hmm, all right.

**Julia:** Today, I’ll be grilling John and Craig about the legend and lore of Scriptnotes. And I’ll also be presenting them with some brilliant listener questions about the history of the show. Then we’ll have some listener follow up featuring a real life Scriptnotes love story.

**Craig:** Whoa.

**Julia:** And for our bonus segment, we’ll ask how would this be a movie about the first 10 years of Scriptnotes?

**John:** Oh, god, I’ve got some casting suggestions, so cool. Do stay tuned.

**Julia:** Might be low on pop, but I think there’s a couple ways to play it. We’ll get into it.

**Craig:** Yeah.

**Julia:** Before we dig in, I should clarify for your listeners that my primary qualification for this gig is years of obsessive listening to Scriptnotes, which has made it really, really fun this past week to see how Scriptnotes works behind the scenes. Listeners will not be surprised to learn that when I say John and Craig have invited me here, I mean that John has invited me here. Craig did you know that I would be here until this very moment.

**Craig:** I knew that you would be here at some point. Oh, boy, that’s so true.

**Julia:** It all works exactly the way it sounds like it works.

**Craig:** Yes.

**Julia:** I also got to take a look at the show’s infamous WorkFlowy doc frequently referred to on the podcast.

**Craig:** Hmm, yes.

**Julia:** And I have to say it reveals John’s robot tendencies, like –

**Craig:** Thank you.

**Julia:** Beautifully. John, having invited me to come in and interview you in the document had laid out a whole set of things that perhaps I might want to cover, and a loose order and also some intro text, all of which I think is –

**Craig:** You get it? You get it now?

**Julia:** Intended to be very generous and welcoming. But I –

**Craig:** Yeah, you know –

**Julia:** I’m allowed to tease you, John, because the joke on my podcast is that I’m the robot. So from one robot to another, I salute you.

**Craig:** John used to write these things in machine language. So it was just hexadecimals.

**John:** Yeah.

**Craig:** And I just begged him, I said, “John, please, please, let’s put it in human language.” And he did. He got a new compiler. It’s now in human language. I love it.

**John:** Absolutely. I, I try to just map out like the shape of the show. So that it feels like, oh, okay, this is how we’re going to get through it. But I would say like over the course of 10 years, I’ve tended to write more and more in the actual Workflowy about like the things I’m going to say just because I’m not a great spontaneous speaker. It’s just the secret truth behind Scriptnotes. And so I just love having things to look at and read off of.

**Craig:** Whereas I don’t like to prepare anything. And I sometimes don’t know how my sentences will end when I’m three quarters of the way in.

**Julia:** Well, I’m going to take some but not all of John’s suggestions. And judging by the fact that you don’t seem to have looked at the Workflowy yet, Craig L., my questions will be surprises for you. So –

**Craig:** I love surprises. Yep.

**Julia:** We can dig in. I’m going to start with a few questions about the history of the show. And then we can move on to discuss its impact on the world and also on you guys personally. And then if we have time, we’ll do maybe a lightning round of –

**Craig:** Oh.

**Julia:** Some questions on the mechanics of the show and a few wildcards. There’s a lot to get through.

**Craig:** Yay.

**John:** I’m excited.

**Julia:** But let’s start with the zoom out. First, congratulations on 10 years of podcasting.

**John:** Thank you.

**Julia:** And, John, why did you start the show?

**John:** I’ve been writing this blog for years and years and years, the johnaugust.com blog, answering questions about screenwriting. And it’s just a monologue when you’re a blogger. You’re just talking to the void. And for a while I had comments turned on so people could answer back, but I hated comments so I turned them all off. Craig had his own blog that he gave up at a certain point. And I just decided, like, rather than have me talking, us talking together would probably be better. And I was listening to a bunch of podcasts that I liked, tech podcasts, but also like the Slate Culture Gabfest and Political Gabfest, and it’s like, oh, we should do something like that, which is just me and Craig talking. So I pitched the idea to him, and he had no idea what I was talking about but said, “Sure, we could try that.”

**Craig:** I thought for sure he had made a mistake. But he meant to call someone else but he called me. So I said, “Yeah.”

**Julia:** Did – by the way. John, were there backups? Like if Craig said no, were there other advice-dispensing screenwriters out there?

**Craig:** Great question.

**Julia:** Or was there anyone you asked before Craig who shut you down we’ve never heard about?

**Craig:** Oh, yeah, that’s a better question? That’s a better question. I like that one.

**John:** Craig was the first person I asked. I don’t think I had a backup list because I didn’t really have a fully formed idea of what it was even going to be but I just felt like he’d be the right person to talk with. But Olean and I were kind of friendly at that point, so she would have been somewhere in there. Derek Haas and I knew each other. So there were probably some backup contenders. But I, honestly, I don’t think I would have done it if Craig had said no.

**Craig:** Hmm, aww.

**Julia:** Craig, why did you say yes? You make a lot of noise about how you don’t know what podcasts are still practically?

**Craig:** I didn’t. Yep. No.

**Julia:** And certainly not then.

**Craig:** I didn’t.

**Julia:** So why – what was in it for you?

**Craig:** Well, in terms of knowing what podcasts were, it didn’t really matter because I trusted John. He was very web-forward is how I would put it at the time. And in fact, I had called John early on when I was putting my blog together just to have some technical questions about blog design and things like that. So I had been working on this blog, and it had been a bit draining. It had become a thing during the strike. It was a raucous bar of comments during the strike. And the Wall Street Journal wrote it up, and it got unwieldy and drifted apart from its purpose. And so, I – and also, you know, we write. So we write for a living and then I had to like –

**John:** Yeah.

**Craig:** Suddenly felt like, oh, my god, in this like, job, I had given myself that I don’t make any money off of to write more. So when John called it was the perfect time because it didn’t involve writing. And also, you know, John was like, he’s a big shot, you know, and I thought, well, you don’t say no to a big shot.

**John:** So I would say, interestingly, at the start of this podcast, I was a higher profile screenwriter than Craig was, and Craig had made movies, but I had a bigger sort of platform and was probably better known. I knew that Craig actually knew a ton about the industry. He and I worked together to try to set this writer’s deal at Fox. And so, I knew sort of how his brain worked. And I really thought he would have strong good opinions that were not exactly the same as my opinions and it would be a good conversation.

**Craig:** Yeah.

**Julia:** You know, you both mentioned the blogging and the internet writing you were doing with sort of a similar audience of working screenwriters and aspiring screenwriters in mind. And, you know, the listener engagement in the show is such a big part of the show now. What’s the difference between that relationship you had sort of in the aughts web with written commenters versus the teens and 20s audio internet of audio listeners? What are the differences, similarities?

**Craig:** Yeah. Tell them about our commenters, John.

**John:** Yeah. So, I mean, comments on blog posts are just such a scourge because like, they’re going to be positive ones, but then just people will just write paragraphs and paragraphs and paragraphs. It’s like, “Oh, no, this is my space. It’s not your space.” And so, just be cool. Or you try to have like living room rules. The good thing about a podcast is like, we only can invite people in that we want to invite in even when we do live shows, we will stop a questioner if they’re just being a jerk. And the fact that it is really a conversation that we can invite you into versus you can just pile on at times is, I think, the big difference between writing online versus being on a podcast.

**Craig:** Yeah, it’s a bit like the difference between curation and moderation. All you can do on a blog is just go, “Oh, god, stop it or you’re booted,” but then they just change their name and come back and keep acting like jerks. And we can curate exactly what we present here. Which, weirdly enough, turns out that’s what people like. They think they want just unfettered access, but what they actually do want is a connection to a platform that has some kind of moderation so that there’s quality control.

**Julia:** All right, so it’s early days. You’re doing this show. You’re figuring out the format, and you’re figuring out whether you’re having an impact. How did you first begin to appreciate that you were finding an audience? Like what were the early inklings that this was not just you talking into microphones and in vain?

**John:** Well, with podcasts, you can see sort of how many people are downloading the show. So you get some sense of listenership through that, although in the early days, it was really hard to get good metrics. And like early podcasts really had no sense of how many people were listening to them. Now, you can get a better sense. For me, it was I think, probably when we went to the Austin Film Festival and did a live show there. And really could see like, oh, my gosh, these people know who we are. And they’re showing up because they do listen to the show. That was the first time I really felt the impact of it. Craig, did you have an earlier time?

**Craig:** No, no, I mean, to this day, I still repeatedly am shocked when people say they listen to the show. I know that people listen to the show. I don’t have access to those metrics. I mean, I suppose if I ask John nicely, he would tell me. But he just knows that I don’t really care. Like every now and then I’ll be like, “How many people do actually listen to the show?” And he’ll tell me and I’ll go, “No,” and then I’ll forget. But –

**Julia:** Wait. Hold on. How many people do actually listen to the show?

**Craig:** Yeah, how many people do listen to the show, John?

**John:** Megan is also on the line, so she can probably tell us, give us some specific figure, but it’s around 40,000, I want to say. Megan, correct me if I’m wrong?

**Megana Rao:** Yeah, it’s about 40,000 a week and then –

**Craig:** Good god.

**Megana:** Like, looking at the monthly metrics, like each episode usually gets to about 80,000.

**Craig:** What? Okay, well, that’s terrifying.

**John:** And I think the thing that’s been most surprising to me is I assumed that it would just be L.A. people who would really be listening to the show because it’s so Hollywood-centered and yet it turns out we have a lot of listeners in Europe. We Have listeners in Antarctica. We have listeners everywhere who are listening to the show because they want to write things for their own countries or to come to here. And also a ton of people listen to the show who have no interest in writing at all. And, I mean, Julia Turner, you’re not a screenwriter. So there should be no reason for you to listen to the show.

**Craig:** Yeah.

**John:** But you listen to the show, which is just terrific.

**Julia:** No. And I now edit the entertainment coverage of the L.A. Times. So your discussions are relevant to things that the journalists I work with cover. But that was much less true when I started listening to the show, you know, back when I was running Slate. So –

**John:** I’m sorry to play host here for a second, but do you know why you started listening to the to the podcast? I’m curious.

**Julia:** You’re allowed to play host on your own show anytime you want, John.

**Craig:** Right. Can I?

**Julia:** Well, I think Andy Bowers, who ran podcast at Slate, put me on to it. And I just love the way you guys, I mean, I am a culture critic on that show, right? So I’m, you know, the scourge of Craig’s mind, one of those baddies.

**Craig:** Yes, correct.

**Julia:** But I think it’s really interesting when you’re conducting criticism to know about how things are made, and why they’re made and what the mechanics are behind them. And so, I love learning about that from you guys. I loved the rapport, I mean, any chat show that you listen in on regularly, and I can say this, because I do one is just basically like a book club you like to go to where you don’t get to talk, like, you know, you just feel like you’re kind of hanging out with your friends. And I like the way you guys would kibitz and squabble and have interesting insights.

And then maybe it’s because I see parallels in this to journalism, but I love the way you guys balance appreciating screenwriting for the difficult creative art that it is, and knowing that a successful screenwriting career means having a lot of practical skills and –

**Craig:** Yes.

**Julia:** Qualities of temperament and comportment, for lack of a better word –

**Craig:** Mmm.

**Julia:** That are actually as important to your success as your creative genius. And I feel like you are so generous to the listeners we have who are aspiring screenwriters and encouraging their art while also encouraging them to be steely and practical. And something about that balance and the way you guys talk about screenwriting as a trade and a craft. It really appealed to me. I think there’s –

**Craig:** Thank you.

**Julia:** Aspects of that in journalism too where it’s a lot of people are writers and thinkers, you know, but got to turn things in on time. So long answer.

**Craig:** That is the problem for all of us, right. No, that’s a beautiful answer. And I think what I found along the way, it’s certainly, when I said yes to John, it really was because I admired him. And I thought, this sounded like fun. But what I found along the way was a natural instinct to save people from the trouble I had seen. And this business is full of trouble.

There is so much trouble in our business that if you’re a certain kind of person, and in this case, we’re both guys, there were layers of trouble we weren’t even seeing. So there’s so much trouble. And there’s so much trouble for writers and there particularly is a lot of trouble for writers in features. And so, trying to just save people some of the misery and strife, and also to debunk so much of the cottage industry of nonsense that had sprouted up to add insult to injury by taking money from people and preying on their fears and their ignorance and their worry and their desire and ambition. That felt great. I mean, the part of doing the show that makes me the happiest is the part where we provide this to new people, like you’re showing up, you’re new, maybe you don’t look like the sort of person that Hollywood has hired as a screenwriter before. There are no books that are really going to teach you how this business works. As far as I know, we’re the only game in town when it comes to telling you the truth. Uh, because Hollywood is very ashamed of the truth, and for a good reason.

**John:** I would say at the start of the podcast, I felt like there was an objective truth that we could sort of share, like this is our experience. This is how it actually really works. And I think one of the sort of journeys over 10 years is recognizing that we sort of don’t know everything and that our experience rising as screenwriters in the ‘90s is not going to match necessarily writers’ experience now, and that we sort of needed to invite more people onto the show to talk to us about their actual specific experiences, be it like genres that we’re not writing or for mediums that we’re not writing in that I think we just both developed a little bit more curiosity about how the other parts of this industry work.

**Craig:** Yeah.

**Julia:** Yeah, I’ve noticed that. And actually, that brings me to one question I wanted to ask, which is sort of how did the show find its format over time? And how has that evolved? You mentioned bringing in more people, but how did you find the right mix between interview episodes, advice episodes, you know, Three Page Challenges, all of the different kinds of recurring rubrics you have, how did that evolve?

**Craig:** Well, mostly John, I mean, I’ll tell you, the Three Page Challenge thing came out of something that I used to do on this old board called Done Deal Pro. And it had its roots in a basic theory, which is, ah, I could probably tell you, I think it was at the time five pages. I can tell you in five pages if you’re going to make it or not, because it’s just, you could tell, right? Like there are people, they just write five pages and you go, “No, no, no, no, do something else, just do something else.” But out of that came this interesting notion that there is a lot you can learn just from drilling down into a very small amount of pages.

The vast majority of the format of the show is John’s conception. In my normal life. I’m a bit of a bossy person. I’m a producer, I’m a director, I run shows. I’m in charge. I’m alpha. It is so lovely to just – I’m even the DM in our Dungeons and Dragons.

**John:** Oh, yes, he is.

**Craig:** But it is so nice to not be that guy and to let somebody else who’s incredibly competent, and good, be that person. And I can follow. I love following John’s lead on the show. It is my place on the show, and I’m extraordinarily comfortable with it. I’m a sidekick. I’m Ed McMahon.

**John:** Which, in terms of the format, I think I originally sort of pattern them off of the Slate show, so that the Gabfests tend to have three topics per week, and then the equivalent of a One Cool Thing, our inaudible recommendation at the end, and then some boilerplate. And so initially it was just that, but then when Craig had this idea of like, “Oh, what if we would like a Three Page Challenge?” “Like, oh, that’s great.” And that became our first like recurring statement, so every once in a while we’d come back to that. And then How Would This Be a Movie became one. We’ve tried other things like This Kind of Scene. Listener questions were always really kind of from the start were an important part of it. So it just started to evolve that way.

In terms of bringing on guests, originally, they were just like our friends, like people we knew and we’d bring them on. And I think increasingly over the last couple of years, we’ve just reached out to people we don’t know and we bring on complete strangers onto the show, because we want to learn about their experience.

**Julia:** We actually have a listener question related to guests from listener Todd. Megan, do you want to cue that up?

**Megana:** Todd asks, “I’d love to know from both John and Craig who’s the dream guest who they’ve yet to land?”

**Craig:** Mmm, mmm.

**John:** Mmm. The White Whales. I just saw the Matrix trailer and we’ve always talked about having the Wachowskis on. And we’ve never been able to make that happen. But I feel like we could get Lana Wachowski on to talk Matrix. That’d be amazing.

**Craig:** I mean, I would love to. It would be a lot of weird fanboy gushing for me. You know, who I would love to get on the show, and maybe I just haven’t asked her and I should, is Shonda Rhimes.

**John:** Well, with Shonda Rhimes, we tried it for many times, so I think we actually got pretty close to Shonda Rhimes once for a live show.

**Craig:** I see. And then she was sort of like, “Nah, I got 12 shows I got to do.”

**John:** Yeah, so it becomes like a publicist thing. And if her publicists gets involved –

**Craig:** Oh, yeah.

**John:** As a guest, it’s just doomed. We just know that it’s doomed.

**Craig:** Right.

**John:** But I think Shonda is great. James Cameron, obviously a talented filmmaker, but it’s hard to overstate sort of how important he was as a screenwriter for us coming up, just like sort of how much he shaped like the early ‘90s action writing is sort of a James Cameron thing. So I’d love to have him on the show.

**Craig:** Uhm, it’s a good one.

**John:** Any other folks that we’ve just kind of always had on our dream list?

**Craig:** I mean, you know, I don’t think about the show much in between. I’m so tired.

**John:** Yeah. So there you go.

**Julia:** All right. If you guys were starting the show today, what would you do differently?

**John:** I don’t know if it would be just me and Craig, just to be fully honest, two White guys in their 50s. I think we would have reached out so it’d be a three-person show rather than a two-person show. It’s just my guess.

**Craig:** Yeah. I mean, what’s the joke? What do you call a group of White men? A podcast. So, just like, yeah, I’m sure that’s true. That makes sense. And, you know, in, I guess, in a way, we are kind of like a legacy act, you know.

**John:** Mm-hmm.

**Craig:** I mean, by and large, when people put things together these days, I think in a reasonable and appreciable way, they’re trying to present a diverse group of voices. So you don’t put together a panel of all White people. You don’t put together a panel of all men. You don’t put together a panel of all people in their 50s. So we’re sort of a bit of a legacy act. And, you know, I’m okay with that. I think what is important, if you are a legacy act, is that you keep up and you also open the doors as much as you can.

One of the things that we’ve done over the years that I’m really proud of, is, as John said, bring people onto the show that aren’t the traditional voices. We try and feature people from all different walks of Hollywood life, not just successful people, but also up and comers and also assistants. We’ve gotten involved in how people are paid in our business, including not writers, the Writers Guild spends a lot of time figuring out what writers should be paid. Nobody but us, as it turned out, was worrying about what assistants were getting paid, other than the assistants I mean to say. And it was really gratifying to kind of connect with the assistants and work on that with them.

So we do our best to kind of help move the ball forward because we know the world has changed, and for the better. And I’ve changed for the better. I think just being part of it and being exposed to different people, it helps you see things from other points of view. Hollywood is, and has always been, an utter mess, but it is getting better. And I can’t say that that was always the case. For a while, I guess, when you know, John and I started at the same time in the mid-’90s, stretching through really to, you know, about 2016 or ‘17, it was just sort of a flatline of bad. And then there’s this sort of fairly impressive upward curve towards better. I’m not going to say good, but I’ll say better. And so, it’s been nice to at least go along with that and do what we can as a couple of older White guys. And yeah, I agree with John. If we had started it today, I don’t think it would be him and me. It would be him and someone else. Let’s face it.

**Julia:** I want to hear more actually about the work you guys did on assistant pay. I mean, I think you guys haven’t been shy on the show ever about expressing opinions about things in Hollywood that were terrible or should change. In addition to the assistant pay issue, you guys have tried to reform the way executives give notes and offered to give them advice on how to make their notes better.

**Craig:** Yeah. Mm-hmm.

**Julia:** And, your podcast, I would argue, played a big role in kind of airing some of the concerns and grievances about agency behavior that presaged the WGA talent agency fight. You know, I’m curious how you think about that power you wield. In what ways do you think Scriptnotes has changed the world of screenwriting?

**Craig:** Geez.

**John:** Geez. I don’t know if we’ve changed the world of screenwriting. Because there’s always screenwriters, I mean, who have no idea that I host a podcast or this podcast even exists. What I do think we’ve done in our sort of limited way is because enough people listen to the show in the town, if we’re talking about an issue, at least someone is talking about that issue in their ears, and they’re thinking about it. And they might make some different decisions about what they’re going to do. And so, be those executives who invited us in to do that Notes on Notes session.

Or as we’re talking about assistant pay, for me personally, it was like recognizing my own blinders in terms of how I thought about assistants, having been an assistant, how I thought sort of like, oh, this is where you start and this is how you grow. And this is how it all works and not recognizing that the system was really fundamentally broken, and that I hadn’t been sort of inflation adjusting the expectations about sort of how that all works. And so, we weren’t the first people to discover that assistants were underpaid. I wanted to stress that. But we certainly were not shy to use our platform to push people to pay attention and to think about the ways they’re paying assistants and how they’re treating assistants to make sure that we could make some progress on that front.

**Craig:** Yeah. Yeah, I think we are both aware that people listen. At least, if I’m not aware of how many people listen, I’m aware that there are people that make decisions and run things who listen. And we, I think, handle that quasi influence fairly well. We don’t really go out of our way to change the world. But when we see things that seem pretty much like slam dunk easy ones, we go for it.

The nice thing about this podcast is that it is entirely pro social. This is not a, you know, profitable enterprise for me. I just want to underline that. So, we’re doing this because it’s a good thing to do. And when you’re doing something that is just for good, it is remarkably freeing, especially when you work in Hollywood where you start trying to do things for good. And then everybody gets in there and sort of throws a little muck on it and tries to steer it towards what would put money in their pockets, which I, you know, that’s a business, I get it. This is not.

So when things come along that we can kind of activate on, it’s really lovely to be able to do it. And we do it fearlessly. I was never concerned that any agency was going to yell at me for saying that they should pay their assistants more. You know, I had some interesting conversations in the days leading up to the divorce between the Writers Guild and the agents, with my agency, about the things I said about them, you know, and I stood by my words.

**Julia:** What kind of conversations?

**Craig:** Well, they took exception to some of my assertions and opinions. And I stood by them because they were correct. But it was a good conversation. And I just said, guys, this is how this is going to go. And this is the way the world is, and you can’t keep doing this the way you did it before. And there has to be an answer. I don’t know what that answer is. And I don’t know how to get to that answer. But I urge you to get to it. Because I would like to come back to my agency, because I do like my agency a lot. And I like my agent a lot.

And then, the nice thing about having a show like this is that I tend to get yelled at by everybody. So then I got yelled at by writers, because once we did sort of hit our divorce, and occasionally I would question the way the Writers Guild was doing things then the writers would yell at me. So if I’m being yelled by both sides, it’s a good day. And I have a feeling that for John, when no one is yelling at him on either side, it’s a good day for him. It’s just like we’re different that way.

**John:** Yeah, we are different that way. I’ll say one of the things about being a screenwriter, especially a feature writer is you just have so little control over the finished product. We’re there at the very start. And we are building the engine of the thing. And then it goes off. It takes off. And then we sort of see the finished movie. And maybe we had some input, but we didn’t have all the input we’ve wanted.

For me, what’s been great about Scriptnotes is every week like, it’s the show I want it to be. And so if I wasn’t taking notes from anybody else, it’s like, this is the conversation we had. And it’s what we talked about. And it’s not beholden to anybody else. We are not part of any network. We’re not part of any sort of overall structure. We don’t have to make money. It’s just the thing we wanted to make. And to be able to do that every week has been great. And to have a generation of producers who sort of come up through it and helped us do it, it’s been amazing.

**Craig:** Yeah.

**John:** So that’s been the real treat is like it’s a structured conversation every week between me and Craig. So it’s like therapy. But also there’s a thing, there’s a tangible thing you can say, oh, we accomplished that this week, and that’s great. Because so often, as a feature writer, you can spend a year on a project that just never happens.

**Craig:** Yeah.

**John:** Those pages just disappear.

**Julia:** That’s so interesting, because that sounds like you’re describing the satisfaction of creation and unfettered creation. Although, part of what strikes me about the role you guys have played in some of these Hollywood conversations is that it’s not the role of being an artist or a creative. You’re sort of quasi-journalistic because you’re reporting things out sometimes. You’re sort of an organizer role because you’re connecting people who have similar grievances sometimes. Sometimes you’re just making observations. Sometimes there’s a reforming zeal, I think would be fair to describe some of the umbrage taken with the agency practices.

**Craig:** Mm-hmm.

**Julia:** It’s a place in which you get to wear these other hats, but it sounds like your primary emotional satisfaction is actually the creation of the thing. Is that fair, John?

**John:** Yeah.

**Julia:** More to the point, how do you feel about those other roles that are wrapped up within it sometimes?

**John:** I think the advocacy thing was always there from the start, because, one of the real goals of the show is to debunk a lot of sort of the myths of screenwriting and sort of that everything had to follow the Syd Field formula or that the proper logline was the key to success, just all that sort of nonsense that screenwriters are constantly taught, and to really talk about the actual daily life of a screenwriter and sort of what really goes on and sort of dispel those other things.

Journalistic is sort of an interesting word, because I don’t think we’re reporting that much. We’re sort of reacting to what’s happening. So we will talk about sort of the stuff we see around us. And while we try to be accurate, we try to sort of be fair, I don’t see it fundamentally as a journalistic enterprise. It’s really just a conversation. And it’s hopefully, an entertaining conversation. It’s like, you described being the other person at the bar who’s overhearing a conversation but can’t contribute. That’s sort of what we want people to feel is that these two friends are having this conversation about things that are hopefully interesting to screenwriters and people who are interested in things about screenwriting.

**Craig:** I know that slogan.

**Julia:** Okay, fair, you’re not breaking much news unless it’s Craig Mason breaking the news of how many episodes of his next show to write.

**Craig:** Right, right. Yeah. Yes. Incredible, hot headline.

**John:** Yeah.

**Julia:** Do you have examples? I mean, in 10 years of screenwriting, there must be people who had no foothold in the industry who started listening to you 10 years ago –

**Craig:** Yeah.

**Julia:** Who now have successful careers, what kinds of interactions have you had with folks who’ve had that story?

**John:** Yeah, it’s been great. It’s terrific when you hear those success stories, or folks who read the blog, and then listened to the podcast, like Craig’s assistant right now, I guess, was like in high school or college listening to the podcast?

**Craig:** Yeah, it’s college.

**John:** It’s just – it’s impossible.

**Craig:** Yeah. Yeah, we – I do get these stories particularly when there are some sort of large event, if we go to a – if we do a live show or something like that, that’s where people come up and tell you these things. And sometimes it’s overwhelming.

**John:** Mm-hmm.

**Craig:** I don’t quite know what to say. You realize fairly quickly, and you’ve probably encountered this, Julia, because you’ve been doing your own podcast for so long and you have a connection to the public, that people who listen to you, especially for a show that goes on as long as ours has, they have a relationship with you.

**John:** Yeah.

**Craig:** You don’t have one with them. But they have one with you. And when you meet them, you are confronted with it. And it’s it can be very beautiful. It can be very emotional at times. There are times where I’m just overwhelmed by the things people say to me, I don’t know what to say in return because you realize that you have silently, and without any awareness, been an important part of another person’s life.

**John:** Yeah.

**Craig:** And that’s very gratifying and beautiful.

**John:** There are people who would drive across the country to come into a live show, which is crazy, but I also sort of get it because we’re talking about things that they’re interested in and they do feel like they know us because they do kind of know us. I mean, Craig and I are careful to keep some stuff out off of the podcast just for some little zone of privacy, but you are hearing our kind of unfiltered opinions. And that can be nice. It’s interesting, like some of the folks who I saw like the first live show, who then I see eight years later in another live show, you see oh, they actually grew up, they changed. They got married. They had kids. That’s kind of cool to see too. When we were just doing blogs, those were little forum posts. People are – you can connect with them. But like when you see them at a live show, oh, that’s that same person. I got to see sort of where they’re at in their life right now.

**Julia:** All right, we have a listener question from Dana.

**Craig:** Okay.

**Megana:** Dana asks, “Is it easier or harder to be a working, meaning paid, screenwriter now than it was 10 years ago?”

**Craig:** Well, I guess the first question would be feature or television, I’m going to presume feature because she said screenwriter. I think it’s harder. I think it’s harder because there are even fewer movies being made now than they were before. And the movies – where the movies have been expanding have been in the streaming area. I think that salaries have been pushed down quite a bit in those areas. I think a lot of the stuff that’s made is even more than it was 10 years ago, retreads, remakes, reboots, they’re adaptations of toys and things. Paramount just literally said that’s pretty much all we’re going to do just today. So I think it’s harder. And I think that doesn’t necessarily reflect some areas that have gotten better.

What’s gotten better? They are hiring more women. They’re hiring more people of color. The dark lining of the silver cloud there is that it’s the new hires that get paid the least. It’s the new hires that worked the hardest, and in many cases abused by being asked to do more and more work for free. So unfortunately, a lot of the people that are coming in, if they are diverse writers, they’re also being treated poorly. So that’s not a good outcome either.

I am not particularly optimistic about the future of feature screenwriting. It was always the worst place for writers to be in terms of how they were treated. And the way things are going, I don’t see that necessarily getting better. And of note, in the last five negotiations the Writers Guild has had, feature concerns have been minimal. They’ve mostly concentrated on television writers. I know that there’s an effort to at least think about trying to concentrate on feature writers. Problem is the Writers Guild is essentially a TV writers union, by demographics. So bad news feature writers, I don’t think it’s gotten easier. And I’m not sure it’s going to get easier from here, either.

**John:** So I agree with a lot of what Craig said. But that actually sort of points out like one of the areas of conflict that’s always been on the show is because Craig will say like the WGA doesn’t care about screenwriters and like, oh, I was actually on the board for, a two-year term, and was involved in all these negotiating committees so I actually know sort of the other side of that story, and sort of why these things happen and don’t happen. And so, I get frustrated when Craig says like the WGA doesn’t care because I was elected and I cared then and we did a lot. And so, there has been a lot of stuff that has happened for screenwriters through the WGA, but just not through the contract, and the focus on the MBA negotiation as the sole thing the Writers Guild does for feature writers, I think, is a very limited view.

**Craig:** I don’t – I don’t think that the Writers Guild doesn’t care about feature writers. I too was on the board and I too did things for screenwriters.

**John:** Yeah.

**Craig:** I think that you care about screeners. I think I care about screenwriters. I think some people care about screenwriters. I think the institution is designed to serve the membership. And the membership mostly is not feature writers. Also, feature writer problems are just harder to negotiate.

**John:** Yeah.

**Craig:** And they’re tricky.

**John:** It’s absolutely true. So I think on the pros and cons of being a feature writer now versus when we started is that when Craig and I started, there was a lot of development. So it’s not that more movies were getting made. Also, a lot of movies were being developed. And so you could work for quite a long time on movies that never shot, but you were still getting paid. And that was awesome. Now, for better or for worse, writers are being hired to write stuff for the studios or for the streamers. And those things are only for projects they think are actually going to get made. And so, the jobs you’re getting are these high-pressure cooker things for this thing has to work because it has a slot, it has a thing and it’s just a different environment than what Craig and I grew up in. Things are just changing and because the whole industry has warped itself just to make things for streamers.

**Craig:** Can I just say that one of the things I like about our show is that we do model, I think, a way to disagree.

**John:** Yeah.

**Craig:** Do you know what I mean? Like, we don’t always agree. I think we agree a lot.

**John:** Oh, yeah.

**Craig:** I don’t want to present us as Crossfire, but when we disagree, we figure out how to disagree. There’s precious little of that in the world right now. People just yell at each other and then just take sides and become teams and squads and things. And I’ve heard this fed back to us a few times from listeners that they just appreciate that we can disagree with each other respectfully and thoughtfully and that’s nice. I like that we can do that, and that’s a credit to you and to me. I’m going to take half the credit for that.

**John:** You deserve half the credit as well.

**Craig:** Thanks.

**Julia:** I have been part of some podcast fights that have led listeners to write in and be like, “Are you guys okay? Are you still friends?” Have you guys ever had a podcast contretemps that either caused your listeners to worry about your bond and/or actually tested your relationship?

**Craig:** I mean, we faked one once for our conflict show. That was great.

**John:** Yeah, the conflict episode. That was really great. That made people really, really nervous. People pulled over there car on the side of the road because they’re like, “Oh, no, they could crash.” Just true confession, during the middle of the agency campaign or sort of early in the agency campaign, it got really uncomfortable between me and Craig. And so when we would need to talk about this stuff on the show, we’d have to sidebar and really figure out, okay, how are we going to talk about this in ways that we can both honestly express what we want to say but doesn’t blow up our relationship or the podcast or everything else around us. And that was probably the hardest time over the 10 years for me doing this podcast was our genuine disagreements about what was happening in the agency campaign.

**Craig:** Yeah. And a credit to both of us again, because, I have values and I believe in the value of the questioner and challenging authority. I’ve always been that guy. I love dissent. And I’ve always had a weird relationship with the Guild because I love my union. It’s why we do the shows is because John and I both love and care about the status of screenwriters and television writers. So then there’s this organization that sometimes does really good things, and then sometimes just blows it. And I get angry at them. And I get angry at them, in part, because, I’ve also been on the inside as well. And during that whole time, it was challenging, and I appreciated that John was in a really difficult spot. And I think he appreciated that I was in a difficult spot. Because, I’m supposed to be me. And he’s, you know what I mean?

**John:** Yeah.

**Craig:** And he’s supposed to be him. And so, we had to negotiate it without feeling like we were abandoning principles or anything like that. And we did. And I will say that, underneath all of it, as dedicated as I am to challenging authority and questioning whether or not things are going the way they should, that John and I have been doing this for a long time. I would never, in any circumstance blow this thing up for that. I would not give the Writers Guild the satisfaction of being the cause of blowing this up. Hell no.

**John:** But I will say that whole period was probably toughest actually on Megana Rao who had to listen in on those conversations and deal with the stress and anxiety of, like, dad and dad are not getting along, so.

**Craig:** Yeah. You know what, Megana? It’s okay.

**Megana:** Thank you so much for acknowledging that because I was sitting here and I was like, this is incredibly triggering for me.

**Craig:** Aww.

**John:** Yeah.

**Craig:** Well, what happened was, we would start to argue about something and then eventually just because psychologically it was beneficial for us, we would triangulate and blame Megana. So, you know, I get it. I get it.

**Megana:** I do not. I call bullshit on that answer. That’s just not –

**Craig:** Yeah. No, I don’t. I definitely made that up.

**Megana:** Since I have invisible relationships with you of a decade long, I can tell.

**Craig:** Yes.

**Megana:** Because I know you so well. That’s not what happened.

**Craig:** Yeah. No, that is not what happened.

**Julia:** All right. I want to ask you guys a zoomed out question about the state of the industry. And it’s connected a little bit to that, that question about the changing status of feature writers. But just looking back on where the industry was 10 years ago, you launched Scriptnotes 18 months before House of Cards launched on Netflix –

**Craig:** Oh, wow.

**Julia:** I believe in the months around your show they were like quietly launching streaming services in Bolivia. But like broadly –

**Craig:** Wow.

**Julia:** Streaming was not yet the primary way that American entertainment consumers got their media. You were both pretty firmly film writers, if I’m remembering correctly.

**John:** Oh, yeah.

**Craig:** Correct.

**Julia:** I’d love for you guys to project forward 10 years. I mean, we’re living in a moment where as you guys say, it feels like the TV writer is ascendant and the film writer is under duress. But if you zoom out a level further and look at what the average 18-year-old is doing with their time and how much gaming they’re doing and Twitch they’re watching and how many YouTube personalities they aspire to be rather than movie stars, which they haven’t heard of, and maybe they do or don’t watch sitcoms. Where will screenwriting be in 10 years? How do you think that industry will have changed in 10 years by 2031? And what do you guys imagine your places in it will be?

**Craig:** Well, you know, my place will be obviously as the emeritus. I will be considered the grandfather of – I have no idea. I don’t know. I think that movies, theatrical, the theatrical experience is in trouble. I think that the combination of COVID, streaming and the dissolution of the Paramount decree is probably going to lead to a large amount of movie theaters being purchased by large corporations like Disney Marvel, Pixar. And they will – you know how Disney has got that lovely theater in Hollywood, El Capitan, I suspect that maybe in 10 years, the theatrical experience will be really more of an extension of the studio theme parkish experience, where there will be Marvel theaters that play Marvel movies and charge a lot of money for them.

I think that the generation coming up will bring their interests forward in terms of the kinds of comedy that shows up, I think that’s where we’ll see at first. My son and daughter’s generation have an entirely different concept of what comedy is. And I love it. I mean, it’s great. We will not recognize it. We will watch it. And as we should, as old people, we will say, “Ah, it’s not funny,” and then they will look at us and say, “You’re old, just go back to watching your Friends reruns old people.” And we will because that is the way of the world.

The structure the business will continue to accelerate along the paths of just piping things directly into your home. And even homes will change. As they build homes, I do think that where you used to have certain things that – like large dining rooms are no longer necessary. They will be eliminated entirely. Nobody needs a dining room. But you will have home theaters. People will just have little rooms with little seats, and a big screen TV. Because the movies are going to your house. It just feels like that’s where it’s going. I can’t imagine that it doesn’t accelerate even more than it has been, especially because you have entire studios like Paramount just giving up. They just gave up officially. Paramount, that made, you know, The Godfather, they’ve given up.

**John:** I am much more bullish on the future of roughly two-hour movie experiences that are shown outside of the house. I think that is an experience that will still be around in 10 years. I agree with Craig that with the fall of the Paramount consent decree, you’re going to see the big studios buy those things out. But I think people want to leave their house. They want a reason to leave their house and a movie, going to see a movie is a way to do that, especially for a teenager, it’s just the thing – it’s a place you can go and a thing you can do. I think that will continue.

I also don’t think that the home theater thing is going to be such the bonanza because I look at my own kid and she wants to watch stuff on her computer or on her phone. She just doesn’t care about it being on the biggest screen possible. So I don’t know if that persists. But for the writing of it, I think there’s still going to be writers who are writing those two-hour features. There’s going to be a lot of writers writing all the streaming television. I think that will persist and continue. I don’t see a real coming crisis for that.

Where it’s going to change though is like this blurring of lines, we have to talk about video game writing and how video game writing is writing. And it’s very analogous to what we’re doing. I think there’s going to be universe building that requires a tremendous amount of writing. And it’s going to be really murky and awkward to figure out what covers that and when it should be that becomes advertising and promotion writing or copywriting or toy making versus screenwriting. I think it’s all getting blurrier. And that’s only going to persist and continue in the next 10 years.

**Julia:** Right. I mean, I guess my question is, are the people who write games going to consider themselves screenwriters? Or, you know, the biggest celebrity in my kid’s mind is like some guy on YouTube who narrates his Minecraft world.

**John:** Mm-hmm. Yeah. Of course, like a Jacksepticeye, that kind of person. Yeah.

**Julia:** Yeah. And, you know, there’s no writer for that entertainment. And they watch hours of it, and they’re not watching whatever is on – I don’t even know –

**John:** Yeah.

**Julia:** What the popular Nickelodeon shows are right now because they don’t watch them or care about them, you know. Like, Are you concerned about the rise of content that’s not written in the way that you guys talk about writing things?

**Craig:** No. No, nope because it’s different. It’s just different. It is a lovely thing to watch. But to me, when my kids or your kids are watching a Twitch stream, or YouTube, just people putting makeup on YouTube or something, it’s a little bit like when my sister and I were just parked in front of the TV and watched The Brady Bunch, or I Love Lucy, meaning it wasn’t new. It was just sort of there. And it filled time and we enjoyed it. Now that was obviously scripted. This is not. But watching I Love Lucy and watching the karate movies on channel five and watching The Brady Bunch didn’t keep us from wanting new content that was scripted. We did like that. And similarly, I do see – or here’s something that, you know, John knows. So his daughter and my daughter are the same age, and we watch these things sweep through that cohort.

**John:** Mm-hmm.

**Craig:** And so, for whatever reason, what was it last summer?

**John:** Yeah, Criminal Minds.

**Craig:** Yeah. Every 15-year-old girl was obsessed with bingeing Criminal Minds. I don’t know why, but they work, which means it still works, right? It still works. And we know that as you get older you do gravitate more toward narratives. That’s always, I think, been the case. For my parents’ generation, they probably got more of their narrative from books, but they also would watch movies that we would find boring. I think that the world of narrative is not only alive and well, it’s thriving. There’s more of it than ever. It’s everywhere. And the people who make it and make money off of it are spending money in ways that we’d never thought was possible. Never. I mean, the amount of money that Amazon is spending on the Lord of the Rings show alone is mind boggling. And it’s not slowing down. And in a good way, the amount of money that they’re spending on reliable show runners who produce quality content is also skyrocketing.

**John:** Mm-hmm.

**Craig:** We will always, as a group of professionals in Hollywood, struggle with income inequality. Our income inequality is even more grotesque than the income inequality in the United States. But one of the things that I think John and I talk about and that I think we should continue to ring this bell as much as we can, is getting the salaries of writing staffs up. We think that the Writers Guild can solve all these problems, but I will point out for the one millionth time, writers are in charge of television writing rooms. It’s the writers who do the hiring. It’s the writers who figure out the budget and allot what they allot. So hopefully, the rising tide will start picking up a few more boats as it rises. But narrative is not going anywhere. If anything, there’s too damn much of it.

**John:** The other point I would make about 10 years down the road is ultimately, you don’t need a studio with a history and library necessarily to get started in this business. You just need a ton of money and there are people out there with a ton of money. So I think there will be new players that come online and it won’t just be mergers of the existing ones. Other folks are going to come online like Apple did, or Amazon did just because they have so much money they need to do something with that money. So there will be some new names that we – we’re not even thinking of 10 years from now.

**Craig:** I think Apple is going to buy Netflix.

**John:** Could be.

**Craig:** I’m just putting that out there.

**John:** Yeah, yeah.

**Craig:** Not, not anytime soon.

**John:** Yeah.

**Craig:** Don’t – don’t take that as a stock tip. I’m just saying eventually.

**John:** Like Peloton will inevitably start doing like scripted series. There are just companies that have big money and who will want to do things and ultimately those people will write those things and hopefully that’ll, you know, Megana.

**Megana:** Right.

**Craig:** Oh, no, come on, we can do better than Peloton for Megana.

**John:** Well, okay, all right. The next step.

**Julia:** We’re going to – we’re going to check back in 10 years and see whether in fact Apple has bought Netflix and Peloton has started making television shows.

**Craig:** Yeah, I think we should. Yeah.

**Julia:** Your predictions are officially recorded here.

**Craig:** Nice.

**Julia:** We got so many wonderful listener questions that I think are informed by that dynamic of people who feel like they know you as people and care about you as people and are curious about you as people. And I think we should ask a couple of those before we do our One Cool Things.

**Craig:** Sure.

**Julia:** Let’s take a question from John from London.

**Megana:** John from London asks, “From all of the guests you’ve had over the years, what’s the best piece of advice you’ve applied to your own writing? And what’s the one thing that someone has said that stuck with you?”

**John:** I am thinking back to Katie Silberman. So I don’t remember what episode she was on. But she came on to talk about her writing on Booksmart. And she prewrites. She will have two characters talking about nonsense and just really get a sense of character’s voices independent of the scene. And it’s one of those things like, I always felt I probably should do that. But I don’t know anybody who actually does do that. And her doing that got me thinking oh, I should try to write some unimportant plot scenes just for the character so I can hear their voices. And I’ve started actually doing that. So that’s a Katie Silberman piece of advice that I took to heart.

**Craig:** I don’t have any, just flat out. I don’t have – I don’t remember any of it. Yeah, I don’t. I love having these conversations. But I can’t – we’ve had a thousand of them. I can’t remember the individual things. This is why I think it kind of works. John really does plan and he thinks these things through and there’s so much intention. And I really do fly by the seat of my pants through it and try and be as experiential as I can within it.

**John:** Mm-hmm.

**Craig:** Everything is a surprise to me. Everything is in the moment. So when we have these conversations, I do think to myself, oh, that was amazing. It was such a great – like we had a great one with Dave Mandel and Julia Louis-Dreyfus. And I just remember being delighted with it. But then if you ask me what did we talk about, I can’t remember. I’m old. And I can’t remember. I’m being as honest as I can. I think this is probably what no one ever does, right? They just pretend. They just make up something, right. And I have to just be honest. I can’t remember. How did you remember that?

**John:** Because I actually did it. But I also, it was in the WorkFlowy.

**Craig:** There we go. There it is.

**John:** I thought about the question ahead of time.

**Craig:** You thought about it ahead of time.

**John:** I did my homework. That’s really how I thought of it.

**Craig:** All right. You know what, I will say, I know that we talked to Lindsay Doran.

**John:** Mm-hmm.

**Craig:** And whether or not Lindsay Doran said this in our podcast, it is a piece of advice that has stuck with me ever since she said it. So I will repeat this advice. And it is that it is incredibly important to know what the central relationship of your story is. If you don’t have one, you’re in trouble. I, at least, think of everything through the lens of relationships. And what Lindsay points out, there are all these relationships and people can get stuck viewing everything kaleidoscopically. But humans need one. You can have other relationships, but they need one central one. They need the one that matters the most.

**John:** That’s me and Craig.

**Craig:** Yeah.

**John:** That’s the central relationship.

**Craig:** It is. Well, you know, I think the central relationship is me and Megana. But I appreciate that you do what you do.

**John:** Yeah.

**Craig:** Yeah.

**Julia:** All right. We’re only taking questions from listeners in London, let’s hear it from Anna in London.

**Craig:** Great.

**Megana:** Ana in London says, “I’d be interested to know if there are any opinions you’ve expressed over the years that looking back now you’d like to edit, especially if you’ve changed your mind on a craft thing.”

**Craig:** Oh.

**John:** Oh, I’d be surprised if I changed my mind on a craft thing. Although, I think before I started this podcast, I had gone to a single space after a period. So I used to be a double space writer and I went to a single space.

**Craig:** Oh.

**John:** Single space is where it’s at now.

**Craig:** Yes.

**John:** But if there’s any opinions I’ve expressed that I want to take back, you know what, we tend to get like a lot of listener mail when there’s like a really bad opinion expressed. And then sometimes we’ve addressed it in follow up, actually, I’d say our follow up on this show is an important part of the history of the show. The early tech podcast I was listening to would always have follow up at the start of their show. And I really liked that. And it’s not a Slate thing. And that’s a thing that I took from other podcasts. And so, we try to address when we misspoke or said too much or said something that was incorrect or inaccurate. But I don’t know that I have an opinion that I want to go back and erase.

**Craig:** Yeah, I’m sure if I were confronted by a number of the stupid things I’ve said, I would be embarrassed by most of them. Obviously, since I can’t remember anything that I said, it’s hard for me to answer this question. I don’t remember what I’ve said either. But I can say that over the course of this show, I have learned things from John that I think have made me a better person. I’m still very different. I’m still much more fiery. And I get very passionate, and I get angry, which I appreciate. I value that. But I also think about people more. And I think about their feelings more. And I try and temper myself more because I think John sets a really good example that way. And also over the years, I think I have required myself to be a little less – there’s this kind of old guy thing that happens where you just start to insist that –

**John:** Mm-hmm.

**Craig:** Everybody that makes it makes it because they did it. And if you don’t, you didn’t, and it’s a meritocracy, brah, brah, brah. And I have weeded quite a bit of that out because it’s not a meritocracy. And I think the more that we discuss that and appreciate it, the better off we are. It’s not an ameritocracy. It’s not random. And that’s not what anyone is going for. But it is additionally challenging for a lot of people in a lot of different ways. And almost everyone has some kind of challenge. But some people have more than others. And so I’ve tried to – I change my point of view and the context with which I evaluate things. That certainly has changed over time.

**Julia:** I want to note as part of the beautiful synchronicity between you guys sometimes that among the things that John proposed is things I might ask about and that you might answer. One was what we got wrong, and a bullet under that was meritocracy. So –

**Craig:** Ah, there you go.

**Julia:** I take it.

**Craig:** See? And you know I wasn’t cheating because I didn’t read it.

**Julia:** I take it from the WorkFlowy that John agrees. Is that fair, John?

**John:** Absolutely. And I remember trying to defend meritocracy at some point on the blog, even pre-podcast and it feels as a White guy growing up and having some success you feel like, oh, well, I earned it. And it’s like, well, yeah, you did things that actually helped you. But it’s so hard to acknowledge, oh, but you’ve had many advantages coming into it. And I think over the course of the 10 years during the podcasts, and really just talking with a bunch of other writers, I’ve really learned a lot more about oh, these were the challenges that I did not face just based on who I came into this industry as and when I came in. So I think meritocracy is just a bad word that we just shouldn’t say.

**Craig:** Yeah.

**Julia:** All right, a couple last lightning-round questions. Craig, did you retire sexy Craig of your own volition or did John make you do it?

**Craig:** He’s not retired. Oh, no. Oh, no. Sexy Craig is right there. He’s right there with you in those moments when you’re alone, and your mind starts wandering, he’s there.

**Julia:** Oh, no. Have I started another fight, John? Tell him to –

**Craig:** Oh, yeah.

**John:** What’s John answer to this question?

**John:** It’s somewhere between a shudder and a cringe anytime Sexy Craig shows up.

**Julia:** It is somehow audible, as a listener –

**Craig:** Mm-hmm. Yeah.

**Julia:** Even though you make no sound.

**Craig:** Yeah, inaudible shudder. You shudder already.

**Julia:** All right. Next question.

**Craig:** Yeah.

**Julia:** This one is from listener Chris.

**Megana:** Chris asks, “If you both ran for the presidency, who would be president and who would be VP? And who would you have in your cabinet?”

**Craig:** Oh, well, I mean, I’m, I’m not going to do any of that. So VP, for sure.

**John:** Yeah. I think Craig is the VP.

**Craig:** Yeah.

**John:** But the cabinet is going to be full of really fascinating people. A recent addition to the show, but also just a superstar is actually Nicole Black, she needs to be in there providing comedy and context and warmth. Love her. Alene has to be in there because she’s an all-star. I don’t know what department she’s running.

**Craig:** Department of good taste.

**John:** Yeah, that’s what Alene is doing in there. Does Malcolm makes the cabinet cut?

**Craig:** I hope so.

**John:** Yeah.

**Craig:** Because I need somebody to talk to.

**John:** We have a lot of really great guests who can come in there and help make things run properly. And also, we have friends with many show runners and the showrunners get stuff done. So it’ll be a somewhat chaotic country, but stuff will happen.

**Craig:** It’ll be organized by WorkFlowy.

**John:** That – there’ll definitely be a WorkFlowy behind it all.

**Julia:** All right, my last question, what do you each hope for the next 10 years with the Scriptnotes?

**Craig:** Hmm.

**John:** Hmm. Oh, that, it presupposes that there will be 10 years of Scriptnotes. And I have no intention of shutting it down. But also just recognizing that stuff happens and things change. And podcasting could change. If Craig got really busy doing his show. If I were directing a movie at the same time Craig was doing a show there could be no Scriptnotes. But if we make it to 10 years, I hope just continuing to evolve and feeling that there’s new segments that always feel like they always should have been part of the show that it feels like it’s a continuity, but you can see that was Scriptnotes in black and white and this is Scriptnotes in color.

**Craig:** Yeah, I don’t know what 10 years will bring. And if you want to make God laugh, tell him your plans. But I would imagine that somewhere along the line, somebody should really replace me, don’t you think? I mean, somebody should just gradually replace me. I think that would be great, you know.

**John:** I could also – I could also imagine at some point, the show is me and Craig. And so, there was at some point a suggestion, like, Craig and John should just give the show to other people to do Scriptnotes. Like –

**Craig:** Mm-hmm.

**John:** As is Scriptnotes is the thing that is just independent of me and Craig.

**Craig:** Right.

**John:** But there probably would be a way to transition out and become the occasional hosts, or just how to be a thing that exists independent of us the same way that the Slate shows, even if all three hosts are gone, it’s still is the show, kind of. But we have no intention of doing that. We have no plans to do that. But if we were to move on at some point, I think we would try to do a gradual fade out and handover the torch to somebody else.

**Craig:** Like when Blue’s Clues changed the guy.

**John:** Absolutely. It was just too abrupt. You got to send Steve off to college in the right way.

**Craig:** Right.

**John:** And Craig I’ll send you off to college.

**Craig:** Yeah. Exactly. Oh, you sent Craig to “college.” And if I died, you know, like, if I died.

**Julia:** On that note, I think we have one piece of follow up.

**Megana:** Yeah. So on an earlier episode, I think you guys said that we have heard a lot of stories of screenwriters who’ve had professional success, but we haven’t heard any Scriptnotes love stories. So Isaac wrote in and he wanted to share his love story and prove you guys wrong.

**Craig:** Okay.

**Isaac:** Howdy, folks. Back some time ago, I was listening to one of your episodes and heard Craig mention that, though you both hear plenty of stories about people succeeding in their screenwriting professions with the help of this podcast, you’ve yet to hear any good Scriptnotes love stories. Well, back in 2019, I was walking to work and listening to a podcast where John mentioned a live recording was happening at theater of the Ace Hotel. And it just so happened to be taking place on that very day that I was walking to work. There were a few tickets left. So I nabbed one and left work early.

Once I arrived alone and introverted, I went to the bar and was immediately drawn to the bartender. She chatted me up and encouraged me to come back and talk more, which I did several times. I would pour out each drink in the bathroom and wait a few minutes so I wouldn’t actually get drunk. I had no interest in alcohol at that point. The show started. You killed it with Melissa McCarthy and Rob McElhenney. And I ran to the bar again the moment that it ended, but she was gone. I hung around, bought a Camp Scriptnotes shirt to kill more time, which I wear every week, but she never came back.

Back home, I came up with a simple plan to see her again, just go back to the Ace. Problem is I needed to buy a ticket to the event. And the only one in the near future was a $600 VIP ticket to the Sundance Institute presenting The Farewell. I was desperate and dumb. And worse came to worse, I just get to hang out with Lula Huang and Awkwafina for an hour, I crossed my fingers that I wouldn’t have any medical emergencies in the near future and bought the ticket.

The next day, however, I got an Instagram DM from the bartender. It turns out she had clocked me as well. And thankfully, I paid with the card, because she took that opportunity to memorize my name so she could look me up later. We joke now that both of the things that we did were sort of creepy if the other person wasn’t quite into it. But it worked out. We went to get coffee the next day, and I told her about the farewell premiere, but not the price because I’m not a psychopath. She said that she’s glad that she remembered my name and reached out because she was about to leave for a family vacation and wouldn’t be working at the Ace for a few weeks.

Yes, I still went to the Sundance event. It was wonderful and surprisingly opened up a lot of doors that were closed to me originally. The bartender, who turned out to also be an exceptional actor, and I saw each other as often as possible after the first date. And a little over two years and one seemingly unending pandemic later, I asked her to marry me. Anyway, I just wanted to reach out and thank you two for putting this podcast together. To this day, when we get especially starry-eyed about the future, we’ll look to each other, smile and say, fucking Scriptnotes.

**Craig:** Fucking Scriptnotes.

**John:** Ah, that make – that just makes my heart my heart sing.

**Craig:** Wow.

**John:** Yeah. And so, I love the Scriptnotes wedding. I love the Scriptnotes baby. I love, you know –

**Craig:** Oh, my god, look at that.

**John:** Any people brought together by these circumstances.

**Craig:** You think, John, that Isaac knows her name yet because he’s just calling her the bartender. Do you think maybe he never found out?

**John:** Yeah. Or maybe there’s – she could be in witness protection. And that’s obviously a possibility. Yeah.

**Craig:** Oh, either way, man. That’s pretty awesome.

**John:** Yeah.

**Craig:** That’s, you know what, that’s pretty – I’m glad.

**Julia:** Wouldn’t she still have a name if she were in witness protection? She would just have a new name?

**Craig:** Yeah.

**John:** Yeah. A false name.

**Craig:** Yeah, I think that that’s one of the things they try and do otherwise they know it’s, yeah, if you just like, “What’s your name?” “Bartender.” And they’re like, “Oh, you’re in witness protection.” Now, they get – she has a name, I just don’t know if he knows it. Look, if you want to stay with her because John and I have been married for a long time so we can tell – not to each other. But we can tell you.

**John:** Yeah.

**Craig:** One of the keys is knowing your partner’s name.

**John:** It’s really good. Name, birthday, just the basic facts. You know, be able to recognize her face in a crowd –

**Craig:** Yeah.

**John:** So you can actually see here. Yeah.

**Craig:** Oh my god, like there’s like this sad part where she never came back and he was hanging around. Aww, I, you know, I feel like even though Isaac is saying that it’s Scriptnotes brought him and his wife together really it was just alcohol. I don’t think it was us at all. I mean, if you – if you really interrogate what he’s saying, he’s saying that he left the show to go drink and talk to her. So we actually were kind of in the way. Fucking Scriptnotes.

**John:** And so it 10 years.

**Craig:** Oh, ah.

**Julia:** Ten years, a lot of impact.

**Craig:** Ten years.

**Julia:** Is time for One Cool Things? I don’t feel like I can say that unless John decrees that it is.

**John:** It is time for One Cool Things.

**Craig:** Whoa.

**Julia:** So who goes first, John? You go first?

**John:** I’ll go first. Sure. I have two One Cool Things. My first one is a hawk named Spencer. So Spencer is the hawk who flies around the new Academy Museum and scares away all the other birds who might poop on the amazing glass dome that they built there. So I just love that there is a trained hawk who comes out there twice a week to fly around there and scare birds away. I just love that we still use hawks to do things like this. So this is a story in the L.A. Times. For all I know Julia, you may have been the person responsible for the story, but it’s written up by Deborah Vankin. I just – it’s cool that there’s like a hawk flying around Los Angeles to protect our new museum.

**Julia:** I can take no credit for that story because I’m on maternity leave, but I was delighted to see it.

**Craig:** Good job, Deborah.

**Julia:** Deb is a specialist at finding – she did an amazing story this year also about how the Getty fights moths, which is apparently a terrible thing you have to fight at a museum.

**John:** Oh.

**Craig:** Ooh. Oh, yeah.

**Julia:** She’s got a sub beat of museums, and they’re animals.

**Craig:** Yeah.

**Julia:** Yeah.

**John:** My second One Cool Things is actually just kind of a humble brag. Not a humble brag, just to brag. I built this typewriter out of Lego and it’s so cool. It took me nine hours to do but it looks great. I love vintage typewriters. And now I have a vintage typewriter made out of Lego. You guys can click the link in the WorkFlowy and see what it looks like. But, uh, it turned out great. It was my first Lego kit I’d ever done as a grown up and I just loved it and it actually makes little clacky sounds and the cartridge moves as you type. It’s delightful.

**Craig:** I see in your Instagram that Alex and A. Smith says, “My money is on this being next week’s One Cool Things.” Correct.

**Julia:** I saw that on your Instagram.

**Megana:** I was just going to say I’ve watched John make this Lego typewriter the pictures do not do justice to how complicated this was.

**Craig:** You are talking to the guy that built the 5,000-plus Millennium Falcon. So –

**John:** Wow. So really nothing – doesn’t mean for you.

**Craig:** What I’m saying is LOL to your Lego typewriter.

**Julia:** Hmm, I don’t know. I also am engaged in some high-level Lego building over here with my 8-year-sons –

**Craig:** Yeah.

**Julia:** And have also been given adult specialized Legos. So maybe we need to have a Lego off.

**Craig:** Ah, I would totally be into that. The key to building Legos is to just commit.

**John:** Yeah.

**Craig:** Just commit.

**Julia:** You know, but I remember hearing before I had kids like, “Oh, Legos, it’s so terrible. There’s no creative building anymore. The kids just want to follow the rules and build these sets.” And like as a non-kid haver and non-Lego doer, I was very sympathetic to that kind of cranky Gen-X argument. It’s not like we were when we were little. And then having kids, these sets are so cool. Like, they’re really fun –

**John:** Yeah.

**Craig:** True.

**Julia:** And you learn a lot like, I mean, yes, there’s the problem that they make you buy new Legos and capitalism, etc. But I anticipated loathing Legos in parenthood and instead have found them a great source of parenting pleasure.

**Craig:** Yeah, of course, the sets are amazing. When I was a kid, and I didn’t have sets. I just had a huge, big bag of Legos. I built a large brick. I built the largest Lego brick ever. It’s the kind of thing that gets you institutionalized.

**John:** Yeah.

**Craig:** If people really consider what you’re doing as a child, “What does your son do with those Legos? He built one massive Lego. Okay, well, he’s a danger to society.”

I’ll tell you what is my One Cool Things and some people consider it dangerous to society like for instance, Stephen King who doesn’t get the genius of this, Ketchup Doritos. So in Canada there are all these ketchup things like they have ketchup potato chips, and they have Ketchup Doritos. And it sounds disgusting for I think a lot of people. I thought it would probably be disgusting.

Ketchup Doritos are wonderful. They’re the greatest thing ever. I have a bag of Ketchup Doritos that I keep in my trailer and I try and work through it slowly like over the course of a couple of weeks. So I’m like – I don’t eat out of the bag. I like take a handful, put them on the table, put the bag back, eat my eight Doritos and I feel super happy. Although I will say, I’m pretty sure that Bo steals a lot of the ketchup Doritos because there was a time I think she ate through one-and-a-half bags. Nobody can eat food like Bo by the way. Bo is my assistant, Bo Shim is very small, and she can eat more food than I can. It’s amazing. Regardless, Ketchup Doritos, I don’t know if you can get them in the US.

**John:** Mm-hmm.

**Craig:** But if there’s some sort of Canada deal where they can ship it to you from Canada, and you got a few extra bucks and you feel ketchup-ing it up, hmm, so good.

**John:** Well, then, it sounds great.

**Julia:** All right. I’ve got two One Cool Things as the vernacular has it. The first is just a book that I want both of you hosts to read and actually Megana too given her background as I learned about it on the show. Have any of you read Empire of Pain by Patrick Radden Keefe, the book about the Sacklers?

**John:** Um, it is sitting on my Kindle to read. I’m excited to read it.

**Craig:** I have read it.

**Julia:** I found it to be such a great mix of really impressive reporting and really gripping storytelling. It’s very hard to write nonfiction that is both rigorous in its standards of accuracy and inquiry and reads like a fucking potboiler. And I could not put this book down. I found it so impressive on both levels. And it’s fascinating about the evolution in the pharmaceutical business and all of the terrible decisions that brought us the opioid epidemic.

**Craig:** So many.

**Julia:** But if you haven’t read it and those subjects sound at all interesting to you, read it. It’s not a beach read, but it’s a page turner, yes, page-turner.

**Craig:** it almost is a beach read. There are these moments where the stupid humanity of it all. Like, first of all, the way that they ended up with the name Purdue Pharmacy is incredible. So weird and shabby. And then the fact that the whole thing ultimately can be traced back to one poorly cited study in a journal that shouldn’t have even been in there. It’s awesome, and terrible, and wonderful. Definitely, great read.

**Julia:** All right, so that’s my first Cool Thing. And my second one, possibly stepping outside my role here as the ruthless journalist come in to interrogate you guys. But my second Cool Thing is Scriptnotes. You guys have built something really extraordinary here.

**John:** Aww.

**Megana:** Aww.

**Craig:** Aww.

**Julia:** And it’s been lovely over the years to hear all of its ramifications, all the different people you’ve touched, all the impact you’ve had, all the interesting knowledge you’ve surfaced. And as a longtime listener, that’s my Cool Thing in honor of your 10th anniversary is you guys.

**Craig:** Oh, Thank, Julia.

**John:** Thank you.

**Craig:** That’s so sweet. And thank you for doing this.

**John:** Yes.

**Craig:** This is awesome.

**John:** Now, Julia, you have the opportunity, but not the requirement to do the boilerplate at the end of the show. Do you feel like doing that or would you like me to do that?

**Julia:** Oh, man. Scriptnotes is produced by Megana Rao. It’s edited Matthew Chilelli. Our outro today is by Matthew Chilelli. If you have an outro, you can send us a link to ask@johnaugust.com. That’s also a place where you can send longer questions. For shorter questions on Twitter, Craig is sometimes online as @clmazin, and I am always @johnaugust. You can find the show notes for this episode and all episodes at johnaugust.com. That’s also where you’ll find transcripts and the sign up for our weekly-ish newsletter called Interesting, which has lots of links to things about writing. We have T-shirts, and they’re great, from the Cotton Bureau. You can sign up to become a premium member at Scriptnotes.net, where you can get all the back episodes and bonus segments.

**Craig:** Thank you, Julia.

**John:** Thank you so much for doing this. And please stick around after this because you have a bonus topic for us to talk through which I’m very excited about on How Would Scriptnotes Be a Movie.

**Julia:** Very briefly, I know we have a cutoff, but I have one question I had wanted to ask you was, “What is the story of the Scriptnotes theme, where those notes come from? What’s the deal?”

**John:** So the Scriptnotes theme comes from, the bump, bump, bump, bump, bump, actually came from a short I did called The Remnants. It was a pilot for a web series, which we can put a link in the show notes to that, and I just wrote that as the opening jingle to The Remnants and I needed some intro music. So just like grabbed those, and so the actual name of that is Bloops and that became the basis for all of our outros. And so, all the outros should have that same pattern in there. And sometimes we get outros that are like really cool but you can’t actually hear the bloops in there. And they get dinged because we have standards.

**Craig:** Stuff I don’t know. The stuff I don’t know about this show is just a mountain of stuff I don’t know.

**John:** Oh, also, one thing we didn’t talk about, who came up with the name Scriptnotes? It was Craig Mazin.

**Craig:** Oh, also didn’t know that. Is that right?

**John:** Yeah, that’s true. You were the one who said Scriptnotes and –

**Craig:** Oh, okay.

**John:** Scriptnotes is meant to be – only the “S” is capitalized. There’s – the “n” is not capitalized, and it drives me absolutely crazy when people capitalize the “n” in it. So it’s, it’s one word, just to capital on the “S” whatever. And Craig –

**Craig:** When John sees it, he has a kernel panic.

**John:** I really do. Like, the camel case is not appropriate for this kind of work.

**Julia:** Why one word instead of two?

**Craig:** Yeah.

**John:** Just because I – it should be one word. I don’t know why. It just feels like it should be one word.

**Julia:** All right, mysteries, mysteries persist –

**Craig:** Yeah.

**Julia:** At the end of this conversation.

**John:** Just taste. Yeah.

**Julia:** Just taste.

**John:** And thank you, Julia Turner, for coming on to do this. But you should listen to her every week on the Slate Culture Gabfest which is phenomenal. And of course, subscribe and read the L.A. Times, which is a great local newspaper. Julia Turner, thank you so much for doing this.

**Craig:** Thank you, Julia. That was great.

**Julia:** Thank you. Thanks for having me.

Hello, and welcome to the bonus segment of Scriptnotes. I’m doing the Slate Plus intro tone of voice here, but you guys will just have to roll with it. Today we are playing How Would This Be a Movie with the first 10 years of Scriptnotes. Is it a buddy comedy? Is it a bracing Hollywood critique? Is it kind of Norma Rae where you get the assistant’s better pay? And who plays each of you?

**John:** That’s the crucial question. All right. My choice for Craig –

**Craig:** Oh.

**John:** Is Paul is Paul Giamatti.

**Craig:** I mean, he’s a little too old.

**John:** He’s a little too old. That’s the problem. So –

**Craig:** I think you’re thinking of 10 years ago, Paul Giamatti.

**John:** I’m thinking 10 years, so like, Josh Gad, could you – who else could do it? Now, who do you want to play you?

**Craig:** I don’t know. Just somebody sort of Jewy and grumpy, who’s sort of Jewy and grumpy. There’s so many of us. I don’t know. I have no idea.

**John:** And maybe Craig plays himself honestly.

**Craig:** I mean, I am an actor.

**John:** You’re quite a good actor.

**Craig:** Thank you.

**John:** You are an actor. Yes.

**Craig:** Thank you. Thank you.

**John:** Yeah.

**Craig:** Yeah.

**John:** Maybe Craig plays himself. But I am played on the show by – I think by Jim Parsons of Big Bang Theory, that’d be my choice.

**Craig:** Yeah, that sounds reasonable.

**John:** Yeah, because he could do that sort of, like, good-natured, but gay and also can be robotic at times.

**Craig:** Yeah.

**John:** That’s –

**Craig:** I mean, he’s sort of got that market cornered, actually.

**John:** Yeah.

**Craig:** Yeah.

**John:** So I’m saying Jim Parsons. But what is the tone?

**Julia:** Yeah, yeah, casting is fun. But like what’s – yeah, how would it be a movie?

**Craig:** Hmm. It’s a boring goddamn movie. I’ll tell you that.

**John:** Yeah. So the drama-drama came out during the agency stuff, but much of that is especially good. It could be like one of those sort of backstage comedies like getting ready for a live show. Because that’s always sort of interesting and scrambly because here’s what tends to happen, especially an Austin is Craig would put together a dinner before the show.

**Craig:** Yes.

**John:** And we have like 30 or 40 writers around this big, long table, and we take forever to get our food and like, “Craig, the show is going to start in 10 minutes, we have to go.” And Craig is like, “Oh, great, Who should we have on as guests, and so that we bring really drunk people on the show?” So that stuff behind the scenes would be half the fun. Like, we’re sort of like, Game Night. It’s like Game Night, but without trying to put on a live show.

**Craig:** That’s not bad. I mean, there is a version where we do the show, but really, we’re spies or something, I mean, the whole thing is a cover. We’re not even screenwriters.

**John:** Yeah, no.

**Craig:** But –

**John:** That’s a very long con.

**Craig:** There could also be a version of this where we hate each other.

**John:** Yeah. Oh, I love that version –

**Craig:** Yeah.

**John:** Where like, it’s all we just detest each other. And so like –

**Craig:** Yeah.

**John:** So, you and I both know, it’s like some TV shows where they’d be cast members just despise each other.

**Craig:** Yes.

**John:** And could not actually – they could like, cameras rolling, they’re great. And they never spoke offset. That could be us.

**Craig:** I think that would be kind of fun. And then I guess in that regard, the hero of that show would be Megana.

**John:** Mm-hmm. Yeah. Or she’s like sort of trapped in the middle of the first shot.

**Craig:** Yeah, she’s like, so it’s from her perspective, like Megana wakes up, and she’s like, “Oh, my god, I got to go to work with – ” And everyone is like, “Oh, my god, you’re so lucky. You get to produce that show with those guys. They’re so great.” And she’s like, “Mm-hmm.” And then she gets there. And we’re screaming at each other and she’s like, “My life sucks. And then and then she falls in love.”

**John:** Yeah. But I think –

**Megana:** Ah, with who?

**Craig:** Exactly. See, you’re into it. So I’m feeling like, there’s another podcast that we’re super angry about because they’re getting into our stuff, and we hate each other but we hate other podcasts more. And you and the producer of that podcast –

**John:** Mm-hmm.

**Craig:** Start to commiserate over some drinks. And then it happens. And then the thing – it’s like Romeo and Juliet.

**John:** Yeah, so we may be begging the question, Craig –

**Craig:** Oh.

**John:** Because we’re assuming that this is supposed to be a movie, but I don’t think it really is a movie. I think it is a –

**Craig:** It’s inaudible.

**John:** It’s a series. I mean, it really is –

**Craig:** Great use of begging the question. Great use of everything.

**John:** Thank you. I want to take all the praise you can give me. I think it really is, though, a – it’s a comedy. I think it’s more like Veep, honestly, where like, we are incredibly dysfunctional.

**Craig:** Right.

**John:** And Megana is the equivalent of that chief of staff like trying to hold us all together.

**Craig:** Right?

**John:** And that’s Craig…

**Craig:** Perfect. It’s like the first – maybe it’s not the first comedy – but it is of a model where finally the millennials have to take care of the diapered up Gen-Xers. You know what I mean?

**John:** Inaudible.

**Craig:** Like, we’re just cranking and out of it. So out of it.

**John:** Mm-hmm.

**Craig:** And I like the idea that you are super racist behind the scenes.

**John:** I think that – well, you know, I’m Southern. I try to keep my accent hidden but I’m actually from the deep, deep south, the really racist south.

**Craig:** Yeah. Yeah. And so like –

**John:** So –

**Craig:** When once the thing, like, you know, it’s Hollywood, nothing is ever what you think. Like I’m the nice one. You’re a dick. And then, Megana, she’s like, deal with that, but you know, I think it would be wonderful. That’s – how would it be a show?

**Julia:** Reverse Odd Couple where the odd couple you play on the podcast, you are the opposite odd couple behind scenes.

**Craig:** Correct. Reverse odd couple plus generational babies. Yeah. I love it.

**Julia:** Yeah.

**Craig:** Plus romance. Romance is the key.

**John:** Oh, so much romance. Yeah.

**John:** I’m really excited about this whole Megana romance angle. We do it to figure this out.

**Megana:** I’m excited about it, too.

**Craig:** I know. Megana, let’s talk. We got to figure this out.

**John:** Yeah. But it has to be like, like fumbles along the way. So it has to be like, sort of like –

**Craig:** Of course.

**John:** I mean, because it has build over the course of season like will they or won’t they? But then of course, stuff will sort of pull them apart and there’s terrible stuff about him too.

**Craig:** You know, I feel like that’s something that is from our time. I think that for millennials, there’s no will they or won’t they.

**John:** Mm-hmm.

**Craig:** It’s you will – we will.

**John:** Yeah.

**Craig:** But then what?

**John:** Yeah.

**Craig:** That’s exciting.

**John:** But then it got awkward. Yeah.

**Craig:** Yeah, exactly. Now it’s like, oh, my god, am I on his Insta, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. This is great. Love it.

**Julia:** All right.

**Craig:** I’m just summing up an entire generation with the word Insta.

**Julia:** Okay. I think we can conclude that Scriptnotes should remain a podcast based on this conversation. But thank you for indulging my inquiry.

**Craig:** Of course.

**Julia:** And thank you listeners for supporting John’s effort to enrich himself at the expense of Craig.

**Craig:** Thank you. Hey, finally, someone gets it. We did it!

**John:** Yay!

**Craig:** Yay!

**John:** This was so much fun.

**Craig:** Whew! Whew!

**Julia:** Thanks, guys. This was really, really fun.

**Craig:** Thank you so much.

**John:** Thank you so much, Julia. This was amazing.

Links:

* Julia Turner on the [LA Times](https://www.latimes.com/people/julia-turner) and [Slate Culture Gabfest](https://slate.com/podcasts/culture-gabfest)
* [The Matrix Trailer](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9ix7TUGVYIo&t=1s)
* [Scriptnotes, Episode 411: Setting it Up with Katie Silberman](https://johnaugust.com/2019/setting-it-up-with-katie-silberman)
* [Empire of Pain](https://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/612861/empire-of-pain-by-patrick-radden-keefe/) by Patrick Radden Keefe
* [The Academy Museum Hawk](https://www.latimes.com/entertainment-arts/story/2021-09-09/academy-museum-hawk-spencer) Deborah Vankin for the LA Times
* [Lego Typewriter](https://www.lego.com/en-us/product/typewriter-21327), check out John’s finished [project!](https://instagram.com/p/CTqH6wWvdW-/)
* [Ketchup Doritos](https://www.walmart.ca/en/ip/doritos-ketchup-tortilla-chips/6000196078571)
* [Check out the Scriptnotes Index for our first 500 episodes](https://johnaugust.com/scriptnotes-index)
* [Get a Scriptnotes T-shirt!](https://cottonbureau.com/people/scriptnotes-podcast)
* [Gift a Scriptnotes Subscription](https://scriptnotes.supportingcast.fm/gifts) or [treat yourself to a premium subscription!](https://scriptnotes.supportingcast.fm/)
* [Julia Turner](https://twitter.com/juliaturner?lang=en) on Twitter
* [John August](https://twitter.com/johnaugust) on Twitter
* [Craig Mazin](https://twitter.com/clmazin) on Twitter
* [John on Instagram](https://www.instagram.com/johnaugust/?hl=en)
* [Outro](http://johnaugust.com/2013/scriptnotes-the-outros) by Matthew Chilelli ([send us yours!](http://johnaugust.com/2014/outros-needed))
* Scriptnotes is produced by [Megana Rao](https://twitter.com/MeganaRao) and edited by [Matthew Chilelli](https://twitter.com/machelli).

Email us at ask@johnaugust.com

You can download the episode [here](http://traffic.libsyn.com/scriptnotes/516standard.mp3).

The original post for this episode can be found [here](https://johnaugust.com/2021/looking-back-and-forward).

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

**Craig Mazin:** My name is Craig Mazin.

**John:** And this is Episode 514 of Scriptnotes, a podcast about screenwriting and things that are interesting to screenwriters. Often on the show we talk about what’s happening in the WGA West, but today we’ll be taking a look at our sister union in the East and the debate over who the WGA should represent. Then we’ll be answering listener questions about reading lists, blue skies, bad agents, and bored executives.

**Craig:** Huh?

**John:** And in our bonus segment for premium members we will discuss how life has gotten better in the past few decades.

**Craig:** Doesn’t seem like it has, but it has.

**John:** But it actually has.

**Craig:** Oh yeah.

**John:** And Craig this is our kind of unofficial but also official 10th Anniversary show. Ten years ago–

**Craig:** Oh my god.

**John:** Was the first episode of Scriptnotes. So we’ll be doing later talking about sort of what actually happened over those ten years, but I do want to celebrate this milestone of ten years of doing this show.

**Craig:** That’s terrifying.

**John:** It is. It’s genuinely terrifying.

**Craig:** Yeah. We are aging and what we’re doing is leaving behind ourselves this enormous digital wake of yapping. But I do think for guys who have been doing it for ten years we still have stuff to say.

**John:** We still have stuff to say. I mean, as I said on our Episode 100 I had confessed that I didn’t know that we would make it past 100 because I’d felt we would run out of things. Nope, stuff just keeps coming.

**Craig:** Oh you thought we wouldn’t make it past 100 episodes?

**John:** Yeah.

**Craig:** Oh man. What’s today’s episode?

**John:** 514.

**Craig:** Oh man, we made it. So the question is are we going to make it to a 1,000?

**John:** I don’t know. We could.

**Craig:** Has any podcast made it to a thousand?

**John:** Well I don’t think podcasts have really kind of been along that long. Although there’s podcasts who do it twice or three times a week, so obviously they would have made it to a thousand.

**Craig:** Right.

**John:** Yeah. But for a weekly show that’s good.

**Craig:** I think it’s amazing.

**John:** You were saying before we started recording that Bo who works with you started listening to this when she was in college. So, just crazy.

**Craig:** Oh god.

**John:** Or high school maybe even. Who knows?

**Craig:** Possibly high school. Well, no, she said she started listening to it when we was 20. So she was in college. But we started recording the show I think when she was in high school. So if we do this again, we keep going, and we make it to a thousand there will be people working for us who were not even born.

**John:** Born, yes.

**Craig:** When we started the show.

**John:** Uh-huh.

**Craig:** Well that’s going to be great.

**John:** Yeah.

**Craig:** They’re not going to resent us and our stupid old selves. Not at all.

**John:** So let’s start this episode by looking back at looking forward. So this is a question from Martin in Sandringham, Australia who writes, “Hey John and Craig. In Episode 167 back in 2014 you discussed superhero movies on the slate for the following seven years and I was wondering if you could now revisit this and see how it all unfolded in reality.” And Martin also notes “I did shudder when John posed the question about what the world would be like in 2020. Craig thought that we would all have phones implanted in our ears.”

**Craig:** Well…

**John:** Well…

**Craig:** Earbuds. Not far off.

**John:** We have our earbuds.

**Craig:** Not far off.

**John:** Not far off at all. We’ll put a link in the show notes to the transcript from that episode. And also the archived version of the article we were talking about, because this was an article on Newsarama that was sort of laying out the next seven years of superhero movies.

But I thought we’d take a look through and sort of what’s supposed to be there and what actually was there and Megana took a look at really tried to chart what movies actually came out on the days that they were supposed to come out and a surprising number did. So let’s take a look back, start back in 2015.

So 2015 was predicted for The Avengers, Age of Ultron, Fantastic Four from Fox, and Ant Man. Those all came out on the days they were supposed to which is good because that was the year the article came out. So within one year is pretty easy to predict what movies are going to come out within a year.

**Craig:** Yeah. I mean, did we doubt that they were coming out?

**John:** No.

**Craig:** Oh, good, well OK.

**John:** I don’t think we doubted it. But I think we were at the time surprised that any studio could have the hubris to suggest like oh this is the next seven years of movies we’re going to make.

**Craig:** I do remember this now. This is coming back to me from six years ago or whatever it was, seven years ago.

**John:** So 2016 the predictions were for Batman vs. Superman: Dawn of Justice. That did happen.

**Craig:** Yup.

**John:** They said Captain America 3 which became Captain America Civil War. X-Men Apocalypse. I don’t really remember.

**Craig:** It did happen.

**John:** It did happen?

**Craig:** Yup.

**John:** Doctor Strange was the untitled Marvel film. The untitled DC film was Suicide Squad and both of those came out on the date they said they were predicted to. But, the first movie that never happened, November 11 was supposed to be Sinister Six from Sony.

**Craig:** What the?

**John:** Sinister Six is a bunch of the Spider-Man villains.

**Craig:** Oh, so Suicide Squad.

**John:** Yeah, kind of. But different and better. And if I remember correctly I think Drew Goddard was supposed to be doing that. So, I feel bad that didn’t happen.

**Craig:** All right.

**Megana Rao:** Sorry. Doctor Strange was supposed to come out on July 8 but ended up being pushed to November of that year.

**John:** So Megana with a correction here.

**Craig:** Ah, OK. Yeah, but I’ll give them that four month leeway there. That’s OK.

**John:** Yeah, some sliding.

**Craig:** Yeah.

**John:** So we get to 2017. Fox had slated an untitled Wolverine sequel. That came out on the day that they predicted. So, March 3 that came out.

**Craig:** Logan, yeah.

**John:** That’s Logan. An untitled Marvel film came out which was Guardians of the Galaxy Volume 2, originally scheduled for May but it came out in July.

**Craig:** It looks like it was originally scheduled for July and came out in May. That’s weird.

**John:** Oh is that right?

**Craig:** Yeah, it looks like they made it go faster. By the way I’ve got to tip my hat to the studios. The plan is working. This is terrifying.

**John:** Yeah. You’re going to notice that the Marvel films tend to be running much more on schedule than the other studios. Not a shock there.

**Craig:** No.

**John:** Sony had Venom: Carnage, a Spider-Man spinoff. So it wasn’t called Carnage. The new movie is called Carnage.

**Craig:** Right.

**John:** But Venom came out and it they didn’t have a date for it but they said 2017. It actually came out in 2018. But it did happen.

**Craig:** Close.

**John:** But they were also supposed to have a female Spider-Man spinoff.

**Craig:** That did not happen.

**John:** No. There’s an untitled DC film set for November 17. That was Justice League. And then came out when it was supposed to. There were two untitled Marvel films on the release schedule for 2017. Those became Black Panther and Thor: Ragnarok, although Black Panther actually got pushed to 2018. Guardians of the Galaxy 2 came out. Spider-Man: Homecoming out. And the untitled DC film became Wonder Woman which was a big hit.

**Craig:** So basically they’re getting everything right. I guess the question is what did they get wrong and there hasn’t been so much. There’s Sinister Six. And that’s kind of it. Oh, and then there was a female Spider-Man spinoff that didn’t happen. And then they kind of got everything else sort of right. Well, OK, once we start getting into 2018, and this is not surprising, it gets a little cloudier, right? Because they wanted a Flash movie. That didn’t seem to happen.

**John:** No. Captain Marvel came out later than was expected.

**Craig:** But you know I give them credit for that.

**John:** Yeah. Nothing bad about that. Moving into 2019 there’s an untitled DC film. That was probably Shazam. That came out in 2019.

**Craig:** Yeah.

**John:** We got some Avengers: End Game. There’s an untitled DC film which you could say was the Suicide Squad sequel. That came out this past year. There wasn’t really another movie in between there that could have fit that bill. We got some Birds of Prey. We got some Wonder Woman 1984. Fox had slated for 2020 a Fantastic Four 2.

**Craig:** That didn’t sound like it happened.

**John:** No. The thing is you don’t get the 2s if the first one doesn’t work. That’s the problem.

**Craig:** Impressive though. Overall you know what studios? I’m sorry for doubting you. I’m sorry for doubting your commitment to making 4,000 superhero movies.

**John:** Yeah. They said they were going to do it and you know what they did it. Some things didn’t come out on time. Some things were big hits. Some things were not big hits. But they can do it. So I guess it’s the planners in those departments, the big whiteboards, it’s nice when it actually works out for them.

**Craig:** If I say “I’m starting to doubt your commitment to Sparkle Motion” do you know what I’m quoting?

**John:** I do. That is from Donnie Darko?

**Craig:** It is.

**John:** All right.

**Craig:** Sometimes I doubt your commitment to Sparkle Motion. Richard Kelly.

**John:** Yup. A frequent Scriptnotes guest.

**Craig:** Correct.

**John:** Great. Last week, or two weeks ago actually. Last time Craig was on the show we talked about conspiracy theories. And we answered a listener question about whether the writing conspiracy theories in movies and TV shows in 2021 is moral and ethical given sort of the craziness that’s out there. And we had people reach out on Twitter saying, yeah, that’s a great conversation. I think that you brought some really good points. Then we had people email in to say, no, those were not good points and you’re wrong.

**Craig:** Let’s see how they did.

**John:** So Megana you got a lot to read this week.

**Craig:** Let’s play the Make Craig Angry game.

**John:** Yeah. So I wanted to include some of them because not only did they raise counterpoints, but in many cases they are great examples of logical fallacies.

**Craig:** I had a feeling.

**John:** And so Megana if you could start us off. I know you got a lot of reading this week, so pace yourself. But why don’t you start with Matt in LA.

**Megana:** Matt in LA writes, “I think you’re giving Hollywood far too much credit. Conspiracy theories have existed for thousands of years throughout the world. The most obvious example historically is probably the centuries of villainizing Jewish people for pretty much anything. I’m not saying to write conspiracy movies or not write them. I’m not saying Hollywood hasn’t played some part. I’m just saying conspiracy theories have always been around and this isn’t the first time in history they’ve gotten ugly.”

**Craig:** That’s the worst. Ugh. Count the mistakes.

**John:** But Craig there are worse examples of fallacies here. So, I would call this as sort of what-about-ism. It’s sort of like it’s kind of changing the topic or redefining. Because I think we’re not talking about the same things. There’s scapegoating which is what you’re sort of doing to Jewish people and atrocities. Or that there’s evil forces out there. But that’s not the same thing as the government is both incredibly competent at keeping secrets but also we know they’re incompetent. That there’s a giant governmental plan to suppress or do something dastardly that’s being kept from you. That’s the kind of conspiracy theory we’re talking about which is different than sort of this idea that Jewish people are the root of all problems.

**Craig:** Even if these were equivalent comments it still wouldn’t make any sense because just because something is true doesn’t mean it is the only thing that is true. The fact that conspiracy theories have existed for thousands of years has absolutely nothing to do with the pernicious practice of spreading or fomenting additional conspiracy theories.

OK, so COVID-19 is out there. Therefore one should not blame some new lab for spilling some I don’t know chemical into the air. One has nothing to do with the other. Yes, there have been conspiracy theories and also we shouldn’t make it worse. How do you possibly argue with that statement? Well, Matt in LA has figured it out. I disagree with you Matt completely. 100 billion percent.

**John:** So I think where the scapegoating and conspiracy theories overlap is that they can be pernicious lies and they’re sort of memes that spread by themselves. But I think a conspiracy theory is different in that it has this unprovable, untestable claim and that if you try to push back against it they’ll say, oh, that’s what they want you to believe. Basically there’s no way to sort of package it up and defeat it because it’s always going to say like, oh, that’s exactly what they would want you to believe.

**Craig:** Yeah. I mean, just because we’re saying that Hollywood makes it worse doesn’t mean we’re saying Hollywood invented it. We’re just saying that we have a responsibility to not promote conspiratorial thinking. If everybody stopped promoting conspiratorial thinking there would be fewer conspiracy theorists in the world. They would never be eliminated, but there would be fewer. This is unobjectionable.

**John:** I think we’re also talking about how in so many of our movies the protagonist’s role is that conspiracy person, the one who is standing up against a hidden system of injustice that I only believe the truth and only I can expose it. And I think we are valorizing that person at our detriment sometimes because people want to identify with that person. Oh, I want to be obviously the hero in my own story, so therefore I should not believe what’s out there.

**Craig:** I mean, Matt knows this.

**John:** I think Matt knows this, too.

**Craig:** I think Matt’s just griping. Let’s see. I’m sure the other ones are going to be better. [laughs]

**John:** Help us out with Nate if you could, Megana.

**Megana:** OK. So Nate says, “I’m firmly pro-science and pro-logic. Yet, I’m concerned this sort of thinking is a big step on the path toward banning books or even burning them. We should never stifle works on art based on what the lowest common denominator might take from them. Not only would we miss out on the fun of fictional movies like The Manchurian Candidate or Conspiracy Theory, but more tragically we could no longer dramatize important true stories, like All the President’s Men, The Insider, Erin Brockovich, Spotlight, or The Post.

“I realize you weren’t suggesting our government might make it illegal to write conspiracy-related films.”

**Craig:** Thank you.

**Megana:** “But even self-censorship can be a dangerous proposition. So let’s just keep telling compelling stories that inform and/or entertain and remind ourselves that stupid is as stupid does and there’s nothing we can do about that.”

**John:** So many things wrapped up in this one.

**Craig:** Oh, Nate.

**John:** So, Nate, you are both slippery-sloping and straw-manning which is a hard thing. But basically you built a strawman and then you put it on a slippery slope down to–

**Craig:** You know what he’s doing? He’s Slippery-Manning.

**John:** He is slippery-manning.

**Craig:** And you know who likes that?

**John:** Oh no!

**Craig:** Yeah.

**John:** No. No.

**Craig:** That’s right.

**John:** 10 years.

**Craig:** Nah. Go on. Talk about slippery-manning. Sexy Craig loves slippery-manning.

**John:** All right. So and again at the end Nate is trying to pull it out like let’s all agree that this is a reasonable thing. And that’s its own kind of thing, like trying to find a middle ground. Middle-grounding there at the end.

It’s really frustrating. Again, the strawman here is that you are saying that we said something we did not say which is that we should categorically not make these kinds of movies. We’re saying that we should actually think about the kinds of movies we make and the things we depict onscreen, which is a thing we do. It’s a thing we’ve decided we’re going to do as a culture, as filmmakers, as TV makers.

**Craig:** Yeah.

**John:** We’re going to decide what to portray and it’s changed over the decades. It just has. You look at shows from 20, 30 years ago, they were depicting the world differently. That’s progress.

**Craig:** Yeah. You know what? John, why are you self-censoring? I mean, it’s not illegal to make a movie where people are in blackface. So why are you self-censoring? It’s really dangerous. [laughs] This is so stupid, Nate. I don’t even know how to wrap my mind around it. Also, I don’t believe you believe this. You say you’re pro-logic. I challenge that. Because come on, man. Self-censorship is part and parcel with artistic creation. We are constantly making choices and then we’re constantly self-editing. Editing. Restraining. Refining. Holding back. Pushing forward. These are choices we make. What is your suggestion? That we just never consider the world around us when we tell stories?

That’s just ridiculous. And you are absolutely engaging in the most bizarre slippery-sloping. Do you really think that this is a “big step on the path toward banning or burning books?” Nate, Nate, come on, man. Cut it out. This is fun. Who is next? I’m enjoying this.

**Megana:** So Elijah says, “Yes, some people doing their own research will be led to the wrong conclusions, but others like myself know how to do research properly and wouldn’t have trusted the COVID-19 if I wasn’t able to verify from multiple doctors and healthcare professionals that it is safe.”

**Craig:** [laughs]

**John:** All right. So I wanted to save that last little argument because Elijah had written other stuff, too, which is similar to other people. But that last part is a fallacy of illusory superiority. It’s that belief that when people overestimate their own qualities and abilities saying everyone who thinks that they’re better than average. And basically well I’m a person who can do my own research and therefore I can do this. Well, then you’re sort of be default saying other people aren’t smart enough to do their own research. It’s a weird trap to fall into.

**Craig:** Yeah. Also you don’t have to do research. If you are concerned about what multiple doctors and healthcare professionals think just go to the AMA website, or the CDC. There’s really no need to do research. The inability of Americans to do research is astonishing to me. They like to say the word research, but what they really mean is Googling crap from nonsense sites and talking to each other on Facebook. That’s not research at all.

**John:** No.

**Craig:** Or misreading studies, which is almost a national pastime at this point.

**John:** It definitely is. I think if you’re going to look at what doctors recommend you might look at what doctors themselves are doing for themselves. And if you see 98% of doctors are vaccinating themselves.

**Craig:** Yeah.

**John:** That might be a sign that that’s a thing you want to do. I think inevitably everything leads to COVID these days, but I wanted to include that here just because of conspiracy theories and people writing in about this.

**Craig:** I suspect, I could be wildly wrong, but I suspect that the reason that Matt, Nate, and Elijah have written these comments is because they engage in conspiratorial thinking and they feel called out. And so they are defending. They feel defensive. This feels like defensive stuff. It doesn’t feel like a calm, rational, observation, or concern whatsoever. I think that they engage in conspiratorial thinking and they don’t like the fact that we don’t like it. And you failed to change our minds.

**John:** Yeah. I think I’m trying to be aware of situations where I am thinking conspiratorially, which is not about national government stuff, but there are definitely situations in which I can find myself guilty of conspiratorial thinking and I will try to take a step back from that. But I don’t believe that the overall system of the universe is rigged against me that I have to research everything to death to figure it out.

**Craig:** Yeah.

**John:** Dave from New Hampshire I think actually had an email here that could point us to a way out.

**Craig:** Oh good.

**John:** So Megana if you could share Dave’s email here.

**Megana:** “If movies and television can exacerbate this conspiracy theory problem, could they also help fight it? I’m working on my first screenplay now. It’s a dark comedy set during the satanic panic of the 1980s and one of the major themes is about how dangerous and harmful conspiracy theories can be. Do you have any thoughts on how my or any other movie could be effective in slowing the spread of conspiracy theories?”

**John:** Yeah, Dave. So first off I think that’s a great thing to look at, because I remember that time. And D&D was of course wildly implicated in it and it was nuts. So here’s my suggestion is rather than have the outside character sort of pointing to this conspiracy theory is crazy and wrong, if you can find a person who believes the conspiracy theory and is able to get their way out of thinking that the conspiracy theory is true. That’s actually genuinely helpful. Because we have very few examples of people finding their way out of these labyrinthian traps of conspiratorial thinking. And if you can show that and show that progress that is terrific.

**Craig:** I agree. What you’re doing is certainly one way of doing it as well which is to look at the aftermath because one of the hallmarks of conspiratorial thinkers is that they leap frog from one conspiracy to another. Their stock and trade is mobile goal posts.

So, if one of their hard thought and hard one beliefs is just absolutely finally proven to be utter nonsense they move onto a new one. It’s what they do. And it’s important to follow up and to show everybody that they thought this, they promoted it, and they were wrong, and here’s the proof. That’s important. That matters.

The satanic panic of the 1980s was real, it was insane. By the way, the nonsense about whatever it was, the missing children. Remember how obsessed everyone was with missing children when we were kids?

**John:** Definitely. Child abductions. Stranger dangers.

**Craig:** Child abductions. Stranger danger. The threat to children was vastly overrated. What was underrated was how many kids were being hurt inside their own homes. So, Megana, you’re going to find this hard to believe but when John and I were children, first of all they would make us drink milk in school. So let’s just start with how stupid that is. And John I don’t know if your school district did this, but in our school district in New York City they put pictures of kids on milk. Like on the side of the milk carton. Missing. I mean?

**John:** Yeah. I knew what that was.

**Craig:** It was crazy.

**John:** For whatever reason our Boulder dairies did not care about missing children.

**Craig:** I see.

**John:** And so it would never print those photographs. They were involved obviously in the child abductions.

**Craig:** I don’t know why they thought milk – like why was milk the thing? People who like milk tend to also be great detectives? I don’t know. Anyway, the point being it needed to be debunked. And we must constantly debunk because it is the only thing I think that will stop people who are salvageable from continuing on that path. So I think you’re doing it. And I think John’s suggestion is terrific. Documentaries are a great idea.

And if you are doing a story where there is a conspiracy make sure to underscore how mundane it is, because most conspiracies are brutally mundane. They are not conspiracies of malicious people seeking to puppet master the world. They’re usually conspiracy theories of mediocrities covering up their own mess.

**John:** Yup. And a couple people, we trimmed these out of the emails, but they were saying like, oh, but Craig is being hypocritical because in Chernobyl he was talking about government cover up. But that is covering up a mistake. That is not from the start saying we’re going to do this thing and then we’re going to hide it.

**Craig:** Correct.

**John:** No, they were actually just trying to cover their ass.

**Craig:** There was no conspiracy at Chernobyl. There was a cover up but there was no conspiracy. They didn’t do this so that it would blow up. They just built a bad reactor because it was cheap. And then they kind of crossed their fingers and hoped that it would work. And then it blew up and then they tried to hide it. That’s not a conspiracy.

But that sad that people don’t understand the difference. In fact, I was pretty proud of how clearly we explained the mundanity, the kind of almost pathetic nature of the cause and aftermath of Chernobyl.

**John:** Yeah. All right, let’s move onto our next topic. So usually on the show we’re talking about the WGA West which is the organization that represents all the screenwriters and television writers west of the Mississippi, although you really could be nationwide. But most of when we talk about people running for office and the drama we’re really talking about the West, even though the East and West work together a lot.

But over the past month there’s new stuff coming out from the East that I think is worth talking about on the show. We’ve had East members on the podcast before. And many people involved are friends and colleagues. And so I really am sort of curious to talk through this because I think it’s an interesting issue that I think I can actually probably argue both sides pretty well about. And so far to everyone’s credit everyone is being really polite and civil and they’re really explaining themselves clearly and articulately. But no one is being finger-pointy and negative which is awesome and I love to see that.

So here’s what happening sort of overall. The WGA East represents film and TV writers like me and Craig, but they also represent folks who work for digital news outlets and things like Salon, or Slate, or Huff Post. And these digital places now account for almost 50% of the guild’s total membership. That can be a challenge because sometimes the things that the writers who are working for those organizations need are different than the ones who are working for the traditional studios, so folks who are writing for TV shows, movies, or for variety-comedy shows. And that’s the changing nature of the demographics there that is really the crux of this and it’s all coming to a head because there’s an election happening in the East and there’s a slate running for what’s called Inclusion and Experience which is basically how the guild has traditionally worked and a group called the Solidarity slate which is about continuing to organize these digital places.

**Craig:** Yeah. Well I will certainly give the Solidarity slate credit for a name that accurately represents what they stand for. The Inclusion and Experience ticket that’s kind of amusing because they really are quite overtly talking about exclusion, so that’s nifty.

So this is an interesting situation and we in the West contemplated many years ago when we were in the middle of our reality television organizing campaign. And there was a faction, a significant faction in the guild, that felt strongly that we should be organizing editors, reality television editors, into the WGA because the companies were essentially skirting around the idea of what a writer was by calling them editors. And they were editing, but they were also creating narrative.

And one of the arguments against this that was made by myself was that we would face an economic tremor. I wouldn’t call it an earthquake but there would be a tremor because – and this is where the law of unintended consequences rears up and gets you. For most people in these unions, I’m not talking about – some people are truly dedicated to certain aspects of what our unions do. Most members in our union and in the East I believe are primarily concerned about the preservation of residuals and the preservation of strong minimums and above all else a preservation of a strong and accessible healthcare plan.

The healthcare plan is entirely predicated on how much we earn. The companies put in a percentage of what we earn up to a certain number. We know that the amount of money you have to earn to qualify for healthcare is much lower than the amount of money that you have to earn to actually pay for your own healthcare. So, of course, the people who are earning more are subsidizing the people who earn less. And that’s a good part of a union. That’s how it should work.

However, that system only holds true if you have a certain kind of distribution of income. When you increase organization into an entire industry that across the board earns much less than the average income for the – well let’s call it traditional guild member – then you are absolutely going to negatively impact what your healthcare plan can do.

So, it’s an economic issue. I don’t think this is a moral issue per se. I think it’s just a straight up economic issue. The WGA East shouldn’t exist. Let me just go off into that. There’s a real easy way to solve this problem. We ought to have a national union with locals and our locals should serve the things that we do well. There should be locals that create their own contracts for news and for digital publishing and for television writing and for screenwriting. I would separate those two as well. And then you kind of work from there.

We should be organizing people. We should be bringing people into the union. But we are not designed – our current structure is not designed well for it. We have to revisit how we function as a union if this is what we want. Because if we think it’s as simple as just let them in, well, there’s going to be pushback and then there’s going to be as you can see – they’re not chicken little-ling here. It’s absolutely real. That economic tremor will grow and grow and grow.

**John:** So let’s talk about what unions do, because almost I’d say 95% of the discussion we’ve had on the show has been about, in terms of the WGA, has been about the contract with the studios, so the AMPTP, which is every three years we renegotiate and that is the basis of our minimums, our residuals, our healthcare plan, our family medical leave, all that stuff is an every three years negotiation with them. Or it’s been about the agency campaign which really just represents film and TV writers, traditional film and TV writers. The folks who are working under the auspices of the WGA who are not part of that contract would include news writers. In the WGA West we have some I think CBS people. There’s little bits and pockets. And the East often had broadcast news folks there, too, but now they have all of these digital houses.

Those are not working under the same contract. So the WGA is negotiating separate contracts with the individual employers here. Unions can absolutely work that way. That’s a great way for them to work. But it’s strange because most of the membership is working under one contract and then have these little pockets of things is different. And it becomes a question of focus. And when we see people who are working in IATSE or these giant unions that have all these disparate little pieces the needs of an editor in IATSE or god help them an animation in IATSE is not being as well served as they could be by a really dedicated, devoted union that was focusing on their specific needs.

**Craig:** Yeah. Now I think it would be fair for some people to question as many people have many, many times why do we need a WGA East and a WGA West? In particular for television and screenwriters why isn’t there some sort of folding in of those things? And there probably should be. Well, there definitely should be. It’s just sort of pointless. I don’t know if that would solve this particular problem.

A union is a good thing. And people working union jobs is a good thing. Not as you point out every union is good for every job simply because people work for the same corporation doesn’t mean that the same union should represent them. Maybe it used to function that way but given the way these corporations are structured now they are massive, they’re multinational. They have 400 divisions. They make sewing machines and they make movies.

So simple common employment isn’t the definition of common union membership. If the WGA East continues to organize digital writers as they are doing then, yes, it will become a digital writers union. Because it’s a very small union. There aren’t a lot of screenwriters and television writers who are in the WGA East. Much smaller union than the WGA West. And, yeah, absolutely. They will take over because it’s a democracy. That’s how democracy works.

It is a little squirmy to me to hear otherwise progressive individuals talking about keeping people from coming in because they don’t want changing demographics to cause an existential threat. That sure sounds like some nasty rhetoric to me. What you have to do is figure out how to restructure your organization to work for everybody fairly. I don’t think you can just shut the door.

**John:** I hear you there. And we’re going to include links in the show notes to various candidate statements that are talking through the various options and where they see the problems coming out there. So to try to explain what that argument would be is that because WGA East members can choose to join WGA West, film and TV writers could just choose to join the West, there’s a concern raised that a bunch of these writers might just say, “You know what? This is not the organization I signed up for. I’m just going to join the WGA West.” And East might just kind of collapse because most of the money is coming from film and TV writers.

That’s the existential threat to it.

**Craig:** It’s real. That’s real. If they don’t restructure that is correct. They would need to restructure in order to continue the path that they’re on.

**John:** And I think one thing that’s important to point out is that no one I’ve seen has ever suggested that the writers for these digital news places do not deserve a union. I think it’s the argument of sort of like what is a union that best would represent their needs and whether a different union would better serve them or spin them off into their own thing.

I’ll also include a link in the show notes to Adam Conover has a Twitter thread which I thought was a good explanation of the counterpoint to that which was that the kinds of places that are actually represented by the East or digital news places, they really are doing video. They’re doing stuff that kind of feels like TV but it’s not Netflix or it’s not Amazon. But it’s actually really kind of similar to that. And it’s the kind of stuff we keep talking about we need to make sure we are covering that because that’s going to be the next television.

**Craig:** Yeah, so I’m just reading it now. I think actually this is a pretty good version of the argument that I disagree with which is that common employment equals common union applicability. I just think it doesn’t necessarily work the same way like that. There is a reality you have to deal with. You can absolutely be a purist and you can just say we have to organize everybody. But my issue is the word “we.” We have to change what “we” is. Everyone ought to be organized. Everyone ought to be unionized in the face of corporate employment. I think it’s really important.

But the WGA East as it is currently constituted is a really poor delivery system for that. I do believe that. It is a very small union. It is kind of a boutique union that has continued to exist despite a thousand reasons for it not existing. Because a small but powerful group of very well paid writers in television and screen want it to, because they have I mean traditionally felt that they were a bit of a militant stake against a somewhat complacent and more company-friendly West, which would be surprising to hear – I think a lot of people would be surprised to hear.

**John:** So different now. I would also say that traditionally late night shows were made in the east coast and the writers who were working for those late night shows had a very specific set of needs and circumstances which was important. Now more late night variety comedy stuff is happening on both coasts so it’s not so exclusive to one guild or the other.

**Craig:** And the coast is no longer relevant either.

**John:** Where are these writers living? Most people moved home with their parents during the pandemic.

**Craig:** We all live on Zoom now. So the system has to be figured out there. Yes, if it continues in this way then the WGA will transform into a guild for digital writers. I guess that’s what we’re calling them, digital writers. And then I think a number of screen and television writers will go to the West. And transferring your membership from East to West is as simple as sending a letter to the executive director of the WGA East saying I want to transfer. And then they have to honor it by their constitution.

**John:** So, the last point I do want to bring up because I think it’s worth always remembering is that once upon a time there were animation who could have joined the WGA West and we always regret that animation was not covered by the West when it could have been. And instead those writers are kind of screwed and they’re in an Animation Guild which is not a powerful union and that’s not just money that’s being lost but it’s protections that writers who are working in animation really writing the same scripts as we’re writing for live action are not getting the protections that they deserve.

And so I want to make sure that – I want us to always be mindful of the fact that the stuff that we’re writing right now saying oh it’s not really what we’re doing, well for all we know in ten years it could be really the same thing as what we’re doing. And so to make sure that we’re not overlooking a very important group of writers who we are going to wish were in the WGA West because somehow they’re going to be in another union which is sort of a competitive union which is not going to have the same clout or power.

It becomes – I’m just always mindful that we need to be thinking not just about what are our needs in 2021, but 2041.

**Craig:** Yeah. I always like to point out that while we absolutely have a better situation for WGA writers than what is offered to writers in the Animation Guild, which is part of IATSE, that the people who run the Animation Guild are doing their best.

**John:** 100%. I don’t want to slag on them.

**Craig:** They got kind of a raw deal, too. But you’re right. Where I think it’s a little bit different is that animation writing, writing animated television or writing animated films is still what it is. We were snobby about it a long time ago and we shouldn’t have been. Writing for Gawker is not the same thing as what you or I do. It’s just a different business. It’s a different business. It’s a different occupation. It’s a different vocation. And it’s not going to be the same thing.

**John:** But writing for The Onion or writing for The Onion’s video things, you look at The Onion’s video production and that could 100% be the same kind of material that would be on a late night variety show.

**Craig:** Exactly. And so what’s happened is there hasn’t really been a discrimination. It’s just been sort of – we’ve been defining it as do you write stuff? Then come on into the union. If the Writers Guild, and I mean to say West and East, could just finally combine and then create divisions within, subdivisions, that addressed the specific contract needs and economic realities of the writers in those divisions then this could absolutely work. If we don’t it can’t. It just can’t. Because 40 or 50 years from now people writing for Gawker will still not be doing the things that you or I do. It’s just a different thing. It’s not worse or better, but it is different.

We have that problem with news. And like you said in the West we don’t have many news members. And they are terribly underrepresented by us. They shouldn’t be part of our union. I think they get a terrible raw deal being a part of our union because we just ignore, because there’s very few of them. And in the East they’ve always had a lot more and there’s been a lot of conflict out there between news writers and television and screenwriters. So, we have to think much, much bigger.

Will the WGA West and the WGA East consider merging and restructuring and thinking bigger to do a better job of organizing and unionizing as many writers as it can? My prediction is no. So I’m very curious to see what happens in the East. This is an interesting watershed moment.

**John:** Agreed. All right. Let’s get onto our other listener questions. We have a bunch and we’ll see how many we can get through. Megana, do you want to start us off with Ghosted?

**Megana:** Great. So Ghosted writes, “Earlier this year two WGA writers approached me about writing a script from a treatment they wished to produce. They were offering $10,000 on behalf of a third producer. After some video calls I wrote a treatment and received the contract and commencement fee of $2,500. The contract makes clear that the project is a guaranteed first draft, rewrite, and polish. Although it doesn’t mention my treatment.

“I delivered a very good first draft on time and I received extensive notes, but no payment. After I asked what was going on the producer said that this draft didn’t count as a first draft and that I would be required to do additional rewrites until they were ready to call it a first draft. They promised it would only be one rewrite, but their notes indicated huge changes to structure, tone, et cetera, much of which conflicted with what we had discussed before I began writing. It would end up being a page one rewrite and they hinted this could become as many as eight rewrites.

“At first I considered doing the unpaid rewrite as a courtesy, because I’m an idiot and was dazzled by the opportunity, but the communication with the writer-producers became increasingly hostile and toxic to the point where I just wanted to leave the project. I emailed the main producer with whom I have the contract saying I would do the additional rewrites if I could just deal directly with him. After not hearing back I let them know I expected payment for the first draft and won’t be doing any free rewrites. It’s been about three months and I still haven’t heard back.

“Obviously based on the fee I’m not in the WGA and to make writers worse I’m not in the US. The contract says that disputes must be handled via arbitration but the fee to initiate arbitration would eat almost all of what I’m owed. I don’t really have that money to gamble so what should I do next?”

**Craig:** Oh dear god.

**John:** Oh dear god. Craig, so I’ve actually emailed back and forth with Ghosted a few times, but I’m really curious what your first thoughts are here.

**Craig:** Well, this is deeply regrettable. WGA members simply should not be doing this. It doesn’t matter if you can do it legally. In this case Ghosted works overseas so they can work in a way that is not covered by the WGA, but it’s just immoral. You are in our guild. You’re part of our union. You’re supposed to be part of the promotion and protection of the status of professional screenwriters. You offered $10,000 for a script which is atrocious.

**John:** Mm-hmm.

**Craig:** And you also I don’t know if the two writers asked for a new treatment or not, the contract and commencement fee $2,500. You know, that’s embarrassing. Like they should feel embarrassed for offering that kind of money to another person. Do it yourself or offer a real fee. Don’t exploit people. That’s just exploitation as far as I’m concerned. And it’s wrong. And I hope that they set it right. Maybe they will hear this and they can set it right.

At the very least pay the $10,000.

**John:** Yeah.

**Craig:** That is owed. Or I guess in this case the $7,500. And I don’t care if the script is the worst thing you ever read. You hired that person, you’re accountable. That’s the way it works.

**John:** Hiring somebody is a gamble. And you gambled on this writer. And this writer delivered on time. And you may not be happy with it, but that’s not their problem. This is the situation that you’re in and you’ve messed it up by not getting back to this person, by being rude and dismissive. Pay this writer. It didn’t work out and you need to move on. That’s frustrating.

**Craig:** We’re hearing one side of the story.

**John:** Yes.

**Craig:** So in my mind I’m altering it. I’m imagining a version of the story where Ghosted is just nuts and the worst writer ever, which is not true I’m sure. But let’s just say that Ghosted was nuts and wrote a really bad script. It doesn’t matter. You made an agreement which you shouldn’t have made in the first place because it was too low. And by the way you get what you pay for. They offered this money. They’re not giving it. And when they got the script they did the thing that we have been fighting against other people doing for decades which is saying, “Oh, it’s not really a draft because I need you to write eight drafts, or four drafts, or even just two drafts for the price of one.” Not even the price of one draft. The price of one-seventh of a draft.

That’s outrageous. You can’t do that. And it’ll get around. And it’s not going to work for you, either. I just don’t understand what the theory was here.

**John:** Yeah. I mean, karma will come back to you because the way you’re mistreating this writer others will mistreat you. And it’s bad and shameful. So, specific advice for Ghosted. Ghosted asked should I register the script so I can at least prove that I wrote this in case it ever becomes a thing. Yeah. I mean, you have your email your back and forth to show that you wrote this thing. It exists in a chain of title. If you really feel like registering it for copyright in your country or the US, you can. If you feel like registering with the WGA, that doesn’t actually do anything other than prove that you wrote it at a certain time, which your email already does. I don’t think that matters.

I don’t think it’s really worth necessarily starting the arbitration. If there’s basically a no cost way to indicate that you are starting it, or just basically do the very first little checkmark of I’m doing this thing I suspect they will just pay you out to make you go away, and that’s not the worst thing.

I feel for Ghosted because Ghosted is afraid of naming these writers because he doesn’t want to blow up his career. But also these people don’t deserve – they don’t deserve whatever success they’ve had so far. They don’t deserve to be hiring other writers.

**Craig:** Well, yeah. I mean, look if they can only afford to pay $10,000 for a script from a treatment then they are not in a position to blow your career up. They’re just not important enough. If they can’t afford to pay you real money they’re not important enough.

**John:** Yeah. And it seems like it’s not even their money, it’s the producer’s money. So really your argument is kind of even more about this producer. This producer needs to pay you the money.

**Craig:** Yeah. Whoever agreed to pay you the money needs to pay you the money. And they need to stop engaging in this kind of arrangement. I consider it to be unethical. Deeply unethical. And exploitative. And not becoming who we are as professional writers. And if they don’t feel like writing something themselves then they ought to stand up for the people that get hired. And I have been in situations where other writers have disappointed me. And that happens. That’s called life.

Just as you and I have disappointed other people. You pay them and you move on. You don’t do this. And I agree, John, practically speaking the situation here is such that I think the best Ghosted can hope for is perhaps that they settle out at $0.50 on the dollar or maybe they just pay Ghosted off to go away. But if there’s anything you’ve learned, Ghosted, it’s if you’re going to get paid $10,000 to write a script get paid as much as possible upfront. And if they refuse then they don’t even have $10,000 as far as I’m concerned. And now you’re dealing with knuckleheads.

**John:** I agree. Megana, what do you have for us?

**Megana:** So Audrey asks, “I recently had a meeting with a production company over Zoom. It was an informal chat about a project they’re looking for writers on. I’d be really excited to work on it and wanted to demonstrate my enthusiasm for the project, but I struggled because one of the women in the meeting just looked so bored. It wasn’t even that she looked like she was reading something else or checking emails. She was listening to me, but no matter what I said or did she looked totally unamused. Do you guys have tips for dealing with meetings like this? And how do I focus on the engaged listeners and not the bored ones?”

**John:** Oh, yeah, I’ve been there.

**Craig:** Me too.

**John:** So here’s what I’ll say. There always was the bored person in the room during a pitch, but in real life you just don’t look at that person. And on Zoom you can’t help but sort of see that person because their face is right there and you kind of can notice more like, ugh, that person is really bored and that sucks. As long as it’s not the main decision maker it’s not such a big thing.

**Craig:** Yeah. And by the way be aware that you might be misreading. We think we’re better face readers than we are. Sometimes people look bored and it’s just that’s their face. And inside they’re thinking, OK, who are they also going to talk to about this and who should I get about. They also might have also had a really bad day and they’re doing their best not to cry. You never know what it is.

Sometimes they’re bored because they’re bored. My strong advice, Audrey, is don’t change nothing. You go in there to do a pitch, or a meeting, or a chat, do your pitch, do your meeting, do your chat. Don’t let their face make you change your course, because you just don’t know. Similarly don’t read too much into people that are incredibly engaged. Sometimes they’re just sociopaths.

**John:** [laughs] Yeah. One of the things I think Craig is leaning towards here is really look for what the actual actions they’re taking. They might be saying nice things in the room, but if they’re actually sort of following up and really are engaged that is a sign that this went well and you should keep doing that thing. If the feedback you’re getting is like, oh, they didn’t think you were right, or there’s something that wasn’t right about that pitch, then you can actually iterate and see what it is that can work better. Because over the course of this pandemic I’ve had projects we’ve taken out and pitched to multiple buyers on Zoom and you do recognize like oh OK there are consistent patterns or there are ways that we can do this pitch better based on the feedback we’re getting.

So maybe that’ll be your situation. But in every one of those pitches there’s been somebody who has been kind of just a little bit checked out. That’s just Zoom. It’s fine.

**Craig:** It’s just Zoom.

**John:** Zoom. Megana, another question?

**Megana:** Jack writes, “I’m 20 years old and have been writing scripts since I was 14. I’ve also been reading scripts as I’ve heard you guys say that this is the best way to actually write a script. I was curious what books you guys were reading at my age. In an attempt to educate myself over the past two years I’ve torn through Syd Field, Easy Riders, Raging Bulls, Adventures in the Screen Trade, Screenwriting is Rewriting. And now I’m writing Truffaut’s book on Hitchcock.

“Also Save the Cat has been shoved down my throat so many times over the past two years that I think I’m going to cough up a hair ball. Is there anything else I should be reading?”

**John:** Well, Jack, it’s great that you’re reading scripts. So let’s emphasize that. And really reading screenplays is the best education you can get. These other books sound great and useful to some degree. We all had to read Syd Field and maybe it’s good to read one other screenwriter book so you had a sense of like what people were talking about, but don’t read too many screenwriting books would be my advice.

I think production diaries and books about the making of a film are incredibly useful. The one that sort of inspired me was Steven Soderbergh’s book for Sex, Lies, and Videotape which is both the script and his production journal for going through it and how the movie changed as he was shooting it. It was just really helpful to think about this is what the intention was in the script and this is what the actual reality was shooting it and editing it. How you discover the movie as you’re making it. So there’s a ton of really good things. Like Do the Right Thing there’s a good production book for that, too.

Really learning about how those parts of the process work is super helpful even if you perceive yourself as “just a screenwriter,” because ultimately you are going to be responsible for making these movies and knowing how to make movies is important.

**Craig:** I agree with John. And I think that the books about the making of movies – I think the greatest amount of value there is probably how fascinating they are. They are engaging, they’re fascinating. And you do learn a lot of practical things about how movies are made. Will it help you write a screenplay? I don’t think so. The only thing that’s going to help you write a good script, Jack, is writing a good script. And before you write a good script you’re going to write a bad script. You write two more bad scripts. Then you write a mediocre script. You write four more mediocre scripts. Then you write a really good one, then you go back to bad, and this is how it goes.

But you don’t have to worry so much about the secret book that’s going to blow your mind. The one book that has probably meant more to me than any other is by Dennis Palumbo who we had on our show in Episode 99. I think it’s called Writing from the Inside Out.

**John:** Yeah. I have that book.

**Craig:** And it’s essays about the psychology of writing and that was helpful because it made me feel better. And these books aren’t going to make you a good writer, but that book will make you feel better. And writing stinks, so anything that makes me feel good I recommend that.

**John:** Always remember that writing is writing. And while screenwriting is its own unique weird art form, books that are about the writing process can be helpful for some writers. I really like Bird by Bird by Anne Lamott. On Writing everyone loves from Steven King. There’s a new book out, Never Say You Can’t Survive by Charlie Jane Anders. And sometimes writers are really good about talking about their own process and the journey, the struggle, the getting through it.

And so remember that you are writer and that writing is hard, but other people have done this before you. I would say also look for kind of what are your weak spots. And if you don’t have great insight into character conflict and drama, well read books about how in real life people resolve conflict or how to deal with conflict. Look for books that fill in the parts of your education that you’re sort of missing out on because those will be helpful for you as you’re writing stuff.

So if you’re a person who is really good at writing action but you have a hard time with two characters in a scene having an argument, maybe really look at books on psychology or books about marriage dynamics and other things like that that can really dig into what the communication strategies are between two people. Because that may be a thing that helps you more than any book on three act structure.

**Craig:** Here. Here.

**John:** Cool. I think it is time for our One Cool Things. My One Cool Thing is the good news that the majority of Americans now believe in evolution.

**Craig:** How is this good news that it took this long? This is tragic.

**John:** I’ll take the good news where I can get it.

**Craig:** OK.

**John:** This is coming out of the University of Michigan. So beginning in 1985 every two years they did a survey. They took these national samples of US adults and asked them to agree or disagree with this statement. “Human beings as we know them today developed from earlier species of animals.” And so from 2010 to 2019 that increased from 40% of people agreeing with that to 54%. So it got us over the 50% line.

**Craig:** That’s good.

**John:** That’s some progress. I’ll take that.

**Craig:** It is progress. I guess that’s part of what we’re going to be talking about in our bonus segment that even when things seem bleak or not ideal over time it seems like the trends generally are towards things being better, slowly but surely, in some areas slower than others. And maybe in some areas stagnant. But this is certainly a good sign. I see that in the study it says even among religious fundamentalists the percentage from 1988 to 2019 went from 8% to 32%. That’s a massive shift actually.

**John:** That is a massive shift. And I think that apparently also reflects that the number of people with college degrees has really skyrocketed. And so you sort of – it’s hard to get through a college education without having some understanding of some science or how things kind of work in the natural world. And so that’s probably one of the big factors. And so even among religious fundamentalists college education has increased and that’s probably a factor there, too.

**Craig:** Yeah. There’s a cultural thing there, too. It’s harder to maintain a belief in something that is absurd when a lot of people around you very calmly disagree. There aren’t a lot of people out there that are yelling about evolution in your face. They just know it’s true because there’s this insane tidal wave of evidence. And they simply leave it there. And they talk about it. And when you say, “No, god made the earth,” in whatever they think it is, 5,000 years ago or something, or 10,000 years ago. “And he made Adam out of some dirt and he made Eve out of a rib.” They look at you and say, no, that’s incorrect. And then they move away and go eat lunch with someone else. And you are forced to confront the absurdity of that point of view.

I’ve always believed in evolution but I came from a very blue collar/middle class kind of upbringing and I thought and believed a lot of stupid crap. And it changed while I was in college because I was exposed to people who knew better. And that’s part of that process.

**John:** Yeah. I may have actually had this be a previous One Cool Thing, but this is occurring to me now. While I was on my east coast trip this summer we stopped by Dinosaur State Park in Connecticut. I don’t know if you’ve ever been Dinosaur State Park.

**Craig:** I have not.

**John:** So what’s cool about it is basically they were doing some big construction project and they came across this slab of stone that had all these dinosaur footprints in it of these dinosaur tracks. And so they had to stop everything and they put a big dome over it and that’s now Dinosaur State Park. And it occurs to me I just feel like every person who doesn’t believe in evolution should just go there because you see, oh, there are these dinosaur footprints there.

So how did these get here? These are from billions of years ago, so please explain why god would have buried these footprints under this thing?

**Craig:** Well that’s what they say. I mean, someone once said to me that those bones were put there to test our faith. Well, at that point I’m going to go eat lunch with someone else.

**John:** That’s probably true.

**Craig:** Yeah.

**John:** So if you’re driving across Connecticut and you see the signs for Dinosaur State Park I think it’s worth an hour to sort of go through it because weirdly they don’t have the dinosaurs, they just have the footprints. But you can see that like, oh, they were just stomping around in the mud here. And you can see how massive they were. Nice.

**Craig:** Great.

**John:** What’s your One Cool Thing?

**Craig:** I’m keeping this streak going of games on iOS. I don’t know what it is. There was a real drought for a while of the kinds of games I like playing and then suddenly a bunch just showed up in a cluster. And this week my One Cool Thing is a game called What Remains of Edith Finch. This is not a new game. This is a game that came out in 2017. I think it was released on – oh yeah, so it was on Steam maybe or something. But you also could have gotten it on your PS4, your Xbox. But it is now available on your iPad or your iPhone maybe.

It is directed and written by a gentleman named Ian Dallas which sounds like a – that sounds like a fake tough guy name, doesn’t it? Well, Ian Dallas has made a beautiful game. This was published by Annapurna which in its short life was known correctly so for quality. And this game is quality. It’s a beautiful game where you are moving through a house that was occupied by a number of your ancestors. Your uncles and aunts and grandparents. All of whom died untimely deaths. Every single one of them. And as you move through the house you discover little shrines to them and you then go into their memories and the game play is very varied. Sometimes it’s incredibly simple and beautiful. Sometimes there’s actually a little bit of a challenge. But really is just an experience. And it’s lovely. Just gorgeous. It’s beautiful. The music is lovely. And it’s really creative. Each person’s world that you go into is wildly different than the one before, not only in terms of narrative but in terms of game design and tone and style.

So, I strongly recommend it. What Remains of Edith Finch. And that is available on iOS.

**John:** Excellent. And I think it’s important that you have a videogame recommendation for your One Cool Thing because in ten years I feel like by far the majority of your One Cool Things have been games. Consistency over the ten years is really nice.

**Craig:** It’s really all I care about is games.

**John:** And that is our show for this week. Scriptnotes is produced by Megana Rao. Megana, thank you for all your reading this week. It is edited by Matthew Chilelli. Our outro this week is by Christiaan Mentz. If you have an outro you can send us a link to ask@johnaugust.com. That’s also the place where you can send longer questions like the ones we answered today. For short questions on Twitter I am @johnaugust. Craig is around there occasionally, but not too often.

You can find the show notes for this episode and all episodes at johnaugust.com. That’s also where you find the transcripts and sign up for our weekly-ish newsletter called Inneresting which has lots of links to things about writing.

We have t-shirts and they’re great. You can find them on Cotton Bureau and celebrate our 10-year anniversary today with our special 10th Anniversary t-shirt.

You can sign up to become a premium member at Scriptnotes.net where you get all the back episodes and bonus segments like the one we’re about to record on how things have gotten better over the last 20 years. Craig, thank you for ten years.

**Craig:** Thank you for ten and here’s to another 40.

**John:** Yay.

[Bonus segment]

**John:** All right. So this bonus segment is inspired by this post by Gwern Branwen which is just an amazing name.

**Craig:** Welsh I presume.

**John:** I would assume. And they have this really long blog post that’s just talking about how life has changed since the 1990s. And really goes into great details and made me remember so many things that I had forgotten about what daily life was like in the 1990s which is not that far away, but also feels more distant when you actually look at just how you had to get stuff done, especially work stuff done.

**Craig:** Yeah. And I feel it all the time when I sometimes talk about these things with Bo because she is almost 25 years younger than I am. So when I talk about the way things used to be in the way that old people do sometimes she looks like, “Oh really? That sounds terrible.” And she’s right. A lot of those things were terrible. And a lot of things have gotten much better.

**John:** Well, so computers are a really easy one we can probably knock out quickly because they’re just so much cheaper than they used to be. I remember getting my – I stated on an Atari computer, but my first real computer that was my computer that I really loved and identified with was my Macintosh 20. I got the Macintosh with the–

**Craig:** The SE20.

**John:** SE20. So it had a hard drive built in. But that was $3,900.

**Craig:** Yeah.

**John:** Which was – that’s $7,000 now. It’s a huge amount of money for an incredibly underpowered computer with floppy drives. It was the best thing I could possibly get at the time and also just a joke by any modern standard.

**Craig:** Same. I believe my first computer was a Franklin Ace 1000 which was a clone of the Apple 2 or Apple 2E. I think it cost about $1,500 in 1982. I don’t know what that is today, but you’re right it’s probably like $7,000. And this was a computer that had 64k of memory total I think.

**John:** Yeah. But even this blog post is pointing out that not just the memory and speed of it all, but just mice. Do you remember having to clean out your mice because they all got gunk in them?

**Craig:** Disgusting. First of all, your wrists would. So we created a pandemic of wrist trouble. And then the mouse would get disgusting, or the track ball would get disgusting because we’re constantly shedding skin. And we are gross.

**John:** Yeah. And so people don’t understand mice used to have a ball in them that was actually rolling around on the mouse pad or on the table. And it would just pick up everything. And eventually it would stop working properly and you’d have to get in there with a Q-tip or your fingernail to get all the gross stuff out. I don’t miss that. Don’t miss that one bit.

**Craig:** Not at all.

**John:** We had no GPS. We had Thomas Guides to find our ways around places. At a certain point we had cellphones but they couldn’t do any of the things that our current cellphones did. We didn’t have cameras that could do this kind of stuff.

**Craig:** No. We didn’t have any of that stuff. How about real simple things? Let’s just already give everybody computers. Let’s give everybody phones. If you get an email on your phone and you delete it’s still there on your computer when you get home. How about just simple stuff like that?

**John:** Closer to home. Movie theaters are much better than they used to be. So we all miss some of the giant old screens. We loved some of those things. But seats are more comfortable now. You can reserve individual seats. You don’t have to line up an hour ahead of a screening of a movie to get a good seat. You don’t have to save seats anymore. This is progress. This is a good thing.

**Craig:** Not saving seats, and then not getting into arguments about the saving of the seats.

**John:** Oh god. It was just the worst. Laying your jacket across multiple seats to try to protect them while your friend is at the bathroom.

**Craig:** Terrible.

**John:** Craig, people used to smoke. Do you remember when people used to smoke?

**Craig:** I was one of them. It was amazing.

**John:** From what year to what year did you smoke?

**Craig:** I started smoking I want to say in 1990 and I went to like 1996.

**John:** Yeah. So college age and post-college.

**Craig:** Yeah, early 20s.

**John:** I never smoked. But I guess some of the advantages of smoking is you have an excuse to sort of step outside of the work to smoke. It gives you that little jolt of – the nicotine. What does nicotine actually do chemically for you?

**Craig:** Interesting. It can do two different things. They’ve done these fascinating studies. If you have a kind of rapid and shallow intake of nicotine vapor, whether it’s from a cigarette or vape, it will amp you up. It’s a stimulant. When you do slower, deeper draws it will actually calm you down. So what’s fascinating about nicotine is the system that it runs through, this nicotinergic system in your brain actually has a complicated pathway. That’s why it’s one of the best drugs there is. Just unfortunately the delivery system is really bad.

But, yeah, I love nicotine. That’s why I can’t have it. Because my brain loves nicotine.

**John:** But smoking was not only unhealthy for the individual but also just kind of sucked for society. And things smell like smoke all the time. The used car that I owned and that I drove out here to Los Angeles a smoker had it before this. And so whenever it would be parked in the sunlight a film would form on the inside of the windows from the cigarette smoke coming out of the seats. Smoking is just gross. I’m glad there’s much less smoking.

**Craig:** Megana, have you had the experience of being in a restaurant with a smoking section?

**Megana:** No. But I remember being little and having hotel rooms and you had to specify smoking or not smoking.

**Craig:** The restaurant smoking section was one of the great anti-choice of our childhood. Because they were honestly were like if you go over there inside if you’re in those tables you can smoke. Well the smoke doesn’t know that.

**John:** It doesn’t know there’s nowhere to stay.

**Craig:** In fact we know just from simple physics and diffusion that the smoke will fill the room equally over time. But in a very serious way wait staff were being poisoned by smoke.

**John:** Small things I would have not thought of but it’s actually very true. Wheeled luggage has gotten so much better. Because I remember old suitcases with wheels on it were just terrible and the wheels would always shatter and break. And then they just figured out how to make wheels good. They figured out how to make skateboard wheels and rollerblade wheels and they decided what if we actually put quality wheels on luggage and now luggage is just a delight by comparison to where it was in the ‘90s.

**Craig:** How about the fact that there was luggage without wheels? Because all the luggage didn’t have wheels. And the people that had the wheeled luggage were the flight attendants and the pilots. And I guess at some point someone was like, wait, why don’t I have that? Why am I carrying this? This sucks. Yeah. Were we stupid? Were the luggage companies stupid? I don’t know.

Oh, I got a good one for you. How about this one?

**John:** Tell me.

**Craig:** Diapers.

**John:** Oh yeah.

**Craig:** Yes. Disposable diapers back in the day were awful. Because the stuff inside of them was just not really well engineered. And then they came out with those little gel pellets. And now you can jam a bunch of diapers together in one thing and they soak up like four gallons of pee. They’re pretty incredible.

**Megana:** What do you mean by jam a bunch of diapers in one thing?

**Craig:** Ah. So when you would buy diapers, back in the old days, you would go and you would get a package of ten diapers. It was an enormous package because the diapers were really thick. There was no absorbent stuff. It was more like just here’s a–

**John:** Just padding.

**Craig:** Here’s a baggy with a sponge in it. But the baby would pee once and it’s coming out the sides. It just was useless. And now if you have a baby and you go to the store you can get a thing of 20 diapers and they’re so thin because of those little gel pellets. It’s genius.

**John:** Yeah. So until you are around modern babies, like the diapers do start really thin and then you do see the diaper sort of swell up as pee goes in there.

**Craig:** It’s amazing.

**John:** But the other thing is it sucks the water away from the skin and so they get less diaper rash and it’s more comfortable for them and it’s good.

**Craig:** When you take a diaper off a baby now it weighs like eight pounds. It’s incredible. And that’s just from pee. I’m not talking about poop. Just a pee diaper is heavy like a bowling ball. It’s amazing.

**John:** So, a controversial opinion here which people will write in about. I find the smell of a pee diaper is not bad to me. It’s actually sort of comforting to me.

**Craig:** Wow.

**John:** I don’t love it, but it makes me feel happy that there’s a baby around. A poop diaper is just disgusting. Nobody needs poop.

**Craig:** I wouldn’t say comforting. But, yeah, I’m happy a baby is around. And changing a pee diaper is like a joke. No big deal at all.

**John:** No.

**Craig:** See, you didn’t have a boy. The second you take that diaper off you’ve got to be ready with a cloth to drop on top of his junk or else he’s peeing right on you. Because as soon as the air hits that thing, boom, pee.

**John:** We lucked into a baby who just did not ever want to poop in her diaper, and so we sat her on the potty before she was a year old and she was just pooping in her potty.

**Craig:** What? That’s crazy.

**John:** It’s crazy but it works out. Not related to babies, another thing which is so much better do you remember car stereos and car stereos being stolen out of cars? God that just sucked.

**Craig:** Megana, let me explain something to you. When John and I were little in the car there was an FM/AM radio. You might remember those. But they weren’t digital. They were analog. So that meant there was a dial. And you would move the dial and this little red stick would just slide from left to right and land sort of on the station. And you had to really get it right. But once you found it there were these little push buttons and you could press one of them to make it your preset. So you would hit that button and the little stick would go ka-tunk. Ka-tunk. Ka-tunk. Ka-tunk. And you went through all of that so you could have your five stations stores, each one of which was mostly advertising and you couldn’t hit pause. Amazing.

**John:** But not only did you get to enjoy the car radio, but if you had a stereo that actually had a tape player or something someone might break into your car to still that thing and rip it out of the dashboard because they could sell it, because those things were sold separately from the car. They were not inherently a part of the car. They were often a thing that was added to the car. And so one of the choices you might have is like, oh, take the radio out of the car when you park it someplace. So people would actually take their radio out.

Or, the plate, the face plate of it would pop off so that no one would steal the radio, so you’d just take the face plate of your car stereo. I’m just delighted that’s not a thing anymore.

**Craig:** Seriously.

**John:** Or people would have GPS mounted to their windshield and you’d have to worry about someone stealing that. Nope. It’s just part of your car. It’s part of your phone. We’re in a better time now.

**Craig:** Yeah.

**John:** So we will revisit this segment in 20 years on the show and see what things we can’t believe we had to suffer through way back in 2021.

**Craig:** You know what’s going to be fun? If we keep doing this Megana is going to get old. [laughs]

**John:** Megana, we’ll bring you back. So as you’re running some – you have five shows on the air and a dynasty–

**Craig:** Still bringing you back.

**Megana:** Or I might still be here.

**John:** Yeah.

**Craig:** I’m actually OK with that. I really like you.

**Megana:** Me too.

**Craig:** I’m happy you want to stay with us.

**John:** Thanks both of you.

**Craig:** Thanks guys.

**Megana:** Thank you.

Links:

* [Episode 167, The Tentpoles of 2019](https://johnaugust.com/2014/the-tentpoles-of-2019) and [transcript](https://johnaugust.com/2014/scriptnotes-ep-167-the-tentpoles-of-2019-transcript)
* [The Original Superhero Slate from 2013 from Newsarama](https://web.archive.org/web/20140809000438/http://www.newsarama.com/21815-the-new-full-comic-book-superhero-movie-schedule.html)
* [Episode 512: There is No Conspiracy](https://johnaugust.com/2021/there-is-no-conspiracy)
* [WGA East Election](https://deadline.com/2021/06/former-wga-east-president-michael-winship-running-unopposed-will-succeed-beau-willimon-as-guilds-next-president-1234779475/)
* [WGA East Considers Spinning Off Digital News Members Into New Union Amid “Existential Threat”](https://deadline.com/2021/08/writers-guild-east-digital-news-members-spinoff-union-idea-existential-crisis-1234818316/) by David Robb
* [Adam Conover WGA East Twitter Thread](https://twitter.com/adamconover/status/1430682946898317314?s=20)
* [University of Michigan Study: Evolution now accepted by majority of Americans](https://news.umich.edu/study-evolution-now-accepted-by-majority-of-americans/)
* [What Remains of Edith Finch Game](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/What_Remains_of_Edith_Finch)
* [Improvements since the 1990s](https://www.gwern.net/Improvements) by Gwern Branwen
* [Get a Scriptnotes T-shirt!](https://cottonbureau.com/people/scriptnotes-podcast)
* [Gift a Scriptnotes Subscription](https://scriptnotes.supportingcast.fm/gifts) or [treat yourself to a premium subscription!](https://scriptnotes.supportingcast.fm/)
* [John August](https://twitter.com/johnaugust) on Twitter
* [John on Instagram](https://www.instagram.com/johnaugust/?hl=en)
* [Outro](http://johnaugust.com/2013/scriptnotes-the-outros) by Christiaan Mentz ([send us yours!](http://johnaugust.com/2014/outros-needed))
* Scriptnotes is produced by [Megana Rao](https://twitter.com/MeganaRao) and edited by [Matthew Chilelli](https://twitter.com/machelli).

Email us at ask@johnaugust.com

You can download the episode [here](http://traffic.libsyn.com/scriptnotes/514standard.mp3).