TV writer who eats danger for breakfast
Every artist should have a code, a set of rules, to keep them sane in a city with more traffic than trees and way overpriced lattes.
I have three rules that I set for myself ever since I came out to LA, and they’ve governed every decision I’ve made out here. Here they are:
Daily practice will keep you sharp, so keep a notebook or a journal of daily ideas, freewriting, and inspiration on top of your script pages and other projects. [Read more…]
Back in the day, I wrote a guide for men on how to write female characters.
In a nutshell: like human beings. Complex, flawed, whole. Strong — but also weak. A spectrum, just like male characters have been written about for decades in film and television.
However, even though men should portray female characters as complex in their writing — should men elect to tell stories that are told from the female perspective, about the female experience? As storytellers, what should our responsibilities be when telling stories that are not our own experiences? [Read more…]
It’s the top of the New Year and I hope you’re as ready for this year as I am! Every year after Christmas I let my OCD tendencies take over and deep clean my apartment and get my projects in order by making a project calendar. I also get started on new scripts, so I thought I’d write this post about how to write a killer series bible for your TV show.
Let’s write stacks on stacks of final drafts this year guys, OK?
add some red string and I’m at serial-killer level of preparedness for this year
If you’re writing a TV show at the top of the year, I wanted to talk a little about writing a series bible. For those of you new to the world of TV writing, a series bible is the document that is like hey guys if we made a TV show about Wonder Woman saving us from the horrors of 2017 HERE’S WHAT IT WOULD LOOK LIKE
spoiler alert: it would look like AWESOME
So what would you include in a series bible? [Read more…]
In 2017 I worked on two different TV shows, wrote lots of pages, and took far too many artsy photos of my cat.
my cat rika in a coma after the vet (2017; oil on canvas)
I also wrote some blog posts. If you missed them, here are some of my best articles about writing from 2017:
In which I tell writers entering The Real World (TM) how to meal prep and write like the wind. But mainly, taco bowls.
In which I make the case against “dramedies” and create one hell of an infographic to break down the form of the half-hour TV drama.
This post actually stemmed from a presentation I gave to the Z season two writers’ room.
Two years ago, I didn’t know anything about these jobs OR how to get them. Now, I’m more versed in that job search life, and have met a lot of different writers’ and showrunner’s assistants and heard their stories about how they got to where they are. So if you’re looking to get an assistant job, check out this post!
I love sharing book recommendations, and this book list is perfect if you’re looking for some motivation to kick yourself in gear for 2018.
If you’re looking for a homicide-free writing partnership, I’ve got some tips for you! I’ve been writing with writing partners for the past few years, and I even took a class on the intricacies of collaboration.
That’s a wrap on 2017!
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if slightly off-center muffins stress you out, this article is for you
In the past, I’ve written about how to balance writing while being a showrunners’ assistant or writers’ assistant, but today I’d like to tackle general strategies for stress relief so that you can maintain your creativity in any period of your life — during the holidays, in times of financial stress, or while anxiously waiting the return of FX’s LEGION (how am I supposed to pretend not having new episodes is not affecting my mental sanity??)
So. Here’s how to preserve those creative thoughts when they’re being attacked by stress hormones.
This incredible TED Talk changed the entire way I view stress: as a preparation for a challenge instead of a detrimental function of our body to be curtailed as much as possible.
Another study I was reading recently talked about how repeating the words “I am excited” in your head before a challenge (like a pitch or big meeting) can help turn nervousness into excitement. [Read more…]