Latest / Indie Film Hustle® - A Filmmaking Podcast / IFH 846: Why Breaking Into TV Is HARDER Than You Think with Sandra Leviton

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IFH 846: Why Breaking Into TV Is HARDER Than You Think with Sandra Leviton · Indie Film Hustle® - A Filmmaking Podcast

0:03
Speaker 1: You are listening to the ifh podcast Network. For more
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Speaker 1: amazing filmmaking and screenwriting podcasts, just go to ifhpodcastnetwork dot com.
0:12
Speaker 2: Welcome to the Indie Film Muscle Podcast, Episode number eight
0:15
Speaker 2: forty six. Cinema should make You forget. You're sitting in
0:18
Speaker 2: a theater, Roman Polanski.
0:21
Speaker 1: Broadcasting from the back alley in Hollywood. It's the Indie
0:25
Speaker 1: Film Hustle Podcast, where we showed you how to survive
0:28
Speaker 1: and thrive as an indie filmmaker in the jungles of
0:31
Speaker 1: the film biz.
0:32
Speaker 3: And here's your host, Alex Ferrari.
0:35
Speaker 2: Welcome, Welcome to another episode of the Indie Film Huscle Podcast.
0:38
Speaker 3: I am your humble.
0:39
Speaker 2: Host, Alex Ferrari. Today's show is sponsored by Rise of
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Speaker 2: the Film Entrepreneur How to turn your independent film into
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Speaker 2: a profitable business. It's harder today than ever before for
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Speaker 2: The book is available in paperback, ebook, and of course audiobook.
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Speaker 2: If you want to order it, just head over to
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Speaker 2: www dot filmbizbook dot com. That's film bizbook dot com.
1:49
Speaker 2: Enjoy today's episode with guest host Dave Bullis.
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Speaker 3: My next guest is an amazing TV and film development exac.
1:59
Speaker 3: She has worked on shows like It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia, which,
2:02
Speaker 3: by the way, we're going to talk about Sons of Anarchy,
2:05
Speaker 3: and now she just produced her own film, which is
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Speaker 3: Zoned two uh with her production company. Under the Stairs
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Speaker 3: Entertainment with guests Sandra Leviton. Hey, Sandra, thanks off for
2:16
Speaker 3: coming on the show.
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Speaker 4: Thank you for having me so Santra.
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Speaker 3: You know, growing up, you know, were you always sort
2:22
Speaker 3: of interested in you know, in film and TV, and
2:25
Speaker 3: and was that you know, the main reason why you
2:27
Speaker 3: know you're into today was because you know, you've you've
2:29
Speaker 3: sort of found it at a young age.
2:31
Speaker 4: Oh. Absolutely, There's never been a point in my life
2:34
Speaker 4: where I wasn't going to do this. As my mom
2:38
Speaker 4: likes to tell the story that by the time I
2:40
Speaker 4: was born, my bags were already packed and ready to
2:42
Speaker 4: move to Los Angeles to work in film and TV.
2:45
Speaker 4: There was never a single question ever in terms of
2:49
Speaker 4: what I was going to do with my life. This
2:50
Speaker 4: is always going to be it. And I started doing
2:52
Speaker 4: it quite young, you know, theater at very early ages,
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Speaker 4: and then eventually started working in cable access. So I
3:00
Speaker 4: started working in television at a super young age, probably
3:03
Speaker 4: around sixteen years old.
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Speaker 3: So when you when you first moved out to to
3:08
Speaker 3: a Los Angeles, did you actually know anybody or did
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Speaker 3: you just completely know nobody and you sort of just
3:13
Speaker 3: had to find your way.
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Speaker 4: Thankfully, I came out with a really great support system.
3:17
Speaker 4: I went to you know, Emerson College, and we have
3:19
Speaker 4: a huge alumni you know mafia. If you will out
3:23
Speaker 4: here along with you know, all of our friends. So
3:25
Speaker 4: by the time that we you know, get to our
3:27
Speaker 4: senior year, we do internship. We all move out here together,
3:30
Speaker 4: we do internships, you know, we make contacts that way,
3:32
Speaker 4: and we all just kind of grow in the industry together.
3:34
Speaker 4: So thankfully coming out here fresh out of you know,
3:37
Speaker 4: during school, actually we had I had a wonderful support system.
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Speaker 3: Excellent. So do you actually and you did go to
3:44
Speaker 3: college for for film production.
3:47
Speaker 4: Actually, I am probably one of the few people who
3:48
Speaker 4: actually has a degree in television. Oh wow, yep, I'm
3:53
Speaker 4: very specific.
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Speaker 3: Yeah, I mean, I actually have a degree in business.
3:58
Speaker 3: So it's kind of you know, it's interesting how everyone
4:00
Speaker 3: sort of finds their way into this industry.
4:03
Speaker 4: Oh definitely. Everyone has such a unique and such a
4:05
Speaker 4: fascinating path. It's really cool to listen to everyone else's stories.
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Speaker 3: Yeah, yeah, exactly. That's why when I was doing this podcast.
4:11
Speaker 3: You know, I've here, I've heard everyone who's been on
4:13
Speaker 3: here there has a different story, and it's always interesting
4:17
Speaker 3: to hear everyone's different story because they're all different, you know.
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Speaker 4: Oh, absolutely, absolutely.
4:22
Speaker 3: So when you got it out to la you know,
4:24
Speaker 3: what were some of the first things in first some
4:27
Speaker 3: of the first projects that you sort of wan to
4:28
Speaker 3: work on.
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Speaker 4: Oh gosh, Well, my very first Los Angeles jobs, if
4:34
Speaker 4: you will, was an internship while still in school, and
4:36
Speaker 4: that was at twentieth Century Fox. And I'm going to
4:39
Speaker 4: date myself a little bit here, but it was a
4:41
Speaker 4: really exciting time in TV development I was in. I
4:44
Speaker 4: was interning in one of the current programming and development
4:47
Speaker 4: offices and it was the season where they were developing
4:50
Speaker 4: House and Bones and Desperate Housewives was coming and they
4:53
Speaker 4: had all lost in Space reboot, and it was just
4:56
Speaker 4: it was kind of considered like the start of the
4:58
Speaker 4: new Golden Age of television. So it was a really
5:00
Speaker 4: exciting time to be there. And so, you know, that was,
5:03
Speaker 4: you know, just a semester or so, and then I
5:05
Speaker 4: had a job pretty much straight out of school, working
5:07
Speaker 4: at a small agency that worked with celebrities doing commercial
5:13
Speaker 4: endorsements and voiceovers. And then from there I actually took
5:18
Speaker 4: a turn and worked in reality TV for a number
5:19
Speaker 4: of years. So my first like real shows, like if
5:22
Speaker 4: my first real on screen credit, if you will, is
5:25
Speaker 4: for shows like Extreme Dodgeball, America's Most Talented Kid, And
5:30
Speaker 4: you'll see that my credit is like receptionist. But it
5:33
Speaker 4: was really exciting because this was my first on on
5:36
Speaker 4: screen credits. And then I had a lot of jobs
5:38
Speaker 4: where I worked on really great shows, but because I
5:41
Speaker 4: was doing more production coordinating or I was behind the
5:44
Speaker 4: scenes at an agency or at a network, you stop losing.
5:48
Speaker 4: You end up not having any on screen credits for
5:51
Speaker 4: a while. But yeah, my very first projects was a
5:55
Speaker 4: you know, outside of school were these like bunch of
5:57
Speaker 4: reality shows and so it was like this Real Life
5:59
Speaker 4: and Mad Life with Flavor Flave, and it was kind
6:01
Speaker 4: of a really fun and interesting time to be even
6:05
Speaker 4: in reality TV because it was just exploding.
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Speaker 3: You know, I actually remember this Real Life with Flavor Flave.
6:12
Speaker 3: That was actually I remember that show in Flavor Flave
6:15
Speaker 3: and I think Jordan Knight was on there, and yeah,
6:18
Speaker 3: I remember that now. And but yet, you know, uh,
6:22
Speaker 3: you know, reality TV, you know has opened up a
6:24
Speaker 3: lot of doors for some people because you know, as
6:28
Speaker 3: as again as I've had a lot of people on here,
6:31
Speaker 3: you know reality some of some of them have actually
6:33
Speaker 3: started in reality TV, and you know they say, hey, listen,
6:37
Speaker 3: even like episode ninety nine, you know, when when I
6:39
Speaker 3: am working Jay Freeman on here, he actually started in
6:41
Speaker 3: film and now he works primarily in reality TV.
6:45
Speaker 4: You know, that's one of the great things about this business,
6:47
Speaker 4: and particularly now, Like when I think when I first started,
6:50
Speaker 4: people were very much like, oh, you're in scripted TV,
6:52
Speaker 4: or you're in film or in reality TV, or you know,
6:55
Speaker 4: eventually you're you know, you're only in digital. But now
6:57
Speaker 4: everyone can cross over into all of different mediums and formats,
7:01
Speaker 4: and so whatever your heart desires or whatever your medium
7:04
Speaker 4: your story dictates that it wants you to be in,
7:07
Speaker 4: you have the freedom to do that. And I think
7:08
Speaker 4: that's one of the most exciting things that's happening right now,
7:11
Speaker 4: is being able to do all of that. So I'm
7:13
Speaker 4: not surprised that you're you're getting those kinds of stories
7:16
Speaker 4: when I was, you know, when I was starting out
7:18
Speaker 4: during that time, I think almost all of us got
7:21
Speaker 4: jobs in reality TV because that's just where all the
7:24
Speaker 4: jobs were at the time, and so a lot of
7:26
Speaker 4: us started there. And I know many friends who are
7:28
Speaker 4: still there and loving it, and I have some friends
7:31
Speaker 4: and people like myself who transitioned over into the scripted world.
7:34
Speaker 4: So it's it's such a cool and exciting time, I
7:37
Speaker 4: think to be in the business because of the crossover everywhere.
7:40
Speaker 3: Yeah, I definitely agree. You know, there's just so much
7:43
Speaker 3: going on. And you know, once you once you started
7:46
Speaker 3: doing the reality shows, like you know, real Life, you know,
7:49
Speaker 3: what did you go from from there? Did you go
7:51
Speaker 3: back into TV or did you segue into film?
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Speaker 4: I was. I stayed in TV, and so from there
7:58
Speaker 4: I actually worked at Paradigm Led Agency for a while,
8:02
Speaker 4: and I was able to transition there quite seamlessly, actually
8:05
Speaker 4: between reality and scripted television, because when I first started there,
8:10
Speaker 4: I was working for two agents, and one of them
8:12
Speaker 4: was in alternative television and the other one was in
8:14
Speaker 4: scripted television, and so I was able to kind of
8:16
Speaker 4: play the fine balance of knowing the reality world really
8:20
Speaker 4: really well and beginning to really immerse myself in the
8:23
Speaker 4: scripted world. And then eventually, I don't know if you've
8:26
Speaker 4: ever been inside of Paradigm, but they're in two buildings,
8:28
Speaker 4: and my agents ended up being split into two different buildings,
8:32
Speaker 4: and then from there I fully transitioned into scripted television.
8:35
Speaker 4: And so then I was there about fifteen months or so.
8:39
Speaker 4: So you know, I did my year and I did
8:41
Speaker 4: my time, and it was actually had a great time
8:43
Speaker 4: there and then eventually went to FAX and so I
8:46
Speaker 4: stayed in scripted television and I've only recently transitioned into
8:50
Speaker 4: film about the last three four years.
8:53
Speaker 3: So, you know, when you went to FX, you know,
8:55
Speaker 3: obviously from being your bio, you got to work with
8:57
Speaker 3: some really really cool shows like Sons of Anarchy. Uh,
9:02
Speaker 3: you know, it's always sung in Philadelphia. So is there
9:05
Speaker 3: any sort of like, you know, things that you can
9:07
Speaker 3: talk about, you know from your time there, you know,
9:09
Speaker 3: like some of the things that you've learned.
9:12
Speaker 4: Oh my gosh, I mean, we'd be here all day.
9:15
Speaker 4: But honestly, like I'll say that, you know, that was
9:18
Speaker 4: my that was my dream job. You know, FX when
9:22
Speaker 4: I first started working there had The Shield and Nip
9:26
Speaker 4: Talk and Rescue Me. And Nip Talk was my all
9:28
Speaker 4: time favorite show. Like I had even read wrote a
9:31
Speaker 4: specscript of it in you know, for one of my
9:35
Speaker 4: screenwriting classes when I was in college in season one,
9:38
Speaker 4: and you know, so like that show just had so
9:40
Speaker 4: much emotion for me. Being able to go and work
9:43
Speaker 4: on my favorite show was like the coolest thing ever.
9:46
Speaker 4: And also working at a network that was just so
9:48
Speaker 4: exciting and was going through such a growth phase and
9:51
Speaker 4: actually still is.
9:53
Speaker 2: We'll be right back after a word from our sponsor,
10:00
Speaker 2: and now back to the show.
10:03
Speaker 4: And so, you know, it was really great. My very
10:06
Speaker 4: first day there was the day that they picked up
10:09
Speaker 4: Damages to series, and so shows like Damages and Sons
10:14
Speaker 4: of Anarchy and Louis and all of these other great shows.
10:19
Speaker 4: You know, I was there from day one. Meanwhile, I
10:21
Speaker 4: got to enjoy the final seasons of The Shield and
10:25
Speaker 4: Rescue Me and Niptok and some of the classics and
10:27
Speaker 4: really watch how not only the network changed, but how
10:32
Speaker 4: television changed through the various different development cycles there. And
10:36
Speaker 4: it's been super fascinating. And so you know Sonny too.
10:40
Speaker 4: I think Sonny is a really great example. And this
10:42
Speaker 4: is something I talk about a lot with clients and
10:46
Speaker 4: people I work with now and when I do panels
10:49
Speaker 4: and stuff, and it's just about how television has changed,
10:52
Speaker 4: even during the short amount of time. So when I
10:55
Speaker 4: first started there, So Sonny was in season three when
10:57
Speaker 4: I first started, and I'm being a fan. I'm sure
11:01
Speaker 4: you know the background. But the real quick thing is,
11:03
Speaker 4: you know, these guys were actors. They had basically bought
11:07
Speaker 4: a camera from Best Buy for like two hundred bucks, shot,
11:11
Speaker 4: a pilot returned the camera, so they essentially spent zero
11:15
Speaker 4: dollars and was able to shop this around and get
11:18
Speaker 4: a show on the air and for a basic cable.
11:21
Speaker 4: At that time in the you know, early to mid
11:24
Speaker 4: two thousands, that was actually really possible to do. And
11:29
Speaker 4: in the amount of time that I was there, and
11:30
Speaker 4: I was at FX for about five years, that became
11:32
Speaker 4: harder and harder for people to do. Suddenly the schedule
11:37
Speaker 4: was you know, not just peppered with you know people
11:40
Speaker 4: we already had you know, good relationships with writers on
11:43
Speaker 4: other shows, all different levels of writers pitching shows. But
11:46
Speaker 4: by the time that I had actually left, and that
11:48
Speaker 4: was in twenty twelve, and we see this a lot
11:51
Speaker 4: more now. I think across the board in television is
11:54
Speaker 4: that it has gone very much of the way of
11:56
Speaker 4: the film studios, which means that you need to have
11:59
Speaker 4: a plus talent attached, and that can mean writers and showrunners,
12:03
Speaker 4: that can mean some other high level producer, some high
12:06
Speaker 4: level actor talent, musician, somebody who's a household name. And
12:11
Speaker 4: it was even hard to get on the schedule. People
12:13
Speaker 4: were fighting to get on the schedule to just pitch shows.
12:16
Speaker 4: At that point in time, and this was right before
12:20
Speaker 4: you know, Netflix and Hulu and them like really exploded
12:24
Speaker 4: onto the scene as well. So thankfully there's more outlets
12:27
Speaker 4: to do all of that. But it just to be
12:28
Speaker 4: able to see all of that change and to see
12:31
Speaker 4: the you know, just even growth of television during that
12:35
Speaker 4: time was just fascinating. So I recommend going back and
12:39
Speaker 4: definitely like reading up on you know, history and interviews
12:42
Speaker 4: not just with critics, but you know, when they interview
12:45
Speaker 4: the executives and the showrunners, you really see how the
12:48
Speaker 4: shows have changed.
12:50
Speaker 3: Yeah, you know, I was actually inspired by It's Always
12:52
Speaker 3: Sun in Philadelphia to create my own TV pilot, and
12:55
Speaker 3: I ended up shooting that mind cost a hell of
12:59
Speaker 3: a lot more than there is did though, because there
13:01
Speaker 3: was caused zero. I was very stupid and I tried
13:04
Speaker 3: to put way too much production value in mind. So,
13:08
Speaker 3: to make a long story short, I ended up shooting
13:10
Speaker 3: in a news film studio, a new soundstage that opened
13:14
Speaker 3: up right down the street from me. We ended up
13:17
Speaker 3: buying up a best Buy, a Rite Aid, and there
13:20
Speaker 3: was one other store that was going out of business.
13:23
Speaker 3: We bought a lot of stuff at a heavily dis
13:25
Speaker 3: kind of price, including racks and cover art for like
13:28
Speaker 3: movies and stuff and all this other stuff, and was
13:31
Speaker 3: just I mean, I'm talking with pennies on the dollar,
13:33
Speaker 3: and we built this whole thing. I shot it, and
13:37
Speaker 3: the whole time, I'm leaving out a lot of stuff,
13:40
Speaker 3: by the way, But as you know, as I shot it,
13:44
Speaker 3: there were so many problems behind the camera. You know,
13:46
Speaker 3: listeners this podcast know what I'm talking about. But there
13:48
Speaker 3: were so many problems behind the camera that it showed
13:51
Speaker 3: on camera. And when I went to shop this around,
13:55
Speaker 3: one of the notes I got was, this seems like
13:58
Speaker 3: it would be like something that my kids would watch.
14:02
Speaker 3: And He's like, you know, it's almost like you're there.
14:04
Speaker 3: He's like, it's almost like this is a is a
14:06
Speaker 3: polished version, but it's not quite there yet. And I
14:09
Speaker 3: and I would say, you know, that's exactly right, you know.
14:11
Speaker 3: And I got to pitch uh to a G four
14:14
Speaker 3: and right as they were closing, and I actually that's
14:17
Speaker 3: how I actually met Chris Gore. And it was a
14:20
Speaker 3: shame because people were saying that this is exactly what
14:22
Speaker 3: we would have put on G four.
14:24
Speaker 4: Yeah, I mean that that happens. And you know, this
14:28
Speaker 4: is a debate that I engage and often on Twitter
14:31
Speaker 4: with people because I think it's just it's so fascinating
14:34
Speaker 4: and to watch it change. But there really isn't an
14:37
Speaker 4: independent television market quite yet in the same way that
14:41
Speaker 4: there is with film, and so a lot of people
14:44
Speaker 4: are going out and they're doing exactly what you did.
14:46
Speaker 4: They're spending a lot of money to shoot these pilots,
14:49
Speaker 4: and you know, there's a couple good festivals now for
14:52
Speaker 4: like ITV and whatnot, and occasionally people do get options
14:55
Speaker 4: and pickups from it. But television tends to be also
14:59
Speaker 4: a little bit more more of a hierarchy than film does.
15:03
Speaker 4: So you can come in with something like really really great,
15:06
Speaker 4: but with no experience, you're gonna be paired with, you know,
15:10
Speaker 4: other showrunners. You're gonna have other people kind of coming
15:13
Speaker 4: in creatively and financially. And when you sell to a
15:16
Speaker 4: studio and a network, you know, they they're really the
15:18
Speaker 4: ones calling the shots and in charge, and they like
15:20
Speaker 4: to work with people they've worked with before, and so
15:24
Speaker 4: selling and pitching shows still to kind of tend to
15:27
Speaker 4: go through the same funnel system where you need to
15:30
Speaker 4: have the representatives or you know, lawyers and the people
15:33
Speaker 4: that you know, to get you in through the proper
15:35
Speaker 4: doors to do that. Even for a lot of the
15:37
Speaker 4: new digital networks, you know, Hulu and Crackle and Awesomeess
15:42
Speaker 4: TV and all of them, they have a little bit
15:44
Speaker 4: more of an independent stream, but at the same time,
15:46
Speaker 4: you're still going through that kind of same gatekeeper funnel system.
15:50
Speaker 4: And you know, in film, you can really you can
15:52
Speaker 4: just go out there, you can make it, and you
15:53
Speaker 4: can find some way to distribute it either through you know,
15:57
Speaker 4: bigger companies to distribute it, you can do it yourself online.
16:00
Speaker 4: I know, you've had some really great indie filmmakers who
16:03
Speaker 4: have done that themselves and you know, have really wonderful
16:06
Speaker 4: careers that way. And in television it's a lot harder
16:08
Speaker 4: because TV signals are still owned by big conglomerates, and
16:12
Speaker 4: even with these big you know, digital outlets like Netflix
16:16
Speaker 4: and Amazon, they're still owned by these big conglomerates and
16:20
Speaker 4: so they still have this very traditional funnel system. So
16:23
Speaker 4: being able to go out there and make an independent
16:26
Speaker 4: TV show and just shopping it around is very difficult,
16:29
Speaker 4: and so that's why a lot of them end up
16:30
Speaker 4: turning to web series and hopefully you can build your
16:33
Speaker 4: audience that way and then get the eyeball enough eyeballs
16:37
Speaker 4: to be able to get you into that funnel system.
16:39
Speaker 4: So it's still a really, really tricky thing. And I
16:41
Speaker 4: know a lot of people like to debate me on
16:43
Speaker 4: this and I'm happy to so feel free. We can
16:45
Speaker 4: talk about this on you know, online and on social
16:47
Speaker 4: media a ton, because I love hearing different people's experiences.
16:50
Speaker 4: And you know, there's a lot of great cases even
16:53
Speaker 4: right now where those things do happen. You know, Insecure
16:58
Speaker 4: is a great example of that, where she was a
16:59
Speaker 4: website that started out you know, online and then has
17:04
Speaker 4: now has a great HBO show. You know, The Sunny
17:07
Speaker 4: Guys are a really great example of that. That their
17:09
Speaker 4: time was earlier, well that was a little bit possible.
17:12
Speaker 4: But what I think a lot of people don't realize
17:14
Speaker 4: about that story is they were already part of the
17:17
Speaker 4: traditional funnel system, and I think that's something that people
17:20
Speaker 4: don't necessarily realize. They were actors at the time, They
17:24
Speaker 4: already had representatives, they had at the very least managers,
17:28
Speaker 4: and they were the ones that really helped them get
17:30
Speaker 4: into the doors at the networks. They were the ones
17:32
Speaker 4: making the phone calls and doing the pitching and all
17:34
Speaker 4: of that. So while their story is super great and
17:39
Speaker 4: inspiring and it totally is across the board because I mean,
17:42
Speaker 4: and they're wonderful, it's one of those elements that I
17:46
Speaker 4: think people don't realize and television that that in order
17:50
Speaker 4: to get to the proper channels and the proper networks
17:53
Speaker 4: and the proper studios and the proper production companies, you
17:56
Speaker 4: still have to go through that funnel system to get there.
18:00
Speaker 4: You know, there are some really great examples of what
18:03
Speaker 4: we would call independent television that have done this in
18:06
Speaker 4: a very different way, which you know, the show Insecure
18:10
Speaker 4: is a great example of that, where she had a
18:12
Speaker 4: web series where she built an audience, and it was
18:14
Speaker 4: that audience and the eyeballs that were she was already
18:19
Speaker 4: accomplishing with her show online is what got the attention
18:23
Speaker 4: of the agents and the managers and everyone else involved
18:27
Speaker 4: that brought her into the traditional funnel system that got
18:29
Speaker 4: her into HBO. And so I think that's one of
18:33
Speaker 4: the big things that comes up that there's this misconception
18:37
Speaker 4: that TV works the same way as film, because it
18:41
Speaker 4: really doesn't. There's you still have to go through some
18:44
Speaker 4: kind of funnel system in order to get distribution. Otherwise
18:49
Speaker 4: you are doing it yourself, you're doing it online, in
18:52
Speaker 4: which case you're considered more of a web series versus
18:55
Speaker 4: an actual television show.
18:59
Speaker 3: Yeah, you know, And and it's also about like Felicia
19:01
Speaker 3: Day when she actually hit her stride with with her
19:06
Speaker 3: with her tell show. Yeah, and that's you know, that's
19:09
Speaker 3: again you know, that's what a lot of people use
19:11
Speaker 3: for inspiration as well. But you know, it makes sense
19:13
Speaker 3: with the olday sunny guys because I know Rob was
19:15
Speaker 3: an actor before, and it doesn't make sense that at
19:18
Speaker 3: by that point he probably did that. You know, he
19:20
Speaker 3: would have to have a manager at that point, and
19:22
Speaker 3: uh cause I guess he was what in his late
19:24
Speaker 3: twenties o thirties when he was pitching that. So yeah, yeah,
19:27
Speaker 3: so I mean I imagine that's probably you know what happened.
19:29
Speaker 3: I mean, and it's just over again. You know, that's
19:33
Speaker 3: I use that as inspiration. And my biggest mistake, Sandra
19:36
Speaker 3: was I should have aimed smaller, and looking back now,
19:42
Speaker 3: I actually have tons of ideas now that I could
19:45
Speaker 3: have used to shoot my TV pilot for like a
19:48
Speaker 3: fraction of what it actually ended up costing me.
19:52
Speaker 2: We'll be right back after a word from our sponsor
19:58
Speaker 2: and now back to the show.
20:02
Speaker 4: Yeah. Absolutely, and I think you know, really, if that's
20:04
Speaker 4: the way that you want to that you want to
20:06
Speaker 4: go with it, you know it is. It's all about
20:09
Speaker 4: cultivating that audience and finding that audience and really building
20:13
Speaker 4: that hard and you know, distributing it yourself for a
20:16
Speaker 4: while online and which means you have to watch the
20:18
Speaker 4: costs and you have to act like an actual producer,
20:22
Speaker 4: not that you're not when you're doing it that way,
20:25
Speaker 4: but you have to kind of think that way and
20:27
Speaker 4: be a marketer at the same time, because the more
20:30
Speaker 4: eyeballs that you get, that's when you know, the representatives
20:35
Speaker 4: come running. That's when other producers come running. That's when
20:38
Speaker 4: the people who want to help lift the tide come running.
20:41
Speaker 4: Is when they feel like there's something there that they
20:44
Speaker 4: can legitimately sell and make money off. Of just going
20:47
Speaker 4: out there and shooting something and then trying to shop
20:49
Speaker 4: it around without having that extra boost of people really
20:55
Speaker 4: kind of helping you along is extremely difficult in television.
21:00
Speaker 3: Yeah, it's uh, you know, and when I look back
21:03
Speaker 3: back to on it, Sandra, you know, I probably if
21:07
Speaker 3: I had to do it all over again. I would
21:08
Speaker 3: do it with whatever is describing, but like now I
21:11
Speaker 3: would handle it completely different like you're saying, I would
21:13
Speaker 3: actually handle it a lot better. And in fact that
21:17
Speaker 3: I probably I may have not even done it at
21:19
Speaker 3: all instead of just and just say instead focused on film.
21:22
Speaker 3: Uh you know, I actually the reason I did it
21:24
Speaker 3: was because I had to. You know, it was kind
21:26
Speaker 3: of like a perfect time for me. But I ended
21:28
Speaker 3: up I probably should have done a film instead. And
21:32
Speaker 3: actually about a year after that or about a year
21:34
Speaker 3: and a half, I ended up doing a trailer project
21:37
Speaker 3: and uh we were going to be part of a
21:39
Speaker 3: bigger team and that ended up you know, fizzling out,
21:42
Speaker 3: but we still shot the trailer anyway.
21:44
Speaker 4: Uh.
21:44
Speaker 3: But you know, just looking back at all this stuff,
21:46
Speaker 3: you know, it's all it's all learning experiences. That's why
21:49
Speaker 3: I think, you know, why I do this podcast is
21:51
Speaker 3: that way. So if somebody out there is, you know,
21:52
Speaker 3: thinking about doing something similar to what I did, they
21:54
Speaker 3: can at least learn and you know, save themselves some
21:56
Speaker 3: you know, time and energy and money. But just by
21:59
Speaker 3: hearing a well you know mistakes that I made.
22:02
Speaker 4: Yeah, oh absolutely, And honestly, like if you feel the
22:04
Speaker 4: drive to go and do it. By all means, go
22:07
Speaker 4: and do it, you know, because at the end of
22:09
Speaker 4: the day, it's still excellent experience. It's how you grow,
22:12
Speaker 4: it's how you find your voice, you know, it's how
22:14
Speaker 4: you get yourself out there.
22:16
Speaker 3: You know.
22:16
Speaker 4: What I would recommend is that if you do want
22:19
Speaker 4: to have a television show in the traditional sense of
22:22
Speaker 4: the word, I would say, just write right, right, right right,
22:28
Speaker 4: because that's really the way TV works. It's a writer
22:30
Speaker 4: driven medium and so, you know, and it's got a
22:35
Speaker 4: hierarchy within it. You know, there's a hierarchy to get there.
22:38
Speaker 4: There's a hierarchy in the writer's room. Can you skip
22:40
Speaker 4: some of those steps, absolutely, but those are rare and
22:44
Speaker 4: so what they like to see is this kind of experience.
22:48
Speaker 4: But if you do want to have a traditional TV show,
22:50
Speaker 4: the best thing you can do is to write a
22:52
Speaker 4: massive portfolio and get those people interested. Because what's going
22:55
Speaker 4: to happen is is whether you've shot a pilot or not,
22:58
Speaker 4: the studio and the network or going to go and
23:01
Speaker 4: completely reshoot everything. They're going to have you rewrite everything.
23:03
Speaker 4: They're going to have you recast everything, They're going to
23:05
Speaker 4: have you completely redo everything. So going out there and
23:11
Speaker 4: you know, shooting it and doing it all for yourself.
23:14
Speaker 4: If your intention is to be in a more traditional
23:16
Speaker 4: TV environment, you are kind of hate to say wasting
23:20
Speaker 4: your money, but you know you want to be financially
23:24
Speaker 4: smart and you want to be smart with your energy
23:26
Speaker 4: as well.
23:28
Speaker 3: Yeah, and that is one thing too, is I've after
23:31
Speaker 3: talking after making that pilot, was that they are going
23:34
Speaker 3: to remake, They're going to recast everything. I kind of
23:37
Speaker 3: knew that going in though I had kind of figured,
23:40
Speaker 3: you know what. I what I did with my pilot
23:41
Speaker 3: was I was like, this is an example of what
23:43
Speaker 3: things could be, which is again just to I know
23:46
Speaker 3: it's too late to stop being a dead horse, but
23:48
Speaker 3: if I could have made it cheaper, I believe me,
23:51
Speaker 3: there would have been at a lot of different ways.
23:53
Speaker 3: And I actually ended up just writing out a script
23:56
Speaker 3: one day without any idea of what I was. You know,
23:59
Speaker 3: I really have a plan like, oh, this could have
24:01
Speaker 3: been another pilot and I could have used this as
24:03
Speaker 3: more of like the concept pilot or the proof of concept.
24:06
Speaker 3: But as I started writing, and I said, you know what,
24:07
Speaker 3: I could have shot this in somebody's house and it
24:10
Speaker 3: would have cost me a fraction of what it cost
24:14
Speaker 3: me to actually do that. Exu. I had to pay
24:16
Speaker 3: the studio costs I we had, we had to buy insurance,
24:19
Speaker 3: I had to pay for the crew. I had to
24:21
Speaker 3: pay for all the stuff we used. I mean, we
24:24
Speaker 3: had a ton of stuff going on. Uh And and
24:27
Speaker 3: you know I still hadn't released a pilot because right
24:29
Speaker 3: after we got I got done making it, I actually
24:32
Speaker 3: was pretty pissed off about a lot of things. And
24:35
Speaker 3: I actually have an inclination now I think about about
24:38
Speaker 3: re editing it and and uploading it. I mean because
24:40
Speaker 3: also I also had a manager at the time, not
24:44
Speaker 3: not like representing me, but he was, you know, talking
24:46
Speaker 3: to me about things, and he said, you know, don't
24:48
Speaker 3: upload that pilot. Somebody could take the idea and then
24:50
Speaker 3: you'd be really out of all that money. And so
24:53
Speaker 3: I kept it back. And now you know, in the
24:55
Speaker 3: in the passing years, other people in the business have said,
24:58
Speaker 3: Dave just just released it on YouTube just to get
25:00
Speaker 3: in some attention. Yeah.
25:03
Speaker 4: I mean, I guess the big question that I would
25:06
Speaker 4: say I would recommend to ask yourself and for other
25:08
Speaker 4: people who are doing that, is you know, what is
25:12
Speaker 4: your ultimate goal and intension with it, and also what
25:15
Speaker 4: is your goal for the series? You know, if you
25:18
Speaker 4: do end up uploading things online, then the idea is
25:22
Speaker 4: to get eyeballs and to get attention and then to
25:24
Speaker 4: build an audience. So now you have a pilot, So
25:27
Speaker 4: then what you know, Now you're trying to build an
25:29
Speaker 4: audience on just you know, a half hour and an
25:32
Speaker 4: hour's worth of work versus you need to start churning
25:35
Speaker 4: out content. You know, that's the one thing about when
25:37
Speaker 4: you're building an audience, and particularly online, you need to
25:41
Speaker 4: start churning out content to get people to keep coming
25:44
Speaker 4: back to you and to grow that audience. And so
25:47
Speaker 4: I think that's one of the big things to keep
25:50
Speaker 4: the perspective of. I mean, that's how television in the
25:52
Speaker 4: grand scheme of thing works. So if you only have
25:55
Speaker 4: a pilot, you wrote a pilot, you shoot, you spend
25:57
Speaker 4: all this money shooting a pilot, and then you're like, okay, well,
25:59
Speaker 4: now what you know, if you're going the more independent route,
26:04
Speaker 4: then you need to build the audience, which means you
26:06
Speaker 4: need to actually have a series and not just a
26:08
Speaker 4: singular pilot.
26:10
Speaker 3: Yeah. That when I talked to another producer about that,
26:13
Speaker 3: they actually said, you know, could you ever do it
26:16
Speaker 3: like in someone's house, like you know what I mean,
26:18
Speaker 3: like or someone on the location that you could get
26:19
Speaker 3: for free or cheaper. And that's the reason why it
26:23
Speaker 3: made more episodes was because I was you know, the
26:26
Speaker 3: whole thing took place, you know, at the on the
26:28
Speaker 3: sound stage where we made it look like a video
26:31
Speaker 3: game store, and it was so you know, I said, no,
26:34
Speaker 3: we had to break all that stuff down. Half of
26:36
Speaker 3: it was thrown away, the other half was supposed to
26:39
Speaker 3: be sold, and the person at the last minute, but
26:41
Speaker 3: you know, bailed out of the deal, which was killer again.
26:46
Speaker 3: I mean, honestly, Sandra, I actually wrote and this is
26:48
Speaker 3: a funny part too, I actually wrote a book all
26:50
Speaker 3: about this, and I chronicled every day. I chronicled all
26:54
Speaker 3: the things that went wrong went right. And I actually
26:57
Speaker 3: pitched the book as well. And most publishers like we don't,
27:00
Speaker 3: we don't really have have had a lot of success
27:03
Speaker 3: with first hand accounts like this. Usually we prefer the
27:06
Speaker 3: how to books. But now the more I talk about
27:10
Speaker 3: the book, everyone goes, well, do you still have that
27:12
Speaker 3: ready to publish? And and I'll say, well, it's you know,
27:15
Speaker 3: it's it's in a bunch of note forms, and they said, well,
27:17
Speaker 3: if you ever typed it up, you know, you should
27:18
Speaker 3: just self publish it now, because.
27:20
Speaker 4: That's one of the great things about now is that
27:22
Speaker 4: you can do things like that.
27:25
Speaker 3: Yeah. I mean, I actually and think about putting it
27:28
Speaker 3: together with another book that I was going to write,
27:30
Speaker 3: and put the two together, and just because it was
27:33
Speaker 3: going to go back and forth, I actually got there's
27:35
Speaker 3: a book called Disaster Artist by Greg Cstero, and it's
27:38
Speaker 3: about making the room, and I got inspired because it
27:42
Speaker 3: was almost like he was, you know, each chapter is different,
27:45
Speaker 3: each chat. One chapter is in the present, one chapters
27:47
Speaker 3: in the past, and that's sort of what was going on,
27:50
Speaker 3: and that's sort of what I was going to do anyway,
27:52
Speaker 3: was you know, trying to make this film and also
27:55
Speaker 3: working at a soul crushing day job and those two things. Uh,
28:00
Speaker 3: the stories I have of both of those nobody really believes.
28:02
Speaker 3: And you know, I ended up starting this podcast in
28:05
Speaker 3: twenty fourteen when I got turned down for a job
28:08
Speaker 3: that was you know, rightfully mian and I was like,
28:11
Speaker 3: you know, what, fuck it, I got to do something creative,
28:13
Speaker 3: So I started this whole podcast. But you know that's
28:15
Speaker 3: that's something that i've actually you know, I'm just working on,
28:19
Speaker 3: you know, so many different things. It's kind of hard
28:20
Speaker 3: to sometimes find a time to do some of these
28:23
Speaker 3: little like projects like that, like creating the book and
28:26
Speaker 3: then just doing the Kinnel publishing route. But it's something
28:28
Speaker 3: in the back of my mind. And I also wonder
28:30
Speaker 3: if some people would actually believe half the stories that
28:32
Speaker 3: I actually have in there.
28:33
Speaker 4: You know, I think people working business and already working
28:36
Speaker 4: in the industry would absolutely believe the stories because we
28:39
Speaker 4: work in a very strange, very interesting business where weird
28:43
Speaker 4: things happen very often. And you know, I know whenever
28:47
Speaker 4: I talk to my friends back home and I you know,
28:49
Speaker 4: talk about things in my day to day life or
28:51
Speaker 4: things that have happened and experiences working on the various
28:54
Speaker 4: shows and projects I've worked on, and they just can't
28:57
Speaker 4: comprehend the kind of life that we lead sometimes. And
29:01
Speaker 4: so yeah, I think if they're in the business, they
29:03
Speaker 4: will completely get it and they'll be like, oh, yeah,
29:06
Speaker 4: we've been there too. And then I think, on the
29:07
Speaker 4: flip side, I think it is kind of fun and
29:10
Speaker 4: interesting for people who are not in it to hear that,
29:12
Speaker 4: and it could be a little unbelievable to them, but
29:15
Speaker 4: we know it's real.
29:18
Speaker 3: Yeah, absolutely, you know, it's just again some of the stories,
29:22
Speaker 3: you know it is, it is just so outlandish, and
29:25
Speaker 3: sometimes they're just so unbelievable. But if you again, if you,
29:28
Speaker 3: if you work in the industry, they it seems it's like, well,
29:30
Speaker 3: all right, it's just another day at the office.
29:33
Speaker 4: Yeah, exactly. I think one of the fun stories I
29:36
Speaker 4: like to tell, and by all means not the weirdest,
29:39
Speaker 4: is when I was, you know, working at FX, and
29:41
Speaker 4: I was on the Fox lot and they were shooting
29:44
Speaker 4: water for Elephants at the time, and so they were
29:46
Speaker 4: doing this big parade scene. It was kind of down
29:48
Speaker 4: like the New York Street set, and it was right
29:49
Speaker 4: outside my window. And I had a friend come by
29:52
Speaker 4: for lunch that day, and we were walking over to
29:55
Speaker 4: the commissary and we turned around the corner of a
29:57
Speaker 4: building and there's an Juliane elephant just getting hose down
30:01
Speaker 4: right in front of us.
30:03
Speaker 2: We'll be right back after a word from our sponsor,
30:09
Speaker 2: and now back to the show.
30:12
Speaker 4: And you know who does that happen to? You can't
30:15
Speaker 4: work in a hospital. Turn a corner and then suddenly,
30:17
Speaker 4: like there's this giant elephant taking a happy bath. You know,
30:21
Speaker 4: it's one of those things. And one of the fun
30:23
Speaker 4: things about our business is that, you know, that's a
30:26
Speaker 4: weird least can be in everyday occurrence.
30:29
Speaker 3: Yeah. Absolutely. You know a story I like to tell
30:32
Speaker 3: is this guy who I was once when I first started.
30:35
Speaker 3: We were going to go make this film that he
30:37
Speaker 3: was always talking about making, and he finally got some
30:41
Speaker 3: funding to make it. It wasn't a lot of money, you know,
30:43
Speaker 3: about about twenty grand, and we were finally going to
30:46
Speaker 3: make this film, and the film didn't have a lot
30:48
Speaker 3: to it, so it didn't really it was a self
30:50
Speaker 3: contained thriller or self contained horror. So we get to
30:53
Speaker 3: this this like house. It was like an old, dilapidated mansion,
30:57
Speaker 3: and there were these brand new steel gates locking everybody
31:02
Speaker 3: out right. So we get there and uh, we said,
31:06
Speaker 3: and he and we get there and he says, oh,
31:09
Speaker 3: wait a minute, I forgot the key and we can't
31:12
Speaker 3: get into this to this house because these gates are now,
31:15
Speaker 3: these new gates are there. So he says, let me
31:17
Speaker 3: call my brother. His brother is all the way across
31:20
Speaker 3: the country. And he says, oh, huh, So then he's
31:25
Speaker 3: trying to convince that this this little PA, I mean,
31:28
Speaker 3: because they're smaller and uh, you know this to to
31:32
Speaker 3: hop the fence and try to let us in on
31:35
Speaker 3: the opposite side. And the PA was like, I think
31:38
Speaker 3: that might be breaking and entering. He's like, no, no, no,
31:39
Speaker 3: we have permission to shoot here. Well, uh, the PA
31:43
Speaker 3: hops the fence. Well, the gate doesn't open, there's no latch.
31:46
Speaker 3: It's literally a traditional locked gate. So if you don't
31:48
Speaker 3: have it the key, you know, yeah, exactly. So so
31:54
Speaker 3: he eventually said, I guess we're not filming today. He's
31:57
Speaker 3: because he said, I there's no way I'm getting over
31:59
Speaker 3: this fence, and and I was trying to think of
32:00
Speaker 3: a way we could do this. But you know, it's
32:04
Speaker 3: just funny because I tell this story of people and
32:06
Speaker 3: they go what the hell? They were like, you don't
32:08
Speaker 3: have that? How do you not have a key? I said, Well,
32:12
Speaker 3: the guy who was doing this whole thing just completely
32:15
Speaker 3: forgot about it. And you know, even still we tried
32:18
Speaker 3: to get in there and eventually was just like, you
32:20
Speaker 3: know what, he goes, let's just call it a day.
32:23
Speaker 3: But that's after we were there for a couple of hours.
32:25
Speaker 3: Trying to figure out a way to break into through
32:26
Speaker 3: this fence.
32:27
Speaker 4: But I mean the stories are hysterical. I mean, like
32:31
Speaker 4: when you think about your daily conversations that you have
32:33
Speaker 4: when you're you know, in pre production and production on
32:36
Speaker 4: shows and you're trying to figure it all out, and
32:38
Speaker 4: you're having these intense conversations about you know, somebody's you know,
32:43
Speaker 4: bodily functions or you know, how to make something look
32:48
Speaker 4: bloodier or not bloody. You know, like there's so many
32:51
Speaker 4: aspects of it. Like I remember we would watch, you know,
32:53
Speaker 4: whenever we would watch dailies, and particularly on some of
32:56
Speaker 4: our shows, they were a little bit more on the
32:58
Speaker 4: racier side of things, and we were always so paranoid that,
33:01
Speaker 4: like HR would be walking down the hallway and think,
33:03
Speaker 4: we're watching porn because we're sitting there watching dailies of
33:07
Speaker 4: you know, a sex scene and we're you know, making
33:10
Speaker 4: sure and you can hear them screaming to make sure
33:12
Speaker 4: that the actor has the proper sock in the right
33:16
Speaker 4: places to be able to shoot properly, or they're swearing,
33:20
Speaker 4: and meanwhile, you know, you have particularly at a at
33:24
Speaker 4: a place like like Fox, you know, it's a big
33:26
Speaker 4: corporation and different departments operate very differently than creative departments,
33:30
Speaker 4: and so we were always so paranoid that they would
33:32
Speaker 4: be coming down the hallway and report us for you know,
33:35
Speaker 4: vulgarity or porn or god knows what else, you know,
33:38
Speaker 4: because you know, we would be in things, you know,
33:41
Speaker 4: these group things about like you know, sexual harassment and language,
33:44
Speaker 4: and there would be another like the would be like
33:46
Speaker 4: a little old lady complaining how somebody swore during one
33:49
Speaker 4: of their meetings, and we just kind of duck our
33:51
Speaker 4: heads because that's half of what we're doing. So it's
33:55
Speaker 4: really fun to think about the kinds of conversations that
33:58
Speaker 4: we get to have on a daily day.
34:01
Speaker 3: Yeah, it's always a different day, and it's always some
34:04
Speaker 3: kind of some some kind of new problem as well.
34:07
Speaker 3: And you know, especially now because you know things are
34:10
Speaker 3: going into more of a tech route, so now you
34:12
Speaker 3: know there's a lot of problems like oh man, you
34:14
Speaker 3: know final cut's not working, or hey, advid's not working,
34:17
Speaker 3: or these new three D effects aren't working or something
34:20
Speaker 3: like that. You know, it's just, you know, it's funny
34:23
Speaker 3: because now it's the same problems, but they're different. So
34:26
Speaker 3: it's you know what I mean. And now it's like
34:27
Speaker 3: there's always there's always those tech problems that that never
34:30
Speaker 3: seem to exist outside of when you're actually going to
34:33
Speaker 3: go shoot your film and all of a sudden, you know,
34:35
Speaker 3: all these interesting tech problems that you know, when it happens,
34:39
Speaker 3: you're ready just to say, oh that's it, I'm done,
34:41
Speaker 3: I'm going home. But you know, it's it's stuff like that,
34:44
Speaker 3: and you know, it's it's just again, That's why I
34:47
Speaker 3: enjoy this podcast because again you have to hear stories
34:50
Speaker 3: like that and hopefully, you know, you try to avoid
34:52
Speaker 3: some of that stuff, you know what I mean, if
34:54
Speaker 3: you can, as much as you can, you try to
34:55
Speaker 3: minimize it.
34:56
Speaker 4: Yeah. Absolutely, And I think what's so funny is that
34:58
Speaker 4: you can talk to people who have been in the
34:59
Speaker 4: b in this thirty forty years and they still have
35:02
Speaker 4: problems that they never thought they would ever experience. It
35:06
Speaker 4: never goes away, no matter like how much experience or
35:08
Speaker 4: how long you've been doing it, and so you know,
35:10
Speaker 4: you definitely have to have a good sense of humor
35:12
Speaker 4: to I think, get through a lot of this.
35:14
Speaker 3: Yeah, oh yeah, I've listened. The thick skin and being
35:16
Speaker 3: able to lay up in the face of like total
35:19
Speaker 3: total collapse, and you know, it's interest, you know, I
35:21
Speaker 3: wanted to just to get back to you know, to
35:23
Speaker 3: your career. I know, I kind of got sidetracked there,
35:25
Speaker 3: you know. So what do you know? You've done all
35:28
Speaker 3: this work, great work at FBX, you know, so what
35:30
Speaker 3: are you currently working on right now?
35:32
Speaker 4: So I left Fax, I said in twenty twelve. I
35:36
Speaker 4: took a little time off because I have worked my
35:38
Speaker 4: entire life. And from there I started my company Under
35:42
Speaker 4: the Stairs Entertainment and mainly to produce, and then I
35:46
Speaker 4: actually transitioned into writing in the last couple of years
35:49
Speaker 4: as well. So I produce them right, and my attention
35:52
Speaker 4: went to features. And the reason behind that was because
35:56
Speaker 4: I knew I could go out there and produce a
35:57
Speaker 4: feature and actually build an audience and really make a
36:01
Speaker 4: name for myself and my projects, and you know, and
36:05
Speaker 4: still keep my foot in in television. So that's what
36:09
Speaker 4: I had been doing. And so for the past few years,
36:11
Speaker 4: I have been developing a number of projects, mostly dark,
36:15
Speaker 4: character driven stuff. I'm a big proponent of diversity in film,
36:20
Speaker 4: both in front and behind the cameras, and unfortunately in
36:23
Speaker 4: that in this business, it also includes being a woman.
36:26
Speaker 4: Even though we're fifty one percent of the population, we're
36:29
Speaker 4: still considered diverse in the film industry. But you know,
36:33
Speaker 4: that includes everything across the board, from disability, sexuality, ethnicity,
36:38
Speaker 4: and skin color, whatever. And that doesn't mean every position
36:42
Speaker 4: necessarily on my projects has to be filled by that,
36:45
Speaker 4: even though I do like that. But all of the
36:48
Speaker 4: major components, whether it's you know, story elements, whether it's
36:53
Speaker 4: key cast and crew, has to incorporate that in some way.
36:57
Speaker 4: And so I'm very proud of my projects to be
36:59
Speaker 4: able to to get voices out there that aren't normally heard.
37:04
Speaker 4: And so while I've been developing and writing and amassing
37:08
Speaker 4: my feature projects, released a short film in the meantime
37:12
Speaker 4: called Zone two, made the festival rounds for the past
37:15
Speaker 4: about year year and a half and we're just now
37:18
Speaker 4: diving into digital distribution. So that will be coming out shortly,
37:22
Speaker 4: probably in the next handful of months, and so we
37:26
Speaker 4: will have announcements on that soon. But that one did
37:30
Speaker 4: really well, played a lot of major horror festivals, played
37:32
Speaker 4: all over the world. Super proud of it, and really
37:35
Speaker 4: just acted as a way to propel the company into
37:40
Speaker 4: the features and kind of regaining my on set toes
37:45
Speaker 4: because spending so much time working at a network and
37:47
Speaker 4: working at the agencies, I hadn't been on set in
37:50
Speaker 4: a while, and so it really helped you that. And
37:53
Speaker 4: so currently now have about three projects I'm producing in
37:57
Speaker 4: about three that I'm writing one of them right now,
38:01
Speaker 4: we are going out. We are in the process of
38:04
Speaker 4: finding financing and casting, and I'm looking for directors on
38:08
Speaker 4: two of the others.
38:10
Speaker 3: And you know we're talking about in the pre interview,
38:13
Speaker 3: you have so much going on right now, and you know,
38:15
Speaker 3: like all these projects start taking off, and you know,
38:18
Speaker 3: it just it's almost that they all take off at
38:20
Speaker 3: the exact same time, and it just sort of you
38:21
Speaker 3: know what I mean, It's almost like it has that
38:24
Speaker 3: luck to it all the time. Oh.
38:26
Speaker 4: Absolutely, it never fails. I know. One of the things
38:29
Speaker 4: we were discussing before was my company, Script Chicks, that
38:33
Speaker 4: I had formerly been doing with Miranda say Jack, who
38:36
Speaker 4: was a previous guest on your show, and we had
38:38
Speaker 4: co founded it together not long after we had both
38:44
Speaker 4: left our jobs kind of around the same time to
38:46
Speaker 4: pursue our various elements, and we realized that we were
38:50
Speaker 4: doing a lot of you know, we were working with
38:52
Speaker 4: a lot of writers, you know, doing notes and business coaching,
38:55
Speaker 4: and so we decided to form script Chicks at that time,
38:59
Speaker 4: and we actually just recently closed it down due to
39:02
Speaker 4: the fact that our individual projects have started taking off
39:04
Speaker 4: and doing a lot of really great things, and so
39:07
Speaker 4: we haven't had the time to put the attention to
39:09
Speaker 4: it that we've still that we'd like to. You know,
39:13
Speaker 4: we're both taking individual clients still, but our projects have
39:18
Speaker 4: really kind of shifted and become more of the focus
39:21
Speaker 4: in each of our lives. So it's, you know, all
39:24
Speaker 4: good things, and it's really exciting to be able to
39:26
Speaker 4: do that. And you're right when it rains the poors
39:29
Speaker 4: and you know, all the tides rides together. You see
39:32
Speaker 4: all your friends, you know, making it at the same time,
39:34
Speaker 4: you see all your projects going at the same time,
39:36
Speaker 4: and so it's a really exciting point in life when
39:38
Speaker 4: you finally get there.
39:40
Speaker 3: Yes, yes it is. And like I was saying too
39:43
Speaker 3: about this podcast, you know, like when I'm trying to
39:44
Speaker 3: do all the other stuff, sometimes I feel like this
39:46
Speaker 3: podcast has like a life of its own.
39:48
Speaker 4: You know.
39:49
Speaker 3: It's like it's just the more attention I try to
39:52
Speaker 3: put towards other things. The more it like tries to
39:54
Speaker 3: pull me back in kind of I kind of feel like,
39:59
Speaker 3: what was it Scarface said that? Why am I drawing
40:01
Speaker 3: a blank?
40:01
Speaker 2: Yeah, we'll be right back after a word from our
40:05
Speaker 2: sponsor and now back to the show.
40:12
Speaker 3: Yeah, yeah, yeah exactly. I was like, wait, who said that?
40:15
Speaker 3: Oh my gosh. For a guy who's seen a lot
40:18
Speaker 3: of films, I blank out on here all the time.
40:20
Speaker 3: And I don't know why that is, probably because I'm
40:23
Speaker 3: trying to do too many things at once here, because
40:26
Speaker 3: I'm always It's not that I'm like, you know what
40:27
Speaker 3: I mean, I'm trying to do the interview and I'm
40:29
Speaker 3: also watching to make sure that like the recordings doing
40:32
Speaker 3: going properly. I'm trying to I'm making sure that the
40:34
Speaker 3: internet's proper. Now. I'm just like, you know, I'm looking
40:37
Speaker 3: at these like these, these all these things now, and
40:40
Speaker 3: I'm always like, you know, uh, having sometimes I'm having
40:43
Speaker 3: brain farts here. But but you know, you know, Sandra,
40:46
Speaker 3: I wanted to ask you also, you know, if there
40:49
Speaker 3: was one piece of advice that you could give to
40:50
Speaker 3: anybody about who was who were starting out, you know,
40:52
Speaker 3: what would that piece of advice be?
40:55
Speaker 4: Oh, gosh, that is a very big question. It would
40:59
Speaker 4: be really to just get out there and do things
41:03
Speaker 4: and meet people, because this business is so much about networking.
41:06
Speaker 4: And I know that this is advice that you've heard
41:09
Speaker 4: a million times before, but it is true. It's you know,
41:14
Speaker 4: get to know people, and get to know people in
41:15
Speaker 4: a very genuine, authentic way. Because people can smell b
41:21
Speaker 4: yes from a mile away. We all know that we're
41:24
Speaker 4: all talking to each other and we're going to networking
41:26
Speaker 4: events because we all want something from each other. So
41:28
Speaker 4: you know, why not make it a little bit more
41:30
Speaker 4: pleasant get to know each other as people. And they're
41:32
Speaker 4: also more likely to help you once you get to
41:35
Speaker 4: know them as people, and they don't feel like you're
41:37
Speaker 4: being used. And so I would say, just, you know,
41:40
Speaker 4: make genuine connections with people. While you're doing that, do
41:44
Speaker 4: not be afraid to pay your bills and eat. But
41:47
Speaker 4: also please go out there and be creative and make stuff.
41:50
Speaker 4: Like we're at a time right now where you can
41:52
Speaker 4: you can make stuff on your iPhone and put it
41:54
Speaker 4: up on YouTube and it may or may not go anywhere,
41:56
Speaker 4: but you're just exercising those muscles and creativity and all
42:01
Speaker 4: of this is just practice, and so if you're not
42:04
Speaker 4: doing it, you're not gonna get better at it, and
42:07
Speaker 4: people aren't going to pay attention to you. You know,
42:10
Speaker 4: there really is no such thing as an overnight success
42:12
Speaker 4: in this town. You're a ten year overnight success. You
42:15
Speaker 4: can ask any successful you know, writer, director, director of photography, producer.
42:21
Speaker 4: They are all plugging away at it for ten years
42:23
Speaker 4: before anybody knew their names. It's just everyone likes to,
42:26
Speaker 4: you know, hear the fun stories and not the you
42:30
Speaker 4: know struggle that everyone went through. But you know, the
42:34
Speaker 4: truth of it is is, you know, just get to
42:37
Speaker 4: know people, because that's how you're going to get your
42:39
Speaker 4: jobs in this business. And you know, apply your energy
42:44
Speaker 4: to your practice whatever that may be, whether it's writing
42:47
Speaker 4: or producing or directing or you know, photography, just be
42:52
Speaker 4: doing it.
42:54
Speaker 3: Yeah, you know that is a fantastic, you know sort
42:56
Speaker 3: of way to end the Podcastandra, because you know, I
42:58
Speaker 3: agree with you hundred percent. And the fact is, you know,
43:03
Speaker 3: I think now is the time if you're going to
43:04
Speaker 3: make a film, to make a film, because I think
43:06
Speaker 3: in five years time, if you're listening to this podcast
43:10
Speaker 3: and you're thinking about making a film five years from now,
43:12
Speaker 3: you're going to be glad you did, and you don't
43:14
Speaker 3: want to be that person five years from now, going, man,
43:16
Speaker 3: I should make that film. Still it's like, you know,
43:19
Speaker 3: time to take it away.
43:21
Speaker 4: Absolutely, and you know, and I'm so jealous of all
43:24
Speaker 4: of you young people now who have all of this
43:26
Speaker 4: technology because when I was coming up, and when I
43:29
Speaker 4: was growing up, you know, we had like VHS cameras,
43:32
Speaker 4: we could you know, I learned tape to tape editing.
43:35
Speaker 4: You know, trying to be able to do things was
43:38
Speaker 4: a little bit more difficult at the time. Even when
43:41
Speaker 4: I started in this business, it was much harder to
43:44
Speaker 4: you know, develop your voice a little bit earlier on
43:46
Speaker 4: and build that. And now you have every opportunity. I mean,
43:50
Speaker 4: we have video on our phones where we can upload
43:54
Speaker 4: things immediately, and so you can start developing your voice
43:57
Speaker 4: at so much of a younger age where I feel
43:59
Speaker 4: like a lot of people from you know, our generation
44:02
Speaker 4: and older than us. You know, it happened a little
44:06
Speaker 4: bit later in life because we had to wait till
44:08
Speaker 4: the point where we had jobs where we were able
44:11
Speaker 4: to do those things to gain access to the types
44:13
Speaker 4: of things. Now we have access to everything, so you
44:15
Speaker 4: can develop your voice so much younger, So God, don't
44:17
Speaker 4: waste any time.
44:18
Speaker 2: Go do it now.
44:19
Speaker 3: Yes, absolutely, Sandra. And you know that's why I have
44:24
Speaker 3: so many people on here and of all different age backgrounds.
44:27
Speaker 3: The youngest person I ever had on here was nineteen
44:31
Speaker 3: or twenty and the oldest person I had on here
44:34
Speaker 3: was eighty six.
44:36
Speaker 4: Oh I love it.
44:36
Speaker 3: I love it. Yeah, so very very very wide range.
44:43
Speaker 3: You know, it's funny. And the person who was eighty six,
44:44
Speaker 3: by the way, actually used to work with Bruce Lee,
44:47
Speaker 3: and that is that is Leo Fong by the way.
44:49
Speaker 3: Everyone who's wondering, but yeah, he was in a very
44:52
Speaker 3: interesting interview and how he got from movies made. And
44:54
Speaker 3: the youngest at that point was was Joe Kowalski. But
44:58
Speaker 3: I'm actually talking to somebody now who's like, I think
45:00
Speaker 3: she's sixteen.
45:02
Speaker 4: But there's a young well, there's a young teenage horror
45:05
Speaker 4: filmmaker female who's like sixteen who's been doing really well,
45:08
Speaker 4: so I hope it's her.
45:11
Speaker 3: There's a girl who lives around me who does horror
45:13
Speaker 3: films as well. Her name is Emily something, but I
45:17
Speaker 3: don't know. I've tried to get her on the podcast.
45:19
Speaker 3: Have heard of that come on, but we can't sort
45:22
Speaker 3: of make our schedules meet. But there's a friend, there's
45:25
Speaker 3: another girl that I was thinking of. Her name is
45:26
Speaker 3: Kansas Bowling, Okay, and she actually I was talking about
45:31
Speaker 3: her to have her on. Yeah.
45:33
Speaker 4: I think it's great. There's such a great community of
45:38
Speaker 4: filmmakers online. Like, it's just such a great great resource
45:41
Speaker 4: and social media and everyone's getting younger and younger and younger.
45:46
Speaker 4: But it's so wonderful to be able to that they
45:48
Speaker 4: have the opportunity to cultivate the talent and for all
45:51
Speaker 4: of us to be able to meet in this you know,
45:54
Speaker 4: ambiguous kind of place but connect on such deep levels.
45:57
Speaker 3: Yes, Yeah, I couldn't agree more. And that's why I
46:01
Speaker 3: you know, I like your social media can be a
46:03
Speaker 3: bit of a double edged sword. But the one part
46:05
Speaker 3: I do like about it is I do get to
46:06
Speaker 3: meet people like you, Sandra, and then doing this podcast
46:09
Speaker 3: is you know, it's just even extra, you know, and
46:12
Speaker 3: being able to meet different people and really expand my
46:15
Speaker 3: network and you know, it's just yeah, I think it's
46:18
Speaker 3: great for everybody, you know, and it's uh, it's just
46:20
Speaker 3: great here about what everybody's up to.
46:22
Speaker 4: Yeah, absolutely I mean I've met many of my collaborators
46:25
Speaker 4: and my writers we met on Twitter, and you know,
46:29
Speaker 4: Twitter has been an amazing, amazing tool, you know, for
46:33
Speaker 4: the projects I've worked on for myself personally, and and
46:37
Speaker 4: even when I was you know, at the network, it
46:39
Speaker 4: was such a great tool for for our shows in
46:41
Speaker 4: terms of research and connecting with fans. I mean, social
46:44
Speaker 4: media just provide such an amazing, amazing community and so
46:47
Speaker 4: much opportunity.
46:49
Speaker 3: Yeah. Absolutely, And that's the that's the key word, is opportunity.
46:53
Speaker 3: And you know that's so listening to not only this
46:57
Speaker 3: podcast episode, with the other podcast episodes. It's all about
47:00
Speaker 3: either creating your own opportunities or finding other opportunities that
47:04
Speaker 3: you can that can help you know, where you can
47:06
Speaker 3: provide value and then they can help you out at
47:08
Speaker 3: the same time, like finding a crew to be a
47:11
Speaker 3: part of or if you're going to need to create
47:13
Speaker 3: your own opportunities, you know, maybe make your own movie,
47:15
Speaker 3: maybe write your own movie that you wanted to actually do.
47:17
Speaker 4: Absolutely, and I think also too, I mean, every person
47:20
Speaker 4: you meet is another opportunity, and it might not be tomorrow,
47:23
Speaker 4: it might happen, you know, years from now. I mean
47:27
Speaker 4: the reason why I got my job at FX stemmed
47:31
Speaker 4: directly because of not just my job at the agency,
47:35
Speaker 4: but because of a very particular conversation I had with
47:39
Speaker 4: my you know, future boss. You know, I was working
47:44
Speaker 4: for an agent who had a bit of a reputation
47:46
Speaker 4: of being very intense with people, and which was fine.
47:50
Speaker 4: We had a great working relationship, but I also would
47:53
Speaker 4: have to follow up and clean up a little bit
47:56
Speaker 4: after some of those phone calls. And so after this
47:59
Speaker 4: onearticular conversation with my future boss, they had gotten into
48:05
Speaker 4: an argument over a show that we had been developing
48:07
Speaker 4: together with some of our clients, and she had been
48:09
Speaker 4: developing at a previous job, and I don't know, we
48:12
Speaker 4: called back at some point and I just started immediately
48:15
Speaker 4: apologizing for him and just totally taking responsibility for my
48:18
Speaker 4: boss's intense conversation. And you know, I completely forgot about
48:24
Speaker 4: it because it was so normal to me. And then
48:26
Speaker 4: fast forward, you know, about eight months to a year later,
48:30
Speaker 4: and I was interviewing at FX, and you know, and
48:33
Speaker 4: these jobs are very tough to get, and you know,
48:36
Speaker 4: I was really fortunate to be able to have this job.
48:38
Speaker 4: And I think it was two years into my time there,
48:42
Speaker 4: she finally told me why she hired me, and part
48:45
Speaker 4: of the reason why she hired me was because of
48:47
Speaker 4: that conversation that I had taking responsibility from my boss
48:52
Speaker 4: three years prior. And so you just never in the
48:55
Speaker 4: point of all that is to say, like you never
48:57
Speaker 4: know what you know, who you're going to be, what
49:00
Speaker 4: you're going to do, and what's going to be that
49:02
Speaker 4: thing that creates that opportunity for you, So just be open.
49:07
Speaker 3: Yeah, absolutely, Sandra. I couldn't agree more. Uh, Sandra. I
49:11
Speaker 3: want to say thank you very much, you know for
49:13
Speaker 3: coming on. I mean I could talk to you all day.
49:16
Speaker 3: I could, you know, I mean you and I could
49:17
Speaker 3: be sharing war stories all day. Uh Sandra. Work people
49:20
Speaker 3: find you out online.
49:21
Speaker 4: Absolutely. You can find my company at uts Entertainment dot com.
49:26
Speaker 4: I'm also on Twitter. I have two handles. One for
49:30
Speaker 4: my personal handle, which is lil SJL, so that's l
49:34
Speaker 4: I L Underscore s j L, and the other one
49:37
Speaker 4: is Understairs Ent and that one obviously is for my company.
49:42
Speaker 4: I like to host a little thing called TV chat,
49:44
Speaker 4: and I love talking about television. I love talking about
49:47
Speaker 4: film and story. So come hang out with me there
49:51
Speaker 4: and ask me anything. I'm always open for conversation and
49:55
Speaker 4: I will.
49:55
Speaker 3: Link to all of that in the show notes. Everybody,
49:58
Speaker 3: and you know you can talk to Sandra on Twitter
50:02
Speaker 3: and or argue with her as she as she put.
50:05
Speaker 4: Earlier, Come come argue with me. It's fun.
50:10
Speaker 3: Sandra. I want to say thank you so much for
50:12
Speaker 3: coming on.
50:12
Speaker 4: Well, thank you so much for having me. This is
50:14
Speaker 4: super fun and let's talk more. Yeah.
50:17
Speaker 3: Absolutely absolutely, and please stay in touch and I will
50:19
Speaker 3: talk to you soon.
50:20
Speaker 4: Absolutely. Thank you so much.
50:22
Speaker 3: Thanks Sandra, Bye bye bye.
50:25
Speaker 2: I want to thank Dave so much for doing such
50:27
Speaker 2: a great job on this episode. If you want to
50:28
Speaker 2: get links to anything we spoke about in this episode,
50:30
Speaker 2: head over to the show notes at Indie film huscle
50:33
Speaker 2: dot com. Forward slash eight forty six, and if you
50:35
Speaker 2: have it already, please head over to Filmmaking podcast dot com,
50:39
Speaker 2: subscribe and leave a good review for the show. It
50:43
Speaker 2: really helps us out a lot, guys. Thank you again
50:45
Speaker 2: so much for listening to guys. As always, keep that
50:47
Speaker 2: hustle going, keep that dream alive, Stay safe out there,
50:50
Speaker 2: and I'll talk to you soon.
50:53
Speaker 1: Thanks for listening to the Indie Film Hustle podcast at
50:56
Speaker 1: Indie film Hustle dot com. That's I N D I
50:59
Speaker 1: E I L M h U s t l E
51:02
Speaker 1: dot com.