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IFH 730: Writing the Netflix/TV Drama Series with Pamela Douglas · Indie Film Hustle® - A Filmmaking Podcast

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You are listening to the IFH podcast Network. For more amazing filmmaking and screenwriting
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podcasts, just go to ifahpodcastnetwork dot com. Welcome to the Indie Film Huscle
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Podcast, Episode number seven thirty. Being a good writer is three percent talent
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and ninety seven percent not being distracted by the Internet Unknown. Broadcasting from the
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back alley in Hollywood. It's the Indie Film Hustle Podcast, where we show
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you how to survive and thrive as an indie filmmaker in the jungles of the
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film biz. And here's your host, Alex Ferrari. Welcome, Welcome to
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another episode of the Indie Film Hustle Podcast. I am your humble host Alex
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Ferrari. Today's show is sponsored by Rise of the Film Entrepreneur How to turn
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your independent film into a profitable business. It's harder today than ever before for
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Dot filmbiz book dot com. That's film bizbook dot com. Well,
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guys, today on the show we have Pamela Douglass. She is an award
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winning writer and has written on shows like Star Trek, The Next Generation and
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written an amazing book now in its fourth edition, writing the television drama series.
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Now, I want to have pam come on the show so we can
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do a deep dive into writing those Netflix style Hulu style drama series which are
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all the rage now and where many many screenwriters are getting jobs. So we
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go deep into the weeds on writing the television drama. So, without any
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further ado, please enjoy my conversation with Pamela Douglas. I like to welcome
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to the show, Pamela Douglas. How you doing, pam Hey, good
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to see you, alis. Thank you so much for doing the show.
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I really appreciate it. You very welcome. So I wanted to bring you
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on the show because you've written a book. You wrote a book. This
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is the fourth edition of the book now writing the TV drama series and obviously,
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if you I mean, the first edition is perfectly fine. Nothing has
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changed in television dramas at all. It's pretty much the same thing as Hill
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Street Blues. Essentially. No. Things have definitely changed at a Beatennick pace
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in television. And it's even is it called television anymore. It's now streaming.
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It's like this whole thing. So we'll get into the details of it
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as we get through the through the conversation. But before we get started,
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how did you get into the business. Well, I was always a writer,
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and by the way, I'm also a visual artist, so have lives.
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And it seemed to me long ago that the power in terms of communicating
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ideas, stories, characters, life experience was all on television. I dabbled
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in movies, but nothing has the reach or the impact of television, even
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in the era before streaming, because it's in people's homes. It speaks to
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them in an intimate person to person way, and that has sway over people's
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viewpoint and notions of of what matters and who's in the world. So I
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think I was partly attracted to the scale, the scale of what you could
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do. And I mean when you were writing, I mean you worked with
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you written for Star Trek The Next Generation, which is an amazing show,
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and a lot of the lot of shows in the in the eighties and nineties.
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How I mean, I mean for the young ends listening. Back then
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it was three channels and there was only so many shows you could watch,
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where now there is just an obscene amount of content coming through the doors all
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the time. How do you as a writer kind of well, I mean,
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obviously there's more opportunity now than ever before to be a television writer,
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But how do you break through as a series How do you try to get
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in? I mean, you know, both as a writer as a series
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creator, and I know those are two very different No, no real late
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they're they are a single track and just once I ended the other the way.
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Uh. Let me address the first point. It's true that most of
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my credits are from the later nineties into even early two thousand. Next Generation.
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Bless It's Heart was a very long time ago. Yes it was,
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Yes, And I don't know all that's possible since you look like you're twenty
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five, so I really don't much, uh it. It was an important
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show at its time, and it's the one that people cite because it's familiar.
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Most of my writing after that really words. Uh was in uh originals,
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the the TV dramas, uh, the TV what was that at one
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time called TV movies. So I've done a large spectrum of things in television,
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even before I started teaching it. But what has happened in terms of
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involvement is that, Yeah, when I was a beginner, there were three
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networks, then fourh're now the legacy networks, the traditional networks, they're still
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around, but even they are going to streaming. You mentioned something about,
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well, whatever television is, if it's even a word anymore, And I
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think there's a simple answer to that, which is that television is inclusive in
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the language. In other words, television long since stopped being a box in
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the living room, people gathered. Most people watch television on their computers or
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on other kinds of screens. Now the difference in fact between small screen indie
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films and large screen televisions is almost disappeared. And as Netflix in particular and
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Hbo always as also Amazon to another extent, have moved into the two hour
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format what used to be called featured films, that blurs the line even further.
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So the question is of what is television is an interesting one. The
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writers field has a definition, and it's a strange definition because it says television
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is everything that is not feature filmed in a closed movie house. And that
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is yeah, because the problem with that not problem, but what that opens
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up to is to what extent our games television they are looked at on a
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screen, you know, So we're off on that side. And then when
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you get to the whole international aspect of all of this is the definition of
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the range of television gets even more expansive. Where television is made, how
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it's made, who it's made for. All of this is new, and
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I think it's I think it's encouraging really to people who are coming into the
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industry because you mentioned is it different to create a show or to write for
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a show? Well, the way in which is the question you actually asked
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before a bandam the way in it is twofold. The first thing is that
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it's basically a ladder. That the way into doing anything, including creating original
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series, generally starts with whatever is the lowest rung on a series ramp.
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That's usually staff writer, but sometimes it's writer's assistant, which is a fine
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job. Sometimes it's researcher. There are people who have taken any job they
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could get, including secretary, just to get their foot there. And once
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they're there and you meet people, they might be embarrassed to not read your
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script. So that's the hope that you get in somewhere once you do that.
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If you're successful in your first forays a as a writer of an episode
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for somebody else's show, you will find yourself moving up and off and up
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and out until somebody offers you an overall deal or says, hey, do
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you have an idea for a show you'd like to do? Because I see
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now you're a good writer, and that's normal that's normal. It's not the
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only way. There are people who have with the tremendous amount of production,
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just immense amount of production, who have written pilots. We'll be right back
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after a word from our sponsor, and now back to the show. I
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have had a number of students who have written pilots and sometimes been successful in
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actually placing them. They don't get to be the showrunner if they're a new
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writer, because they wouldn't know how to run the manufacturing operation, but they
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do if they're smart. They stay with the show and come on in a
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mid range and can grow with the show. So yeah, I have seen
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it happen once in a while, not often, but once in a while.
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I've known of people who've written theatrical features that became backdoor pilots. So,
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in other words, you got to a pilot, not by writing a
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pilot that you admit that it's a pilot, but by writing something that shows
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your voice and your characters and your world and gets someone excited to go into
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further development. So is that a backdoor pilot? I was going to ask
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you what a backdoor pilot? It's like me writing the script and then sending
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it in they're like, really, it's really a pilot for a show.
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It could be turned into a show, but you're disguising it as a feature
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script kinda. Basically, it's something It's not unusual to have a two hour
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pilot anyway. These days, a lot of readers, judges, agents,
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managers, producers don't want to read one hundred or one hundred flag pages because
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you can tell in sixty pages or less whether there's a voice, whether there's
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a personality, whether there's whether this is a real storyteller. So they figured
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they could know it from that. If you marry that with a Bible,
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it goes on to the answer to the question of why is this a series
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not a movie? In other words, how come it doesn't just end right
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there? Where are the legs? Where are the springboards? And where are
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we're going to be a few years out? Now? You hear of everything
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though, I mean, do you look at something like Netflix that's been on
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a mad buying spree all over the world, you know it's that's the Netflix
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joke. Somebody comes in and it's the pitches I want a story about ooh,
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and they said, yes, I love it. Here's the money exactly.
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Well, like it's a perfect example. Like, you know, Jaws
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can't be turned into a series, like that's a pretty much beginning, middle,
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and end. Jaws the series is going to be very difficult to pull
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off four seasons of that, you know what, No, I don't.
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I wouldn't personally propose Jaws the series. But but but uh, somebody who
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is clever enough Jas the movie and do what theatrical peaches often do. Look
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at all the Batman's look at all the Wars Star Wars, But those are
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adventures that could happen where it just basically Jaws is just the one and you
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can maybe stretch it out over to it like a season, But I can't
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see five six seasons of it would have to change. Yeah, it'd have
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to. It'd be a new thing. It'd have to be a whole new
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thing. Actually, this is a question I'm sometimes asked from somebody who writes
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a finite script and it ends, possibly because the character dies at the end
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so you can't go on anyway, or the quest is finished, the arc
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is finished, and they say, gee, I'd love to do this as
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a as a series, and I don't know how because it finished. And
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my answer to that is stopped looking at the ending, look at the middle.
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You don't expand from the end. The difference between episodic televit writing episodic
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television and movies is partly that a feature film script or a finite script has
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an arc. Somebody wants something here, the complex and the the complications,
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They go through all the obstacles, and at the end they win it or
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lose it. Television and television can still have that kind of horizontal storytelling,
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but it also has vertical storytelling. And what I mean by that is that
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while you will also while you will do your plot in a horizontal way,
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there's so has to be so much depth in the characters that you could take
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a character from the center and tell stories outwards from that. So it's not
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then the question of what happens to Jaws the shark, or in Back any
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of those characters. It may be the story of one of the people in
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it who suspected and how their storyline goes. Give you a perfect example,
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A classic, great example is what have a breaking bad? You read my
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mind, you ran my mind? Brilliant, brilliant. Now it's Vince Gill
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again, who is a great writer, an expert in this whole thing.
15:16
Walter White is dead at the end of Breaking Bad. Show is vastly popular.
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Where are you going to go? And they brilliantly saw went the lawyer
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Saul Goodman and did a prequel, which is absolutely a wonderful piece. Very
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often a spinoff of any kind is not you know, they're just training on
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it. This is brilliant stands on its own feet as its own show,
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with its own style, its own tone, its own cast. And that's
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a perfect example of expanding up from the middle from one of the characters in
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the richness rather than going from the nd right. And also with Saul is
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at first you're just like looking for the Easter eggs from Breaking Bad. But
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after a while you're just watching it because it's a good show, not just
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like, oh, there's that thing from that episode of Breaking Bad. Oh
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there's not one character is back, and yeah, that's all great, but
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at a certain point, wow, it's just solid. Now it's just like
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its own thing. And it took them a little bit to find those legs,
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but they found that they had character richness. Oh, start from it's
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him. Also the character of Mike. I mean, there's a whole episode
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called five. Oh it's in the first season. I think it's the third
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episode or something where where Mike I put out his last name, you know,
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yeah, Mike, Yeah, of course Mike. Yeah, I forgot
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Mike. You know you're talking about, Yes, yeah, where it's his
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life with his grandchild and his back. You know. Uh, you can
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do that if your characters are rich enough. You can't do that if all
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you've got is a plot. I mean, if all you've got is a
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scary shark. Not that that's all Joe's had, but if that's all you've
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done, you really don't get anywhere to go. But great television you can
17:08
spin off vertically as long as characters have secrets right and or people are interested,
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Like I'm like, what was Saul like before Breaking Bad? You're like,
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wow, Like he's such a great character. He's a runaway in a
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show with a thousand great characters. He was. He stole the scene anytime
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he was in it. I mean literally, yeah. Oh well that and
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also it posts questions like how did this attorney get into this situation? Well,
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got him into the strip? Mall? How did he get into the
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strip? Mall? All of it? You know, and so what you
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want a pilot to do is not answer questions, but to ask them right
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exactly. Now, One thing you said earlier, which I wanted to really
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emphasize this to the listeners because there's a lot of writers out there who really
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don't understand the machine that is television writing and television creation. You said the
18:02
manufacturing process. And I've never heard television used in that, but it is
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so apropos because it's exactly it's it's in our industry the closest thing we have
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to a product, because our industry is insane. I mean, the entertainment
18:18
business. It's pretty crazy because we create a product and then if the product's
18:22
a hit, we can't create it again. So if we have one big
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hit, that's why there's sequels and prequels and they're trying to rep you know,
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when Star Wars a hit, they're like, we need the sequel to
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Star Wars. But television is the like. But if you have like a
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bag of a bottle of a Coca Cola, you can make a thousand million
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Coca Cola cans and keep making money. But you can't do that with entertainment.
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But television is the closest thing we have to that where you can recreate
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that product and it's a manufacturing Is that fair? I would depart from the
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analogy to Coca cola because I just it. Yes, you know, because
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every episode, if you again look at something like Breaking Bad, any of
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the great shows, Churches, each one is a work of art in and
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of itself. Correct. However, you were right, and what I meant
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by the manufacturing process was actually the act of what it takes from your first
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idea to things getting on television or things getting on any screen. With a
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movie, there's also a manufacturing process. There are people who do the camera
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and sound and editing, so you are still manufacturing a product. With television,
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especially traditional television, you really had to spill out a product every week.
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Right, we'll be right back after a word from our sponsor, And
20:00
now back to the show, which means that you have to have a writing
20:07
staff. You have to have a structure with a showrunner, with executive layers,
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and with people who have jobs that you can depend on to deliver.
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There are many stories before streaming, which is structured a little differently of what
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happened. When the script falls out, you think you've got it. You've
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got a tight schedule, you have to shoot for seven days, you have
20:34
to edit this number of days these days before it actually airs, and it's
20:40
already advertised, and the thing falls out and you ended up we end up
20:45
with a repeat episode. Rarely happens. Doesn't happen really anymore. But it's
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a marathon. If you look at something like The Good Wife, which was
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probably the last of the great written series that tried to do twenty four episodes
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a year, my god, which nobody does that anymore. Nobody does that
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anymore, and they did it well, they did it wonderfully. It's been
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compared to the Ginger Rogers, who has to dance as well as Fred Astare,
21:18
but backwards and heels. It's not you know, That's what happens with
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trying to do something like The Good Wife with all those episodes. Nobody does
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that anymore. Series are now maybe Netflix might do thirteen. The number of
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episodes in a season has pretty much sailed in an eight to ten. Even
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so, there are shorter seasons, and because with streaming especially they were all
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in the can in advance or almost all in the canon advance. That intense
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weekly pressure to get this script done and out there is not what it used
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to be. I mean, that also makes other changes happen. But what
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I'm talking about with the manufacturing is when I see somebody who has a pilot
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and a good idea, but as a beginner has really not worked on a
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show, or even if they've worked on the show a little bit far be
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it from them to have a clue about the budget for the set construction or
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casting a million other things. And that's where and they say I'm going to
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be the showrunner, it's my show. I well, no, you're not,
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and you don't want to because you don't know what to do with the
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with the various craft unions. You really don't know what to do in terms
22:48
of directors, actors, even staffing your show. So that's why it takes
22:56
some time actually being in the business to move up to that. And that's
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there's nothing wrong with that. There's nothing wrong with learning your craft. I
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must say, That's how I learned everything. I mean, now I'm a
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professor at USC, so my students all come out of school, you know,
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with some education in all of this inexperience, and they have portfolio.
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When I was starting, I really hadn't gone to school for it. I'd
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been a creative writer, done other things. But I learned. I learned
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because the showrunners took the time on a staff. Say you know, no,
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there were about three acts in television, right? No? Or even
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this is how page looks, basic stuff like that. Yeah, yeah,
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Now, what are some myths about writing television dramas that you would like to
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debunk? Here? Because me, the book has a chapter on some of
24:03
my favorite terrible myths. I'm going to open the book to the miss let's
24:07
see where are my favorite myths? By the way, ok everybody, everything
24:15
you would ever want to know is in this book. We're the myths.
24:22
Okay, all right, it is Okay, here we go. It is
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in the very first chapter. And the first myth is that TV is small
24:34
movies. TV is not small movies. TV is very very very very very
24:41
big movies. Because if you've got something that's going to end in ninety minutes
24:48
or two hours, you're off the hook pretty quick. If you've got something
24:53
that's going to go on for one hundred hours, as some do, or
24:57
even thirty six hours with the three series of thirteen, or even if you've
25:03
got a limited series of something that's going to be six or eight hours altogether,
25:07
it's much larger. Also, even the size of the screen sizes are
25:15
changing. Yes, people are watching. People watch everything on poems. It
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drives me crazy. Somebody has taken the trouble to beautifully light and go goot
25:23
and collar and everything size. But no, TV is not small movies.
25:33
Here's another one. TV is cheap. Well, it depends. Yeah,
25:40
there is some cheap television. YouTube is cheap. There are some off network
25:51
platforms, especially those for very young audience, that pay lower salaries and don't
25:56
have much budget. But in general, look at HBO Game of Thrones.
26:03
Please you're telling me that's cheaper that some feature films. No, it's much
26:07
more expensive. There's more of it. There are cost savings in various areas
26:12
because you may have sets that you can reuse over time, see and will
26:18
admortize some costs. But no, unless you're getting a movie budget that's completely
26:23
bloated because of a star salary or something like that. Movies, even very
26:30
expensive ones, are not more expensive than television and help it cost cost plenty.
26:37
So I wouldn't I wouldn't even think about that. Now I do warn
26:41
students to be realistic that if you're going to decide to create your own series,
26:47
you're a beginner, you know, use common sense. I mean,
26:51
if you're going to have people flying all over the world for you know,
26:55
international locations and you're a beginner, the answer is going to be no.
27:00
If your game of throngs the heads there, it is, yes, but
27:03
you're not getting throngs. So so common sense. Now what you were in
27:11
your book you talked about a presentation real can you can you explain what a
27:14
presentation reel is, why and why writers need to do it. If they
27:17
do, no, I don't do it, okay, So what is it?
27:22
So what is it? So we don't we avoid it. I'll tell
27:23
you what it is and then I don't think it's at the time. Okay,
27:30
I'm advising you not to do it, with the caution that there is
27:34
nothing that you can't do sometimes and won't work sometimes somewhere. Sure, So
27:40
there's nothing hard about this. But a presentation reeler is basically clips from other
27:51
work you've done, or it might be scenes for what you're hoping to do
27:55
that you are going to present to a network or studio. As an example
28:00
of your plans. That's really not the way things work anymore. Generally,
28:11
it's pretty straightforward in terms of brand new shows. They want to see your
28:17
pilot script, the pilot script accompanied by a bible. Now there's a story
28:23
from long ago, and this story I don't think happens anymore. But this
28:29
was way back in my beginning baby days. There was a movie called Starman
28:37
that was the John Carpenter. It was a movie. Yeah, and because
28:41
it was successful movie for some reason, Michael Douglas and I don't know Michael
28:48
Douglas the actor for some reason, I have no idea what his connection to
28:52
that movie was. Maybe he had an ownership in it, I don't know,
28:56
But he decided this should be a television series. Well, there was
29:00
really no hang for that to be a television series. There was a classic
29:03
case of something that actually pretty much ended, and it was at a time
29:07
before streaming serialization was different. It wasn't a good idea, but because he
29:15
is an important person, he decided that the way he was going to present
29:21
this with no pilot nothing, was to get some of his friends who are
29:26
also professional actors, to bullpark some scenes that might be in the future.
29:33
So this guy goes to top Brass at the network and says, here's some
29:41
clips from how this is going to show if I take this franchise and make
29:45
it into a series. And because he is, we is they said,
29:49
okay, reenlight that reenlight what We'll be right back after a word from our
29:57
sponsor and now back to the show. There was nothing there and he wasn't
30:07
interested in staying with the project. He had other jobs to do. None
30:11
of the people and those clips were in the show and had left with a
30:15
commitment for a show on the air. I think this was like Spring and
30:21
it had it be on the air in September or something with zip. So
30:26
they brought in some very very experienced producers, television producers who had just done
30:33
a lot of work, and they put out a call to the agencies,
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please send us some writers who can tell us how to do this show.
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And I was one of the people brought in, which is how I came
30:45
to know about this. And they gave us a bible which was mainly there
30:52
are hopes for who would be in it and how it would work, but
30:55
no stories because they didn't know. Didn't last I think they did get something
31:00
on the air I wasn't part of it, so I don't know the rest
31:03
of the story. That story doesn't happen anymore. Really, I wouldn't bother
31:11
making a presentation reel for anything. I would just write, well. Now,
31:19
there are cases where people have done web series that are in effect presentation
31:27
reels. In other words, you're showing something on screen that gives them look
31:33
and feel of it. But it's not the way it mostly works. Honestly,
31:37
the way most shows get on television right now is that they are they
31:42
have underlined books or IP or IP of some sort of some sort. It
31:48
could be a graphic novel, good example, or another movie could be played,
31:52
but mostly novels, mostly novels. And so sometimes people who are struggling
32:00
to get into the business because they have a deep sense of story and character
32:05
and really something to tell some and if they don't have an MFA in screenwriting
32:12
and are not in one of the fellowship programs, they might actually be better
32:15
off doing a graphic novel or a novel and taking that in to see if
32:21
they can adapt that. The reason that is so attractive is that it gives
32:27
a buyer the sense that the project has a future. You see because one
32:32
of the questions you ask in television is besides is this well written? Do
32:37
I like the character's story moving? And all those things they're asking, is
32:42
there enough here for many many episodes? And a novel will answer that again
32:49
back to Lord of the Rings and right Now or other great examples like that.
32:54
So, then how the hell the Vince Gilligan ever get Breaking Bad made?
32:58
Because that's arguably one of the worst pitches even that it's like, this
33:01
was the worst pitch ever. Yeah, Well, Vince Gilligan didn't come out
33:06
of the woods already he had a track record. Yeah, and he wrote
33:12
the script. He wrote the originals. The script of the pilot was not
33:17
al different. The names changed, the location changed. It was not also
33:23
different from what was finally shot. If you look at the original original script.
33:30
That show benefited from a an oddity, which is a writer's strike at
33:35
the time. Yeah, because they had time to do development that he hadn't
33:39
done in advance. They were going to kill off Jesse. Yeah, and
33:45
fortunately the show got suspended during the strike, during which time they said,
33:52
oh, wait a minute, that is the show, right, Yeah,
33:55
because that's exactly it. Yeah, because it was only eight episodes. I
33:59
think with the first or something like that. It was a short run and
34:01
then they picked up afterwards. Yeah, I've studied, I've studied that show.
34:06
It's one of my favorite shows of all time. And great, it's
34:08
a there's there's basically I think two episodes that I wanted to kill somebody afterwards.
34:15
But other than that, every other episode the fly, the fly episode
34:17
by the fly episode, please stop. I mean I was watching the Fly.
34:23
I don't know what that was, but I'm just in there, going
34:25
why are we? What is going on? Like it could mostly only two
34:30
characters in the whole hour, but not much. No, and there was
34:35
a fly. There was a fly, two characters just because it was an
34:38
or it wasn't I mean, yeah, I know, I know, I
34:40
don't. But like, there are some other examples of things that once were
34:46
what was called mini series, which is the word you don't really hear anymore.
34:51
Like Battle Star Galactica started as a very tiny goop books shows was so
34:59
popular that it took off and ran for five years. But it was another
35:02
case. We were on Moore Race show runner, an experienced writer who by
35:07
the way, had his training on Star Trek. You know, knew how
35:14
to draw out stories that come from character going forward because it did have legs.
35:20
Yeah, yeah, And I think they're talking now about I mean,
35:24
Queen's Gambit was one of the limited limited mini know one mini series. It's
35:29
a limited series on Netflix, which was it just exploded and who knew?
35:34
It's the you know, a show about chess and it's brilliant and it's so
35:37
popular that they're actually talking about doing another season of it. And I'm like
35:43
it ended, like how Yeah, I don't. I saw it. I
35:49
thought it was successful. I really don't know where it's going to go from
35:53
there. I mean, but in the right hands, you know, maybe
35:57
they'll develop one of the other characters and that depth that could got his name
36:00
the boyfriend, yeah, or or her is older. I don't know,
36:05
Like I don't really like, is she going to become the missus Miagi teach
36:08
somebody else? Like, I don't, I don't know where you go with
36:10
it. But it was so one one. It was that work. But
36:14
those are the kinds of puzzles that are given to writers coming in who are
36:19
new and they somebody says, look, I've got a quandary, I've got
36:22
this product here I don't know what to do with it, and then they
36:25
hear pitches and somebody comes up with a way to do it. Now you
36:30
in your book, you also spoke about the four act grid. Can you
36:34
can you explain a little bit about that? Yeah. Again, people really
36:39
need to see the book, not because I get ten cents for it,
36:46
but because they've got you get ten cents, You're you're good. Most only
36:50
get five. H No, because it really goes into depth in this The
36:58
four X structure goes back to traditional television, where an act occurred, the
37:06
act breaks occurred because commercials had to be fit in roughly every thirteen minutes or
37:12
so, thirteen to fifteen minutes, and you take the hour and you divide
37:15
it and that's what you get. The template became teaser plus four, and
37:21
then after that sometimes teaser plus five. It was originally created partly because of
37:30
commercial television, which doesn't make sense anymore on any of the streaming places.
37:37
And we're setting aside Hulu that just interrupts things bizarrely, but that's their problem.
37:43
You could buy it without the commercials as I do, as I do
37:46
don't, which I do, and Peacock too, I did with Peacock.
37:50
I just got Peacock to watch the Yellowstone and I'm like, what is I
37:53
cannot know how much is it? Am onth I just need to I can't
37:55
do the commercials. This is ridiculous, now exactly exactly. So that's how
38:00
the structure emerged. But if you really look at at it structurally without being
38:07
concerned about the commercial breaks, you discover that things that don't have commercials anymore
38:15
are still largely relying on something like that in order to have some sort of
38:21
basis for telling your story. And if you think about it, the three
38:25
the so called three acts structure the old sid Field bottle is the first act
38:30
is one quarter, the second act is half, and the third act is
38:35
one quarter. But if you do a midpoint in the middle of that second
38:38
half, which you need anyway to turn it, you've got a four x
38:42
structure. So it's kind of a normal breathing structure. So I recommend that
38:51
to students and people who are just struggling with laying out this plot at an
38:58
early time. It gets it's more complicated when you have A B and C
39:01
stories, when you have parallel storytelling and it's not a single story that's broken
39:07
up that way, but you might have this many beats of the beast story
39:12
in this act and this many and another act. It's not quite as linear.
39:15
And then you come over to something like Netflix and HBO and they don't
39:20
want to hear about that. They want to hear you break the story based
39:24
on character, on character arcs. But the truth is, even if you
39:31
break the story on character arcs, the writer has to go home and organize
39:37
the scenes somehow. And that's why I recommend that writers try filling in the
39:45
grid just to get an overview of the layout of the story. You can
39:51
be flexible with it to some degree. We'll be right back after a word
39:57
from our sponsor, and now back to the show. There are some template
40:07
things that tend to work. For example, at one is usually longest in
40:14
a classic script, it might end somewhere around page eighteen to twenty. At
40:19
four its shortest, or if you've got a five act, at five is
40:23
very short. It's almost a tag. So there are ways to make adjustments,
40:29
but you need something to hang on to. And that's why I put
40:31
a grid in the book just before you're even writing, just so you can
40:37
see it laid out in aspect, you're talking about chess, sort of like
40:40
a chess board, where all the moves are going to be and where the
40:43
things are going to be, and read you can move stuff around in the
40:45
earliest stage before you start writing. Now, when you talk about a B
40:51
and C kind of stories, when you're structuring a four act or a grid,
40:55
let's say a four act grid or four acts structure with these parallel stories,
41:02
how do you allot the time in let's say the first act establishing the
41:07
characters if you have if you have ABC characters, well, let's talk about
41:12
the pilot, because once the show is off and running, it's a different
41:14
conversation. But let's say the pilot, how do you how do you adjust
41:19
the or allocate time to these other plot points in the in the structure in
41:24
general, usually the a story is the dominant character of the series, or
41:35
certainly the dominant character of this episode. For a pilot's probably the dominant character
41:39
the whole series, and you will probably want to tell that story throughout first.
41:47
So if you have let's say a scene is roughly two minutes, that's
41:53
not always true. There was a time when there was a lot of vignette
41:58
storytelling it, people will put the scenes to be one page long. There
42:02
was also a kickback on that and something like man Men, which is very
42:07
slow. You would have really really long scenes, which by law, I
42:13
only really need three or four minutes, right, I mean, we're got
42:16
back to Casablanca with a seven minute scene because people won't sit for it.
42:22
That is, the audience is ahead of you now. But let's just use
42:27
as a ballpark numbers. Let's say a scene is in two minutes, and
42:30
let's say you've got sixty minutes, which nobody's got sixty minutes, but let's
42:37
just imagine that two minutes into sixty is thirty scenes. You're not going to
42:44
get thirty scenes. Let's go for twenty eight. And then you say,
42:50
okay, so the whole hour is going to be something like twenty five to
42:53
twenty eight scenes. That's all you got. People sometimes mistake it and they're
42:59
up in fifty sixty scenes and they're doing you know, some bart movie.
43:02
Not it's shorter than that. So let's say if you were to have four
43:09
acts divided into twenty eight scenes, that would give you roughly seven scenes per
43:15
act. Doesn't actually work out that way. Usually act one is a little
43:22
longer and or is less, as I said, But what you would want
43:28
to look at is, Okay, out of these twenty eight scenes, you're
43:31
probably going to have many of them be your A story. Is it going
43:36
to be twelve fourteen? You know, maybe it's fourteen, maybe it's half
43:39
of the whole show. Well, now you've only got fourteen scenes left over
43:45
to divide between B and C stories. Probably your B story is going to
43:50
be pretty important also, and so you might have ten scenes on the B.
43:55
So now you're up to twenty four. That leaves you only four scenes
44:00
for the C story, which is fine because the C story sometimes a runner.
44:04
Those are bullpark numbers. Nobody should try to do that exactly. I'm
44:08
just giving a sense of the rhythm. Uh. There are many shows with
44:15
the A and the B story, meaning the story for one character and the
44:17
story for another character are almost balanced, are almost the same size. There
44:23
are also shows when they're when the pilot in particular will not have a B
44:28
and C stories, will really follow the central main character who's got a quest
44:34
throughout the show, and that that is where you are going with your storytelling.
44:38
That's what you want to book. The people want so you may have
44:42
only an a story show and that's okay, Yeah, which is fine.
44:46
I mean, I mean i'd argue, like something like Sherlock that was done
44:51
over at the BBC. Sherlock is obviously the main driving force and that's the
44:55
most also procedural, but Holmes get that's a little bit of a little bit
45:01
of action every once in a while, but generally, but drives the show
45:04
is Sherlock, and that happens with all you know, you could go down
45:07
the line with all these kind of major shows. But yeah, I was
45:10
just curious on how you felt to kind of like we're really starting to break
45:14
it down into the nuts and bolts of an episode and of story and things
45:19
like that. And obviously we could talk for for hundreds of hours about this,
45:23
but this is just this is just a touch. That's why you want
45:25
to go by go out and buy the book. Now, you did talk
45:29
at something you refer to something called the staff ladder. Can you break down
45:32
what the staff ladder is like in general and so people can understanding of what
45:37
the the pecking order, if you will. Yeah, yeah, well,
45:40
the lowest level they used to be at a job on a lot of shows
45:45
called stamp writer. A lot of shows don't do that anymore, and that
45:51
entry level is now very often the writer's assistant. Is actually not technically a
45:58
writing job, but it's a way into the writing job, and it's a
46:01
good job. You get to be in the room where the stories are broken,
46:07
you get to see all the scripts. It's a wonderful postgraduate learning experience.
46:12
Then the first step after that is a staff writer. Staff writer may
46:16
or may not get to write an episode. They might just talk in the
46:20
room, or they may get assigned one or two. The problem with the
46:25
staff not the problem. The situation with that beginning level is that you've got
46:31
your salary, but you may not be paid in addition for the script,
46:36
so it's a financial difference. The next step of that is story editor and
46:42
then executive story editor. For in some shows, a story editor is a
46:46
high level position, and other shows it really just means a staff writer in
46:51
their second year. So shows don't use these titles always exactly the same way.
46:59
So the story editor is going to probably be assigned one or two scripts.
47:06
They will be paid for the script in addition to the weekly salary,
47:09
and they may have some little bit of rewriting jobs. They're also continuing to
47:16
learn, and it depends on your show. Sometimes it's higher level after that.
47:22
The next step up is producer. A producer in this sense does not
47:27
mean producer like you think of a movie producer. It's a writing title and
47:31
it's simply one more step up. You're getting a larger salary, you're getting
47:37
paid for your script. You may be rewriting scripts from the lower level staff
47:43
people and somebody a little more experience after that, supervising producer get all these
47:50
are promotions. If a show goes on for well, you may get promoted
47:54
of the ranks, or you may go to another show and make a lateral
47:59
move, or you may be hired up. Depends how good you're writing is
48:02
and other things. Supervising producer very likely is doing rewriting of other people's scripts
48:10
or holding the hand of the beginners. Sometimes it's a complete rewrite that gets
48:16
put in the supervising producer's lap. In addition to writing their own scripts.
48:24
From producer on up, you're also probably sitting in on casting sex sessions and
48:29
you're going to dailies, so you're seeing actually the process of it. You're
48:34
seeing how it changes and you're learning your show. You're learning the strengths of
48:38
the actors. You're learning all of this from supervising producer, next level of
48:44
this executive producer. It's a very wiggly titled. There are some shows where
48:49
everybody on the show is called executive producers are meaningless. It just means that
48:52
their agents got them a book well, and they're just still writing and rewriting.
49:00
On some shows, the executive producer many shows is also the showrunner,
49:05
as showrunner is the person whose vision is guiding this whole as I sit manufacturing
49:13
operation, but is also the visionary and has the looked toned feel style and
49:19
in some shows, depending on who's doing it, some executive producers and showrunners
49:25
will run every single script through their computer, even if it doesn't need changes,
49:30
because they want to feel ownership of it or they want their own voice
49:34
enate. So all scripts in that sense are written by those people. David
49:39
Kelly is an example of somebody who runs a shop like that, where generally
49:47
they do let the lower level writers keep credit on screen, but actually it's
49:53
a very much rewritten script. We'll be right back after a word from our
49:59
spo and now back to the show interesting. Yeah, and so basically the
50:07
book stops at the executive producers, last show runner, the show runner.
50:12
Yeah, you might have five executive producers. Yeah, so, but the
50:15
showrunner is is the guy. And and like you said, it's such a
50:20
different it's just such a different skill set than just being a writer and a
50:23
lot of a lot of writers, like I wrote the pilot, I'm going
50:27
to be the showrunner. I'm like, you have no idea what and experience
50:31
and that you could be an experienced writer with a lot of credits and still
50:37
not have the skill set or the personality to be a showrunner. Well,
50:39
you know what is a matter of personality. This is an executive job.
50:45
Wants to be an executive. Some people want to, you know, have
50:49
more of their own time to fully create. It depends what you want to
50:52
do. There are you think of a great showrunner? John Wells one of
51:01
the masterful showrunners. John Lells is essentially a manager. When he graduated from
51:10
USC, he had written some and his first jobs were as a writer.
51:16
But he graduated from the Peter Stark Program, which is a producing business program,
51:24
and that was always why he did such a wonderful job on whether it
51:29
was Wes Wane or er or Ate more lately shameless than you know, all
51:35
his other credits, he's got a million credits because he was an outstanding manager.
51:42
He is not just what he could write, but that what he could
51:45
enable other people to write, which is what makes a great manager, right
51:50
exactly. And I just wanted to make sure everyone listening if they have any
51:53
illusions of writing their first pilot and then show running, it's just a different
51:59
it's a really different skill set. That's why a lot of writers who jumped
52:01
into the director's chair get a stark a stark reality, and and and vice
52:07
versa. When a director wants to start writing, it's a different it's just
52:12
a different skill set. It's a different skill set. And and some people
52:15
are that that wonderful combination, like of Vince Gillian, who could just bring
52:21
it all together. Absolutely, you know, but it's it's hard. It's
52:24
that's why I've had a lot of showrunners on the show, and and I
52:29
hear it. I've heard the stories that hear what they've gone through. And
52:31
and also with the one thing we've never even discussed in this episode is the
52:35
politics. There's an obscene amount of politics that go on behind the scenes of
52:38
just dealing with the politics of person and like any office. But then when
52:44
you're talking with studio execs and and well that working sects. I can give
52:47
your your listeners a tip if you're beginners and you get a first job on
52:52
the show. And this was told to me by one of my graduates and
52:58
yes, yes, in yell Ma's who got her very first job on her
53:04
very first show after graduating. And she said she made a policy to be
53:09
the first one there in the morning and the last one there at night,
53:14
regardless of what her assignment was. And after a while the boss noticed that
53:20
here is somebody who is really giving all she can and never asked for an
53:28
assignment and then got one because she was helpful in the writer's room. She
53:32
made other writers look good. It was the generosity of spirit, not competing
53:38
with them, but making other writers look good, being available to do whatever
53:43
job they was and being there. And I'm sure she will do very well.
53:46
And anybody else's got that attitude. There's an arrogance that you want to
53:51
set aside. It's not that it really is. I mean, there are
53:55
people who really should just go, you know, to a private room in
54:01
the attic and write their movies and produce some indiviably. And that's the kind
54:08
of art they do. Then that's the life they do. It's nothing to
54:12
do. That's really very deftriction from actually being in the industry if you want
54:19
to pay, if you were. And I look at when I first started
54:22
out, I was I was driving an hour commute every day to work for
54:24
free. I worked for free through like four months, and I just showed
54:29
up every day as an intern at this production company until they hey, you
54:32
want to work, Hey, you want to do this? And then my
54:36
boss quit. My boss quit, and then they're like, well, who
54:37
are we going to get this job to. Well, he's been here every
54:39
day, let's give it to him. Yeah, And I was, that's
54:44
right and that, but it was that you're right, that kind of work
54:46
ethic is something that it really should be a thought in school at the people.
54:52
Yeah. Yeah, I wouldn't call it politics so much as I would
54:55
call it a sense of art to cipation and cooperation and making good relationships.
55:04
And it's all And that is one other big tip I've heard from all the
55:07
hundreds of interviews I've had, It's all about relationships. It's all about building
55:12
authentic, good relationships. I had a producer on the other day who the
55:17
craft service intern twenty years later got them a job animating a huge studio movie
55:25
that went on to make a half a billion dollars and it was his and
55:29
it was his I mean, they stayed friends all that time. But imagine
55:32
if they would have never built that relationship, Peop would have lost out on
55:36
that job twenty years later. Well, it's another reason to either go to
55:40
school or join a workshop because you hear about openings from your trends, you
55:47
know, but he gets it, becomes an intern, or finds out there's
55:52
a possible job somewhere. And yes, when you're further along and you have
55:58
an agent, that's their job to do that for you. But you're not
56:00
going to probably have that starting out. So you know, for everybody out
56:05
there who's just all alone in you know, Nebraska wherever, uh, you
56:09
really got to get yourself to some kind of film school or workshop. You
56:15
got to get in the mix. It does double the relationships. Yeah,
56:20
probably should be in Los Angeles, but but there are some other places too.
56:23
For television television, like it used to be the case, that you
56:27
had to be in LA for everything, and that, from what I'm understanding
56:30
now, is not the case anymore. In the feature world, there are
56:35
things, but television is still very difficult. Uh. You need to be
56:38
here. It helps a lot to be here. There are writers' rooms.
56:42
Yeah, yeah, you meet in person with people, right, so you
56:49
pretty much have to be here. There are a few other places to be.
56:52
There are some shows that are based in New York, Vancouver, Vancouver,
57:00
and work is another whole issue of a certain night, except to be
57:02
on stand Georgia, Georgia, Atlanta. Sure, you know. So there
57:10
are a few other hubs. But basically I see the people who do really
57:17
well. They probably you know, got an MFA at a film school or
57:22
were part of some writers workshop, wrote a lot, didn't write one script
57:28
and say there see I'm done now now I get it it right. Where's
57:32
Miami? Where's my money? Guys? Where's you could just you could just
57:36
back up the truck here. Uh. Yeah. So I'm gonna ask you
57:42
a few questions to ask all my guests. What is the biggest mistake you
57:45
see young screenwriters make or young writers make. I can let me answer that
57:52
two ways. I post because I wanted to think about whether it's about writing
57:58
the pilot or the industry. There's one. Let me do a micro first.
58:06
Students who want to write, not students, but new writers who want
58:08
to write pilots make certain key mistakes in the pilots. And the first one
58:14
is to stuff that pilot too much. They say to this, Oh,
58:17
I know television is a big ensemble cast, so I'm that put all on
58:22
hundred of them in the pilot. Ye no, just like Lost, Just
58:25
like Lost? Yeah, right exactly, But Lost the series began close on
58:31
Jack's eyeball. It well, aw one character right in, and so you
58:37
need to home in on the quest of a single character in your pilot to
58:44
draw the story forward and to draw the reader in. So, if there
58:50
was one single mistake that for pilot writers, that would be the one I've
58:55
noticed in beginnings students, I teach from the industry point of view, I
59:04
think misjudging the level that you're going to enter in that this is a this
59:09
is a process that's not one minute long. Then you really want to try
59:14
to get a fellowship, You want to try to get experience. You in
59:17
turn start on whatever job is there, join organizations, learn your way.
59:28
Put aside that arrogance that you are the one and only most brilliant person and
59:32
your first draft is going to make you a star. Because you want a
59:37
substantial portfolio, you want to have written a lot. Believe me, every
59:43
script you write will be better than when you wrote before. Yep, very
59:46
much. So now, what are three pilots that every writer should read.
59:52
Will be right back after a word from our sponsor, and now back to
1:00:00
the show. Oddly, some of the best shows are not the best pilots.
1:00:09
So let me just to take a departure to recommend some of the best
1:00:13
shows that people should see from beginning to end. And the top of my
1:00:16
list, which is not a good pilot actually or not not a useful pilot
1:00:22
most people, is The Wire. Do not imitate the pilot. That's an
1:00:24
example of one hundred people on screen in the pilot. Don't do that.
1:00:29
But if you can look at all sixty hours, you will learn so much
1:00:34
about writing, depth of character, layered serialized storytelling. It is truly the
1:00:39
great American novel, as it's been called. So you must watch that.
1:00:44
You should see all of Breaking Bad. Now, the Breaking Bad pilot is
1:00:49
one you should read so cut. Wait now I have to tell you that
1:00:52
the actual pilot has produced doesn't exist. There's an early draft, but it's
1:00:57
close enough, is enough you can just watch it actually, just so that's
1:01:04
another one pilots. Another good sample for learning is Orange, just the New
1:01:12
Black Speaker, because although it's going to spread and have many, many layers
1:01:21
of death in the many characters and don't even meet at the pilot, it
1:01:24
gives you a wedge in to a single character's issue. And it has the
1:01:30
example that old pilot writers should know that opposed to movies, it doesn't close
1:01:37
at the end. It opens at the end. And so that's a perfect
1:01:42
example of structuring. There are other fine pilots. I'm sure there are many
1:01:49
good pilots out there. Yeah, that's excellent. Now, where can people
1:01:52
find you? Where can people find the new fourth edition of the book?
1:01:55
And so on? There are two ways to buy the book, and I
1:02:04
plead with everybody to please buy the fourth edition. Plubs in twenty eighteen.
1:02:07
A lot of people have the third edition, but that was twenty eleven and
1:02:12
the world has changed since then a little bit, little bit, a little
1:02:14
bit. So even if you have a third edition, go get the fourth
1:02:19
And there are two ways to get it. One is Amazon is inexpensive and
1:02:22
they will bring it to you in a day, so that's But also my
1:02:29
publisher Michael WEEZYMWP dot com, you can buy it direct from the publisher and
1:02:37
they also have some discounts. Going bookstores unfortunately don't exist much anymore. You
1:02:43
could probably get it at Barnes and Noble or something. If you order it,
1:02:45
they would have to go get it for you. But you can get
1:02:49
it immediately at either Amazon or MWP. Great. And is there a way
1:02:53
to people to reach out to you? Do you have a website? I'm
1:02:58
not used. I have a book website. I don't really use it.
1:03:00
So just I'll tell you what. I'll keep you my email. Well,
1:03:02
I'll put it. We'll put it in the show notes. So don't worry
1:03:05
about it, Okay, all right, because I don't know what because if
1:03:07
you put your email out you're going to get intundated. Yeah. The best
1:03:13
way to get to me is is through the book, honestly, and you'll
1:03:20
see yet. The book also, by the way, has referrals to people
1:03:24
who do consulting, not me, other people who do this professionally and if
1:03:34
you can't go to school, go to something, and so there are some
1:03:37
other services here. Pam. It's been a pleasure talking to you and getting
1:03:40
deep into the weeds of writing TV dramas. So thank you so much for
1:03:45
the fourth edition of the book. It's been going strong for quite some time
1:03:51
and it's ever changing, and I'm sure the fifth edition will be coming down
1:03:53
any minute now. No, thank you so much, Pam. You're very
1:03:59
welcome, Alex talking to you. Bye, everybody. I want to thank
1:04:02
Pam for coming on the show and dropping her knowledge bombs on the tribe today.
1:04:08
Thank you so much, Pamela. If you want to get links to
1:04:10
anything we spoke about in this episode, just head over to the show notes
1:04:13
at anifilmuscle dot com forward slash seven thirty and if you have it already,
1:04:16
please head over to Filmmaking podcast dot com, subscribe and leave a good review
1:04:23
for the show. It really helps us out a lot, guys. Thank
1:04:26
you again so much for listening. Guys, as always, keep that hustle
1:04:29
going, keep that dream alive, Stay safe out there, and I'll talk
1:04:31
to you soon. Thanks for listening to the Indie Film Hustle Podcast. At
1:04:35
Indie Film Hustle dot com. That's I N D I E F I L
1:04:40
M h U S T l E dot com.