Podcasts

#11 – Emily Maya Mills (actress & comedian) in Burbank

November 1, 2016 by tombenedek@gmail.com

Emily Maya Mills (Upright Citizens Brigade, Orange is the New Black, Parks and Recreation) talks about writing and performing comedy for the stage and on television

We talk about:

Creating and writing her one-woman shows
All about Upright Citzens Brigade and the process
Her debut stand-up album, By a Thread
Improvisation verus acting and memorization
The evolution of comedy and gender relationships
Strategy for stand-up material and telling jokes

Quotes from the show:

“I have a love for performance and acting where you can’t see the threads.”

“I think there’s a very transcendent thing that’s happening when you’re free of those wires… there’s a zone of sorts that feels a bit like flying.”

#12 – Jack Bender (TV director and executive producer) in Los Angeles

November 15, 2016 by tombenedek@gmail.com

Jack Bender (Game of Thrones, Lost, The Sopranos) discusses directing and executive producing a variety of television

We Talk About:

Directing the Emmy-nominated Game of Thrones episode, “The Door.”
Shooting on The Sopranos and developing Lost
The attitude behind a successful television director
What it’s like to work on both new and established series
Communicating with actors and giving notes
Prepping Stephen King’s Mr. Mercedes with Brendan Gleeson
Writing a children’s book for adults, The Elephant in the Room

Quotes from the Show:

“I’m leaving my ego at the door, and my ego is healthy, even though I vacillate between audacity and insecurity depending on the day… that’s, I think, the reality of being an artist.”

“I always feel like you build a pyramid one block at a time, whatever you’re doing.”

“If you’re doing the work… whatever it is…if you are fully immersed in that world, which I’m in when the camera’s rolling and I’m watching the actors… I’m somewhere else, and that’s a wonderful place to be.”

#13 – Ben Jacobson (literary TV agent) at United Talent Agency

November 15, 2016 by tombenedek@gmail.com

Ben Jacobson (United Talent Agency) discusses representing drama and comedy television writers, directors and producers and the nature of today’s industry

We Talk About:

Staffing season and the selling cycle
Developing and branding for a network vs. cable
Different kinds of working writers today
Breaking in with a new voice
What a pitch meeting is really like
Current trends in comedy and drama
Navigating and structuring deals
Curating digital content and its future

Quotes from the Show:

“It really comes from an idea, a book or a format or an original idea, and it’s about where can it live in the purest form for that idea instead of trying to jam everything into one box or the other.”

“Young people grow up and they want to create something… those creative juices are now naturally gravitating towards television.”

#14 – Billy Finkelstein (TV writer-showrunner) at Culver Studios

November 22, 2016 by tombenedek@gmail.com

Billy Finkelstein (NYPD Blue, Law & Order, LA Law) discusses a career in writing and producing myriad legal dramas and police procedurals for television

We Talk About:

The make-up of a writers’ room and what goes on in there
Creating a legal drama for an international audience
The difference between writing and producing (showrunning)
Writing Bad Lieutenant: Port of Call New Orleans for Werner Herzog
Growing as a writer and learning from experience
Creating the world of a television series in the pilot
Fusing music in Cop Rock and understanding conflict in a scene

Quotes from the Show:

“The process of writing is where you discover, “Who is this character?” and you have ideas of who that character is, a sense of him or her, but I think sometimes that there’s, in an effort to explain the thing, or sell the thing, before you write the thing, you’re cut off from the actual learning curve that a writer goes through in developing a show and bringing it to life.”

“I don’t necessarily consciously think, “What is the conflict?” but I think you get so that you just sort of know that’s an intrinsic component of any kind of drama.”

#15 – Jim Burnstein (screenwriter) at University of Michigan

December 3, 2016 by tombenedek@gmail.com

Jim Burnstein (Love and Honor, D3: The Mighty Ducks, Renaissance Man ) discusses his screenwriting career and shaping the next generation of young writers at UofM

We Talk About:

Working in Hollywood while living in Michigan
The journey to the first feature film production
Teaching Shakespeare to soldiers and Renaissance Man
The importance of re-writing your screenplay
The value of talent versus the value of discipline
Taking notes on your writing and giving notes to others
Collaborating with a writing partner

Quotes from the Show:

“The best thing about being a writer is you can write on the moon. You don’t have to wait for somebody to give you a job. It only takes one great script to get you in the game.”

“I do not believe that you can teach talent any more than you can teach speed. A good track coach can make you faster, but he can’t make you fast.”

“I look at the first draft like a dream. You don’t know what it means. You don’t know why you wrote it. That’s what the process of discovery is. Why did you tell this story? What is it about it that you emotionally connected to?”

#16 – Tian Jun Gu (TV writer) from Brooklyn

December 7, 2016 by tombenedek@gmail.com

Tian Jun Gu (House of Cards) discusses his journey from screenwriting student to working as staff writer on a hit Netflix series.

We Talk About:

Moving to LA, and then, to Brooklyn, NY for House of Cards
What it was like to assist a successful showrunner
The writer’s room, breaking story and learning on the job
How to map out a season of conflict and character arcs
Working on personal projects during a hiatus
Creating more opportunities for diversity on-screen

Quotes from the Show:

“Nothing really prepares you for a writer’s room.”

“What’s the craziest conflict we can see for these two characters in a given setting? What do we really love that we want to see in this season? (In the room,) sometimes we go broader like that.”

#17 – Peter Horton (actor/director/producer) in Santa Monica

December 14, 2016 by tombenedek@gmail.com

Peter Horton (Thirtysomething, Grey’s Anatomy) talks about his journey from musician to actor to a director and writer/producer of film and television.

We Talk About

Finally agreeing to act in “Thirtysomething”
Writing and producing “American Odyssey” for Netflix
Directing the pilot for “Grey’s Anatomy” and producing the first three seasons
The best kind of actors out there
A new project for Cinemax set in the future

Quotes from the Show

“(As a director,) you can never ask for an effect because you’re just sabotaging your actor. You have to be able to say, “It feels like the stakes aren’t as high as they need to be here. Can you find a way to make the stakes higher?” So, then you’re giving it back to them, and they can give you what you need.”

“I find the best actors have a real ego about what they’re doing. The they have a real take on it, too. They come in having really done their homework, having really embodied this character, so that they know them better than I do… they go deep with their work.”

#18 – Tamako Akiyama & Markus Nornes (professors of Chinese cinema)

December 21, 2016 by tombenedek@gmail.com

Professors Tamako Akiyama (Rikkyo University) and Markus Nornes (University of Michigan) speak about the history and state of current independent film in China.

We Talk About:

Navigating government censorship overseas
Foreign distribution practices and circulation
A new film festival in Inner Mongolia
The Bejiing International Film Festival shutdown
Comparing independent filmmaking in China to the U.S.

Quotes from the Show:

“This one festival got shutdown. They just cut off the electricity, so they couldn’t show films. The next festival, the designer of the poster was actually Wong Wo, the guy who directed the film (A Filmless Festival) on the 2014 festival, and his poster was the picture of an electric generator. They bought a bunch of these things just in case… the thing is, that year, they also got shut down.”