Take 97 - Writer and entrepreneur Steve Vitolo, Black-Ish, co-founder Scriptation

SPEAKER_03 0:00

Any of us who've been in it for long enough, our entire career has been littered with jobs that we didn't get, projects that we thought were gonna go for shore, dozens of unproduced scripts littering the floor.

SPEAKER_02 0:13

All of us are running into both major and minor failures in Hollywood every single day.

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For every subject, there is most, sometimes even.

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Like everything in our business, here it has power.

SPEAKER_03 0:40

That process is that does that work? I was being told by my manager it's yours to lose. And I promptly lost it. And I remember thinking like, well, that's it for me. I blew my one big bot. What I've realized from that moment is it's never one big bot. There will be other shots.

SPEAKER_02 1:01

Screaming into the Hollywood Abyss is brought to you by Scriptation. The Emmy Emmy.

SPEAKER_00 1:07

It sounds awful when you say it. Let somebody with a more charming accent do this bit. Screaming into the Hollywood Abyss is brought to you by Scriptation, the Emmy Award-winning app for anyone that reads scripts. Makes notes, organise them into layers, and save hours of time by automatically transferring those notes into new script revisions. Sither listeners can get a free month of Scriptation by going to Scriptation.com backslash Scyther. Now that's how you do it, Noah.

SPEAKER_02 1:57

And I am your industry co-host, Noah's Lynn on today's Screaming Into the Hollywood Abyss, I'm excited to introduce TV writer and entrepreneur Steve Batolo. Steve worked on such shows as Hot in Cleveland, Crowded, and Blackish, and currently has a feature called The List coming out this summer. On top of that, he is also the co-founder and CEO of Scriptation, my favorite annotating software and truly the one piece of screenwriting tech that changed the way I do my job. Welcome, Steve.

SPEAKER_01 2:24

Thanks for having me.

SPEAKER_00 2:27

So this is a slightly different episode to usual, but I'm quite excited for this because um your story the middle part of your story is like 80 of our guests so far. Writer in a writing room, the usual bits of success and failure that everyone has. You've written a feature with all the things that will go into the success and failure of writing a feature. But I guess in some ways you failed so much, you left the industry as a TV writer, but you also succeeded so much because you were a showrunner, but a showrunner of a business in the private sector which happens to make amazing software for writers. So I've never used it, obviously, because I don't work in the industry, although Noah keeps going on about it and was a fan of it before our partnership began. I guess my question is at what point did you realize that you were going to be more successful making effectively software than you were writing?

SPEAKER_01 3:30

It sort of uh well, creating scriptation came out of being a writer's assistant, script coordinator on shows and having them be canceled, um, being on one and done shows. Uh I remember I was on the the I was on Hot in Cleveland, and of course I got on Hot in Cleveland the season that it was the final season of Hot in Cleveland. So I I told this line producer who I've worked with a bunch of times, I'm either on the first season or the last season of a show. He's like, No, you're always on the last season of a show. I was like, Oh, yeah, that's that's more accurate. So I um I was working in the business, uh, writer's assistant, script coordinating on a ton of shows. And you know, Noah will tell you sometimes you're on a show to no fault of your own. You do the best you can, and then the show gets canceled, and then you're out in your ass again. So when you're when you work as a writer's assistant, uh you're not paid as much as a writer, uh, not nearly as much as a writer. So for me, um, it was just out of pure survival that scriptation came about. I was uh just on these one and done shows. Uh, the one that scriptate that I guess came up with the idea for scriptation was a pilot in 2014, where we were constantly rewriting the script every single night. It was multicam, uh, 50-page script out to 100 plus people. And every single night for two weeks, we were putting out a full rewrite. And everyone was writing their notes in the draft, and then they would get the new draft, and then they would hopefully recycle the old draft and rewrite their notes in the new draft. Um, and it was just kind of this crazy, insane process that has been that way for years. Uh, so I just had this idea of what if we could move notes from one draft to another, and that would avoid this paper problem and this productivity problem. And that's kind of how scriptation came about. But it wasn't like I went a hundred percent into the business. It was this sort of side project that kind of turned into something. And just like with your podcast, it was kind of a side project come out of the pandemic. That's like, okay, now this is sort of like a real thing. And and uh I was I was having more success in the business than I was being a writer. So it was like, okay, now's sort of the time for to for to you know put 100% to the business and and see what it could do.

SPEAKER_00 6:02

So when you come up with the original idea, was was the sort of theoretical concept of this is you keep working as a writer, you end up as a showrunner, and everyone in your room is using this software that you developed, as opposed to you're sort of outside the industry and everyone's using the software that you developed.

SPEAKER_01 6:18

Yeah, I mean, that wasn't my plan. I because I I never want to push my software onto anybody, right? I mean, I want it to be something that people are proud of sharing, and definitely at the beginning, because it was something that no one it was a new uh technology, you know, that was the whole idea. Like, can we move notes from one draft to the next? And um, so even in my own writer's room experience, I never wanted to push people towards it. When I was working on black-ish in uh 2017, 2018, I never was like, hey guys, like you got to use this software. I was like, here's what it can do, and you can decide whether you want it. Um, and eventually got half the room on there. And then when I when I was off the show running scriptation for for you know full time, I found out that the entire room was using scriptation. And people that were like had previously said to me, I I can't let go of my paper script. I need this, this is a crutch for me. They moved on to scriptation too. So it's certainly something I I wouldn't want to force, but um, you know, if that's it, if users then want to go and you know go digital, then like that's great for me and uh great for the business and great for the environment.

SPEAKER_02 7:34

Uh thank thanks for those those candid answers. And I I want to add a little bit more context to I think the situation that you probably found yourself because we have a many people who listen to the podcast want to be writers, and we have many established writers, but we have many, many uh aspiring writers, and they're always told that becoming an assistant is the is an e is an easy way to sort of become a writer on a show, and that is a way to become a writer on the show. But what ends up happening a lot is you have four to six assistants from the writer's assistant to the script coordinator to the showrunner's assistants to two PAs often, all up for maybe one spot on a show. Often they want you to work for two years before you even get that shot. So this is so you have to imagine this show has to go on for a number of years before you even maybe get an opportunity to write a freelance. And then once you write the freelance, that has to go well. And then people are like, well, you know, this person to get on the show, maybe they weren't a great writer, but often the show got canceled or they had another need that they had to fill, so they couldn't fill the role that year. So the years start to pass, and then the show gets canceled, and these poor people have to start all over again on this, you know, this elevator on a whole different show. So what happens, Steve, to some, you know, when you're in that situation, how do you, you know, obviously you got some freelances. What is your path to trying to break out of that? And when did you decide that you know what, maybe my time is better served pivoting to this, this, this software that I'm working on, this new idea?

SPEAKER_01 9:04

Well, first of all, you laid that out perfectly. That is the most concise way of like potentially moving up in the business and what you think is going to happen, and then the failure when you get there. Um, but that's what I thought. I thought you work as an assistant, you work your way up, and if you prove yourself and you're good and your scripts are good, then uh you'll get staffed. And that's maybe that used to be the case. Um, working on shows kind of, you know, in the like mid 2000s, you know, 2005, 2006, when I was working with a lot of writers that had worked in the in the 80s and 90s, it was like, oh yeah, that's that's what happens. You come on as an assistant, and then you work for a year, you get a freelance, and then you're staffed the next year. Like that's it. And I was like, okay, like that's what I thought. And that was the only way that I knew uh how it was just like to work your way up. That's how I was sort of raised, and that's how I understood this happening. What I didn't take into account, and I'm this is me being super naive, is that once I got a writer's assistant job and the show was canceled, I would then be out of work and looking for a new job. And this happened to me time and time again. Um, so when I was on Hot in Cleveland, I got a freelance, and it was one of those things where I actually had to fight for it. And, you know, from my point of view, we had 20-something episodes, and I had contributed a bunch in the room, but also I was coming on. This is my first season as a writer's assistant. I was coming on to a show where there was, you know, the room was established and people were getting their scripts. So I understood the showrunners' point of view. It's like, who are you guys? Like you're here for one year. But, you know, for me, I felt I had proven myself enough. And also, since the show was ending, I had to go look for work on another show. So I said to the showrunners, I was like, Look, um, I either need to get a freelance here or I'm gonna go work on a pilot. And it was a really uncomfortable conversation. But something that I mean, uh you sort of learn in this business, and I had been working in it for 10 years, is that like I gotta look out for me because if I am if this show is gonna end and I'm gonna, you know, be on this series for two months, I'm gonna miss out on pilot season and I'm not gonna get a job the next season. So I kind of gave that ultimatum, but also I was like, look, I've contributed this much. Here are my ideas. And then they were like, okay, we're gonna give you a freelance. So then that was my first freelance on a show. It went great. Um, but that series ended. Um, and then when I went on to uh crowded, it was with the showrunner for Hot and Cleveland. And as part of being a script coordinator, I said, like, I've I've proven myself on Hot and Cleveland. So when I went into that, I went into that asking for a freelance script and she gave it to me, which is rare for a first season show to give a freelance script to writer's assistant. But I had a history with the showrunner, we got along, and she liked my script from Hot and Cleveland. That show got canceled. Um, and when I went on to blacklist a blackish, I went into season three, and it was established show at that point. So I wasn't gonna be like, hey, I'm the script coordinator, I'm gonna ask for a script, like, no chance on that show. So it was like, look, that I'm just gonna do my thing and try and make a good impression and pitch ideas in the room and be respectful of everyone's time. And if they give me a script, they give me a script. And they eventually um gave me a script in the second season that I was on there. And getting back to the question, I I was told in you know a few different ways that we're gonna staff you next year. And uh there were maybe five things that had to go wrong for me not to get staffed, and they all went wrong. I I won't go into all of them, but one of the big ones was that Kenya Barris left the show um to to pursue a Netflix deal. So that was probably the biggest one on why I I ended up not getting staffed the next year. But there were also like four other things that all had to go wrong, and of course they all did. This is like the writer's assistant story that you've probably heard so many times. Um so they offered me a freelance the next year, and which uh being on blackish, um, is really good money and really good residuals and all that stuff. But it was at the time that scriptation was starting to take off. So it was a it was a tough decision at the time. Like, do I forego this money that I know I'm certainly gonna have working on the show, or do I sort of take the leap and go into scriptation? And I I'd been a writer's assistant script coordinator for like 10 years at that point, and I just I just couldn't do it, even though I was getting another script. And I was like, I gotta, the business is starting to take off, and I gotta go 100% into the business. So that was the decision where I just went right in.

SPEAKER_00 14:22

So we had Noah's got a better memory than me. We had a guest, I think, in the first season who was a journalist who sort of he was an entertainment journalist who sort of knew the wrong thing to do was say to showrunners, you know, here's a script, but he did it anyway, and it ended up working for him, and then he ended up being very successful. Given that now you've got scriptation, you have, I imagine, access to all sorts of people through that part of the business that you didn't have before. Have you been tempted, or indeed have you, uh, gone to these people and go, hey, you know, I'm actually a writer as well as this guy who's developed this amazing software. So uh, you know, here's a script. Can I come and work for you, or do you want to look at this? Or have you do you not in the way that theoretically I could I mean my script's terrible, but I could do that now I'm friends with all these showrunners, or at least I have access to them. Have you sort of tried to sneak in the side door now that you've got a new level of access?

SPEAKER_01 15:18

I haven't done that with scriptation clients because that oh that feels kind of weird. And I've also generally been bad at that, like in showing people like, oh, here's a script. I always feel weird about it. Um, I want to have a friendship with the person. I I also don't want to put work, I don't want to make people do work. So um, and and that's why, like, as I would say um like as outfront as I was in in I guess asking for scripts in you know, the hot in Cleveland and the crowded example, like there was a backing to that. It was like I've been doing the I've been putting in the work. Um, so I you know, I would like it, and if I can't do it, I have to move on to something else. So there was like always logic behind it. But I I I was never like great at playing the game, and maybe that's why I never got staffed. Because my whole thing was like work your way up and like make friends with every, you know, make friends with everybody, and your work will show. And I don't know, some people are super aggressive with that, and I've seen that, sure. Noah's seen that in the room. Like they've sort of like been able to work their way into a writing job, and and like I've just never been like that, so maybe that's why I failed, or maybe I'm not that good of a writer, and maybe that's why I failed. Um, or opportunity. I don't know. There's the it, but it it it you know, back to the thing. It is uh yeah, that's that's always weird and awkward to be like, hey, I like kind of know you from this thing. Do you want to read this script? I've never been great at that.

SPEAKER_00 16:57

No, I mean arguably you're too nice for this industry, uh, because I know there's plenty of people who don't think like that. Now let's let's talk. So we've sort of done a bit of TV. Let's talk, let's talk features because that part of your writing life is still alive. Um so tell us about your yeah, well, not dead yet. It's as good as alive in Hollywood. Um so give us your uh give us where you are with that one, and it sounds like like all these things, it was a non-linear path to getting to wherever you may have got to, and it's still not there yet.

SPEAKER_01 17:30

Yeah, I mean, this is just a sort of ridiculous journey, but um I was writing scripts in middle school with uh you know my best friend, and in 2008, we had this idea for a feature. Um, and just just that, I mean, the idea was uh have you have you heard of the the free pass list or the freebie list? It's a celebrity you're allowed to sleep with. Technically, you make with your partner.

SPEAKER_02 18:02

I have so many jokes here that I am not making, uh, because it would be probably inappropriate for the podcast. But yes, we have heard of the uh um the yes. I have a lot it's like a universal if it's a British thing, they might add some more ease and use to it, but they probably have it there too.

SPEAKER_00 18:15

Well, I have no idea.

SPEAKER_01 18:16

My marriage is much more solid than those, but you know, um oh no, we might have an international audience problem if it's only the US. Well, friend friends in an episode on the free pass list. Um, but basically it's a list of five celebrities that you're allowed to sleep with that you've decided with your with your snippet other if you're allowed to sleep with. So the idea was what if you actually did that? Could your partner actually get mad at you? So it's like, oh, that's it's kind of funny. Let's see if we can anyway. So we we ended up uh working on that as a feature project, just like uh whenever we would take breaks of years, obviously. This isn't like 2008. So we would take a break of like three years, and then we come back and write it. We're like, oh okay. So we um we've we were just sort of working on it. We wrote it probably 4,032 times. Um and you know, me being bad at like showing people stuff, I was super uncomfortable with showing people my future. Also, like I hate the things I write. Um, I mean, I like them when I'm writing them, and then like the next day I'll hate them. But I so I was I was not very good at that. So, like my my friend and I would joke who my friend who is not in the industry, we would joke about, you know, the only way this is getting made is through like his connection. So, of course, like me being in the industry, working for all this time, what ends up happening is he, through a business associate, knows a guy at a production company. So we send a script to him. And that guy, uh, when he read it, he I guess because it wasn't coming from like a professional writer, he had super low expectations for what the script could be. So I think that worked in our favor. So um the script got to this production company. He was like shocked that it was coherent, I guess, but he also thought it was really funny. And uh we ended up meeting him in 2018. So this is 10 years after the idea and when we start writing it. And through this sort of ridiculous sequence of events, we ended up getting an we ended up getting an agency behind. Now, I'm not represented at all, he's not represented. My writing partners doesn't have representation to this day. We don't. Uh, we ended up getting it to an agency, getting it packaged, getting an actress attached to it. And it all happened like super quick after nothing happened for 10 years, getting financing, and this was all in like a few months, and then like we were shooting like that summer. It was just like totally insane, totally ridiculous. But we had just struck out a thousand times, just and tried all these strategies to try and you know get the script out there and everything failed. And then, of course, my business my writing partner knows a business guy, and that's how it eventually gets made.

SPEAKER_02 21:06

That's a great story. I have like a hundred questions. So I'm trying to figure out the one question that I want to ask, uh follow-up question for this, but I'm gonna ask a very simple question first, which is do you think the pressure or or the the fact that you are not now having to write to feed yourself either as a writer or a writer's assistant or script coordinator, which is sort of you know, which is a writer, and you've been you were writing for 10, 15 years, obviously, before you had those jobs that now, and obviously the script was written during that period and beyond. But assuming success, this movie comes out, and I'm assuming you're still writing now. Do you do you have do you feel less pressure because definitely it doesn't doesn't really matter, right? You're not that's you're you're you're chasing another dream. And if this other dream happens, great. If it doesn't happen, it's not the end of the world for you.

SPEAKER_01 21:53

Yeah, this is now my side project. And that's what was so difficult about working in the industry and being a writer assistant. For so long. Like this was my thing. I mean, I wanted to be a writer since I was as long as I can remember. And um and there was just so much pressure on it. And I I don't know if I know if this is your experience, Noah, but like I when I first moved out here and I, you know, saved a bunch of money to then blow it. Like I worked for a year or two before I moved out in LA, and I blew that money in like six months, and like I didn't have a job. So it was uh there's a lot of pressure just to survive. Um, but when I first moved out here and there was sort of like less pressure at the very beginning, I was able to write really quickly. And like I wrote, I mean, we talked like off-air just about Austin Film Festival. And like I wrote a script in a day and a half that was a semifinalist at the Austin Film Festival, and I went there and like it was great. And then, like, when the pressure hit and I started working as a writer's assistant on the shows, it's probably like two things at the same time. Um, and when you're working as writer assistant, like you'd be working 12 hours a day, 14 hours a day. I was so burnt out, I did not want to stare at a screen anymore. And like I knew I had to to keep my career going and write on the side, but it was just exhausting. That was like the last thing I wanted to do was like come home and then start writing my own stuff. So now that I have the business going and that is my day job, I'm having fun writing again because it's what I want to do. And I feel like I've I've all of this training, you know, 15 years of working in rooms and working in comedy rooms with some of the smartest people, um, and like honing my skills. And yeah, there's just so much less pressure now, and it's just way more fun. And if it happens and I get another feature going, great. And if I don't, I'm cool.

SPEAKER_02 23:54

I I I don't think I think I'm really glad you actually're really glad you wrapped a few things, but I'm really glad you brought up this thing about just time management as an assistant. I'm not saying it's a management issue, it's an exhaustion issue that there's an expectation for these assistants to not only be assistants, but to come up with great scripts so that they can get staffed and yet they're being asked to work 12, 14, 16 hours a day. So when when are they supposed to write this great script with with their brain being uh fresh? But I might you guys this this whole interview has been making me think of another interview that was kind of an interview that stuck in my head for years and years, and it was on the Script Notes podcast where Craig Mason interviewed his therapist, who was also a writer. And the therapist talked about permission to quit. That he gave himself, and I don't know if this is the exact language that he used, but it's the one that stuck in my head. He gave himself permission to quit, and that a lot of people are unable to do that because they've chased this dream to so long. So they're making that as when it's not manifesting in the way they want it, or if it is manifesting, and by the way, a lot of our showrunners also hit these big you know ebbs in their career where they can't stop because they don't know what else they would do, and that nobody, very few people that I've ever come across that have given themselves permission to quit if they've been in it long enough. A lot of people come here for one year and they're gone, two years and they're gone. But if you're here for five, ten years, somehow they try to figure it out and don't give themselves and end up making themselves you know crazy in the process. When did you, you know, let's talk a little bit about your process of giving yourself the permission to quit and what did that do to your mental health?

SPEAKER_01 25:27

It was it was easier for me to do that because I had another thing going. So I I'd also like I hadn't gotten staffed, but I was kind of over it. Um, I I feel like I had success and that I wrote for two shows that people had heard of and that had gone. I I think if I hadn't uh had the business going, then that would be a really tough decision because the decision would be what else am I good at? And I think that's what a lot of people face. But I had this weird tech, like I sort of merged tech and writing or my love for comedy since I was a teenager. I had this Seinfeld website in the 90s, and this is when there were like four websites that existed, but it became popular. So I was contacted by the Today Show. I was in this magazine called Yahoo Internet Life, which was around. I like went to Staples and opened the magazine, and my site was listed as a top 10 Seinfeld fan site. It was just this is like early days of the internet, but um, so I was able to sort of merge tech and comedy. So I knew I had an interest there. So I think what a lot of people could face is they put all their eggs in one basket, which would be the writing basket, and you fail, and like then what do you do? I had an off ramp already, and it the thing that was scary to me was the money because I knew that I was guaranteed a certain amount of money, and blackish syndication money is like stupid, just I mean, NCIS probably like this too, but like it's just it's really good. It was I mean, so I knew I that was the hard part for me. But if I if I didn't know what I was gonna do, then I I think that would be a big sort of internal struggle. But at that point, I would say, like, after being beaten down for 10 to 15 years, getting a phone call that was like, we can't staff you for XY reason. I was expecting it, so I was mentally preparing myself to have moved on, like even before that phone call, just because I assumed once like the domino started to fall, I was like, okay, this guy's gone, that thing's a bad thing for me. This thing also seems like a bad thing for me.

SPEAKER_00 27:52

So obviously, we record this only on audio, but if you were on video now, you would see that behind Steve's head are what looks like about four different coffee machines, which is something I don't understand because I guess I don't work in the industry. But perhaps more importantly, there appears to be an Emmy. Now uh obviously winning an Emmy is very exciting. Um when you won your Emmy, was it a case of sort of, you know, this is amazing, I'm a tech entrepreneur and I've won this Emmy and that's great? Or was it a case of this is a great Emmy, but actually the Emmy I really wanted was, you know, the one that you get for writing or creating a show. Um, you know, what what how did receiving that award land with you, given your background?

SPEAKER_01 28:42

Well, I never thought I would win a technical Emmy, but here's the thing about an engineering Emmy is that it's by the way, you want would you like me to talk about my coffee machines? Because I'm happy to talk about that also. Might be really no, but the um but the thing about the technical Emmy is that it actually is a prime time Emmy award. So it is the same statue as people get for winning uh best TV series so or best comedy series, so it's the same exact one. Um anyway, sidebar. But I I never thought I would win a technical Emmy. I didn't even know there were technical Emmys. I always thought if I was going to win an Emmy, it would be for writing for TV. Um, but no, I mean an Emmy is an Emmy, so I feel pretty good about that, and is in my background with my four different coffee machines, which I am equally as proud of. So this is just the my coffee machine. So the Emmy means nothing to me.

SPEAKER_00 29:41

I I I'm now gonna ask quite a sort of outsider question, but that's fine because I'm an outsider. So is it delivered? It's is it the day before you get the technical emmy, or is it done on the day, you know, are you in the green room with you know the cast of the Game of Thrones? Or uh are you in the green room?

SPEAKER_01 29:59

That would be cool.

SPEAKER_00 30:00

So the answer's no then.

SPEAKER_01 30:02

No, you know it. It's like the uh People's Choice Awards where they know they're gonna win beforehand. So we knew, yeah, we knew we won the Emmy, so we're just there to accept it.

SPEAKER_00 30:13

So when you were at Hollywood parties, assuming you go to Hollywood parties, do you casually you know go up to the room? I do not. You know, okay, right. So my question about bumping into people and saying, Oh, I've got one an Emmy as well, doesn't apply.

SPEAKER_01 30:26

No, but a friend of mine who also has won an Emmy reached out. So there is a secret Emmy society. Oh wait, was I not supposed to say that? So forgot that. Forget it.

SPEAKER_00 30:36

I'm gonna just break with uh the fourth wall, I don't know what you call it on podcasts, and ask Noah a question, which is Noah. I don't know if there is a podcast Emmy, but they definitely should be. If we won an Emmy for our podcast, how would you feel about that given that you think you're a writer? You sorry, you are a writer, you are a writer.

SPEAKER_02 30:54

I you know, I I would be thrilled. I think that you know, anything you put a ton of work into and that is your passion project, those are the things that win the enemies, right? I mean, that's the that's the weird thing. It's like I think, you know, I'm on a I love the TV shows I'm on, but this little podcast has caught on in a way that people truly love, and that's the thing that the Emmys respond to. Scriptation, you know, and again, you know, I'm plugging scriptation because I love scriptation. It's something I was just we were in the we do a little pre-interview, and I was talking to Steve, and I was like, I I don't think I can say the name. Somebody very famous was sitting next to me for something, and that they were using scriptation. And when I asked them about it, they lit up because people love this product. So it's like you create something people love, they're going to uh you might get rewarded by it. And and when TV, you're you're it's it's a big, it's a big machine that you're part of, and sometimes people love it and sometimes people don't. But I do have a question that's on these lines, you know, because this is an interview where we try to ask people questions uh that are not ourselves. Uh uh, Steve, this is a this question is kind of a a variation of a question that Dan has, but I'm now very curious. You have hypothetical situation. Uh you could create a television show that wins all kinds that that does really well, you're staffed and and is up for Emmys. Um, or you could your scriptation product could grow and it's already you know an incredible product to be you being the basically the number one provider of tech services to the Hollywood writing community. Which path would you take?

SPEAKER_01 32:31

This assumes that my investors aren't listening right now. Um geez, that is such a good question. And you know, a few years ago that answer would have been super obvious. It would have been the TV showrunner thing. Um, but now I I don't I don't know. I you know, I don't I I I always like for the longest time I wanted to write my own show and run my own show. I just I I don't have that burning fire anymore. And maybe that just got bludgeoned out of me over 15 years of failure. Um but I would I would probably do the tech, I would I would do the tech part because you know what? It's less work. If I'm a showrunner and I'm I'm working all the time. I mean, I'm working nights and weekends probably, at least the first season of a show as a showrunner. Um I I don't know if I if I want to work that hard as a showrunner, just because I've seen it. Because I've been on so many first season shows and worked for so many tortured showrunners. Um I I think I would do the tech.

SPEAKER_00 33:54

Excellent. That's the best question that was asked in 96 episodes. Um obviously because he uh copied my style, but it's it's a it's a great question for you particularly. So I'm gonna ask the last question, which obviously you know what it is because you listen to the podcast, or at least you you should do. Um I'm gonna add a twist to it. So if you had a single piece of advice for somebody who's not gonna make it in the industry and is thinking about going off to do something else, uh what would it be?

SPEAKER_01 34:30

Do it while you're thinking of quitting. So you can try it out and and uh you know, don't do it cold turkey and then not know where to go. Do what I did and try something while you're in the while you're having that thought to see how you feel and if it'll make you happy and if you can survive and it'll you know make you some money.

SPEAKER_00 34:56

Very good. Steve Vitello failed writer, I think I'm allowed to say that. Uh creator of an Emmy Award-winning app and a supporter of this podcast. Thank you very much indeed for being part of the show.

SPEAKER_01 35:12

Thanks for having me. This was super fun.

SPEAKER_02 35:15

I think failed with a caveat is correct, because he has a friggin' movie coming out this summer. Thank you, Steve. Uh, and and great to have you on. Thanks, guys. Well, that's a wrap on this episode of Screaming Into the Hollywood Abyss. As always, it's this episode was brought to you by Scriptation, the screen writing and annotation software that at the very least has made my life easier and will make your life easier as well. Uh, we'd like to thank our wives who've been coming with us recording these episodes in our offices and basements and closets and bathrooms and anywhere we can get a little space to record an interview. And of course, we want to thank James, who provided us with great intro and outro music.

SPEAKER_00 36:00

Uh, if you want to find us on social media, you can find Noah at NEVLIN on Twitter, tweeting a variety of writer-based nonsense and some terrible puddles and occasionally begging for sponsorship. Uh, if you want more refined tweets, mostly about football and whiskey, you can find me at Dan Rutstein. If you're interested in buying a copy of Scriptation, if you go to www.scriptation.com backslash stiffer, S-I-T-H-A, you'll receive a special discount. Thank you very much for listening. As always, we appreciate you. Uh please give us any feedback, mostly positive stuff about me, and we will see you next week.

SPEAKER_02 36:46

And if you do say a negative thing about Dan, there is a chance I might buy you a free copy of descriptors.