10 ms·

Laws of Showrunning (2016) [pdf]

194 points by luu 4y ago

lylejantzi3rd 4y ago
Out of curiosity: Has anybody ever heard of an engineering manager making the transition to showrunning?
- CyberDildonics 4y ago
  I don't think people with no knowledge of entertainment productions typically "transition" into the highest position orchestrating the use of many millions of dollars and hundreds of people.
  - CalChris 4y ago
    No, Hollywood attracts talent broadly. You'll still serve an apprenticeship, reading scripts, ..., but my anecdote is walking across the parking lot on the way to a meeting at Paramount and seeing a US Naval Academy license plate frame.
    - CyberDildonics 4y ago
      No, I don't think transitioning to an entry level position is the same as 'transitioning' to the highest possible position. That's like someone asking if they can 'transition' to being the CEO of a nationally known company.
  - tough 4y ago
    If the millions are yours you can certainly do as you wish with them tho.
    - dylan604 4y ago
      the old adage in show business was to never spend your own money. with the plethora of streaming options, that has been turned on its head. look at all of the shows where the lead talent is also an executive producer (the ones that write the checks).
      - rtsil 4y ago
        Most of these are either vanity credits, or just a way for the star to participate in the profits beyond salary and royalties.
        dylan604 4y ago
        Or you have a project that as an actor you really want to perform a certain role so you show your commitment by putting up some money to get the project rolling. One of the common ways for financing media projects is where someone is willing to match someone else's contribution. The slimey parts come in when the original funding that is matched is guaranteed to be paid back first before others are paid, but that's not unique to the film industry
        yamtaddle 4y ago
        I assume this is why everydamnthing has like 20 producers now.
      - klodolph 4y ago
        Writes the checks ≠ spending your own money. The executive producer is in some senses a liaison between the people providing the money and the people spending the money. I may be mixing this up. I know that “producer” and “executive producer” are somewhat different roles depending on whether you’re doing TV or film.
        CalChris 4y ago
        Studio = Yale Investment Office, limited partner Producer = VC, general partner leading a funding Writer = Startup CTO, founder Director = Startup CEO It's a little different because studios greenlight and producers generally don't. But there are a lot more startups than movies or tv shows. Well, maybe studios don't greenlight development deals (seed startups).
        dylan604 4y ago
        Depending on the studio, they can be much more than a limited partner. They can be providing the facilities to office out of for pre-production and development, the actual production work using their soundstages and other properties, and to do post-production.
  - swatcoder 4y ago
    Nah, I don't know specific examples that satisfy the OP's original question, but writing for entertainment (and showrunning as a management-level tier of that track) is just a career transition like any other. People who've had one professional career and been grinding on their writing on the side absolutely make the leap and move their way up. Often, their break comes from writing from their expertise. If you dig through shows about medicine, law, policing, etc etc, you'll often find several writers who were worked in those fields. Not every writer was a barista until they made their break. Some of them were indeed lawyers and engineers.
    - CyberDildonics 4y ago
      This sounds like you are talking about people transitioning to being a writer, not a show runner. That's like someone saying "has anyone transitioned to running cartoon network?" and someone else saying "people have transitioned to being an animator, which is almost the same thing".
      - swatcoder 4y ago
        No, there are many showrunners. It’s essentially just a management-like writing position for any of the thousands of scripted programs that produced each year. It’s an achievement to be proud of, just like being a partner at a law firm or an mid-high position at a high-profile FAANG, but it’s not as rarified as you seem to think.
        CyberDildonics 4y ago
        No, it can't be a middle management position if you're the one in charge of the entire project. Also no, people don't transition from middle management in one industry to the top position of another industry.
        swatcoder 4y ago
        They’re not in charge of the project any more than any other project/product manager. Somebody else is still making final go and stop decisions on their projects, setting their budget, demanding stupid details, etc. They’re just in charge of wrangling some of the creative and production processes and get to take credit for the overall creative vision of the project (or blame their execs/peers/staff if they’re unhappy with it). Literally the same as in any other industry. I don’t know why I keep replying, but any reasonably social 40+ adult who had lived in SoCal personally knows showrunners as well as people in most other roles in the industry. Some have even held some of those roles! This isn’t some made up basement-dwelled bs that I’m sharing with you; this is actual ground knowledge.
- walterbell 4y ago
  Documentary director rather than TV showrunner, Charles Ferguson was the founder of Vermeer which created FrontPage, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Charles_Ferguson_(filmmaker) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Charles_Ferguson_(filmmaker) He also wrote one of the best startup failure-and-recovery books, "High Stakes, No Prisoners", https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=2719001 https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=2719001
- crazygringo 4y ago
  It's not a lateral move. Aside from the management aspect, it's an entirely different skill set. If you're an engineering manager who wants to become a showrunner, the process would basically be: 1) Take a bunch of screenwriting classes until you know you're reliably good at nuts-and-bolts screenwriting, which is far, far harder than you might ever guess. Writing a single compelling scene is hard enough, writing a good TV pilot is shockingly difficult. Time: ~3 years full time, but realize there's a 95+% chance you'll quit as you realize you ultimately don't have the writing chops or discover you simply don't enjoy it after all. 2) Write a few pilot scripts and use them as a portfolio to get hired in a writer's room on a TV show. Time: 2-3 years because it's going to take a while to write and take a while to get hired, at least on a show that is even somewhat similar to the type of show you ultimately want to showrun 3) Work for that TV show and then a couple others to build up actual experience, and don't just hang out inside the writer's room. Use the opportunity to get deeply familiar with all aspects of production. Time: 5 years 4) Now with your knowledge of the industry, write 2-3 excellent pilot scripts you think actually line up with what studios are looking to produce commercially. Shop them around until you a studio funds you. Showrun a pilot. Time: 3-5 years 5) Your pilot doesn't get picked up because it's too similar to another show that premiered on another network last month and doesn't have great ratings. This has nothing whatsoever to do with the quality of your own show. Repeat step 4, maybe more than once. Time: 3 years 6) This time your pilot gets picked up. Congrats, you're a showrunner! Total time: 18-ish years?? So obviously it's better if you quit your engineering manager job at age 22 or 25. But age doesn't really matter in showrunning except for your own energy level. Being 50 or 60 and running a show is pretty normal. So even if you want to make the move at 40, it's totally doable, if you have the writing talent. Now of course yes there are a few genius/lucky types that made a hit YouTube series on their iPhone and got their own show a year later (e.g. Broad City). But that's not usually how it works, unless you've really truly got something incredibly fresh and relevant to say. If you know you've got lightning in a bottle, then the above timeline doesn't apply.
- sogen 4y ago
  In The Offer, the tv series deals about The Godfather, and the main guy jumping from tech to show running.
- jasmer 4y ago
  Mike Judge is almost that.
- simonw 4y ago
  Not an engineering manager, but I love that the Queen's Gambit was written by the former CEO of a bunch of Scottish whisky distilleries: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Allan_Scott_(Scottish_screenwriter) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Allan_Scott_(Scottish_screenwr...
- Terretta 4y ago
  Yes
qazxcvbnmlp 4y ago
“For many, the undeniable triumph that is pitching a series idea, having a pilot ordered, successfully producing it, and then having it ordered to series is nothing less than a validation: not only their voice and talent, but also of their Way of Doing Things. This often translates to an intractable adherence to the notion that "my creative process" is so of the essence to success that all other concerns must be made subordinate lest the delicate alchemy that made success possible be snuffed“ Also seen in other fields as “I raised money for my company, so you will do this my way” doesn’t matter if the way is good.
6gvONxR4sf7o 4y ago
Lots of parallels with silicon valley corporate life in here. This one in particular rings true to me: > So, once they have a show on the air, even the most inept of managers - or the most sociopathic of abusers - muddle through and keep their show on the air on something resembling time and on budget: usually by the sweat of a lot of talented individuals who are then denied credit for their toil at the altar of the "visionary auteur"'s brilliance. As I keep reading, this document is great advice for any manager or project lead, and very well written.
- jobu 4y ago
  It's really a treatise on good leadership and management from the perspective of a showrunner. There are a bunch of great quotes, but this bit from 4th Law (Make decisions early and often) really hit home for me: > But you know what "nice people" and "good bosses" actually do? They rip off the Band-Aid early, make the case for their decision, hear out any remaining arguments to a reasonable degree, then shut down the discussion and send everyone off to get on with their work. Even worse than making the wrong decision is not making a decision at all, that's true in any leadership position.
- MichaelDickens 4y ago
  > usually by the sweat of a lot of talented individuals who are then denied credit for their toil at the altar of the "visionary auteur"'s brilliance I don't know about this part. Media is the only industry I know of where most people involved get credit. When you buy a phone or a car or a cup of coffee, you don't get a list of everyone who contributed to making it.
KerryJones 4y ago
I have almost no interest in showrunning but I enjoy the slightly biting writing style: "So you finally have the Brass Ring... and guess what? It won't make that you never found a publisher for your first novel any less painful, and it won't make your daddy finally love you, or your spouse more sexually compliant, or your kids less disdainful of your bad puns and clumsy attempts to make them understand that you really DID like and understand that last Sky Ferreira album."
zug_zug 4y ago
I love this. "You can also [motivate] by instilling fear - of job insecurity, of the loss of political capital in the show's hierarchy, or simply the harsh judgment of a capricious father figure. You have the power to be either an enabler of your employees's creativity, or make them the enablers of your whims." It's refreshing when I find a piece that doesn't reduce the workplace to naive fix-all tropes like "assume positive intent." Of course the film industry just had "me too," so perhaps the lesson is particularly clear there, but it's not like quid-pro-quo doesn't happen in software.
- andsoitis 4y ago
  What makes that quote powerful is that it isn’t prescriptive. Unlike self-help books and business literature, it doesn’t purport to have the wisdom to tell you what to do or how to behave. Instead, it presents you the two paths in front of you and gives you context what you can expect in choosing either, but then leaves the choice to you. You have to take full responsibility, you cannot scapegoat the author.
tdoggette 4y ago
It's not until the Third Law that the author names a show of his: The Middleman (2008) on ABC Family, a one-and-done cult classic comedy show. That show's quality lends strong credence to the expertise backing up his second and third laws. That show really knew what it was, and every decision top to bottom worked to convey the show's very particular tone and style. It must have been a real trick to communicate that effectively-- The Middleman was like "X-Files meets Doctor Who, but less serious than either, and with a sense of ironic detachment, but not so much detachment that we can't tell stories about emotions, and also everyone talks like they're in a comedy sketch making fun of the dialogue in Buffy the Vampire Slayer."
- Sniffnoy 4y ago
  I mean, the author's name is right on top, you can loop up what else he's done: https://www.imdb.com/name/nm0342057/ https://www.imdb.com/name/nm0342057/ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Javier_Grillo-Marxuach https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Javier_Grillo-Marxuach Looks like that might be the only show he was actually showrunner on, if I'm understanding correctly?
  - 1980phipsi 4y ago
    I recognized who he was immediately because that show was so good.
Animats 4y ago
That's been around for years. There are two versions. This is the longer, tougher version. The interesting thing about the culture is that 1) US practice is that TV showrunners are writers, and 2) that all the writing for the season isn't done before starting production. Movies are not usually made that way. The script is usually set before production gets a green light.
- crazygringo 4y ago
  > 1) US practice is that TV showrunners are writers Is that different in any other countries? I'm having a hard time imagining what other background a showrunner would come from. E.g. the directing skillset is somewhat related but ultimately very different. > 2) that all the writing for the season isn't done before starting production. Well you certainly can't do that for a 22-episode season, especially as writers very much adapt in real time to what's "working" in the show. It's quite common for a character intended only for a single episode to turn out to be unexpectedly extremely charistmatic and quickly turn into a main character, because of the actor's performance. But for an hourlong 8-episode prestige drama for HBO, it's not uncommon for all of the writing to be done ahead of time. Or at the very least, the entire story is "broken" (outlined) in detail, even if the dialog isn't written out.
  - ghaff 4y ago
    >E.g. the directing skillset is somewhat related but ultimately very different. Certainly. That's why the showrunner mostly doesn't direct episodes and film directors mostly didn't write the script (though they probably influenced it). The difference is that films can go through a multi-year development process with things hopefully largely nailed down before production starts--because that's when the bills really start mounting fast. TV, on the other hand, historically had a lot more writing and production values were often a lot lower. So writing was important (and had to happen relatively quickly) while a solid journeyman director was probably fine. Certainly their name was mostly not a draw for audiences. (Obviously something like Rings of Power is a lot different from a season of Law and Order.)
    - 4y ago
wpietri 4y ago
Wow, I have worked for this boss for sure: > In the 1980's, the members of the Berlin Symphony told joke about their notoriously imperious conductor, Herbert Von Karajan. It went like this: The maestro gets into a taxi. The driver asks "Where to?" "It doesn't matter," Von Karajan declaims, "I'm needed EVERYWHERE!"
TchoBeer 4y ago
not totally related, but I read this initially as "the elven laws of shadowrunning"
xbar 4y ago
In this quote, there is truth: "The simple answer is that "simple" doesn't necessarily mean "easy". In my experience, the simplest decisions are often the hardest because they demand a painful concession to an unpleasant truth. "
ajkjk 4y ago
This is so good.
jasmer 4y ago
It's amazing that in an industry with so much money they don't have accepted norms of professionalism baked in. Even for startups. It's almost like VC land should have the rule, 'once the cheque is >$1M, you do this required 2-week long training' hopefully jam packed with essential goodies. Most of our time in school is academically oriented, nothing in particular applied. I find that very odd.
- andrewflnr 4y ago
  It's a young industry, as these things go. Just about a century, I think? And that's counting generously, not taking into account growing faster in headcount and budget than it can learn (sound familiar?). A lot of the serious "professions", I'm thinking of e.g. accounting, engineering, or medicine, have histories that go back several centuries, with rules written in blood.
- Terretta 4y ago
  > amazing that in an industry with so much money they don't have accepted norms of professionalism baked in Both US tech and entertainment revenue are in the magnitude of half a trillion per year. Might be hard to argue tech has more repeatably professional norms than TV or movies.
reillyse 4y ago
I got to number 5 but I’m guessing brevity never features?
ChuckMcM 4y ago
From the article: The dark side of the drive to prove one's primacy of vision (colloquially better known as "I'LL SHOW YOU FATHER THAT YOU WERE WRONG TO NOT LOVE ME!") is that inefficient and self-indulgent - and more often than not abusive - senior management is endemic to the television industry. As cable, streaming, and Internet services adopt the television production model to generate content, the problem only gets worse. For me, this was one of the surprises from Netflix, Amazon, and Apple jumping into funding series production. The observations the author makes are anecdotally confirmed by the various "leaks" in the industry (and yes, this biases the view because people often don't complain about a good thing, I know), and yet rarely is the content produced by the studios working for these new entrants much different than the content produced "en masse" so to speak. When this started, I expected more "Love Death Robots" kinds of things and less "Game of Thrones wannabes" kinds of things. I'm really curious how it went on the team doing "The Peripheral" (a show that I really liked), vs "Carnival Row" which seems to be "Jane Austen + Steampunk + Fairys" and, again for me at least, not particularly compelling. As a result I've always wondered if studios did "retros" or look backs to understand how the product evolved, and if the people paying them ever tried to evaluate their process as a means of managing their investments. I doubt I'll ever know, but I will remain curious about these things.
- ghaff 4y ago
  Cable TV also mostly evolved into more channels of more or less the same thing. Streaming (outside of YouTube/TikTok/etc.) has done mostly the same thing--albeit with something of a bias towards prestige drama and away from slot filling procedurals. But there's less strikingly original and good stuff than one might like. And even the anthologies have been a mixed bag.
robodan 4y ago
I find it interesting that he barely mentions the actors, costumers, set designers, etc. These are the "face" of the show. I take this to mean that story trumps all in television. You have to know what your core product is.
- tptacek 4y ago
  In features, directors are the ultimate creative authority. But in a series, the showrunner is, and the showrunner is usually a writer --- most series have episodic directors (and often episodic writers, or at least a member of the writer's room credited for each episode), and because the showrunner has the top-down view of the whole series, the show bible, and has made all the decisions about tone and style that directors will rely on, they end up calling many of the shots a feature director would ordinarily call. It's probably not really so much that television values story more than film than that the episodic structure of television lends itself to this kind of system.
- andrewflnr 4y ago
  I wouldn't read sweeping conclusions into it. I think it's more that most people's instincts suffice for dealing with those aspects, so he doesn't need to write about them as much; he hints at that in calling the "sexy" jobs a refuge from writing. Or just that story is more directly relevant to the part or stage of TV-making he's writing about.
- darkerside 4y ago
  The story and script are the blueprint. Everyone else can operate in a coordinated fashion off of a solid blueprint. The plumber, electrician, framers, etc. are all important and performed by specialized labor, but it's all within the context of a high level plan.
pallas_athena 4y ago
Javier Grillo-Marxuach was also a writer on LOST and wrote a lengthy document about that experience: http://okbjgm.weebly.com/uploads/3/1/5/0/31506003/2._lost.pdf http://okbjgm.weebly.com/uploads/3/1/5/0/31506003/2._lost.pd...

194 points by luu 4y ago

lylejantzi3rd 4y ago

Out of curiosity: Has anybody ever heard of an engineering manager making the transition to showrunning?

CyberDildonics 4y ago
I don't think people with no knowledge of entertainment productions typically "transition" into the highest position orchestrating the use of many millions of dollars and hundreds of people.
- CalChris 4y ago
  No, Hollywood attracts talent broadly. You'll still serve an apprenticeship, reading scripts, ..., but my anecdote is walking across the parking lot on the way to a meeting at Paramount and seeing a US Naval Academy license plate frame.
  - CyberDildonics 4y ago
    No, I don't think transitioning to an entry level position is the same as 'transitioning' to the highest possible position. That's like someone asking if they can 'transition' to being the CEO of a nationally known company.
- tough 4y ago
  If the millions are yours you can certainly do as you wish with them tho.
  - dylan604 4y ago
    the old adage in show business was to never spend your own money. with the plethora of streaming options, that has been turned on its head. look at all of the shows where the lead talent is also an executive producer (the ones that write the checks).
    - rtsil 4y ago
      Most of these are either vanity credits, or just a way for the star to participate in the profits beyond salary and royalties.
      - dylan604 4y ago
        Or you have a project that as an actor you really want to perform a certain role so you show your commitment by putting up some money to get the project rolling. One of the common ways for financing media projects is where someone is willing to match someone else's contribution. The slimey parts come in when the original funding that is matched is guaranteed to be paid back first before others are paid, but that's not unique to the film industry
      - yamtaddle 4y ago
        I assume this is why everydamnthing has like 20 producers now.
    - klodolph 4y ago
      Writes the checks ≠ spending your own money. The executive producer is in some senses a liaison between the people providing the money and the people spending the money. I may be mixing this up. I know that “producer” and “executive producer” are somewhat different roles depending on whether you’re doing TV or film.
      - CalChris 4y ago
        Studio = Yale Investment Office, limited partner Producer = VC, general partner leading a funding Writer = Startup CTO, founder Director = Startup CEO It's a little different because studios greenlight and producers generally don't. But there are a lot more startups than movies or tv shows. Well, maybe studios don't greenlight development deals (seed startups).
        dylan604 4y ago
        Depending on the studio, they can be much more than a limited partner. They can be providing the facilities to office out of for pre-production and development, the actual production work using their soundstages and other properties, and to do post-production.
- swatcoder 4y ago
  Nah, I don't know specific examples that satisfy the OP's original question, but writing for entertainment (and showrunning as a management-level tier of that track) is just a career transition like any other. People who've had one professional career and been grinding on their writing on the side absolutely make the leap and move their way up. Often, their break comes from writing from their expertise. If you dig through shows about medicine, law, policing, etc etc, you'll often find several writers who were worked in those fields. Not every writer was a barista until they made their break. Some of them were indeed lawyers and engineers.
  - CyberDildonics 4y ago
    This sounds like you are talking about people transitioning to being a writer, not a show runner. That's like someone saying "has anyone transitioned to running cartoon network?" and someone else saying "people have transitioned to being an animator, which is almost the same thing".
    - swatcoder 4y ago
      No, there are many showrunners. It’s essentially just a management-like writing position for any of the thousands of scripted programs that produced each year. It’s an achievement to be proud of, just like being a partner at a law firm or an mid-high position at a high-profile FAANG, but it’s not as rarified as you seem to think.
      - CyberDildonics 4y ago
        No, it can't be a middle management position if you're the one in charge of the entire project. Also no, people don't transition from middle management in one industry to the top position of another industry.
        swatcoder 4y ago
        They’re not in charge of the project any more than any other project/product manager. Somebody else is still making final go and stop decisions on their projects, setting their budget, demanding stupid details, etc. They’re just in charge of wrangling some of the creative and production processes and get to take credit for the overall creative vision of the project (or blame their execs/peers/staff if they’re unhappy with it). Literally the same as in any other industry. I don’t know why I keep replying, but any reasonably social 40+ adult who had lived in SoCal personally knows showrunners as well as people in most other roles in the industry. Some have even held some of those roles! This isn’t some made up basement-dwelled bs that I’m sharing with you; this is actual ground knowledge.
walterbell 4y ago
Documentary director rather than TV showrunner, Charles Ferguson was the founder of Vermeer which created FrontPage, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Charles_Ferguson_(filmmaker) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Charles_Ferguson_(filmmaker) He also wrote one of the best startup failure-and-recovery books, "High Stakes, No Prisoners", https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=2719001 https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=2719001
crazygringo 4y ago
It's not a lateral move. Aside from the management aspect, it's an entirely different skill set. If you're an engineering manager who wants to become a showrunner, the process would basically be: 1) Take a bunch of screenwriting classes until you know you're reliably good at nuts-and-bolts screenwriting, which is far, far harder than you might ever guess. Writing a single compelling scene is hard enough, writing a good TV pilot is shockingly difficult. Time: ~3 years full time, but realize there's a 95+% chance you'll quit as you realize you ultimately don't have the writing chops or discover you simply don't enjoy it after all. 2) Write a few pilot scripts and use them as a portfolio to get hired in a writer's room on a TV show. Time: 2-3 years because it's going to take a while to write and take a while to get hired, at least on a show that is even somewhat similar to the type of show you ultimately want to showrun 3) Work for that TV show and then a couple others to build up actual experience, and don't just hang out inside the writer's room. Use the opportunity to get deeply familiar with all aspects of production. Time: 5 years 4) Now with your knowledge of the industry, write 2-3 excellent pilot scripts you think actually line up with what studios are looking to produce commercially. Shop them around until you a studio funds you. Showrun a pilot. Time: 3-5 years 5) Your pilot doesn't get picked up because it's too similar to another show that premiered on another network last month and doesn't have great ratings. This has nothing whatsoever to do with the quality of your own show. Repeat step 4, maybe more than once. Time: 3 years 6) This time your pilot gets picked up. Congrats, you're a showrunner! Total time: 18-ish years?? So obviously it's better if you quit your engineering manager job at age 22 or 25. But age doesn't really matter in showrunning except for your own energy level. Being 50 or 60 and running a show is pretty normal. So even if you want to make the move at 40, it's totally doable, if you have the writing talent. Now of course yes there are a few genius/lucky types that made a hit YouTube series on their iPhone and got their own show a year later (e.g. Broad City). But that's not usually how it works, unless you've really truly got something incredibly fresh and relevant to say. If you know you've got lightning in a bottle, then the above timeline doesn't apply.
sogen 4y ago
In The Offer, the tv series deals about The Godfather, and the main guy jumping from tech to show running.
jasmer 4y ago
Mike Judge is almost that.
simonw 4y ago
Not an engineering manager, but I love that the Queen's Gambit was written by the former CEO of a bunch of Scottish whisky distilleries: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Allan_Scott_(Scottish_screenwriter) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Allan_Scott_(Scottish_screenwr...
Terretta 4y ago
Yes

qazxcvbnmlp 4y ago

“For many, the undeniable triumph that is pitching a series idea, having a pilot ordered, successfully producing it, and then having it ordered to series is nothing less than a validation: not only their voice and talent, but also of their Way of Doing Things. This often translates to an intractable adherence to the notion that "my creative process" is so of the essence to success that all other concerns must be made subordinate lest the delicate alchemy that made success possible be snuffed“ Also seen in other fields as “I raised money for my company, so you will do this my way” doesn’t matter if the way is good.

6gvONxR4sf7o 4y ago

Lots of parallels with silicon valley corporate life in here. This one in particular rings true to me: > So, once they have a show on the air, even the most inept of managers - or the most sociopathic of abusers - muddle through and keep their show on the air on something resembling time and on budget: usually by the sweat of a lot of talented individuals who are then denied credit for their toil at the altar of the "visionary auteur"'s brilliance. As I keep reading, this document is great advice for any manager or project lead, and very well written.

jobu 4y ago
It's really a treatise on good leadership and management from the perspective of a showrunner. There are a bunch of great quotes, but this bit from 4th Law (Make decisions early and often) really hit home for me: > But you know what "nice people" and "good bosses" actually do? They rip off the Band-Aid early, make the case for their decision, hear out any remaining arguments to a reasonable degree, then shut down the discussion and send everyone off to get on with their work. Even worse than making the wrong decision is not making a decision at all, that's true in any leadership position.
MichaelDickens 4y ago
> usually by the sweat of a lot of talented individuals who are then denied credit for their toil at the altar of the "visionary auteur"'s brilliance I don't know about this part. Media is the only industry I know of where most people involved get credit. When you buy a phone or a car or a cup of coffee, you don't get a list of everyone who contributed to making it.

KerryJones 4y ago

I have almost no interest in showrunning but I enjoy the slightly biting writing style: "So you finally have the Brass Ring... and guess what? It won't make that you never found a publisher for your first novel any less painful, and it won't make your daddy finally love you, or your spouse more sexually compliant, or your kids less disdainful of your bad puns and clumsy attempts to make them understand that you really DID like and understand that last Sky Ferreira album."

zug_zug 4y ago

I love this. "You can also [motivate] by instilling fear - of job insecurity, of the loss of political capital in the show's hierarchy, or simply the harsh judgment of a capricious father figure. You have the power to be either an enabler of your employees's creativity, or make them the enablers of your whims." It's refreshing when I find a piece that doesn't reduce the workplace to naive fix-all tropes like "assume positive intent." Of course the film industry just had "me too," so perhaps the lesson is particularly clear there, but it's not like quid-pro-quo doesn't happen in software.

andsoitis 4y ago
What makes that quote powerful is that it isn’t prescriptive. Unlike self-help books and business literature, it doesn’t purport to have the wisdom to tell you what to do or how to behave. Instead, it presents you the two paths in front of you and gives you context what you can expect in choosing either, but then leaves the choice to you. You have to take full responsibility, you cannot scapegoat the author.

tdoggette 4y ago

It's not until the Third Law that the author names a show of his: The Middleman (2008) on ABC Family, a one-and-done cult classic comedy show. That show's quality lends strong credence to the expertise backing up his second and third laws. That show really knew what it was, and every decision top to bottom worked to convey the show's very particular tone and style. It must have been a real trick to communicate that effectively-- The Middleman was like "X-Files meets Doctor Who, but less serious than either, and with a sense of ironic detachment, but not so much detachment that we can't tell stories about emotions, and also everyone talks like they're in a comedy sketch making fun of the dialogue in Buffy the Vampire Slayer."

Sniffnoy 4y ago
I mean, the author's name is right on top, you can loop up what else he's done: https://www.imdb.com/name/nm0342057/ https://www.imdb.com/name/nm0342057/ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Javier_Grillo-Marxuach https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Javier_Grillo-Marxuach Looks like that might be the only show he was actually showrunner on, if I'm understanding correctly?
- 1980phipsi 4y ago
  I recognized who he was immediately because that show was so good.

Animats 4y ago

That's been around for years. There are two versions. This is the longer, tougher version. The interesting thing about the culture is that 1) US practice is that TV showrunners are writers, and 2) that all the writing for the season isn't done before starting production. Movies are not usually made that way. The script is usually set before production gets a green light.

crazygringo 4y ago
> 1) US practice is that TV showrunners are writers Is that different in any other countries? I'm having a hard time imagining what other background a showrunner would come from. E.g. the directing skillset is somewhat related but ultimately very different. > 2) that all the writing for the season isn't done before starting production. Well you certainly can't do that for a 22-episode season, especially as writers very much adapt in real time to what's "working" in the show. It's quite common for a character intended only for a single episode to turn out to be unexpectedly extremely charistmatic and quickly turn into a main character, because of the actor's performance. But for an hourlong 8-episode prestige drama for HBO, it's not uncommon for all of the writing to be done ahead of time. Or at the very least, the entire story is "broken" (outlined) in detail, even if the dialog isn't written out.
- ghaff 4y ago
  >E.g. the directing skillset is somewhat related but ultimately very different. Certainly. That's why the showrunner mostly doesn't direct episodes and film directors mostly didn't write the script (though they probably influenced it). The difference is that films can go through a multi-year development process with things hopefully largely nailed down before production starts--because that's when the bills really start mounting fast. TV, on the other hand, historically had a lot more writing and production values were often a lot lower. So writing was important (and had to happen relatively quickly) while a solid journeyman director was probably fine. Certainly their name was mostly not a draw for audiences. (Obviously something like Rings of Power is a lot different from a season of Law and Order.)
  - 4y ago

wpietri 4y ago

Wow, I have worked for this boss for sure: > In the 1980's, the members of the Berlin Symphony told joke about their notoriously imperious conductor, Herbert Von Karajan. It went like this: The maestro gets into a taxi. The driver asks "Where to?" "It doesn't matter," Von Karajan declaims, "I'm needed EVERYWHERE!"

TchoBeer 4y ago

not totally related, but I read this initially as "the elven laws of shadowrunning"

xbar 4y ago

In this quote, there is truth: "The simple answer is that "simple" doesn't necessarily mean "easy". In my experience, the simplest decisions are often the hardest because they demand a painful concession to an unpleasant truth. "

ajkjk 4y ago

This is so good.

jasmer 4y ago

It's amazing that in an industry with so much money they don't have accepted norms of professionalism baked in. Even for startups. It's almost like VC land should have the rule, 'once the cheque is >$1M, you do this required 2-week long training' hopefully jam packed with essential goodies. Most of our time in school is academically oriented, nothing in particular applied. I find that very odd.

andrewflnr 4y ago
It's a young industry, as these things go. Just about a century, I think? And that's counting generously, not taking into account growing faster in headcount and budget than it can learn (sound familiar?). A lot of the serious "professions", I'm thinking of e.g. accounting, engineering, or medicine, have histories that go back several centuries, with rules written in blood.
Terretta 4y ago
> amazing that in an industry with so much money they don't have accepted norms of professionalism baked in Both US tech and entertainment revenue are in the magnitude of half a trillion per year. Might be hard to argue tech has more repeatably professional norms than TV or movies.

reillyse 4y ago

I got to number 5 but I’m guessing brevity never features?

ChuckMcM 4y ago

From the article: The dark side of the drive to prove one's primacy of vision (colloquially better known as "I'LL SHOW YOU FATHER THAT YOU WERE WRONG TO NOT LOVE ME!") is that inefficient and self-indulgent - and more often than not abusive - senior management is endemic to the television industry. As cable, streaming, and Internet services adopt the television production model to generate content, the problem only gets worse. For me, this was one of the surprises from Netflix, Amazon, and Apple jumping into funding series production. The observations the author makes are anecdotally confirmed by the various "leaks" in the industry (and yes, this biases the view because people often don't complain about a good thing, I know), and yet rarely is the content produced by the studios working for these new entrants much different than the content produced "en masse" so to speak. When this started, I expected more "Love Death Robots" kinds of things and less "Game of Thrones wannabes" kinds of things. I'm really curious how it went on the team doing "The Peripheral" (a show that I really liked), vs "Carnival Row" which seems to be "Jane Austen + Steampunk + Fairys" and, again for me at least, not particularly compelling. As a result I've always wondered if studios did "retros" or look backs to understand how the product evolved, and if the people paying them ever tried to evaluate their process as a means of managing their investments. I doubt I'll ever know, but I will remain curious about these things.

ghaff 4y ago
Cable TV also mostly evolved into more channels of more or less the same thing. Streaming (outside of YouTube/TikTok/etc.) has done mostly the same thing--albeit with something of a bias towards prestige drama and away from slot filling procedurals. But there's less strikingly original and good stuff than one might like. And even the anthologies have been a mixed bag.

robodan 4y ago

I find it interesting that he barely mentions the actors, costumers, set designers, etc. These are the "face" of the show. I take this to mean that story trumps all in television. You have to know what your core product is.

tptacek 4y ago
In features, directors are the ultimate creative authority. But in a series, the showrunner is, and the showrunner is usually a writer --- most series have episodic directors (and often episodic writers, or at least a member of the writer's room credited for each episode), and because the showrunner has the top-down view of the whole series, the show bible, and has made all the decisions about tone and style that directors will rely on, they end up calling many of the shots a feature director would ordinarily call. It's probably not really so much that television values story more than film than that the episodic structure of television lends itself to this kind of system.
andrewflnr 4y ago
I wouldn't read sweeping conclusions into it. I think it's more that most people's instincts suffice for dealing with those aspects, so he doesn't need to write about them as much; he hints at that in calling the "sexy" jobs a refuge from writing. Or just that story is more directly relevant to the part or stage of TV-making he's writing about.
darkerside 4y ago
The story and script are the blueprint. Everyone else can operate in a coordinated fashion off of a solid blueprint. The plumber, electrician, framers, etc. are all important and performed by specialized labor, but it's all within the context of a high level plan.

pallas_athena 4y ago

Javier Grillo-Marxuach was also a writer on LOST and wrote a lengthy document about that experience: http://okbjgm.weebly.com/uploads/3/1/5/0/31506003/2._lost.pdf http://okbjgm.weebly.com/uploads/3/1/5/0/31506003/2._lost.pd...