I want to be a comedy writer more than anything in the world right now. Writer’s room. Sitcom or sketch show. Chinese food. Coffee. You know, you’ve seen 30 Rock.
More than anything, I just want to work in the industry. I have lots of interests, so maybe I would be just as happy writing screenplays or features for a magazine or being the guy who gets to pick out what songs go into TV shows and movies.
…Yeah, so would most everyone, Hunter.
But I don’t apologize for this ambition for two reasons. One is that I truly, deeply care about the craft and also, it’s my dream, so why are you being mean?
The second is the more important one, and that is the misperception that wanting to work in the industry is code for I’m hot shit or I want to be famous. Instead it should be seen as what it is, maybe now more so than ever before: work. Not some “lifestyle” that has ruined the actual definition of both the word “life” and probably “style,” too. It’s work. You know, like a job that pays you enough to live.
A couple of weeks ago, I was talking to a comedian friend of mine who put it plainly: “The goal is not to get rich and famous, the goal is to work.” I already felt and knew that to be true, but after hearing it out loud, I started to notice the idea everywhere, and not just that Ashton Kutcher speech where he goes all Hollywood guidance counselor, either.
For example, Jill Andrews, a singer I’ve admired for years who has opened for The Avett Brothers and Joan Osborne, will also send little ‘ole me an autographed pre-released c-d and a hand-written thank you note for a $50 donation to her Kickstarter campaign. Or how about The Happiest Tour On Earth that came through Charleston last weekend, featuring Aparna Nancherla, Eliza Skinner and Janine Brito? Aparna has been on Conan, Eliza has opened for Louis CK, and all three were writers, comedy writers (that’s me!), on Totally Biased on FXX. And then the show got cancelled. They’re telling jokes to a not-sold-out crowd so Brito can afford the $3,000 a month living room she sleeps in back in New York. But that’s life. That’s work.
People are working in the entertainment industry, be it music, comedy, modeling, art, or production because they love it. That has to be the reason. Because while the down economy has taught the powers that be to pinch pennies with all ten fingers, leading to lower wages and less consideration of the creative as work, it still can’t diminish the passion for which we pursue those same things. If you’re a writer, you write because you have to. If you’re a comedian or musician, you tell jokes or write songs, because you feel like there’s something left to say.
Meanwhile, the line between the earnestly written song, sung solo on a second-hand acoustic guitar in a suburban basement that no one will ever hear, and the pop hit that is playing on every iPod in suburban basements across the country, is growing smaller and smaller. Media of all kinds is more accessible than ever before, which has also scaled everything down. Spotify lets your band be heard all over the world. Great, better hit the road now that no one has to buy your album. Your novel got picked up? Wonderful, it’s an indie publisher—your food and bev paycheck is the marketing budget. You have a MFA and a friend has a friend who knows a guy on set? You’re lucky to just be a PA, so don’t complain. We can give this job to a line of other people.
In a town like Charleston that caters to, but is not bound by the entertainment industry, there are three ways to approach this. One is to become indignant: it takes so much time and talent to “get something” that you’ll never get anything. The other is to become annoyed: it takes so little time and talent to make anything, that now everyone thinks they can make something (see: YouTube).
Then there’s the third option: work. Work hard. Work because you love it.
Maybe you’ll work in L.A. or New York or be on set in Thailand. Maybe you’ll make a couple cry with a perfectly written song that is played on their wedding day. Maybe you’ll write that song in your basement and your friends are the only ones who will ever hear it, or maybe it will be play on the radio as some pimple-dotted kid gets his first kiss during a game of spin the bottle. Maybe you’ll get married to your high school sweetheart and have a completely made-for-TV Leave It To Beaver life. Maybe you’ll be in a made-for-TV reality show about a failing pop star’s career in ten years sarcastically titled Leave It To Beiber!
Either way, one day you may wake up and ask yourself, “How did I get here?” Kind of like that Talking Heads song, but without the whole irony part. Because you’ll know why: you worked. It’s a job, and it paid you enough to live. That doesn’t mean to take less than what your worth, but you should take what you’re given (see also: earned) and make it worthwhile.
That’s life. That’s work.
Copyright © 2015 Dez Inc. dba GulfStream Communications
