Month: October 2015

7 Rules For The Art Of The Possible

Brendan Foley Captureby Brendan Foley

History does not record if Otto Von Bismark was twirling his waxed Prussian moustache when he declared “Politics is the art of the possible”. He meant that dreams and ideals are nothing if we don’t grapple with the real world, and work through real problems to get from where we are to somewhere closer to where we want to be.

For those trying to make their way in the film or TV world in the 21st Century, I would say movie making is the art of the possible. For every thousand people who like the idea of making their living as a writer, producer, director or actor, there is one actually making a living at it. Yet every day, people succeed. They go to work on a set, they sell a script, they persuade a financier to cough up, and a thousand other little victories.

Here are a few guidelines that may be useful to those trying to break in to the business. read article

The Old TV Paradigm is Sinking Even Faster Than We Thought

It’s all Nielsen’s fault. Yeppers. Cuz everything bad in the realm of TV is Nielsen’s fault. Yeppers.

Downward-Spiral

by Karl Bode

For years, we’ve noted how popular TV ratings firm Nielsen has turned a bit of a blind eye to cord cutting and the Internet video revolution, on one hand declaring that the idea of cord cutting was “pure fiction,” while on the other hand admitting it wasn’t actually bothering to track TV viewing on mobile devices. It’s not surprising; Nielsen’s bread and butter is paid for by traditional cable executives, and really — who wants to take the time to pull all those collective heads of out of the sand to inform them that their precious pay TV cash cow is dying?

Now that Nielsen has decided to join us in 2015 and start tracking streaming service and mobile device viewing, the numbers, shockingly, aren’t looking all that hot. Nielsen’s latest analysis shows a number of things, most notably a decline in pay TV subscribers but a sharp uptick in users who are only subscribing to broadband: read article

Michaela Coel Is The Foul-Mouthed Genius Taking Over British TV

This article had us at “foul-mouthed.” But “genius” isn’t such a bad word either. Anyway:

Michaela Coelby Colin Crummy

Chewing Gum doesn’t pull its punches. A new British comedy created by 27-year-old writer and star Michaela Coel and set on a sun-dappled east London housing estate, the working-class world she depicts is a multi-racial, sexually frank, filthy and funny kind of place, with the show tackling issues of religion, race and class with a no-holds-barred frankness. It might just be this fall’s most refreshing new comedy.

Coel plays lead character Tracey, a virgin and a Pentecostal Christian who lives on a council estate in east London with her evangelical mum and sister. She dates the casually cruel, super uptight and strictly religious Ronald who pledges that after six years of going out, sex will remain very much off the agenda if the Lord thinks it best. As he prays, Tracey eyeballs the P in his pants. In steps her best friend Candice, offering sage advice on the realities of online dating: “You can bang someone on Tinder, it’s free. Stick the ting to find someone in your borough and walk. A Tinder bang ain’t even a bus fare, bro.” read article

Favorite TVWriter™ Posts of the Week Ending Oct. 16, 2015

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The most clicked-on posts by TVWriter™ visitors during the last week were:

Peggy Bechko on “Self Editing, the Writer’s Friend” read article

Jennifer Hoppe-House is a New Writer We All Should Know…

…Because she’s good and getting better…and a good Pathfinder is hard to, um, find:

by Connor J. Hogan

Jennifer-Hoppe-House-by-Barbara-Green“I couldn’t break into television,” Jennifer Hoppe-House says. “So I wrote a feature with my girlfriend at the time. She became my writing partner and is still my writing partner.”

With Nancy Fichman, Hoppe-House has penned scripts for FX’s Damages, Showtime’sNurse Jackie, and Netflix’s Grace and Frankie. Now, as part of the Women’s Voices Theater Festival, Hoppe-House is setting out on her own with her play Bad Dog, which deals with addiction, family, and the shared stories that influence them both. read article