Friday Questions

More Friday Questions to launch you into the weekend.

Craig leads off:

Have you got any advice for people living outside of the US on how to break in to TV writing?

That’s a tough one, especially if you don’t plan to come to the US until you’ve sold something. Producers and agents and showrunners and studios want access to the writer. 

There are contests and fellowships you can enter. Professors you might have or working professionals in whatever country you’re in might have stateside connections. A little networking can ease things.

But I’ll be honest: it’s hard to break in even if you live under the Hollywood sign. So to live out of the country, that’s a Herculean task.

Best of luck.

Edward asks:

Can you do a "Friday Questions" podcast as a regular week-ending episode?

The problem is length. I try to hold down my weekly podcast to 40 minutes or less. Ideally, they go a half-hour. So depending on the topic or guest, I often eat up 30 minutes very quickly. And some weeks I have commercials. So I like to squeeze in listener questions when I can. But that’s usually when that week’s content takes up only about 20 minutes.

I will, however, try to squeeze in more listener questions in the future.

Thanks for listening. For everyone else, just click the big gold arrow below the masthead and the podcast comes right up. Please subscribe.

From Ben K:

What happens when a particularly memorable line or catch phrase from a show becomes famous on its own? Is there ever a battle for credit, given that the listed writer(s) of an episode often don't come up with every line?

Normally not. There’s no royalty in a catch-phrase.  Plus, they become catch-phrases either over time or by accident.  No one sets out to "create" a catch-phrase.  

That said, the big catch-phrase from HAPPY DAYS was “sit on it.” Two different writers claim they coined it – Bob Brunner and Mark Rothman.

I was never on the show. I have no idea who’s right.

I’m not a fan of catch-phrases on sitcoms. They make the show sound very formulaic. And the writers twist stories and dialogue around in order to get to them.

I like stories that come out of characters and laughs that stem from attitude and behavior. I never want to feel I have to shoehorn catch-phrases into my dialogue.

There was a show a few years ago called HAPPY ENDINGS that became just a string of catch-phrases. It got to the point where you could write their scripts with “Mad Libs.”

And finally, from Jack Terwilliger:

Friday Question: Preposition proposition: Why do television writers say they write "on a show" rather than "for a show"?

Because that’s just the accepted expression. But you’re right. We could just as easily say “for” instead of “on.”

Either makes sense. As opposed to in baseball when announcers say a hitter is 1 for 3 “on” the night, which is grammatically incorrect. In that case it should be “for the night.”

But getting back to your example: hey, this is a town where we “do” lunch not “have” lunch. So nothing makes sense.

I hope that clears it up for you.

What’s your Friday Question?