718 - No Worries if Not

24:18There's no point. There's no point. And then this next one. They liked it. They just didn't connect with it. Yeah, they didn't like it at all. They don't like it. No. I like it. It's just that I don't like it. Yeah. I also hear like, I wanted to like it, but I didn't. They always want to like it. Yeah. It didn't fully land for us. Right. If a plane doesn't fully land, that means it crashes in a fireball. It didn't fully land. We're looking for something camera ready. Oh, please. No, you're not. Nobody knows what that is. Get out of here. You know what camera ready is? It's a script that's already written.

24:56It's not a pitch. Yeah, you're looking for something camera ready. It's a script, a budget, a schedule, a cast, a crew. I mean, please, we're looking for something camera ready. Yeah. Oh, God. Dumb. Well told. Oh, well told. Well told. Oh, my God. I've gotten a couple of well tolds. And it's just like, I just want to just turn off the Zoom. And commit seppuku. Yeah. So well-told is what they say after you pitch them something and they don't want it and they were bored. They say, well-told, like you did a good job putting all those sentences in the air with your mouth hole. We don't like them, but well-told.

25:41To me, that is like you just saw your friends play and it was awful. And it's like, you were up there on stage. Yep. Wow, it's great to see you up there on that stage. Yep. Well-told. Well-told. Oh, yeah. Like, you did it. Yeah. You did it. Yeah, well told. Oh, this next one is, I don't know. This next one's, yeah, it's bad. It's bad. It's ambiguous. Like, it's not always bad, but let's. It's mostly bad. Yeah. Let's revisit after the holidays. Yeah. Which holiday? Like, Christmas, 2000, and never? Yeah. Because that's just like, if you want something. I mean, here's what happens. All of this stuff gets put in context Once you do something that people want, suddenly nothing is, there's nothing that could be faster.

26:27Like they were like, well, there are three people that want this. They want it now. They want it two minutes ago. They don't want to wait until tomorrow. Here's an offer. It's on the table right now. And if you turn it down, it's gone forever. It's never, we really want this. Let's just not do anything about it for a while. So the situation where it's not a pass, where it's like if you're talking with your reps about a project you take out or stuff like that, like let's revisit after the holidays. Yes, that makes sense. Or like going out after a director. That's a thing that's an absolute valid thing because you don't want to approach people generally like this week in December.

27:06It's just like everyone's busy with other stuff. Yeah, and just fair. I'll defer to the team. What does that mean? What does that mean? So what does it mean, Drew? You have a disagreement about a thing, but you don't care enough to fight about it. You'll let other people sort of make the decisions. Oh, I'll defer to the team. Yeah, but the fact that you're actually saying it out loud means that you are stating that you have a disagreement with it. So it's sometimes a useful piece of information. But yeah, I haven't heard it yet, but now my ears will be open for it. For team deferral. I want to be respectful of everyone's time.

27:46I've said this on Zooms too, where it's like, this is going on a little long. We need to be done here. I want to be respectful of my time. Yeah, and often you're saying that because there's people who are on the East Coast or in London, and it's like two in the morning, and it's like, let's just be done. Or not. Or everyone's in Los Angeles, and this is boring, and it's too much. The phone version, well, I mean, yeah, because that feels like a Zoom thing. The phone version that blew my mind the first time I heard it was, well, I'm going to let you go. Yeah. Well, I'm going to let you go. Like, I know you have been dying to get up this phone call.

28:23I'm going to let you get off the phone. But really, you weren't dying to get up this phone call. I am. Yeah. I'm hitting eject. It blew my mind. I was like, you're going to, oh, thank you for this lovely gift. So my friend Aaron Gibson will make fun of me because I have this thing where we'll go to lunch and at a certain point, like, okay, well, this was great. And she's like, wow, you just like stopped the lunch. I was like, but I'm kind of done. I'm just trying to acknowledge the fact like this lunch is over and we don't need to keep dragging out for another 15 minutes to sort of say goodbye.

29:00Like, this was great. And I'm stopping it. I think the problem, if I may, is the tense. This was great. As in, I unilaterally decided it ended before I said that statement. You get no participation. So, Craig, correct me. How would you end the lunch? Has been instead of was. This has been lovely. Realistically, I probably have. I was doing it. That would be better. The constant presence of... Sometimes I like to go, okay, I've had the best time. So, what are you doing next? What are you doing next today? Tell me what you're doing next. Oh, yeah. And you trend. It's taking the future. But obviously talking about what's coming right after this lunch gets everybody generally motivated to GTFO.

29:46But what you do is nothing compared to what our friend Derek does. Tell me. So our friend Derek, let's say Melissa and I are out to dinner with Derek and Christy. Yeah. At some point, and it's never like the wrong point. It's sort of a point where things, he would just go, okay, I'm done. We're going. Let's go. Christy, we're going. Yeah. We've been at their house where like a bunch of people. like 10 people and then Derek will go, okay, it's over. Yeah. And Christy is always like, Derek, Derek. He goes, what? They've been here forever. It's over. And it's actually awesome. Yeah. Because we all know that he just is going to pull the plug and that's that.

30:28Yeah. Good. Yeah, I respect that. A little, little, little candor, a little honesty there. I prefer the clean break. Yeah. It's the opposite of the Irish goodbye. Yeah, exactly. Oh, I have the best Irish goodbye. You know my ghost strategy? Tell me. Because I love to ghost. That's my favorite thing. So I'm at a party and in my mind, I'm like, it's time. It's time for the ghosting. So I'll start moving towards the door. And I'm hoping that at some point, and usually do, somebody's like, are you leaving? And then I go, no, I don't. I don't. I'm not Irish goodbying. I'm just, I'm heading to the restroom, but I'll be right back.

31:05Then I go. So they're worried about you. Like, Craig, he said he wasn't leaving, so something's wrong. I say I am not doing it. So then if they don't see me, they're like, well, no, he didn't leave. Yeah. He said specifically he wasn't going to do that. He's somewhere. Diabolical. Yeah, but I'm gone. You know where I am? In my bed. No, Craig actually does. So he says that and then he goes to the bathroom and he locks the door on the bathroom and closes it. So it seems like he's locked in the bathroom. And everyone's like, what's happened? Yeah. And meanwhile, there's a line forming. Yeah. No, I lock the door, climb out the window.

31:41There's not enough bathroom windows to climb out of. That is the air duct of, yeah. There's not supportive vents and there are not bathroom windows to climb out of. What a shame. It's tough. Yeah. Let's get back to our passes here. All right. A project's too small. Yeah. That's crazy, but sure. I mean, I get it on some point. I get it, yeah. But then you probably wouldn't be pitching to a place where the project would be too small. Yeah. The next few seem to be sort of from like spec pilots or something. So like not enough of a hook. Sure. Okay. Just, yeah. The idea is not grabby. All right. Not catchy.

32:16Needs more of an engine. It's boring. The story doesn't go anyplace. It's just like you're stuck in one gear. You're not going to be able to write 20 episodes of this. No. You're going to write two and then run out of stuff. Yeah. And two slice of life. The hell does that mean? I think it's not story driven in the sense of like, you know, There's not a compelling thing that's moving you along. It's just like, it's a hangout. So this is fascinating to me. So that implies that there have been a lot of people writing stuff that has been too slice of life-y. And I'm curious, like, why? Is it like a generational thing where like a certain cohort enjoys a slice of life kind of story?

32:56I wonder. Because I don't recall like this being a thing. I've never seen that as a note. Yeah, yeah, exactly. I have a feeling probably a lot of like stuff that's geared towards younger people tends to be you know like 20 somethings hanging out and maybe that's a nice way to say nothing's happening I think maybe they should look at a little movie called Go where things happened you know Slice of Life I mean you could argue that After Hours is a Slice of Life movie but it's tense stuff happens it's not just like yeah there were but I will say there were some slice of life-y kind of, I mean, like, Reality Bites was sort of slice of life-y back in the day.

33:37And the attraction of the movie was, look, it seems legitimate for people your age, right? Yeah, Fast Times, Fast Times, was actually quite slice of life-y. That's true. That's true. But listen, like, you know, comedies on television, like, you know, Friends. Sitcoms are a slice of life. Everybody loves Raymond. Slice of life. Yeah, sitcoms are just, yeah, because it's just the situation happens that week. That's all. It's the same. but there have been slice of life movies that are good I guess maybe the problem is it's a pretty narrow target to hit you know your Cameron Crowe yeah I could see you hitting that but Indies tend to go more towards the slice of life where it's just like they can and sometimes that can drift into self-indulgent or boring and that's a nice I suppose nice way of saying this was bad yeah and you have one thing here as studios speak yeah so Aline's assistant gave me this one because they tend to go out with very female centered projects and they will get the note back that the studios are looking for more mail entry points, which means - I love this as a term.

34:39Incredible. I need to talk to my wife about the mail entry point. This is the worst place. I just talked about heated rivalry, which was full of mail entry points. That's right. By the way, ever since you talked about heated rivalry, I've just been, it's one of those things where you buy a car and then you see that car. Oh, yeah. It's been everywhere. Everywhere. On all the conglomeration sites I go to with news, it's like, and there's like this specific thing of why women are obsessed, like straight women are obsessed with this show. And so I started reading about it at, but you were the first to mention those male entry points.

35:13I snuck in there because it was about to blow up as a meme. Well, listen, gay culture is always right there in front of everything. And male entry points on that show, yes, apparently very important, but they're important for all men. It's not just gay men, straight men, we're all looking for entry points. This is the most horrible phrase possible for what it actually is intended to mean, which is, Drew, that we want more male characters so that men will watch. Just say that male entry points, like you're taking something that's already a little bit and making it so much more, just say like, yeah, you know, we - More dudes.

35:53We want our stuff to appeal to both genders equally. This feels a little lopsided. And that's fine. That's a perfectly fine thing to say because audiences have demographics. Male entry points? Oh, yeah. It also sort of feels like Netflix thinking about like, what are we going to put on the tile on Netflix as you're scrolling through it? Because as a gay man, like my tiles on Netflix look entirely different than your tiles. Just because they're always like, if there's like one hot guy in the show, if it's like the 19th character, that's who will show up on my tile. I actually have to look and see.

36:26Do you want to see what shows up on my... because I don't watch Netflix that often. So I'm going to it right now. We can share screens and see. I rarely see Netflix on my computer. So let's see if it actually pulls up right. Okay. So let's see. All right. This is fascinating. Actually, I have cool tiles. I'll share the screen here. Excited. Yeah. So this is actually like a... That feels pretty normal. Yeah. It's an interesting... Yeah. It's very norm core. So like, but listen, like your Schitt's Creek has Annie as the lead character rather than. Oh, so they do stuff like that. Even that. Oh, interesting.

37:06Interesting. Okay. So any situation where you're not seeing. Got it. Maybe the main star, but sort of a supporting person. Right. Is interesting. Because they're like, you'll like this pretty lady. Yeah. Oh, that's interesting. Okay. But like, it is a, I mean, this is not a bad collection. I don't understand. I mean, well, they've got Man vs. Baby with Rowan Atkinson. I guess I would probably like that. They probably would like these things. Maybe I should watch more of these things. All right, so that was mine. So let's take a look at yours. All right, let me share my screen here. Your collection of hot guys.

37:39Oh, this is not that different from - It's not that different. We have the same tile for The Diplomat. And for Man on the Inside. And Nobody Wants This. And Wednesday. Yeah. You have The Baking Show. Oh, but your Frankenstein tile is different. Yeah. So your Frankenstein tile, they're like, I think there's some hot guys in the extras here. Absolutely. Mine just had the monster. You have Rowan Atkinson also, but you have K-pop Demon Hunters. Yeah, I got to say, it's not... It's actually, it's not radically different. It's very, very similar. Yeah. It's very similar. Nothing is showing up here, but there have definitely been times where it's like, well, that's absurd that they're showing me that as the tile for this movie that that person is barely in.

38:19Right, right. But no, there's nothing that I've been scrolling through here that says like, oh, well, this is clearly just hot men. Yes. So what have we learned in our analysis of our discussion of stock phrases in Hollywood? Like, why do we have them? What good do they serve? Well, they are illuminating about our business because I think in other businesses, people are far more curt and direct because we have a lot of personalities opportunities and because it is a little bit of a, I don't want to date you now, but if you get hot next year, I might want to date you then. Everybody is kind of shining everybody on and nobody wants to say no, no, no.

39:03They just want to be, you know, careful. Yeah. We're a freelance business. And so you're constantly like looking for your next job, looking for the next thing. You're trying to, you're constantly dating. And so you don't want to preclude any opportunities. You're trying to maintain relationships while also getting and stuff done. There's a guy who is a partner at a prominent production company that will not be named. And there was something that I had pitched them many years ago. Oh no, I'm sorry. I hadn't pitched them. It was a script I'd written that I didn't even know they got. And this guy loved it, but wasn't right for us, but loved it.

39:43Years later, there was something I was doing that he wanted. And he was like, and remember, I love that script. It was like the one that you didn't give me any money for. Like, I don't know if that's, but that's kind of the thing is like, everyone's always hedging, hedging their bets. Nobody wants to be mean to anybody. You might, that person could be your boss tomorrow. That's how Hollywood works. So everyone's careful, which can be frustrating at times. Yeah. because sometimes you just want the truth. Yeah, it's not the extreme cliche of Japanese culture, which they will never tell you no. It's not that at all.

40:23Right. But you do kind of have to learn what the things really mean. There's an idiomatic quality to it. And so if you are coming into this from a foreign language or you're neurodivergent, you may have a bit of a learning curve figuring out like what's actually really happening here. You may need to ask some people like, wait, what does that really mean? Because you could make wrong assumptions. Yes, absolutely. And that's a great point about neurodivergence because Hollywood has a lot of not neurodivergent people. And particularly in the area of producers and executives, those people often have outstanding social skills.

40:57They are really sharp and instinctive. They are slippery. Yeah. And they're also sometimes really good at managing up. And so you see like, how does that person have their job? Because like they seem actually terrible at everything I see them do. They're really good at managing their bosses and sort of like understanding what their bosses want to hear and they can deliver that. Yes, and that is, you know, there is, I've always said, like one of the great unheralded skills in Hollywood is the skill of not being fired. And there are people that I think literally their only skill is they know how to not get fired.

41:27Yeah. And they're still there. It is a thing. And so if you aren't somebody that's particularly well attuned to subtleties and all those things, then yes, you can be very quickly confused by or outclassed by these people in these meetings, which, you know, I'm thinking of one screenwriter we both know in particular who's incredible, amazing, a legend, and so, so on the spectrum. And I have seen him in meetings. Absolutely, I mean, like, I'm cringing. I'm like, oh my, I just want to go over there and help because he's just, he does not have meeting skills at all, at all. And so that's the case where you're going to need to find reps and other trusted people who can actually help you interpret and sort of really understand what's going on.

42:12Versus me at my point in my career, when I get on a phone call with my reps or even just emails with my reps, I can be very honest about like, that felt like a past, that's this. I'm ahead of even where they're at because I just know sort of like how things fit together. I know that this project feels great right now and it's going to get really bumpy in about a month when this thing happens. I know we're not hearing back from this because of these other things. And that just comes with time and experience. You will get better at it over time, no question. All right, let's talk about some numbers.

42:43So I was listening to a podcast called Search Engine, which, Greg, you don't listen to podcasts, but Search Engine is a really fun podcast that explores different topics. And a fun thing they do for their premium subscribers is they do an annual meeting, kind of like how you have a shareholders annual meeting and they just sort of talk through this stuff. So they have a Zoom and they have a Q &A, but they sort of make a presentation about like how the year went, how things are going. Maybe in a future year, we'll do that. But I thought on the episode today, we might talk through some of the numbers behind Script Notes.

43:11Oh, good. Both the podcast and the book because I'm a big believer in transparency and letting people sort of see how stuff actually works. Craig, we just passed 15 million downloads all time for Script Notes. Wow. Which is absurd. That's crazy. That's crazy. 15 years. It took us a long time. But still, that's insane. 15 million downloads. Wow. 1.6 million downloads in 2025. Wow. We averaged 25 ,000 to 30 ,000 listeners per episode. And of those, between 2 ,000 and 3 ,000 are premium members who are paying money. So that's information that I didn't know. I don't think that's a lot compared to these big podcasts and everything.

43:51No. But it's just a lot in an absolute sense. I remember many, many years ago, we were trying to understand our numbers. And it was like, you know, we're Bon Jovi of podcasts. We're like, we're filling a stadium. And like, that's kind of true, but it's also - It's a small arena. It's a small arena. Yeah, it's an arena. But you know what? Madison Square Garden, right? Like, I think you got 30 ,000 people. You can fill MSG. It's pretty good. It's important to remember. Yeah. A lot of people listening to it. That's good. It reminds me to say fewer stupid things. Yeah. Yeah. Our most listened episode of the year was 673, Structure and How to Enjoy a Movie.

44:26Okay. which was just a craft episode, which is great. I like that stuff. Our all-time highest episode is the one with Christopher Nolan. Of course. Which was only about double the typical numbers of, so it wasn't like a giant spike outside of everything else. We have 4 ,500 premium subscribers. Those are the people who are paying us. Thank you to all of those people. That's awesome. Which is great. Yes. And January is always our biggest month for premium subscribers, so thank you again for people who do it. Oh, like because it's a Christmas gift. It's a Christmas gift to themselves or other people bought it for them, which is awesome.

44:58Yeah. Craig, you'll remember that I think last year we were sort of harping on people like, don't do monthly, do annually because it just saves you so much money. And so we bumped up the monthlies to sort of nudge people to do the annuals and they did, which is great. Great. So everyone knows, we zero out the budget every year. We're not a nonprofit technically, but we're just a corporation that deliberately does not want to make any money. We're an LLC. We're a for-profit company that hates profit. That's what it is. And at some point, we could probably do like a B Corporation where like we're not...

45:29I mean, we could convert to like a 501c3 kind of thing, right? Yeah, we talked about that with like the... The lawyers. The lawyer people. And it's like the amount of paperwork involved to do that is just... We don't receive a lot of tax deductible stuff. We don't. It's more that we just give it away when we hit the end of the year. So before we started recording, we talked about sort of how we're giving away money that's left over at the end of the year. So, you know, we're going to be supporting PayUp Hollywood and their annual survey. and also Entertainment Community Fund, which we've often supported over the years.

45:58They help out with basically everyone in the entertainment industry, not just Hollywood, but also Broadway and other artists, musicians who need help. So this last year, of course, we had the fires and they were involved in helping people recover from the fires. It's great. Everyone throughout. And so I've actually toured their buildings here in Hollywood. They have low-income housing for artists and it's a great organization. Yeah, this makes me feel good. And I do want people to know, because when we say 4 ,500 premium subscribers, they are paying us. But of course, just so people understand, we use that money to pay for our staff and to make the show.

46:34But when there is money left over, and there is, then we donate it to good causes. Yeah, which is nice. Yeah. We also had a book this year. So our book, we hit the USA Today bestsellers chart, which is certainly not a given. Okay, but I do love how we hit it, though. It's perfect. Yeah, which is... So it is not the top 10. No, no, no. So USA Today lists the top 150 titles each week. And we came in at? 149. Boom. 149, baby. Suck it, 150. And so the USA Today list is basically all books. So kids books. Yes. And because it's December, a ton of Christmas books are on that thing. Yes. So we came in above the most recent Harry Potter Christmas book.

47:16Excited about that. Yeah. We came in below the D &D Player's Handbook, which felt so wonderful and so appropriate and correct. Never want to overdo that. One of the other big titles of the week that we came out was Olivia Nozzi, the journalist. Oh, yes. A book about American Conta, which was the RFK thing. RFK Jr. stuff. And we beat her. Oh, really? Yeah. She sold like 1 ,200 copies and we sold 3 ,129 copies our opening week. Oh, well. We crushed that book. So it's a good reminder that like, just because something's in the news doesn't mean it's actually selling any books. Listen, this book business is tough, but I always felt this about the book that we've done here is the kind of thing that just will sort of hopefully be an evergreen and it just sort of, you know, over time people.

48:06And not because we want to make money, because we don't. It's because I think it's helpful. I think the book will help people. I do. I think it will. So of the 3 ,129, the vast majority are the hardcovers, 2 ,400 of those. 300 e-books, 350 audio books. These are just the North American numbers. It'll be a long time before we hear the UK numbers and sort of the other places that we've sold. But it's a great start. And so, you were on the email chain with the publishers. They're happy with the start of this. It's not like the runaway greatest hit bestseller of all times. It was not going to be. But it's a super strong launch for this book.

48:42We're on a track to earn back our advance at some point, around 13 ,000 copies sold will be earned back the money that they already paid us. But Drew, we have some books that they've sent us that are currently under your desk. And I want to make a pitch for what to do with those books because obviously we want people to buy books for themselves, which is great. But there's also probably a lot of school libraries, community libraries that also need books who don't have the money to buy these books. And so if you are a person who runs a local library a school library probably junior high high school or I don't think a grade school library is going to be appropriate for our book write to Drew ask at johnaugust.com let us know what your library is provide some proof that you actually are this person who is responsible for obtaining books to these libraries and we'll see if we can send you one of these books that we have here in the office because I honestly feel like if somebody takes the time to pretend to be a library I think they've earned a book that's kind of cool yeah And we can send them to U.S.

49:45libraries because of tariffs and customs and everything else. It's going to be crazy if we try to send this overseas. But for stuff here in the United States, we can send them to libraries. Because this is a book that I would have gotten out of my school library if I've been there. Of course. Cool. Craig, any feelings about the numbers? Any surprises? Anything that you're still sorting through? No, I don't know anything about the book business. So I don't know what any of this means. I do think eventually we'll earn our advance back. Yeah, we will. which is just, you know, otherwise I'll feel bad.

50:15Which is great, which is really rare, honestly, for a book to earn its advance back. Then why do they make, then I don't know. Here's the math behind things. And I think this is the general stuff. I'm pretty sure our contract is similar. So there's the list price of the book. And so that it's like$32 for the scripted book. Of that list price, we get$3.20. We get 10 % of the first 5 ,000 copies. I see. The next 5 ,000 copies we get at 12%. Okay. After that, we get at 15%. Okay. And so it's that$3.20 that we're earning on that story now that has to pay back our advance. That's the recoupable part.

50:48Okay, so they're going to make money. The publisher is still making money. They're making money. They're making money. Got it. And the bookstores are making money too. Yes, good. Then I'm happy. I just want everybody to be happy. And an interesting thing about our book, it was something like 50 % of our sales were Amazon, but a lot of them were not Amazon, which I think is also great too. Yes. Just people buying through other places, including local bookstores. So we're excited about that. Great. If you still want a signed copy, there's a place you can order called Premier. Drew, help me out here.

51:17Yeah, Premier Collectibles. And I can put the link in the show notes. So Premier Collectibles has ones that Craig and I signed. But if you're in Los Angeles, you can also just go to Larchmont. And Chevalier's books has a few left that we signed on the day of our live show. So they're there if you want signed copies from me and Craig. Yeah. Let's answer some questions. Okay. Let's start with this first one about video podcasts. Keeping an ear out writes, my question's about the explosion of video podcasts. I heard that this terminology took off because studios wanted to make videos without signing contracts with IATSE.

51:53Is that true? More largely, what's going on with the guilds in podcasting? Do any guilds cover digital content and for what kind of labor? So a couple of things. First off, there's now a term called audio podcast because we always thought of podcasts, well, of course it's audio and then a video podcast is a separate thing, but now you actually have to distinguish it. So currently Script Notes is an audio podcast. We may do some video stuff down the road, but you look at some of these podcasts with video, video podcasts, and they're not that different than a lot of talk shows would be or a lot of other sort of broadcast shows.

52:28Now Netflix is buying some of the Ringer shows and moving them over to Netflix. So video podcasts are in this interesting space where it's kind of like just TV. And so why shouldn't it have the same kind of rules as TV? So I can tell you that some of this stuff is already being covered by the guilds. And so the Pod Save America podcasts are covered by the Writers Guild East. And whenever there's a new market, you've got to kind of figure out how are we going to handle it or treat it? Because you don't want it sort of come in with a heavy hammer and smash everything down before there's even a viable economic model.

53:00But you also don't want it to mutate into this thing that replaces what you're actually really doing or that existing programs get reclassified as being video podcasts rather than talk shows or things where we already have appendix A protections for. So we're going to sort of see what comes in this space. Yeah, I'm not sure what's going on with IATSE here. I mean, that union is just, I don't quite understand how they go about organizing and doing things. But the WGA, for instance, in this case, they have an organizing department And the point of the organizing department is to go to podcasts that are prominent.

53:37And I think somebody said once, you know, the Writers Guild looks to represent anyone who writes things that move on a screen. And this moves on a screen. So let's organize these shows. And we can create contracts. Like the Writers Guild is not about coming in and saying, yeah, so you have a podcast and you employ a writer and you have to sign the same terms that we sign with Apple and Paramount. Or Jimmy Fallon Show, yeah. We have the ability to create separate agreements. We do. We also have an agreement with news writers. We have an agreement with daytime writers and all that. So I think, yes, this is something that the Writers Guild could certainly do.

54:25And IATSE can absolutely shut stuff down if they want. I don't know if you can get around IATSE. At some point, they'll come for you. And when they come, they do have a hammer. A big, big hammer. And nobody wants to mess with that. Really, you look at a show like Last Week Tonight, John Oliver's show, which is terrific and great. It has a big writing staff and a big production staff. And they're able to create an amazing show every week. You compare it to some of the video podcasts, which are also creating a show every week. and they may not be quite to the same scale, but they do similar things.

54:59And so this question of like, well, shouldn't they be treated kind of the same is correct. And also the business model behind it is different. That's why you need to make a separate way of thinking about the deal. Yeah, we look at the delivery system compared to the work itself. Like, is this being delivered through television? Is it being delivered through theatrical? Is it being delivered through the internet? Is it being delivered through... So everything can get its own thing where the guild is not ignorant of the differences. I think in a case like this, this is a good area for the, I don't know what the guild's organizing department has been doing lately, but this would be an interesting spot to go.

55:36So this is the thing that the guild's organizing department is going to be focusing on. And the East already sort of started. We also talked about verticals, you know, a few episodes ago. And that's another thing, which is like the guilds are now looking at sort of how we're treating those. And so WGA is, SAG is, thinking about how are we handling this thing because clearly we can't just apply normal TV terms to it because there's not enough money there for that to actually make sense. But you want to have some protections. You want to have ways that this area can grow, but also that people can make a living at it.

56:05Yeah. Let's answer one more question from Nicole. I have a couple projects that my reps are reluctant to send out anywhere because I created each of them with another person. Their argument is that they're trying to sell me as an individual, and if I want to partner with someone, then they need to be able to sell us as a true writing partnership with our own joint samples and shared career track, and I need to commit to that forever. This isn't really something I'm interested in, and my partners on these projects aren't either. I'm not doing this willy-nilly. In one instance, my TV concept is about a person with a disability, so it felt important that I develop it with a friend with a disability who's also a TV writer with credits.

56:41Are my reps right, and it's not worth trying to sell projects as a one-off partnership? Am I never allowed to work with my friends? Is there something I can do to make these one-off partnerships more appealing to my reps or to execs? And what's the best way to proceed here? Yeah. I think your reps are right. I think your reps are right. Yeah. I mean, look, these things aren't dead. If you don't want to have your career work as a team and you want a solo career or the ability to join up with anyone at any time, you need to create your own career first. If you sell something as yourself, it goes well.

57:18You can always go back to the people that have paid you and said, by the way, I've written a script to this other person, take a look at it, and they will. Okay, but first, you got to kind of get going as yourself. And I'm guessing based on this question that you're not necessarily at that place yet. Yeah. And so Nicole already has reps, which is great. And it's my, I'm reading this letter saying if they signed you as an individual and now they're like, they're trying, like you have this thing you wrote with somebody else. And like, I don't know what to do with this because we've been trying to sell you as an individual.

57:50And now you take this thing out, it just becomes weird and difficult. And I get it. Like, remember, like, reps want to be able to sell you to people and then give a consistent story about, like, this is what she writes. This is the kind of things she's for. This is the kind of shows you're trying to staff her on. And it's confusing if they're now trying to sell a thing which is written with somebody else. And so... Because then you are going to want to sell something by yourself. And people will ask, well, we don't know. ooh, what if Nicole's good by herself? It could have been the other one. And it's the same with writing samples.

58:25If they read this thing that you guys wrote together, they're like, but did she really write it? Exactly. Craig and I both know writing teams who split apart, and they need to start writing something separately that is just their work so people can read it as just their work. Absolutely. All right, let's do our One Cool Things. My One Cool Thing is a substack written by the artist Charlie XCX. I don't care. I love that. Exactly. Greg, I'm impressed you know Charlie XCX. How dare you? I am so sorry. I mean, I barely, like what I just did is pretty much the sum total of my Charlie XCX. So Charlie XCX of Brat, she did the music for the upcoming Weathering Heights.

59:04Brat Summer. Brat Summer. Smart artist. So she has a sub-stack, which is just her writing about the things that are on her mind. And I just feel like more famous people kind of should do it because it's like, it's a chance to serve to have an unfiltered, like if this is exactly what I think, I don't have to go through a journalist to put it out there. So yes, it could be a blog. I mean, the Substack is just a common format for this kind of newsletter. But I just, I dig her for doing it. I think it's a smart approach for this because it's just an unfiltered, this is what I think about, that one we'll link to is the death of cool.

59:40And it's like her opinion on how much she sort of values cool in a way that is felt a little, I don't know, she's ambivalent about it, but also willing to sort of acknowledge that like, yeah, I really care about being cool. And so I really like that she's actually just taking the form and just writing in it. I mean, it's blogging, right? Yeah, you and I both started as bloggers. It's like a very early 2000s thing that people are doing now. Like, this is a new thing. This is a new thing? No, it is not. It is an old thing, but this is very bloggy. I'm looking at it. It's like the blog is back, basically.

1:00:16The blog is back. Which is good. It means... It's not a visual medium. Right. It's not... It's words. It's just words. Thank God. Give her credit. She gets stringed together words that communicate what she wants to say, which is nice and, I don't know, but it's more of us reading things versus just scrolling Instagram. I'll take it. Yes. Complete thoughts with nuanced arguments. Yeah. Twitter just killed blogs. It just killed it. And now it's back because Twitter died. and I'm glad to realize yes yes Dead Bird Dead Bird alright well that's a good one that's a good one what do you got in first Craig?

1:00:52oh baby I see the trailer here and I'm excited so I didn't know about it so okay so at the at the Game Awards which were held just a few days ago the Game Awards are an interesting award ceremony because it's like I would say you know 50 % awards 50 % trailers and announcements So it's very much, it's like if the Oscars weren't run by the Academy, but rather just by all the studios. It's really, it's, and that's, the thing is, that's why it's an awesome award show. Because really you're like, it's like the Super Bowl where it's like, okay, the game's great, but show me the ads. And there was a trailer for the new game coming from Larian Studios.

1:01:40Larian Studios, which made our beloved Baldur's Gate 3. Yeah. They had a prior franchise to Baldur's Gate 3 called Divinity. And in fact, Baldur's Gate 3 is sort of built on the Divinity platform. And they've announced essentially what looks to be like a reboot-ish start, but not like going back to the story, a new story, but like with a different level of polish and accomplishment because of technology. And the trailer is insane. Now, it is not a gameplay trailer. It is very clearly like a very highly rendered cinematic sequence. I mean, I'm going to tell you. Yeah, it's giving Wicker Man. It's giving, yeah.

1:02:22Oh, and it goes so crazy. Like, I loved it. I loved it. And it was disturbing and beautiful and ugly and gross and amazing. And I cannot wait to play Divinity. And I suspect I'm going to have to wait for some time. And this was sort of the first time that they announced that this is what they were doing. And they're saying it's going to be bigger than Baldur's Gate 3 in terms of the amount of content, which is mind-boggling to me. Absurd. Will we ever get Grand Theft Auto or do they keep kicking the can? They'll keep kicking the can. I think they're kind of married to September 26, right? They're saying November 19, 2026.

1:03:00I think they have to hit that. They have to. Okay, right. They can't miss Christmas. They're going to. It's true, it's Christmas. They have to. Good, because it's very cool. In my mind, they are saying November 19th because they probably feel like they could absolutely be DM'd by July. I mean, like at this point. Either way, by the way, they could release it on the worst release date of the year and it doesn't matter. It doesn't matter. It will make$14 trillion. It will break the internet. It is going to break everything, including me. Yeah. You know, we should be well-rapped in terms of shooting by then.

1:03:33So you could just like, just submarine into some... I have to do quite a bit of post-production, but still, honestly, yeah. AI can do it by then. I mean, oh God, how dare you. I can hear my editors screaming at you right now. Oh my God. The best, the worst. That does look like an incredible trailer, so I'm excited to - To tuck in and enjoy it fully. Such smart people. We wanted to have the Larian folks on the show at some point to talk through the - I would love to. Storytelling of that, so we'll see if we can find it. I would love that. Time to get them on. Yeah. That is our show for this week.

1:04:08Scriptness is produced by Drew Marquardt and edited by Matthew Cilelli. Our outro this week is by Nick Moore. If you have an outro, you can send us a link to ask at johnaugust.com. That is also the place where you can send questions like the ones we answered today. You will find transcripts at johnaugust.com along with a sign-up for our weekly newsletter called Interesting, which has lots of links to things about writing. You'll find the clips and other helpful video on our YouTube. Just search for Script Notes and give us a follow. You'll also find us on Instagram at Scriptness Podcast. People have been sending through their book purchases on Instagram.

1:04:39So Drew reposts those when we see them on the stories. It's great to see, you know, the book showing up in all different places. Craig, I don't know if we've talked about how the book in the UK is a little bit narrower and embossed and shiny. Yeah. It looks nice. I mean, people in England deserve something nice. They do. They need to have their own special kind of thing. As well as Scotland, Wales, Northern Ireland. Yeah. I think I covered them all right now. All the Commonwealth countries basically get the UK version. Except Canada gets our version. We have t-shirts and hoodies and drinkware.

1:05:11You'll find those at Cotton Bureau. You'll find show notes with the links to all the things we talked about today in the email. You get each week as a premium subscriber. Thank you again to our 4 ,000 or so premium subscribers. You are superstars. Make it possible for us to do this each and every week. Get signed up to become a premium member at scriptnotes.net where you get all those back episodes and bonus segments like the one we're about to record on Difficult Collaborators. Craig, Drew, thank you so much for a fun show. Thank you, John.

1:06:01you