Ran my first 5k this morning along the Venice Beach Boardwalk [Quick tangent: for someone who grew up in New Jersey, the term 'boardwalk' means that there are actual wooden boards underneath your feet when walking on it, not cement or asphalt. It should be the Venice Beach Walkway or Venice Beach Really Wide Sidewalk. I'm just saying I can't call my studio apartment a villa so why does a stretch of pavement get to be called a boardwalk?]. It was a lot of fun, came in at 30:19 which isn't like Usain Bolt timing but for my first 3.1 mile run I'll take it. Like the announcer said, "All you first-timers look at it like this: whatever time you get is a personal record." Just set myself a new PR.
Didn't beat my sister, Megan, though. She got a supposed 28.22 (but she thinks the timers were wrong and she did it faster). I'll have to work on that for next time - and here's something cool about the 5k I did today: I talked and ran with Kimberly Locke who was 2nd runner-up to Ruben Studdard in the 2003 American Idol. Pretty kickass, right? She was real cool and me and my buddy RJ made plans with her to run again soon, maybe she'll join us for the next event.
But as I'm sure you've figured out by now, whatever my blog posts are about, I try to apply the theme to some aspect of my life and the current situation I find myself in. Well today's was easy.
See, I remember a few months ago talking to my mom about the fact that it was so good to be in film school because I'm learning so much about something I find so fascinating, but at the same time there was a big part of me that was ready to get into the business of television/film and hit the ground running. The most appropriate analogy for how I've felt recently is like a horse at the starting gate waiting for the gun... I'm pumped, excited, passionate about what I'm going after and ready to tackle it.
That's why this internship at ABC Studios has been so great - it's been an amazing outlet for all of the energy I've been storing up for when I'd get that chance to show this industry what I have to offer. My bosses have been encouraging and supportive but also very appreciative of the hard work I do when I'm in the office. Well this past week it all paid off.
On Tuesday I was asked to greet some producers who were coming up to our floor for a meeting. I stood by the elevators and one by one I'd introduce myself and then walk them to the conference room. I got people waters and then waited for the meeting to end so I could clean up. Apparently I left a good impression on those producers because one of them, Christopher Moynihan, called my boss later that day and asked if I was available to work with him. Starting next week I'm going to be working as Chris' assistant which is an excellent opportunity because Chris has created a new pilot for ABC called Man Up that he'll be both writing for and starring in. It's going to give me an insider's view of how to create, write and even act in your own show and I can't wait to get started.
Chris is a really cool guy, too. He's been in a few things like a show that ran on NBC called 100 Questions, and he starred in the Christopher Guest movies A Mighty Wind and For Your Consideration. It was cool as hell when he called me up and we talked like it was no big deal - afterwards I hung up the phone and was like... that guy's in movies! Crazy.
I also wanted to explain the whole pilot thing more. You probably already know this, but a pilot is the very first episode that a television series shoots. This time of year, LA gets a little hectic because it's known as "pilot season". For the next two months, all television production companies (like ABC Studios, HBO, Fox, NBC Universal, J.J. Abrams' Bad Robot, Reveille, etc.) will put together pilot packages which include a shot pilot as well as all of the information regarding the financial aspect of putting the show on television. These packages get shipped off to network/cable execs who then decide if they'd like to place the shows on their channels. What that means for me is that I have a guaranteed job until mid to late April, and at that point ABC Studios will shop Man Up around to the networks.
[In case you were wondering... ABC Studios is not ABC Network (the channel you watch at home). ABC Studios is a production company that will, of course, shop any and all shows they create to ABC Network at first, but sometimes ABC Network will pass and allow ABC Studios to shop the show around to other networks. For example, Criminal Minds is produced by ABC Studios but airs on CBS. Another famous one that people often don't understand is Modern Family - it's made by 20th Century Fox Television but airs on CBS. Believe it or not, I even corrected Modern Family's Wikipedia page because someone mistakenly wrote that it was produced by ABC - it isn't. And I'm a dork.]
So a guaranteed job until mid-April... What does that mean for me? It means I have to spend the next 3 and a half months making the best impression I can on Chris as well as the rest of the crew so that I can make connections and find the next job. It's possible, trust me - it's what's gotten me this far! And hopefully Man Up gets picked up by ABC or another network so I can work with the crew for the remainder of the season, but regardless, I have to remember to work hard and learn everything I can throughout the process. Another positive is the strong foundation I've created at ABC Studios that I can rely on for great connections and resources.
Back to the theme: hitting the pavement running. To keep the momentum going I'll soon be signing up for a February 10k and I'm also going to start working finally, and I am pumped about both.
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