by Steve Boman
T
he Agent does indeed take his time. Weeks go by. More weeks. He says he’s pushing CBS for a deal. It goes on long enough that I start to fret. I worry he’s gonna lose the deal. The Agent doesn’t ask me what I think I should get, he just tells me that CBS’ offer was way too low. “Whatever they offered, I doubled it,” he says. “Don’t worry, Steve; it will be a good deal for you.”
Ted calls me one day and says, “Whatever [Your Agent] is doing, he’s making some people at CBS a little mad.”
I’m both heartened and nervous. Maybe he really is going to lose the deal. My Agent assures me that everything is going to be fine. He’s treating this like a sport, it seems, and he’s pushing the network just because he can.
Finally, at the end of June, there’s an agreement. The money up front is indeed nonexistent. However, if CBS decides to extend the option—by just keeping it on the table—then they’ll pay me $5,000. If they exercise the option, they owe me $15,000. If it goes to a pilot, they owe me another $20,000. And if it goes to series, I’ll get about a quarter million. If it stays on all season, it’s closer to $400,000. I also get additional pay for any writing I do for the show. And I own 3 percent of the show.
I fly back to Los Angeles. I’m meeting Ted, Curtis Hanson, and Carol Fenelon. I couldn’t be more pleased. Ted is glad to see me, and we spend the morning talking over issues. We’ve spent a lot of time emailing and talking on the phone, and he’s made one thing clear to me: I can demand to hold total power over this idea or I can share it. If I hold it to myself, there’s little chance of it going forward, he says. “You can do whatever you want, but that’s just how the world works. The chance of it going anywhere with only you and me pushing it is very slim,” he says. I’d faced the same issue with GeezerJock. Investors wanted in, but my partner Callahan and I had to give up power to get the money. It’s not ideal, but it got the magazine published. I tell Ted I’m happy to bring in the best people we can. They, of course, will get the lion’s share of the wealth if it goes forward. I’m reminded of that old saw: better to have a small piece of something than all of nothing.
Ted and I walk to lunch by the studio and eat at a nice little white tablecloth restaurant. A hamburger is $24. When we sit down, a well-dressed guy comes over and shakes Ted’s hand. It’s all smiles and warmth. Everyone seems to know Ted. When the other guy leaves, Ted turns to me and says quietly he’s an agent who’s been a real jerk in the past.
As we walk back to the studio, Ted says he almost never works with anyone new to the industry. He explains the setup: CBS would like to get Curtis Hanson involved with television production, and Curtis Hanson would like the same. Ted is the matchmaker and the talent scout. If Curtis and Carol like my idea, the three of them will continue to push it forward. Today, I’m pitching my idea to Curtis and Carol.
We talk money. Ted knows my deal. For a first-timer, he says it’s pretty impressive. He says my agent is a good one. He says the real money comes only after a few years of success, and it comes to those who own a percentage of the show. He cites a successful show, LOST, and estimates it is worth in the neighborhood of $400 million to $800 million to those who own the show. I do the math. If this class project blooms into a hit, my contract is potentially worth more than $25 million.
I roll the figure around in my head. Twenty-five million dollars. It beats working as a reporter in gritty urban areas for $35,000 a year. I try to appear cool and collected, like I’m used to contemplating multimillion-dollar payoffs. Ted, however, points out the extreme rarity of success. “Most shows fail. That’s just the way it is, so get used to it,” he says. Besides, he says, we’re still many hurdles away from even getting my idea onto the air.
But Ted is clearly having fun. At FOX, he was the guy listening to pitches, green-lighting the good ones, killing the duds. Now he’s on the other side of the fence. He’s an owner of my idea now, too, and its chief cheerleader. We walk back from lunch, talking like old college friends.
We spend so much time talking in Ted’s office, we lose track of time. Ted calls ahead and warns them we’re going to be late, and he tells me to follow him. I’m driving a low-budget rental car, and we’re driving from Studio City in the San Fernando Valley down to Curtis Hanson’s office south of Hollywood. We face a ten-mile drive through heavy traffic on the expressway. Ted is in his black BMW, and he’s driving fast. I’m thrashing my little Kia to stay on his bumper. When we hit Hollywood, there are black BMWs everywhere. I’m careful not to lose him. We’re racing through traffic, running yellow lights, and I’m thankful I’ve driven for years in congested cities. When we arrive at our destination, Ted is smiling. “That wasn’t a problem staying with me, was it?”
“Naw,” I answer. “You didn’t have to slow down just for me.”
This is way too much fun for work.
T
his is the first time I’ve had to repitch my material formally. My first meeting is with Carol Fenelon. She’s a tall, elegant woman. Today, however, her hand is painful. She’s suffering from gout apparently, and she’s waiting for a doctor to call her back.
Ted tells me the floor is mine. I start into my pitch. It’s going well and I’m right at a climactic moment when I rise out of my seat to talk about life or death events and … Carol’s assistant rings. The doctor is on the phone. Carol excuses herself.
I sit back down. Ted looks at me and smiles. “Sorry about this. But this is how the real world works,” he says. Together, we make small talk for ten minutes, sitting alone in Carol’s office.
Carol reenters. I spring back to my feet to restart my pitch at my high emotional moment … and she waves me off. She seems irritated. “I get it, just keep going,” she says. I do.
When I’m done with my material, it’s hard to know if she likes it or not. Then Curtis Hanson enters. He, too, wants to hear my series idea. He’s a thin, surprisingly tall man. His hair is wild. He’s wearing old jeans and an old shirt.
In Hollywood, everyone wears a uniform. Agents and studio executives wear suits. The creative side goes for bohemian. Hanson is very bohemian.
Hanson shakes my hand. Then I go into my pitch again. It’s a shortened version, just the high points of the series, how I see it structured, obstacles, story ideas, the potential for a long life on the network.
It’s surreal. The meeting is very serious. I’ve got one of the greatest American filmmakers and his producing partner gathered in a room listening to me with attentive expressions. Ted sits back and lets me talk. He keeps smiling though.
After an hour, the pitch meeting is done. We all stand up, shake hands, and I’m walked to the door by a young assistant, probably a recent film school graduate. The word must be out that I’m That Lucky Bastard in Film School because the assistant shoots me a dirty look as I leave.
A few hours later, Ted calls me. “They both loved you. Really. They love the idea.”
Really, I ask, even Carol? She didn’t seem to like me at all. “Oh, Carol thought you were the greatest. They’re both on board with this. Very excited.”
T
he next step is to find a show-runner. That’s the person who will, literally, run the show. In television, they’re the big dog in charge of day-to-day production. They’re almost always writers who oversee story development and shape the series.
And here’s where the rubber meets the road about my decision to give up power for the potential of greater success. Ted has explained that if I write the pilot episode, or share in the writing of it, the top tier of show-runners will likely pass. This decision gives me great pause. It’s very difficult. I know I can write one hell of a pilot—I’ve already got one sketched out, but it’s the hard reality of television. There is no easy answer or right answer. I really want to push for writing the pilot. (And at the time I’m naïve about writing credits—the person who writes the pilot gets the Created by credit, with a corresponding financial windfall if the series becomes a success.) But I keep thinking o
f my family. What would be the best for them? Going to graduate school is an exceptionally high-risk financial decision already. Who am I to hold out for even higher risks?
I tell Ted I’m willing to pass on writing the pilot script. When Ted and Curtis and Carol go fishing for show-runners, they’ll be able to dangle a great piece of bait: a developed show idea, with the pilot script a blank slate. The handoff makes me feel a bit queasy, but I think I understand the odds. And I’m still completely ignorant in the ways of television, for good and for bad. Only later do I realize the full value of writing the pilot script. It’s huge. It means money and power and prestige and control. But at this point, I’m a newbie in TV land, and I don’t realize the importance of my actions until I look back at them. The experience in the real world of Hollywood is like graduate school: the learning curve is steep, and I seem to discover important information only after the fact.
Back in Minnesota, it’s life as usual. The kids are off from school, and there are a handful of house projects that have been deferred over the past year … and I’m officially a producer under contract to CBS/Paramount Network Television. I buy a DVR so I can record television shows and watch them. I watch as much network television as possible after the kids are in bed.
Not long after I’m back, I get a call from Ted. Great news, he says, there’s a show-runner who wants in. “It all happened very quickly. She was our top pick. We heard she was interested and we had a meeting and she liked the idea a lot,” he says. She’s Carol Barbee, under contract with CBS and, until very recently, the show-runner for JERICHO. Ted says she’s leaving almost immediately for a monthlong vacation and said yes almost instantly. He’s thrilled. Barbee is extremely well regarded at the network, he says, and it gives our show a huge push forward.
From that moment onward, I swallow my pride about writing the pilot and move forward. The month of August I become a producer. I’m going to give Barbee the best possible introduction to the world that I pitched. I call dozens of people involved with transplantation. Within a few days, I have the top heart doctor at the famous Cleveland Clinic offering to open the doors to Barbee when she comes back from vacation. The surgeon, Dr. Gonzalez-Stawinski, aka “Dr. Gonzo,” is surfing in Puerto Rico when I contact him. He’s the perfect person to show Barbee the cowboy side of transplantation. He’s one of the world’s best transplant surgeons by night, a surfer by (vacation) day.
I line up tours for Barbee at the Southern California organ donor organization. I get a UCLA transplant surgeon on board. And I write a background briefing book about the real world of transplantation.
One day, Julie asks me if it’s worth the time and energy I’m putting into this. I’m still not being paid a cent for all my efforts. I won’t be paid anything until CBS orders a script, and it’s a script that I won’t be writing. She doesn’t understand any of this Hollywood stuff—it’s so foreign and mysterious compared to the very clear-eyed world of medicine. It appears to her as if I’m working on some secret brew. I’m on the phone constantly and typing up material. Is it worth it?
To keep my wife happy, I’m also landscaping the front yard between calls. One day I’m dirty from yard work, my shirt off, and I’m in the process of moving several tons of decorative stones with a shovel. During breaks, I’m tapping out emails on my BlackBerry, my first acquisition since I got back from California. A neighbor walks over, asks me how school is going. I say, “Great.” He asks me what kind of school projects I’m working on. I lean on my shovel. “Well, I’m producing a show for CBS. We hope to get it on the air next year,” I say. I know I sound like a crazy man. It’s all rather fun.
W
ith all the excitement and demands of the television show and my usual summertime duties at home, I’m giving short shrift to my duties as a codirector of a documentary. We’re supposed to start shooting as soon as fall semester starts. I’m hoping Brent can jump-start us, but he’s got other work going on the side.
I know this: I’m planning on continuing in film school. I intend to get my MFA, no matter what. If distance and having kids and a stroke and pancreatitis didn’t stop me, neither will a television show.
When Barbee returns from vacation, she goes right into meetings with the people I’ve set her up with. I’m due back in L.A. about the same time. This time Julie’s using the Suburban, and I’ve got her Pontiac—a teal-blue V8-powered rocket with leather seats, XM radio, and big, fat tires.
Another drive out to Los Angeles and thanks to my touchy pancreas I’ve sworn off caffeine, chocolate, and all liquor, beer, and wine, which makes me a dull boy. I drive through Wyoming, and it’s gorgeous as I fly down the empty roads. The car is fast, and because I stop every hour or so to get the blood pumping in my legs (no more strokes on this drive), I’m constantly repassing a small handful of cars for much of the trip.
When I’m finally back in L.A., I get together with Carol Barbee. We meet at her office. She’s very polite, very interested in the series, very smart. It’s a little awkward for me—Barbee is doing the job I’d like to have. But her résumé is a bit longer than mine: in addition to JERICHO, she’s been an executive producer on JUDGING AMY and SWINGTOWN, and she wrote for PROVIDENCE. I’m in graduate school.
She’s very interested in my experiences inside the world of transplantation. I tell her a few stories. She is intrigued at the very fact I was hired as a coordinator. I tell her about my first night on the job, when a disgruntled surgeon from another transplant center called me a “radio disc jockey” in the OR. I also tell her how less than a year later, I saved the bacon of another large transplant center when I carried a heart back to Chicago when their surgical team was too timid to fly through severe weather.
We have a good meeting, and I cross my fingers. Carol is going to be the one writing the pilot. As I drive away, I realize my baby is now in her hands.
Luckily, we seem to be blessed. CBS does indeed like Carol Barbee, and our whole team. The network orders the pilot script in what Ted says is record time. First network hurdle crossed.
During the next four months, I’m working constantly. The documentary shoots every weekend. We struggle. Being a two-headed director means we move slowly because so many decisions have to be discussed beforehand, and every mutual decision takes time. And our timing is terrible. The same month we start filming, the California Highway Patrol decides to clamp down on speeding on the road. The word spreads quickly. Bikers avoid the Angeles Crest, but the additional police presence means we’re watched constantly by the authorities. The police keep tabs on us and stop us repeatedly, asking for our permits, checking our driver’s licenses, inquiring about my Minnesota license plates. To add to our woes, the Angeles Crest Highway travels across land overseen by the National Forest Service, and the local ranger station apparently decides it doesn’t want us filming the dirty little secret of racing motorcyclists on the Crest. The station does everything it can to shut us down, to the point of asking the Highway Patrol to arrest us on sight, which they don’t do, because we’re not breaking any laws.
With all the attention focused on us, the size of our crew is a serious hindrance. We have Scott the cameraman and two producers and Brent and me and someone with the sound-boom. Instead of a stealth project, we clank into battle like Redcoats. And our footage suffers. We can’t shoot from the side of the road for fear of getting arrested. We fail to get decent footage from riders’ helmet cams. All we have is talking heads and some nice footage of the majestic mountains. Our street bike documentary footage has all the visual drama of MY DINNER WITH ANDRE. We keep hearing from instructors and classmates that they’re not getting a sense of the excitement and danger the bikers keep talking about.
Many weeks into filming, and exasperated by our failures, I ask Scott the cameraman to ride on the back of one of the bikes to get a point-of-view shot during a group ride by some hard-core bikers. Scott is game. He likes shooting high-octane sports footage of skiers and boarders. I gear him up with a full-fac
e helmet and my Red Wing boots and heavy jacket. I attach a short rope to the camera and secure it to Scott’s waist so he can’t drop the USC-owned equipment. I explain to the crew of bikers that I don’t want any shenanigans, just mellow riding. As the bikers rev their engines and prepare to give Scott a taste of the Crest, Scott gives me the thumbs-up. I’m not overly worried. I spent my teen years riding passenger on my brother’s motorcycles.
The police see us, as usual, and ignore the cameraman riding on a passenger seat. The biker he’s with is excellent, and a commercial truck driver as well.
Later that morning, Scott returns. He didn’t fall off or drop the camera, and no one crashed. We watch the footage. It’s fantastic. We see bikes in formation, riders flitting between shadows, through the canyons, past blurry trees. We show it in class, and our instructors love it. That’s what we’re talking about! they say. Everyone in class is excited. But a few days later, the head of the USC cinematography department picks up gossip of the shoot and she blows a gasket. She says we broke school rules about camera operator safety. She wants my head on a platter. Then she ups the ante. She wants to kick me out of school. She wants to kick Brent out of school. She wants to kick Scott out of school. For long weeks, I spend time in discussions with Brent and Scott, both of whom are also caught in the web. The head of the cinematography department never meets with us, never finds out the details; she just hands down her edict. It’s a big pile of academic manure. I plead guilty and apologize and explain exactly what we did but to no avail.
My antagonist has a reputation on campus as a bitter tyrant, as a man hater. She spent several years on a Marxist collaborative in her younger days, something she’s proud of, and she apparently has a temperament well suited to be a commissar of … something. Luckily, the drama ends when my documentary instructors, loyal to a one, wait her out. When she leaves for a trip to Africa, they vote to end the matter. The three of us will receive a lower grade, and we’ll lecture incoming students about the importance of following the USC safety guidelines. And for the record, I will state clearly here: Follow the USC Safety Guidelines! Do Not Do Stupid Things Like Asking a Cameraman to Shoot as a Passenger on a Motorcycle! (I later had the honor of speaking to all new USC film students and explaining how I got into hot water and warned them to, yes, Follow the USC Safety Guidelines!)