I’m always trying to find ways to be inspired and of course, meet cool, funny people. So, one day, I was doing some random Internet surfing from News sites to gossip sites to trying to find an old NWA video on Youtube, and I came across Aspiring TV Writer, a humorous and informative blog by Amanda P, so of course I NEEDED to interview her for girlatastartup. We met up for strong coffee and provisions at King’s Road Cafe and gossiped, interviewed, laughed, and cried. Haha. Sike. No crying involved.

So, tell the readers of “Girl at a startup” about you.
My name is Amanda P, and I’m from Clarence, a suburb outside of Buffalo. The only reason you would have ever heard of it is because Chad Michael Murray went to my high school. Anyway, when I was a teenager I wrote for a section of The Buffalo News called NeXt, which was by for teens. I focused on entertainment and human interest stories. I wrote lots of reviews of movies, CDs and concerts. I even co-wrote a feature about how everybody I knew was obsessed with the Disney Channel. In addition to Lizzie McGuire and Even Stevens, I LOVED the WB - Dawson’s Creek, Felicity, etc. I also liked Once and Again and a show called Higher Ground – Hayden Christensen’s first big role, a show about troubled teens who go to a mountain for therapy - that nobody else watched. Now I love Friday Night Lights, the Office, Ugly Betty, 30 Rock, Gossip Girl, House, Brothers & Sisters and now Greek on ABC Family. I think Greek is hilarious, yet sincere – and it’s the most realistic depiction of college I’ve ever seen on TV. The dorm rooms actually look like dorm rooms!

So, where did you go to Undergrad and tell us about the transition to LA.
I went to Ithaca College in Central New York, which was great and weird. There’s a saying there that the town is “10 square miles surrounded by reality.” It’s this super-liberal college town in the middle of rural, conservative nothingness – but it’s absolutely beautiful. Don’t tell the palm trees that I actually miss the snow sometimes.

Ithaca was great because it enabled me to major in television writing and also take classes in a variety of fields. They also have a program called ICLA where juniors and seniors can come to LA for a semester, take classes and also do internships in the Entertainment industry. I interned in development at Rogue Pictures where I read scripts, made copies, and just got a first-hand view of the process.

What was that like?
In a way Rogue didn’t really need an intern because the company was so small – but I worked for some really cool people, and actually that’s where having a connection paid off because I got my current position (working at a mid-size talent/literary agency) through one of my supervisors. So I’d say – when you do an unpaid internship, keep in mind that the connection may be really valuable even if you’re not doing that much work at the internship itself. At the same time I interned for Rogue I also worked for Red Wagon Entertainment at Sony Pictures. They kept us pretty busy, and I got to see another side of development at a place that focused on high-budget dramas, romantic comedies and family movies. After my time in LA I went back for my last semester and then I moved out here in August, and shortly after, got a job at the agency.

Being an assistant at an agency. Tell me about it! What do you your friends at home think?
I started in the mailroom, which was boring and extremely low-paying, but not as stressful as I had expected. We basically put together scripts and deliver interoffice envelopes from one box to another. That’s it, seriously. I was doing that for 3-4 months before I became a floater. In terms of telling my friends at home, it can be hard. It’s like, “So you make your bosses calls for him? What?” I try to explain it using Entourage – I used to be that guy Ari accidentally fired when he was putting papers on a desk and Ari thought he was an agent. Now I’m Lloyd.

Haha. What’s a floater?
A floater fills in for the assistants when they’re sick, so you’re the on-call person. In a way it can be harder to be a floater than a regular assistant because you have to adjust to the idiosyncrasies of a different agent every day. I was a floater for about a month before I got offered a job as an assistant, which is where I am now. Usually it’s standard to be on an agency desk for a year. Then you can go work at a studio or production company, or if you want to be an agent, you can be an assistant, then a coordinator/trainee, then an agent.

What’s a typical day like for you, Ms Assistant?
Well, I answer the phone, roll calls, submit scripts to Buyers; Studios and Production companies, submit expense reports, send out e-mails about the projects I’m working on, plan lunches/meetings for my boss and his clients. It’s all really basic administrative stuff – and of course the random funny tasks like sending cupcakes to executives to bribe them into returning calls, or getting custom t-shirts made so my boss can keep an inside joke going with his cronies.

You do a lot! So tell me about the blog, www.aspiringtvwriter.blogspot.com , which is how I found you. When did you start it and why?
I’ve been blogging since high school, except before it was Livejournal, and looking back and reading it now, I’m glad I did, but the topics were, you know, high school, about prom dresses and angsty things. I started my current blog in the hopes that it would be a way to let my friends keep up with what I’m doing with my life, but be a little more focused. I hoped it would give me a chance to talk about TV so I could keep writing, and to motivate myself and other people. I mean, if someone else can learn from my struggles - how to find a job when first moving to LA, writing a cover letter, approaching agencies and production companies, etc. – then it will have been successful. It’s just such a specialized industry, and I’m learning a lot by being here. For example, there is SO MUCH MORE competition than anyone realizes even for these assistant jobs.

Were you freaked out from all the horror stories about being a “Lloyd?”
Yes! I mean, I was an Office Production Assistant for a reality show for a short time, but it was really unsteady. And I had heard all these crazy stories about agents, long hours, people throwing things, but I got really lucky where I work because I have a cool boss. Thankfully. And I met a lot of people, my age, at work, so its like we all go through it together.

What’s the worst part about being an Assistant?
Money. It’s really low – and it’s low across the board, but honestly I know people at studios who make almost twice what I do. But maybe it is because it weeds people out. You see the low pay as an opportunity and to prove that you really do want to be here. But you really have to think of it as an investment in your career. A year at an agency is worth a few years Paing for some show or company no one’s ever heard of. Working at an agency is also a fast track to work at a great studio, production company, or becoming an Ari Gold.

What is the “Fire in your belly?”
Well, I’ve always been writing, and what interests me most is people and human relationships. I always tell people that I’m drawn to people who aren’t necessarily nice or friendly, but are good characters. (Does that mean I use people? Haha.) I was in NYC with a friend of mine, a guy who went to my college for a year and then transferred, but I’ve been one of few who kept in touch with him. He’s this bizarre, freckly gray-haired kid who steals things and gets angry easily, but I think he’s endlessly interesting. Like, he reads 300 page books about Hitler for fun. Anyway, we were eating at the “Seinfeld” diner on the Upper West Side (by the way, it’s only the Seinfeld diner on the outside) and he was twirling a French fry between his fingers and theorizing about relationships. He said, “I just want to be dazzled.” People are always the most profound when they’re not trying to be. That basically sums it up for me. I mean, most of us, we just want to be dazzled, see something different.

There was a recent NY Times article about the plethora of women studio executives and yet the lack of strong female roles especially as Summer box office rolls around. Thoughts?
I read that! And I agree with the article overall, but I DEFINITELY think it’s possible to be strong but girly. I think the criticism of Legally Blonde was a little unfair. Think about it: Elle Woods got her degree at Harvard Law, became a successful lawyer, and dumped the guy who didn’t appreciate her for her intelligence. How is that not feminist? So what if she likes getting her nails done? When I took a feminist lit class in college, my teacher once said, “I think you can wear mascara and still be a feminist,” and that’s exactly how I feel.

I think the problem is that we’ve been trained to think that stories about men are universal, but not exactly the other way around. Then again, look at the box office success of “Devil Wears Prada” and “Juno.” That makes me happy. I think we need to focus on writing strong female characters who are also flawed and real. What I’ve noticed with a lot of scripts I’ve read/have been optioned, is that the mostly male writers, have written these strong, complicated female roles, but they’re actually their own personal ideals of what a woman should be. So, she’s really hot, sassy, strong, but still shows this vulnerability that a man can fix. I hate that…but I don’t know if I have the exact solution. It’s definitely a challenge to write complicated female characters that have flaws.

I agree. What else?
I think that there’s also a huge lack of diversity in the writing rooms. Its something that everyone acknowledges, but that no one really talks about. That’s why ABC, CBS, NBC, they created “Diversity Initiatives,” so that its required to have more minority representation in the writers’ rooms. I really recommend reading BILLION DOLLAR KISS by TV writer Jeffrey Stepakoff. He has a really interesting chapter about diversity (or the lack thereof) in writers’ rooms.

Where do you hope to be in the near future?
Ideally, I want to write for TV. I love TV because it’s so open-ended, and it becomes part of your culture. When a movie premieres, a bunch of people go see it, and then fewer the next week, and fewer the next week, until (barring awards season) everybody forgets about it completely. TV Shows can go on and on, and really evolve. Also, in movies, characters are expected to undergo these big changes in 2 hours – but on TV, characters undergo these tiny changes throughout each episode, but it’s something that makes sense throughout the course of a season. I mean, when “Friends,” first started, you would never have guessed that Monica and Chandler would’ve gotten together, but then when it finally happened, it made perfect sense because that is how the characters evolved.

Do you think TV reflects the reality of America?
No. There is definitely a misrepresentation of minorities on TV. But it becomes about a blame game between studios and advertisers and networks. It’s about targeting that certain demographic. But I’m not sure how much we should be focused on the concept of reflecting “reality” in TV – in a way the reason we like TV is because it’s different than our lives.

As an aspiring TV writer, what do you think about “The Hills” and reality TV?
Reality TV is here to stay and I acknowledge that. I actually have a theory that there are two types of reality shows:

1. Shows that shed light on an existing world you didn’t know about - Project Runway, Top Chef, Dirty Jobs. These are great and interesting because they bring viewers into completely new worlds. They’re like documentaries in that way.
2. Shows that create a contrived world- The Hills, Real World, The Bachelor

I mean, if a reality show can shed light on an interesting world and bring up topics about politics or race, that’s valuable. Is a bunch of people hooking up with each other in hot tub as interesting? I don’t think so.

After the strike, has the development/pilot season gotten back to normal?
Right now, we’re in Staffing season so its really busy. The development process has changed and a lot of networks are moving towards more of a year-round pilot season, but things are getting back to normal. There are spec sales every week, but you know, there are new realities. New media is here to stay and the disconnect to TV is growing. People are obviously watching more on the Internet. But it’s going to be a few years before a new broadcast model is really figured out – and even then, it’ll probably still be changing.

What are some tips for someone who wants to get representation or a pitch meeting?
It’s hard…everybody has a different success story. Just keep writing. You can also find a crew, shoot something funny and short and put it on youtube. I have a friend who taught himself to animate and he got a pitch meeting at a Cable network. Stuff like this happens all the time. So just keep writing and creating projects. Half the battle is doing the work, and half the battle is making contacts. Keep up with writing, keep reading, and keep meeting people. The people who DON’T make it are those that didn’t give it enough time and those that didn’t try hard enough.

You’re awesome! Okay, one last thing, you’re also a volunteer! Tell us about “Write Girl” and how you got involved.
Well, I’ve always been into Community Service, it’s one of the reasons I got my scholarship at Ithaca. Our group was part of an Adopt a Highway program, and we’d walk along the side of this rural road wearing orange vests and yellow helmets picking up trash and shrieking when someone found a deal squirrel. I mean, it’s a great program – bu my friends and I were like, “Is this really using our skills to the best of our ability? We are all communications scholarships - what if we used our communication skills to volunteer?” So we created this group called Megaphone that provided media services to local nonprofits. Once I came to LA, I wanted to volunteer in that same way, so I did an online search and found WriteGirl. It’s a creative writing mentorship program for high school girls. We have mentors who meet with girls weekly as well as monthly workshops focused on different genres like screenwriting, songwriting, fiction, etc. It’s a positive program and targets underprivileged girls so they can see positive female role models and be inspired to write. We’ve had speakers such as Diablo Cody and Diane Warren. I think the girls really get a kick out of seeing these positive, successful women who’ve used their passions to get somewhere in life. It’s a great program.

I’ll have to check that out. Also, you guys are always looking for people right?
Yup. Here’s the info for Writegirl.

Amanda, so good to meet you and I’ll definitely keep reading your blog. And keep me updated with any new “Lloyd” stories. haha…