How to be a Person w/Matt & Oren - Just Shoot It 517

Hey, everyone. Welcome to the 517th episode of Just Shoot It, a podcast about filmmaking, screenwriting and directing. This episode is brought to you by patrons Leaps and Sesk Machine. I'm Waren Kaplan.

0:01

And I'm Matt Enlow. Talk about great Patreon names, huh? That's excellent. Today it's a Matt and Oren episode. It's been a while since we've done one and people, you know, when we see people at the shows, people reach out, they say, hey, I actually like those episodes. And so I thought, well, heck, let's do one real quick. We've got a slew of awesome guests coming up, a couple of themed months coming up, some parties coming. There's a lot coming. So I thought let's go ahead and get. Let's sneak in a quick Matt Norrin episode, because I think it'll be a minute before we have one.

0:11

Yeah, you're gonna learn some great stuff in upcoming episodes. So we wanted to make one episode where you learn nothing.

0:42

Yeah, I haven't looked inside my navel for a while, so let's do a navel gazing episode.

0:48

I am in San Diego right now for a job, and as I was driving down here, I called you and I said, what should we talk about? And then unusual orange style, it devolved into me complaining about things. But for once, I really appreciated you kind of, you know, joined along. Joined.

0:54

Yeah.

1:12

I mean, I don't know if I would call it complain, but you commiserated.

1:12

Yeah, yeah. You know, I. Look, I. I'm. I've got my share share complaints for sure. I think. Yeah, Yeah. I think that we are always. It's always in ebbs and flows. I think. I just. You like to complain more than I do.

1:16

Well, yeah, it's a culture. Your response usually is shut up.

1:29

It's not that you do. You do complain when things are good and you complain when things are bad.

1:33

Yeah. When else would you complain?

1:40

Yeah, things are in between. Yeah. So I. I think we're both. We're both are just thoughtful about where we are on our career years, what's going on, and I think that it's. I think it's probably pretty relatable right now. I. You know, some people are working, some people aren't working. It's the beginning of March, so, Oren, you're on a couple things. I've got stuff lined up, but right now I feel like I'm kind of treading water. And so we. I think we've referred to this as website season. Historically, when you Work on your website when you. This is the time to work on your website. Yeah, I have thought about redoing it, in fact, Actually, it's on my list. But I think we were just kind of going through all of the other aspects of the things that we do when we're feeling a little untethered. Why we're feeling untethered. How to focus in on what's important and work through the things that are going to make us feel better as people and also career wise.

1:44

Yeah. And remembering that, like, we don't have to always be filmmaking and sometimes going away from that is helpful, you know, in all aspects of life, not just balancing who we are, like in our mental health, but also our career and it. And it's funny you said, like, yeah, we're talking about what's going on in our careers, but I kind of feel like it's like less like a moment of like, where we are in our careers and just like, literally a moment of what's going on this week, you know? Sure.

2:36

I think I might be right.

3:04

It's like more of like a micro than a macro thing. I'm like, you know, this pitch is weird and this job is weird and this thing is weird.

3:04

Yeah. You know, I think you're making me realize. I think we were both, like, pretty busy for a while. Like, the. The holiday slowed down, for sure, but you're busy with, like, family stuff and just holiday stuff. But, like, I think we both had been on, like, a street where both of us were pretty, pretty busy, you know, and you're. You're literally on two jobs right now. And I have something. Was just on something, and now I'm headed into something else in a couple weeks, so.

3:13

Yeah, but I should be on that.

3:39

But. But it still makes you crazy. Do you know what I mean? It still makes you, like, you're still. I think we're, as we talk about, workaholics.

3:41

Yeah, perhaps. Anyhow, we hope you enjoy this episode. If you don't, that's totally fine. Matt cares. Fine with it. But if you.

3:48

Yeah.

3:55

What can you do?

3:56

Consider hopping on over to patreon.com Jess Pod. It's a place where you can throw us a buck or two. It does keep the show going.

3:57

You know, we.

4:04

I just was checking on it the other day. It is a little bit lower than it was.

4:06

It's been waning.

4:11

Yeah, it's been waning. So if you're on the fence. Yeah. Do us a favor, hop on over and help us out because we've got a new show that we just recorded a pilot episode of.

4:12

Video show.

4:21

A new video show that's in the works. Things are growing. We've got another party planned. I've got it on the calendar for late spring. Looking like May is probably the one. We'll do it.

4:22

Yeah, I don't think. Schedule that, puppy.

4:34

The reason that we haven't scheduled it, Oren, is because it is the culmination of two themed months of programming. And.

4:38

And I'm not sending the emails to the people that I need to send

4:46

emails to.50 of those emails have not been sent.

4:50

Yes. Okay. It's my fault.

4:52

The reason why, if you want to be put on blast on the podcast, but that's because they're. The guests are going to be really good. And also, frankly, we've got a lot of really awesome indie filmmakers coming up. Too soon. Soon too. It's like it's festival season and so people's movies are coming out and they're promoting a lot of really cool stuff. I am. I. I think the next three or four months of this show are going to be pretty awesome.

4:54

I'm pretty stoked. Yeah, it'll.

5:17

It'll get worse again. Don't worry. But for the short term, it's gonna be great.

5:18

So you're on that contest. Just shoot a button.

5:22

That's right.

5:25

That's right. Someone just sent me a.

5:26

And then we're gonna have a party.

5:27

Yeah, someone just sent me a DM on Instagram saying, hey, Oren, I'm hoping you can give me some advice if you've got a minute. Damn it. This person better be a patron.

5:29

They better be a patron.

5:36

I'm going to be giving out advice.

5:37

I'm going to ask the group, and then we're going to get into the episode. The. The two themed months are going to be really especially exciting for commercial people. Like people who are interested in commercials more than indie film or any of the other stuff that we cover. Should we do a panel or should we just make it a hangout? Is the question. Because we'll have had eight awesome guests from the commercial world that we could ask

5:39

to come be on a panel.

6:07

To come do a panel. Yeah. And then you hang out with them afterwards. Or we could just invite them to the party and maybe they'll come, maybe they won't come.

6:09

Yeah. I can't remember when Jacob, my old manager, came to be on a panel, or I don't think he was even on the panel. He just came to an event we had together. Yeah, he did.

6:16

While we were. We said hi to him, then we were doing the show, and you said, that's Jacob, my manager. And he had said on the show that if you email him, he will look at your materials. And we only recently did. We stopped getting emails from people who were like, hey, can you put us in contact with Jacob?

6:27

Yeah.

6:48

So this was much.

6:48

Years and years. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Okay, cool. Well, enjoy the episode. We'll talk to y' all later. Let's say if a thousand people get. I'm sure it'll Way more than a thousand. If a thousand people at Warner Brothers lose their jobs, what percentage of them do you think stay in the film business?

6:49

It's going to be way more than that. It's going to be tens of thousands of people. They're looking to cut billions of dollars. So it is going to be way more than a thousand people, first of all.

7:09

But, like, when that stuff happens, there obviously there aren't enough jobs for, like, development people and assistants and office, you know, and, like, business affairs and lawyers and stuff in the rest of Hollywood. It's not like everyone's like, netflix is like, ooh, thank God we have all these development people available.

7:21

I think what happens, everyone there were sort. There are the types of jobs that I think there's some buoyancy. I think business affairs actually is one. And, like, maybe you aren't doing deals for Warner Brothers anymore, but, like, lawyers are relatively employable, though we have a glut of lawyers as well. Right. I think our generation, lots of smart kids, were like, well, I would like to be rich.

7:39

Yeah.

8:04

But I think when I was at Comedy Central, I remember looking around and seeing, you know, an office full of people about my age. You know, like, there were assistants and there were people who were kind of like junior executives and that type. Right. And then the closer to 40 you got, the fewer people there were. And then the people north of 40, I could name on one or two hands, and they were VPs and president. So, like, very clearly the base of development is young people. And it gets. The older you get, the fewer jobs there are. And so I kind of was like, wait, I. I think you get. You turn, like, 35, maybe 40, and like, either you become a VP or president of something or you move to a different industry. I was seeing that happening without the consolidation of streamers. You know, like, when. When the industry was healthy. You were. I saw that happen and was one of the reasons why I was like, I don't think. Think I'm gonna Stick around. Like, I think I'm gonna go direct, which is age proof, obviously.

8:05

Yeah, yeah. I mean, it is. I do think about that. I think about like, how old I am and like when I'm pitching against other directors and if my age comes into play at all, you know, like if you're pitching someone that's 10 years younger than you versus 10 years older than you, you know, I, I'm sure there's some. It affects things in a way. Like if you're pitching on someone that's 10 years older than you, but no one's ever heard of anything they've made, then you probably have the advantage, you know, but if you're in the other way around, you probably have disadvantage. Like you might, might as well get the eager young buck.

9:09

Sure, sure. Look, I think that experience counts for something, for sure. But also sensibilities and taste and cultural references, you know?

9:40

Yeah.

9:49

Like, certainly there are jokes that I will laugh at that skew older and there are jokes that I'll laugh at that skew younger. But like, there's certainly stuff that like, you just, you know, you just don't get it because, you know, you didn't hear that song a thousand times in high school the way a person 10 years younger did. You know what I mean? So, yeah, I think there, there's definitely.

9:49

The only reason I had kids was so then I can learn how to be funny for young people again.

10:11

Yeah, I know you're, you're being facetious, but there is something really funny about like, like you can make a K pop demon hunter joke to like a group of dads and it will slay.

10:17

Right?

10:27

I, I, like, I said like frozen. I was like, hey, I'm, I'm entering my napalm era at a birthday party the other day and it crushed. If you said that to a, a, a 35 year old creative director, they would just like slowly blink at you and like nervously chuckle because they don't get it for sure.

10:27

Yeah, totally. Well, anyhow. Yeah, I hope. I don't know. I, I don't even know what to think. I was, yes. I'm like, I guess a little more focused on like the world war that's going on.

10:45

Yeah. You're thinking about that and not. But no, but it is.

10:55

Yeah, it is like hard to be like, oh, hey, my. Literally my parents are in a bomb shelter and I'm on a call explaining to someone why I love their toilet paper brand so much, you know, and I'm, it's because I'm full Of shit.

10:59

Yeah.

11:15

Anyhow, but I think that is kind of like the topic a little bit that we were going to talk about is like, how. How to remain human while you're, you know, doing what we all want to do, which is like, be filmmakers, be simultaneously artists and craftspeople and business people. And. And seeing that the people that are really successful at it are the ones that are just going nonstop, you know, I mean. I mean, now you have a kid, you have a house, you have a wife, you have like, all those. That trio of life milestones. And I'm sure sometimes you go on Instagram and you're like, hey, look at this person that has not any of those things. And they're just traveling all over the world, shooting a lot of incredibly awesome things that you can never do. And part of you is like, jealous, right?

11:15

Yeah, I. I'm not. I'm not jealous of people who are traveling because I still travel. You still travel. You were in Thailand, Know what I mean? Like, yeah.

12:06

I mean, have you had pad Thai? Any. Go on.

12:15

Love it. But, you know, it's less that. To me, I'm more jealous of people who don't need the money as much. Right. Like, yeah, I'm. I'm just spending. Yeah. Twice as much money as I used to spend. And so, like, you know, I had a. You're drinking whole milk now that I'm drinking whole milk.

12:18

It's twice as expensive as 2%.

12:37

No, no, but. But seriously, right? Like, just between a mortgage and. And I had a cheap apartment that I loved. Now I've got a mortgage that's twice as much money. And. And then I have daycare. So those two things right there just make my life expensive enough to feel frustrated that I'm. Even when I'm having a great year, I still feel behind financially in a way that I used to feel like, oh, yeah, great. No problem. Let's go out to dinner all the time. Who cares? You know, and now I'm just much more conscientious of all that stuff. Even though I'm succeeding like that. That's the thing that. That bothers me. And it's the thing that depresses me about Hollywood in general because, you know, like, we know a lot of, like, successful writers and showrunners, and in the 90s, those people would be rich. They'd be like, house in Bel Air rich. And now they live good lives. But, like, you know, our kid. Our kids all go to the same preschool and, you know, they're the. When you're A showrunner of eight episodes of television per season. That means that you have like a modest home in Studio City and not a mansion. And I'm not saying that I want a mansion. I'm saying it's frustrating when I see friends who have, have. Are in the 1% of success who not only staffed on shows enough, like they are running small corporations for mega corporations and they still are not just

12:39

flush with high on the hog.

14:05

High on the hog, yeah, exactly.

14:07

I think.

14:08

Who's getting rich? No one.

14:10

Yeah. Well, you know, in the. Over the past month, we lost two actors that have been. That are great actors that have been around forever. James Vanderbeek and Eric Dane and both of them. And again, I. I get a lot of my news from social media, so I could be totally wrong, but from what I understood, both of them had GoFundMes for their families. And you're like, these are two incredibly famous, successful actors. One of them was McSteamy, one of them is Dawson from Dawson's Creek shows

14:12

in, in syndication, which used to mean. Yeah, you could write your own check. Yeah.

14:38

Somehow these guys and SAG and residuals and acting and how the whole industry works were not, you know, wealthy enough to just be like flush, you know, to have their whole entire family set for the rest of the time or something. You know, Like, I think the fact that these guys had GoFundMe was unexpected.

14:44

The thing is very clear though, right? It's that the residuals that you get for streaming versus the residuals you would get from syndication are wildly different. So you could have a show on Nick at night for five years and be. Be really comfortable. Or you could have the whole world watch your show and, you know, collect like a small.

15:02

Yeah.

15:25

And then need of GoFundMe.

15:25

Yeah. I mean, you know, my wife Kara, she was on Hacks, which won best ensemble, you know, like three years in a row. And then she was at the studio now that. That also won best ensemble. And she had like two lines, maybe four lines on Big Bang Theory, like eight years, like years ago. Yeah, I mean, that paid her 20 times as much as packs and these other award winning shows. You know, it's crazy how little actors get paid for being on these, like, hit, you know, premiere streaming shows. But anyway, I digress. But I think something that, that we were. One of the terms that we talked about when we were planning out what we talked about on this episode is this idea of compare and despair, which. How. How would you define it?

15:28

Yeah, I mean, you know, the person who Will love the, that I'm going to bring her up. The person who really like cemented that term for me is our, our old friend Carlin Hudson, who periodically will go off of social media. She, she like turns off Instagram because compare and despair, I think is that process that as directors we go through a lot of feeling like you're in a rut, feeling like you're not working as much as you want, or you're not as productive as you want, or as creative as you want to be, or whatever. And then you get onto Instagram and you see photos of you and me on set taking selfies with our old buddies, like, you know, New Work alert, all of those kind of updates that we do relatively innocently because the reason that we post New Work alert or whatever. I just posted something today on LinkedIn was just to, to stay top of mind, to be. To remind the people who make hiring decisions that we are in demand and quality directors. So hire us. But the flip side is that if you're feeling inadequate or frustrated, this is just salt in the wound. Right? And so to me compare and despair really is just hyper sharpened by social media, especially that style post.

16:13

Yeah, well, being a filmmaker, especially if you have one job, you're like really busy, right? You're all in. You're like, you know, casting locations, shot, list all the things, screwing up, figuring things out. If you have two jobs, you are just like the most overwhelmed person in the world. You like get mad at people when they ask you if you want to have coffee with them. Coffee. When do you. I can't even see my kids, you know, like, so the crazy thing is, is if a director is like working on three different things in a month, they think in their world that everyone, that there's an unlimited amount of work, you know.

17:30

Well, well, we're also not on social media as much, right. So. So we're not seeing whether we're not reminded of the, the outside world in quite the same way.

18:04

Right.

18:14

And so we're banking all of those photos to post later when things get dry, you know.

18:15

Yeah, I mean, I think that's our

18:20

way to do it.

18:21

But. Yeah, but I think because of that, like if you have two, if you're in the midst of two different jobs in your mind, you might go on Instagram or something and say like, oh my goodness, it's such a busy time. Great to see productions back in la, you know. And then Matt and Oren, who are like almost chosen for five of these different jobs, but just didn't quite something didn't line up. We're like, there's no work at all, you know, like, so I think it's the number that moves the needle in one direction or the other direction is so small. Like literally one job or two jobs are. What's the difference between someone that's like insanely busy and someone that's insanely stressed out about not being busy? So it's, I think that's, that's part of it. I think with actors it's different. With actors it's like, oh, I had five auditions this week. I had zero auditions. Like, the numbers are if you have one audition every two weeks, it's not the same busyness as a director that has one job every two weeks, you know?

18:22

Sure.

19:16

Or even one opportunity to pitch every two weeks. So it's. Yeah, I think that is troubling because when you go on social media and you see someone that's like hopping from job to job, you're like, oh, wow, they're. I must be doing something wrong personally and I need to re reinspect my life because I'm not hopping from job to job, you know, And I think

19:16

that I've talked about this on the show, but the thing that I maybe very high in the list of things I wish I could improve about myself is the way I feel about myself and my, just my general mood when I'm not working versus working. Too much of my self worth is tied up in whether or not I'm booked. Like, I, I wish I could just be happy when I'm not booked. Do you know what I mean? Like, I think you say to people who have normal jobs, like, oh, I didn't work much this last week and they're like, wouldn't that be great to just have some time off? What did you do? Did you read a book? Did you go for a walk? You know, the answer is no. I emailed people, you know, I like, wrote, I like brainstormed an article for LBB Online. All of which is work, right? Like, it's just not the, the shooting part of work. But, but if I could figure out how to enjoy myself during that downtime, I'd have the best life in the world, you know.

19:38

But this for a pitch. If you're not working, don't go on Instagram. If you are working, go on Instagram.

20:36

But that's when you need to go on Instagram is the problem. Right? That's the catch 22 of it all. Like, you know, I shoot, I, I post some photos from when I'm working, like on the day when I'm working just to keep things going. But also like the, the, the video essay about how, oh, I actually rotoscoped this actor out and retimed them to make this thing work. And you. It's an, it's invisible. But this actually really is a VFX video. Can't you believe it? All those process videos, right. That, that book work, that stuff is all during downtime. Right. Ideally I'm too busy to be doing

20:42

it, you know, but I do think that that's like the, the tweak in thinking that is be helpful at least for me sometimes when I'm like, oh, I would love to post like that process video or I would love to make a short film or I would love to like learn how to use how to vibe code or whatever. And just having a list ready of things that I would really love to do if I had like two or three days open.

21:17

Sure.

21:39

And, and trying to find pauses in work is like exciting opportunities to do that stuff.

21:40

Yeah, yeah, absolutely. And I think that, you know, really a lot of what we're talking about is that the job of being, being a working director is only partially pitching and shooting and editing all the stuff that we talk about most of the time. But a large part of it also is networking, outreach, reconnecting with people, keeping relationships warm. All of that stuff is all part of it as well. But you know, it kind of brings up the other thing that we were talking about in brainstorming this. I, I went and saw with a little bit of downtime, thanks to some downtime, I went and saw the movie Nirvana, the Band, the show, the Movie, which is, stars and is directed by this guy, Matt Johnson, who's kind of a gonzo mockumentarian documentarian. That's maybe a little derivative of what he's, of what he's saying. But you know, kind of a really unique Canadian voice who I should mention, you know, is a huge advocate for, for public funded arts like his show, his web series, Nirvana. The man of the show would not be profitable in a capital, purely capitalist sense. It is cult, it is niche, it is very cheap. But I think he, he subsists off of the Canadian government paying for his show, basically. Anyway, after that I kind of was poking around on letterboxd, reading reviews and all of that stuff and saw he had a, he had a post where he talks a little bit about how influential this documentary comedian, the Jerry Seinfeld documentary comedian was on him in that it was a thing. It was a piece of art that really explicitly said how not only is it okay, but it can be fulfilling for an act or for a creative to give themselves over to the idea of their art being. Being a fulfilling part of their lives. That workaholism isn't necessarily bad if it's nourishing, if it. If, you know, being obsessed with the thing that you love to do isn't necessarily bad. And I think that you and I struggle with the idea of being a workaholic right now. Matt Johnson I don't think has kids, which I think is a really different layer to it all. But I. I love to work. Kind of all I've ever wanted to do. I've never told you.

21:46

I mean, there's that old saying. Right.

24:06

I had a real problem with.

24:08

Sorry.

24:09

I had a real problem with my. One of my best friends in high school. Like, we had like a. A big fight about how he was like, you only call me to like shoot videos and, and make the website for our production company and, you know, as sophomores in high school. And I was like, I hear you,

24:10

but that's, that's the, that's all I want to do. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I mean, there's that saying, if you love what you do, then it's not work or something. Something to that effect.

24:29

Yeah, yeah. You never work a day in your life or whatever.

24:38

Yeah, yeah, exactly. So, yeah, I, I think there's that. I mean, I don't know. I personally, I don't think I'm over. I feel like I used to be a workaholic. I don't think I'm a workaholic now.

24:41

That's an insane thing to say. You're 100% a workaholic.

24:51

Yeah, I guess I'm a workaholic with boundaries. Maybe. Like from 7am to 7, 8:52aM Every morning I'm with my kids. How could a workaholic be with their kids at any time of day? Yeah. In the evening I'm hanging out with my. You know, like I. Yes, I. I do.

24:54

You and I text about this podcast during those times. All the time.

25:10

Yeah. I mean, that's fun though. It's not worth.

25:14

Sure, sure. That. That's exactly what I'm saying. That's exactly what I'm saying. The podcast where we talk about how much we like to work or complain about not working.

25:17

Yeah. Well, I was thinking, you know, I, I think we already talked about this, how like Spike Jones and that commercial directors panel is saying how he Only he directs like two things a year. Something, two commercials a year. And how he basically only directs a commercial if it's really awesome, you know, and people come to him and it's like he really connects with it. And a lot of those directors do. And it's because they, their side projects or their other projects are more, you know, like they're only working on things that are fulfilling to them. And I think that's kind of like my next goal in life is to be like, yeah, this script isn't good, or this project. It doesn't sound like, you know, we, you and I will say like, well, this isn't going to go on the site. This isn't going to go on the reel. You know, it's a job you're taking, but it's not for, it's not really going to be a showpiece. And I think someone like Spike Jones only takes jobs that might turn into show pieces.

25:24

You know, I, I can't speak for Spike, but if it were me, like, the reason that I will take work, there's two reasons that I, I would turn down work. Or rather there's two conditions where I have to be fine with it and then I can turn down work. One, work needs to be coming to me regularly. Like there, if there, if I don't feel like there's a scarcity of opportunities. Right. If you're Spike Jones, you're, you know, you kind of at the top of literally every creative director's list. Right. Like, I, I, I can't think of a single person who wouldn't lo love it would be the, the height of their, their career to work with that guy. Right. So he's not lacking opportunity.

26:16

Right.

26:55

And then the other thing is financial freedom.

26:56

Right.

26:58

So if you've made enough money that you're not worried about making more money and you have plenty of opportunities, then it's very easy to say no to projects. Right. But if you need money and the main way that you make money is by doing these projects and we're still fighting to get them, it's a lot harder to turn things down.

26:59

Yeah. I mean, unless those side projects are also finding, you know, like, I think for Spike, if he's working on a feature, he's a guy that's like Oscar winning feature screenwriter, then it's worth, you know, you can say, like, hey, I'm gonna invest my time into this other project that might make me money as well.

27:20

And this is, it's so interesting that you're, you're saying this Run. Because I feel like you'd kind of been singing a different tune for the last four or five years.

27:38

But, like, I have, but, yeah. Gone.

27:45

Yeah. I. I think the reason that I am still so gung ho on features is manyfold. One, it's nourishing, but two, I think that it is the reason why you end up at the top of people's lists. Right. And then this is all informed by my time when I was at the Director's bureau, when people like Mike Mills and Roman Coppola were making their features, and people were like, oh, well, I want to work with them even more because I love their movie. So, like, a different era for sure,

27:50

but definitely a different. We have a friend that had, like, a pretty successful movie last year that just texted both of us and said, hey, I need to shoot some commercials. What should I do? You know? And I don't know the fact that that movie existed is gonna help this. I mean, it definitely. It certainly won't hurt. And if maybe a commercial comes along that's like the exact same genre as the movie that they made, it's helpful. But I think it's a different.

28:18

I think. I mean, look, I just lost a job last week on Friday. We were recording on Monday a couple. So not many days ago, to a director who. The top thing on his website is a movie that I've seen. So. But you're right, it's not like, you know, you know, look, if I. If you're winning Oscars, it's different than if you're like, hey, I won South Spy or something like that, Right? Absolutely.

28:41

Plain south by.

29:02

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Or play Delphi even worse. Yeah. Which is still so hard to do. But I think if it makes me happy and it's. It's the. If I'm trying my hardest to do the best work that I can with the reel that I've got and the opportunities and connections that I have, if I'm striving as hard as I can to make those as cool as I possibly can, to create more work and to be happy, then the other thing you can be doing in parallel are these side projects.

29:03

Right.

29:31

And so that's. That's part of the. The reason why I think the features are worthwhile.

29:32

Right. And I mean, I guess I feel like the reason I'm changing my tune is. And. And. But I don't think I'm really changing my tune is because for. To me, a feature. It's just really hard for me to see the connection between making your you know, $250,000 feature. Feature and that leading to income, you know.

29:37

But sure.

29:55

But I do see earlier today, I'm

29:56

not making a 250, 000 feature though, for, for the record.

29:59

Right, okay, 500. Whatever your sub one million dollar fee. Like, I'm not talking about you specifically, I'm saying just in general you. But I do, I can see when we talked earlier today, you told me an idea you had for like a side business which was more about the experience of doing it than about the money it makes. But I, but to me, that has a clearer avenue for at least paying for itself and paying for the time that you put into it. And to me, that, that, that's like, how cool is it when you are on a call talking to someone about directing their film and they bring up a restaurant and you're like, oh, by the way I own a restaurant, you know, or by the way, I fix bikes, you know, or by the way, I'm a carpenter, you know, like, like those other things like instantly make you more interesting. And you know, every creative director collects sneakers or whatever. You know, there's like these kind of cliche things people do, but there's things that not only are like, can be a fun distraction from the complain, the compare and despair of our career, but can also ultimately make you a more interesting person and potentially even like help pay for some of the stuff, you know, like if you are a fine artist or a photographer or you love freaking fixing people's sprinkler systems, whatever, you know, that brings you joy. Like you, I do love weaning.

30:02

I do love fixing sprinkler systems. That's true. Yeah.

31:21

Yeah. I told you my biggest satisfaction this week was putting together a shed in my backyard. Like there's ways to do things that are outside of like our filmmaking that are valuable. And I think, I mean, I did write, I think an LBB article about, or maybe it was Shots magazine. I forget what, where it was about kind of using my family for pitches like that. My play time with my family can sometimes turn into like a useful way to make myself an interesting person when I'm trying to, you know, new relationships. Anyhow, like, I don't know. I think what we're saying is it's good to have other unrelated things going on.

31:25

Yeah. And so I think, I think the reason that we've kind of started to talk about this, the reason that we started even on this topic in the first place, when we were brainstorming it was that the flip side of all of this is that I feel relatively untethered. Right. Like, last week I wrote some new spots for a producer. I pitched on a couple things. I'm fundraising a feature. I've got this side project that I'm kind of getting excited about that's really fun. And, you know, creatively, all these things that I've dreamt of, kind of thinking about learning and tweaking and, you know, working on, and all of a sudden I'm like, looking at schematics and writing story trees and all this kind of side project stuff. And it's so hard to know what to prioritize on any given day because you're jumping from an investment meeting to writing Sprint to picking up your kids, and you kind of, at the end of the day, you're like, doing.

32:02

You run into, like, another dad, and they're like, so what are you up to? And you're like,

32:57

like, literally.

33:04

Yeah, everything. A bunch of stuff. It's. Yeah. And it's hard to. Like you said when you have one big project, you're shooting your feature, it's like, oh, yeah, well, I'm preparing. We're going to go into production in a month, you know, but when you have 50 things, it's like you feel

33:05

like you have nothing or even six, you know? Yeah. So do you or do you have any ways of coping with those challenges?

33:18

Well, you know me, I like to talk. So usually I'll be like, okay, well, I have six things going on. And by like, the third thing, their eyes glaze over and they decide to never ask me what I'm up to ever again. But.

33:27

So sorry, I want to. I want to press in down that a little bit. How does, How. How does talking help about it? Talking about it help?

33:39

Well, I guess I just. It makes me feel like I have a lot of stuff going on, even if I'm just telling someone else about the things I have going on. I also, you know, I. I'm pretty good, I think, at having, like, a network of other directors, people that do what we do, you know, that I can call and I can just like, rant to. And like today I was complaining to Carlin about something. She was. I'm working on a treatment. I was like, hey, can I, like, just talk to you about this. These scripts for a minute? And I started complaining to her about some job I pitched on. You know, I told you about it, too. And. And I was like, I know, I know it's. It like, I know I shouldn't complain.

33:45

I know.

34:20

I Had, like, a really good year. And I work a lot and, like, a lot of people have it way worse than me, but, you know, I just like. And she's like, dude, you can complain to me. Like, I'm a. I'm the person you can complain to about that. And it made me feel really good. And, you know, just having, like, a network of people that are in your same position or maybe they don't want to hear about, like, your idea for your feature that you just switched from your other feature that you know is. But. But that they'll understand it at least, you know, and so I think to me that, like, that's one way I cope about it is just like calling friends and talking to them about it. But. Yeah, I mean, I. That my other way is, like, kind of mean. But, like, I try to think of the. All the. Excuse me. All the people I know that have nothing going on, and I'm like, hey, at least I'm not them.

34:21

It could be that guy. That's. Yeah, I think that might be a version of gratitude.

35:03

Yeah. It's reminding yourself to not compare.

35:08

Yeah, yeah, yeah, I like that. Okay.

35:12

You know, I think compare and thrive. If you compare people.

35:14

Sure.

35:20

Yeah.

35:20

If you're. If competition drives you, then may. Maybe that's helpful. Yeah.

35:20

You're like, I haven't seen Tom Morris post on Instagram for a couple days. He must be really struggling.

35:25

I think he's on something right now. But. But yeah, I think to me, time blocking has been the main thing because I'm juggling so much. But. But the other big thing, and stop me if I've said this on the podcast before, but, you know, I love this. This productivity guru, Ali Abdaal, and he. He talks about, like, Steve Jobs was famous for figuring out the signal to noise ratio in his life. Right. Have you essentially, like, Steve Jobs could. Could very clearly pinpoint the important thing in his life and he would ignore everything else. So the one thing he needed to do every single day in order to actually invent the imac or the iPad or the whatever, he did that and everything else, you know, he would get to. Right. But asking yourself, what's the thing? What's the main thing I want to do to, like, if I had to pick one thing, what's my real goal? What do I want to get that done today? Sometimes it'll be two or three things, but, like, if you just can be concise with that, then, you know, you're pushing the. The ball up the hill in some

35:30

way and you do that?

36:36

Yeah, yeah, yeah. Every morning before my kid wakes up, I sit in my, with my notebook and write those things. And I tried to do like a brain dump at the beginning of the week of like, here's everything I want to get done. And then you can kind of time block it to be like, okay, well I'm not going to get this done till Thursday, but I know I have an hour set aside for it. And then inevitably when something comes up, you know, where someone tries to schedule over top of that, you can still move it. It's on the calendar, so potentially it'll get done. I think I'm still too optimistic about it, honestly. Like, you know, it's like two riding sprints and lunch with my wife and then, you know, 15 minutes of gardening and you know, because it's nice to get a recharge all that like. And then your day is just like wall to wall stacked. You have to add buffer time in for sure because gear shifts are real and you know, it takes, it just takes a little bit of time to get into something and things always take longer than you want them to. So. But, but when you, when you time block and you know, you drop your kid off at nine and you pick them up at five and you have a client meeting and notes due, your day just, just disappears really quickly. And so it forces you to be selective on what you actually want to get done.

36:37

Yeah, I've learned to accept that I do not get anything, anything substantial done during the day. I just, from 7am to 8 8pm Like I will not accomplish, I'll have meetings, which I don't think are very valuable, you know, thing to spend my time doing. It's like during the day I'm just taking in data, you know, that's like all I'm doing. And then at night after the kids are asleep, that's when I'm like creating things. That's when I'm writing stuff, that's when I'm brainstorming. That's when I'm like putting together decks or treatments or edits or anything.

37:49

So it's 9:30 right now. 9:30pm how much later are you? You have a treatment you have to write tonight?

38:21

I have a treatment that I have to write. Yeah, I'll do well. So. So I'm in San Diego right now. I have a shoot here on Wednesday, the day after tomorrow. And my wife was like.

38:27

And I get a burrito with French fries in it.

38:37

Oh, I should, you know, there's like, there's a Place called like Robertos or Roberto's. And it's like a little chain here that I've seen like in a couple different places that I'm very tempted to go, but.

38:39

But there's a luchador themed taco place that will give you a breakfast burrito with a fried egg in it and one Comic Con that saved my life. It's great. Yeah.

38:50

Anyway, but I. My wife was like, I'm technically only supposed to come here tomorrow for the tech scout. Like, leave really early in the morning, but I have like a couple pre production meetings. I have all this stuff that I was like. She was like, why don't you just go a day early and then you'll have like all day in San Diego and you'll have like, no distractions and you can work on your treatment. And I. I just. I'm completely incapable of like, just sitting in my hotel room at like 2pm or 3pm and just writing the treatment. It's like daylight outside. I don't know. So what I did today is I just started walking around La Jolla, I walked to the beach and I just had my phone out with the notes app and I very.

38:59

That's work though. Yeah.

39:36

Yeah. Well, I very proactively did not have my AirPods in. I. Like, no music. No. And no podcast. No.

39:37

Just thinking.

39:44

Yeah, yeah, and not just thinking, but also, like, with very little pressure of how much I want to accomplish. Like, I knew that I wanted to write like the intro and I wanted to write about the tone and I wanted. I have like a little brainstorming section in my notes where I just wanted to throw out random ideas that come to mind. But I also was very much, like, trying to look up and like, look at people and look at the world and look at the vehicles and the stores and the signs and the architecture around. Yeah, yeah. And. And to see. To try to do that in a way where I know I'm thinking about this project in my mind while I'm.

39:45

You're selling toilet paper. But.

40:20

Yeah, yeah, yeah, but. But I'm trying to like, open up my brain to the world in some way. And this is kind of. That the last thing on our list that I want to talk about is like, idea generation, which is. I find it much easier to come up with ideas. I mean, everyone says this, but when I'm not trying to come up with ideas.

40:22

Sure.

40:40

But it's really hard to come up with ideas when I'm listening to a podcast, you know, but it's easier to come up with ideas. If I'm just driving or if I'm. That's why. That's why the shower is, like, so powerful for so many people, right?

40:41

Is because I've been thinking about this LBB online article for two weeks and I came up with it today. In the shower.

40:55

Yeah. Because it's like you're you. You. It's so easy nowadays to just have, like, YouTube videos pumping into your eyeballs. You can be on a phone call with someone for hours. You can be listening to a podcast. You can be reading the news. You know, you could be hanging out with someone. It's like that, like, time of just, like, letting your brain do its thing is, like, so rare. And so I feel like my treatment is. I haven't quite cracked it yet, but I've, like, laid a lot of foundation out just walking around. I've, like, already have the whole outline written out. I have, like, my list of words that I'm gonna probably, when we hang up, I'm gonna do like. I've done like a preliminary image search, but I'm gonna do, like, more. There's like a spokesperson here, so I'm probably just gonna like, watch spokesperson things. There's like an element that has to do with plumbing in this campaign. I'm gonna just, like, watch plumbing videos. I'm gonna. I was actually gonna go on Google Maps and just like, look for different plumbing offices and stuff, like plumbing companies, plumber companies, and just click on their Google reports pages and see if I can see photos of what they look like to just give us ideas, you know, I think it's like I'm trying to put connect all these things we've talked about together. And I don't know if it's quite working, but I think there is something about you releasing, worrying about filmmaking that helps make you a better filmmaker.

41:01

Yeah, absolutely. That's why I've been gardening so much. You know, it makes me think of. I love bringing up David lynch, but a clip of him just went viral again of him just complaining. Just like, he's just shouting at people. Like, I think he's shouting at his producers. He's like. He's chain smoking and he's like, I had two fucking days to shoot that scene. You know, this is. I can't work like this. I'm not going to do it anymore. He's just shouting about the schedule and his. His complaint is that he does not have the time to just get dreamy. He know. He just feels like, oh, I'm skewed into this schedule where I just have to shoot the shots that we have planned and that's all I can do. And I can't play right. And I'm doing an impression and he's got the hair and the cigarette and the, you know, the black jacket and everything. But, but if the most famous filmmaking, transcendental meditation, you know, art film director who also somehow has like Hollywood movie stars and, and hit films, doesn't have time in his schedule to like go dreamy, then what are we supposed to do, you know?

42:21

Yeah. Except, you know, he has like 10 times as much time as we knew. No matter how much time you have, you think it's not enough.

43:24

Yeah, yeah, yeah, absolutely, absolutely. But I guess what I'm, what I'm getting at is like the David lynch making a movie is to, to be weird and to go dreamy and to be spontaneous and to find that stuff in a commercial, obviously you have to run it by so many stakeholders that like that kind of woo woo sort of stuff just doesn't, doesn't make sense. Right. But dang, you'd hope that somebody would be able to get to do it.

43:31

Did you know that Twin Peaks was originally a movie and that nobody wanted to buy it, so they like remade it into a TV show?

43:56

Makes sense. And then it became a movie again?

44:02

Yeah, yeah, well, yeah, well, I, I'm curious what other people think about how they balance their life, what they think about imposter syndrome, comparing despair. Let us know, Let us know your thoughts. Tony, text me, tell me what you think of this episode. He's been giving me a nice play by play every week about doesn't like the episode. Can I just totally change the subject real quick because I just got a text from a producer I'm working with on a, on a different shoot. And she. I told the costumer, the costume stylist. I'm just curious. I never knew this. I told the stylist that I really liked what most of the actors wore to their auditions and not that they were really kind of helped define their characters. And I think a big part of why they booked the job was because of what they wore and to have them bring their, their casting, you know, their casting outfit. It is a SAG job. And now the producer just texted me. She said we have to pay the actors to bring their audition outfits even if we don't use them. So I just wanted to confirm who are the priorities to bring their audition outfits.

44:04

Yeah, there's also like, I did know that and also like if you bring More than a certain amount of that, like, pieces, like garments, you get award.

45:02

Yeah, but I didn't know that. Like. Like, if you. Yeah, I don't know. I guess it's like you're gonna have to show up dressed as something, right?

45:11

Sure. Is it specifically that you're asking them to show up in the stuff that they wore or.

45:17

Yeah, I like, hey, I liked what you wore in your audition. Maybe bring that as an option. But I probably wouldn't have said that if I thought that we would have to pay for it. I thought it was like, hey, okay, you have a cool tie and a cool shirt.

45:23

Sure. Oh, this jacket. I know this fits you perfectly the way that you like, like, bring that along. Yeah, yeah.

45:36

How much does that cost? Is that like $5 or is it like $50?

45:43

I think it's like $50.

45:46

Okay. Well, now, I guess now I do have some work to do tonight. I have to go through all the actors we cast and figure out thumbs

45:50

up on this sweater. Thumbs down on those jeans.

45:56

Yeah. Yeah. Well, it's funny because I'm like, I kind of was just trying to use their audition outfits as inspiration for the stylist. But, you know, like. Yeah, sometimes when, you know, you know, the giant budget here and when they're getting all their clothes at Target and they came in wearing, like, you know, nice J. Crew sweater or whatever, that J. Crew sweater is probably going to look better on them.

45:58

Or just like that the cut works. Or, you know, knowing the spot a little bit. Like, not everything makes sense to source from a regular retailer. Whether that's Target or H and M or, you know, whatever. Zara or. Or Nordstrom Rack. Right. Like, you know, sometimes you want stuff that's a little bit Zanier, so. Well, good luck to you. Oren, do you have a few more minutes to endorse with us?

46:20

Yeah, of course.

46:44

Unpaid endorsements. Orin, you're in front of your laptop right now. Want you to go to open up your Gmail.

46:45

Okay. Open.

46:53

Now when. When you open up Gmail, you're going to see the URL kind of gives you that kind of. That chain of whatever. It's mail@google.com mail u0/ hashtag inbox. Yeah, I want you to change from hashtag inbox to hashtag S U B.

46:54

S U B sub.

47:13

Yep.

47:15

Okay. Subscriptions.

47:16

Yeah, that is every single subscription that you are subscribed to right now. If you scroll through. So these are all of the different newsletters and marketing emails that you are subscribed to in One clean list that shows you how many emails you've received from them recently and has the unsubscribe button right there. Wow.

47:17

Yep. It's cool.

47:38

That's pretty good.

47:40

That's pretty good.

47:41

As a person who's obsessed with their email and, and keeping it as clean as possible, you know, the, the spam emails or even emails you, you did sign up for, they can be pretty oppressive. So if you go to mail.google.com mail basically when you sign into your email, change it from hashtag inbox to hashtag sub and you will immediately see everything you were subscribed to. And easily you can, you can easily subscribe to all of it. Awesome.

47:42

That's. And that's again, that's pretty good. Yeah.

48:09

Yeah.

48:12

Oren level.

48:12

Yeah.

48:13

Tech tip. Is that all you got?

48:14

I'm gonna save the other ones for later. Yeah, yeah.

48:16

Okay. Well, I'm gonna have two crappy ones then. One is, one is a new flavor of chips from Trader Joe's. It's. God, can I find it? Just wanna make sure I'm saying the right thing. Yeah. So have you, have you tried these Thai style yellow curry flavored potato chips? No.

48:18

That sounds my like my shit though. I, I like like the Thai style Doritos I freaking love so I'm sure I didn't.

48:37

I'm not familiar with the Thai style Doritos. Are they literally mean by the Doritos folks?

48:44

Yeah, it's the Dorito. It's the purple bags. Oftentimes you will see them in the variety packs. So they're like spicy with like a little lime. They're really good. They're really good.

48:48

That's awesome. Yeah. Now these are the Thai style yellow curry flavored potato chips. They are limited time, so when I tasted them I was like, I can tell that these are going to be a limited time item because they're really interesting and there's a difference between like interesting and, and a regular.

48:58

Yeah.

49:17

But if you are into yellow curry, these chips taste exactly like yellow curry, like Thai curry. So I don't know, check them out. It's a fun adventure. What I would recommend is don't tell people what the flavor is and just hand somebody a chip and see if they can place it. Because it is, it is a good, it's a pretty good fit for the flavor.

49:18

That's what I do with my daughter all the time. I'll be like, can you taste what spices are in this? And her palette's pretty great and pretty impressed. Yeah. She can identify A lot of good stuff and it makes it, you know, she's pretty good about trying things, but. But that curiosity of factor I think is part of it. Like, oh, it's a challenge. Like, you know, this is an opportunity for me to tell you if that's cardamom or not, you know.

49:38

Yeah, that's cool. My other recommendation, endorsement. It's stupid because everyone already likes it, but I really enjoyed A Night of the Seven Kingdoms. It's the Game of Thrones midqual. I don't know, what do you call a series that fits between the series?

50:00

Call it a prequel, I guess, right?

50:18

Yeah, it's a prequel. In the Game of Thrones, it's a sequel to House of the Dragon. It has characters.

50:20

Could I watch it without having watched House of the Dragon?

50:25

You absolutely could. I actually come to think of it, don't really know of much of a connection between House of the Dragon and that show. The only thing is I don't think this is like a big spoiler, but there are no dragons in the first season and they kind of talk about dragons as non existent and they're 100% are dragons in House of the Dragon. So all I'm saying is that it tells you that at some point between those two series dragons kind of became extinct. And so sure, that might give you hints as to what's coming up on House of the Dragon. Maybe, I don't know, but. But you don't really know. There are characters, descendants of characters that will be in Game of Thrones.

50:28

You recognize last names here and there.

51:06

Yeah, yeah, yeah. But it's cool. I mean there's Targaryens in there, they talk of dragons. But it's a really simple story. It's only six episodes and they're really simple. Three of them are directed by our friend Sarah Dina Smith. I think I told you I emailed her to tell her how much I love the episodes and it turned out I emailed the wrong Sarah Smith. But just like a tip, if you're watching an HBO show, especially like a show like that, that's got like a, you know, a big built in fan base. I'm sure most people know this but you know how most streaming networks like will push you to the next episode like as soon as the episode ends. But on hbo, if you force your cursor back onto the, you can watch picture in picture. Yeah, yeah. Where the credits are. You can watch through the credits through the like all the weird foreign credits and then it will play the like episode analysis from like the creators, you know, it's like a five minute featurette or whatever about the episode and I just love that. I mean, you know, it's not as good as like a behind the scenes Blu Rays special.

51:07

Sure. But it's in the same space. Yeah. You know, Bobby Lamb, if those are in la, he shoots those. Oh yeah, yeah, yeah.

52:04

There. That, that show specifically you really want. It's nice when an expert is like, by the way, this family, like, like now we see that this family is really turning against this family. They're giving you like the subtext that is sometimes hard to get on your own.

52:13

Sure, sure.

52:27

Anyhow, I really enjoyed that show and yeah, it's like six half hour episodes. You can watch it. You could watch it in like one night, maybe two nights. Sounds fun. So anyhow, well, Matt, we did it. Yeah. If you guys want to tell us what super obvious shows to watch, you can email us@disthunepodmail.com or if you have

52:28

like hobbies or tricks to being a fully formed, fully fledged person and not just insane workaholic or maybe think that that's okay, let us know.

52:47

Yeah. At just Tunapod on Instagram and you can follow me on Instagram also. I'm O. Kaplan.

52:56

And I'm Mr. Maddenlow. This episode was edited by Kevin Oying. Thanks, Kevin. Social medias by Lily Bouvier. Thanks, Lily. Produced by Tyler Small. Thanks, Tyler. And you're listening to music provided by the Music Archive and the artist Jazzar. Thanks everyone.

53:02

Thanks.

53:15