Transcript
Speaker: to call the peace peace peace
Speaker: What's up and welcome to the To Conquer Peace podcast.
Speaker: I'm your host, D'Angelo.
Speaker: On this podcast, we explore ways for creatives to overcome creative block.
Speaker: This season is dedicated to the gift of information and how that could lead to the release and the stigma of something being too big or unattainable.
Speaker: Today, I mean, I'm always going to say this.
Speaker: I have a special guest in the room and I do mean it.
Speaker: Among many things, he was most recently the senior producer for the show Big Brother, which just finished his 25th season on CBS.
Speaker: Eugene O'Neill, what's up, bro?
Speaker: Hey, how's it going?
Speaker: Oh, man.
Speaker: So your show, D'Angelo.
Speaker: Happy to have you here.
Speaker: I'm going to give Eugene his flowers.
Speaker: And this is a big deal because it's a hard.
Speaker: I have a hard time for the with the words of affirmation thing.
Speaker: Call it a guy trauma.
Speaker: I don't know.
Speaker: But Eugene is definitely reality TV.
Speaker: You know, I've worked with Eugene.
Speaker: Reality TV is
Speaker: Fast-paced, you know, it feels like a lot of stress is going on.
Speaker: One of the guys that like does a really good job of staying cool under pressure and has a really good story sense from that lens.
Speaker: And I've enjoyed working with you for the past two seasons.
Speaker: So first of all, thank you for showing me what different type of leadership could look like in that industry.
Speaker: Wow, thank you.
Speaker: All right, I'm lathered up, man.
Speaker: Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
Speaker: I'm working for the next job, guys.
Speaker: You know, I'm just a two-fold thing here.
Speaker: So anyway, and I do really mean that, but in addition to working on Big Brother, which again just concluded his 25th season, he's worked on Survivor, Married at First Sight, Couples Cam, and Paradise Hotel.
Speaker: So a nice diverse, and this is important for you guys to understand, reality TV is not just like Real Housewives of whatever, Beverly Hills or Bachelor.
Speaker: That's one type of reality.
Speaker: That's house reality.
Speaker: But then you have cooking competition shows.
Speaker: You have
Speaker: house competition shows, you have dating shows.
Speaker: There's so much that goes into the reality world.
Speaker: And Eugene has definitely gotten his chops in when it comes to competition reality and house reality from what I've gathered, correct?
Speaker: Yeah, that's fair to say.
Speaker: I've worked on a lot of shows that had just a season one and then not a season two.
Speaker: But yeah, I feel like I've worked on
Speaker: all different kinds, whether it's like shows that strive to show the reality as it happened.
Speaker: And then some that are more manufactured probably in their narratives.
Speaker: Not like I haven't worked on Real Housewives, but that's probably like the signifier show, like a show where you're the whole time wondering, okay, well how much of this actually happened and how much of this is the producer sat around and came up with the storyline beforehand, like, you know, Kardashian type shows.
Speaker: So yeah.
Speaker: But definitely my bread and butter is probably more in competition and house reality shows that kind of strive a little more for like verite or verity in the reality than, you know, the Real Housewives type show.
Speaker: All right.
Speaker: You're using these producer words like verite.
Speaker: For people that might not know what that means, what do you mean by the word verite?
Speaker: The fancy way of saying the reality as it's shown on camera, the reality in the camera.
Speaker: And give Eugene a break, guys.
Speaker: He also has a background as a writer.
Speaker: And post one award show that we had at the end of the season, I learned that he's actually a very talented writer.
Speaker: But before we really get into your journey, because I really want people to understand what this world looks like.
Speaker: Two things that I want people to understand.
Speaker: The word producer is very ominous in some ways.
Speaker: So we're talking about producer in the lens of reality TV.
Speaker: And also, generally speaking, when you're a reality producer, you are freelancing.
Speaker: Do you want to explain to people what producers generally are doing when it comes to reality TV shows?
Speaker: Yeah, I mean, it is an odd term.
Speaker: because I think a producer in like the scripted television sense or the film sense, isn't someone we really associate with, like maybe the creative aspect of what you're seeing.
Speaker: Like we kind of think of that person as a sort of blend of like, they had some big idea, big picture ideas, you know, maybe said yes and no to certain things, but maybe for the most part, like provided the capital, you know, behind the production.
Speaker: And, uh,
Speaker: Reality TV, we think, doesn't have writers in it.
Speaker: So maybe people assume it's all in the editing and that they just have this big bloated load of producers on the show for some reason.
Speaker: But while reality shows do have the kind of producers that a regular scripted series has, like an executive producer, the kind of people that are focused on the big picture, the actual purchasing and production of it,
Speaker: The producers we're talking about, that D'Angelo and I are, are effectively writers.
Speaker: And now that sounds like a term we wouldn't want to use in reality TV because, again, the viewer wants to believe what they're seeing is stuff that doesn't need writing in it, right?
Speaker: That it's just basically reality as it happened.
Speaker: But that's not true because whatever you're watching usually came from like a giant block, right?
Speaker: footage.
Speaker: Sometimes you're watching something that's two minutes long that was hours long, or maybe something that feels like it happened within a day, but it happened within a week.
Speaker: And it's, you know, probably more like a sculptor than a writer, someone just taking a sort of nebulous mass and kind of boiling it down to
Speaker: a narrative that is interesting and followable and falls within a, you know, network allotted, you know, timeframe.
Speaker: I don't know.
Speaker: Is that kind of a fair way of putting it?
Speaker: I think that's good.
Speaker: And that's specific to big brother.
Speaker: I think I like the word sculpting because sometimes when you use the word writer and we'll try not to get too caught in the weeds here, but sometimes when you use the word writer,
Speaker: You think of like someone who wrote a TV show, meaning they came up with this concept from their brain or from being inspired by something and they created the narrative.
Speaker: In the sense of Big Brother and other shows like it, what is happening is they're in a house for 24-7 and things are being recorded all day.
Speaker: Obviously, for most TV shows, you don't have 24 hours to... You got to get the story down to an hour.
Speaker: And you're sculpting what actually happened into the lens of the narrative of the show in what you think is going to be the most entertaining way.
Speaker: And that's where the writing kind of comes in.
Speaker: Right.
Speaker: So we work on, you know, there's three shows a week on Big Brother, basically splitting a week into three parts.
Speaker: And each of those shows has an hour to tell what happened in their two or three day block.
Speaker: You're just not going to get that all across in an hour of television.
Speaker: you have to boil it down and like really any kind of group in any kind of like environment that's insulated from, you know, the rest of the world.
Speaker: And that doesn't have to be a TV show, but like people at any job have their own kind of lingo that they use.
Speaker: There's a shorthand and that kind of thing will develop on the show.
Speaker: Big brother.
Speaker: Everyone will start kind of talking to shorthand or there's,
Speaker: you know, things are expressed through body language or raised eyebrows because these people come to know each other so well that things don't have to be communicated explicitly.
Speaker: But when we're trying to make a TV show, sometimes those things need explaining.
Speaker: You know, you might need someone to pop up in a, you know, a talking head, you know, moment and say like,
Speaker: I can tell just by looking at D'Angelo here that he is on the same wavelength as me, you know, so I, I don't even have to tell him what I'm doing.
Speaker: He knows what I'm doing.
Speaker: Right.
Speaker: In that sense, that's where the producers might come in.
Speaker: We might take them aside and be like, Hey, you know, what happened in that moment between you guys?
Speaker: Could you explain it to the audience for us?
Speaker: And,
Speaker: Again, in terms of boiling this down, they might have a five minute explanation of what transpired between them and another person.
Speaker: We need to boil it down to 30 seconds.
Speaker: So maybe I might kind of help them express that in a more succinct kind of way.
Speaker: I would say to that extent, there is writing on the show.
Speaker: But it is a collaborative process, I would say, with the
Speaker: the subjects of the show because it has to be something that they would say, something that they believe and kind of still in their voice.
Speaker: Yeah, no, that's good.
Speaker: And yeah, so.
Speaker: All right, now we kind of established, at least in Big Brother, what a producer would look like, you know, and there are the things that producers do, like they might be booking locations, getting
Speaker: You know, on different types of shows, they might be doing clearances.
Speaker: If it's like a true crimes reality show there.
Speaker: Things that on a scripted show would have a specific person hired to do that.
Speaker: But because we're in the world of reality TV show or unions are less of a thing.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: We can get these poor producers to take on as many unenviable tasks as possible.
Speaker: Yes.
Speaker: Kind of the things that you're describing.
Speaker: Producers are wearing a lot of hats.
Speaker: Producers are the directors or the writers are producers.
Speaker: So, yeah, especially in the reality world, you're wearing a lot of hats.
Speaker: So you have a lot of say in where the story is going as a collective effort, because you're going to have a lot of producers on shows in a general sense.
Speaker: But what I want to talk about is Eugene, before he kind of pivoted to, you know, reality TV,
Speaker: Before you started, I don't even know what your first freelance show was, but where were you in your career?
Speaker: What influenced the pivot?
Speaker: Well, I wanted to be a screenwriter for basically a long time.
Speaker: And reality TV was something I sort of fell into.
Speaker: While I was writing, I would just, like anyone else,
Speaker: kind of out of college, look for jobs on Craigslist.
Speaker: And there was once a listing for someone to transcribe interviews.
Speaker: And I was like, I can type fast.
Speaker: That sounds chill.
Speaker: I'll do that.
Speaker: And it actually turned out to be the casting, the transcribing casting tapes for Big Brother season eight.
Speaker: And I did that.
Speaker: And then someone there just said, hey, do you want to work on the show?
Speaker: And I was like, sure.
Speaker: And I did that.
Speaker: And I really did not have any, like, I had never watched a reality TV show before then.
Speaker: Reality TV was kind of an anathema in my household because my parents were TV writers growing up.
Speaker: And when reality TV started to become a thing,
Speaker: They just denounced it all the time.
Speaker: They were like, you know, because in their mind, reality TV shows were a way for networks to get around paying writers.
Speaker: So they it was like a byword in my house.
Speaker: So I. Yeah, I like refuse to watch reality TV and I thought it was garbage television.
Speaker: I thought it was like lowest common denominator stuff, just lazy.
Speaker: They just put the camera on some people and then they just put it on TV.
Speaker: No real effort to it.
Speaker: And then kind of being in that environment, watching it kind of unfold and producers taking notes and yeah, kind of boiling this huge mass of stuff down into a narrative.
Speaker: It was more than I thought it was.
Speaker: I did kind of develop this respect for how difficult it seemed.
Speaker: It also seemed like hell to me.
Speaker: producers i remember big brother always looked very harried and overworked and like tired and just like hating life and i like i had briefly thought so like should i do that like should i maybe become a producer maybe make more money than this i'm like no that seems like hell and also it was still kind of in my mind reality tv was like bad you know like stick to i need to stick to my own pursuits of being a writer um and then
Speaker: After like a few years, I finally did manage to sell a screenplay.
Speaker: And one of the number one things I had imagined, like at this point I had been, I think it was maybe three or four years I had been transcribing at Big Brother.
Speaker: And my number one fantasy was I would one day just walk it, like quit this job in the middle of the day, like middle fingers extended, like fuck you guys, I'm like a writer now.
Speaker: And then I did sell screenplay.
Speaker: It happened like in the winter or the spring or something.
Speaker: So it didn't happen while Big Brother was happening.
Speaker: So I thought, well, at least I don't have to like, when that phone call comes asking if I want to come back, I finally get to say no.
Speaker: And then like a week before the movie was supposed to start filming, which is when you get paid the bulk of your money, it fell through.
Speaker: Like the studio decided not to do it.
Speaker: Okay.
Speaker: prototypical la la uh selling shell story unfortunately it's a dirty business so i i remember i think i transcribe i was doing transcribing for another year hoping like you know the movie would still get filmed like a year or so later and then it kept like it basically ended up in what's called as development hell um which is just like it doesn't go into it gets stuck like people can't agree on what the
Speaker: which draft they should shoot or which version they should shoot.
Speaker: And, you know, and then all of a sudden it's been like, okay, I, I can't wait around anymore for like, I was like 32, I think at this point.
Speaker: And I just thought like time was kind of getting away from me.
Speaker: Like I couldn't keep playing the lottery.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: essentially with this.
Speaker: And so I asked to do the hot sheets at big brother, which is basically like a daily newsletter of what happens, you know, in a reality show.
Speaker: So people can kind of get a good summary of everything that happened.
Speaker: And from there, maybe decide what they want to put on TV.
Speaker: So I did that for a year.
Speaker: And then the following season, I was offered to be a segment producer, which is the, a junior producer.
Speaker: on Big Brother.
Speaker: And I kind of thought to myself all the time, all right, well, I'll do this, you know, and then on my off time, all right.
Speaker: And just as like the years kind of went on, I, you know, as the years kind of went on, I just started to work more.
Speaker: This was a show, this was a job I thought like when my first year Big Brother, I was so bad at it.
Speaker: I had no idea what I was doing.
Speaker: I felt so overwhelmed.
Speaker: All the other producers on my team were in their 20s.
Speaker: I was like the oldest person and they were all really good.
Speaker: And I had barely any clue what I was doing.
Speaker: I just thought like, the whole time I remember thinking like, please just don't get fired.
Speaker: Like just make it to the end of summer so that I get all the checks and then just don't bring me back.
Speaker: Like that to me was like the best case scenario because I just felt like I couldn't do anything in that capacity.
Speaker: But I learned it over time.
Speaker: And yeah, Jesus, what is it?
Speaker: 10 years later?
Speaker: I don't know how long.
Speaker: I think, yeah, 10 years later, I mean, I was the supervising producer and leading a team on that same show.
Speaker: Yeah, you really got it.
Speaker: I kind of just fell into.
Speaker: Yeah, well, I think you're undercutting yourself.
Speaker: Falling into would be like, oh, it just happened and then there was no work that needed to happen.
Speaker: You know what I mean?
Speaker: I get what you say in one sense, right?
Speaker: It wasn't like you were looking to become a reality TV producer.
Speaker: That's not why you came out here.
Speaker: But you did have a moment where you were looking at the data and you were like, this is...
Speaker: something that I'm going to need to be committed to, right?
Speaker: Because it's not easy.
Speaker: We already talked about that.
Speaker: I have felt the fish out of water aspect of Big Brother.
Speaker: It's, in any reality show, it's hard.
Speaker: You're jumping into a show that maybe has already been established, has its rules, and people don't always necessarily have time to sit and walk you through things.
Speaker: You have to figure it out, even though you do get a training and all that type of stuff.
Speaker: And so there was a moment where you
Speaker: did commit to that decision and you put the work in into it and then it's paid its dividends.
Speaker: So I really do think you're undercutting that component of your journey.
Speaker: I mean, I do.
Speaker: Yeah, I think what helped, you're right, there was some sort of agency involved.
Speaker: And I think it was my second year doing it where I kind of started to, it started to click for me a little bit.
Speaker: This is probably when I first was allowed to.
Speaker: I was not allowed in the first year because, again, no clue what I was doing.
Speaker: What's called scripting, which is basically writing out a script of a scene from some footage that you saw.
Speaker: And, again, it's that, like, it's, you know, maybe a one-hour or a two-hour chunk of footage, and you're maybe boiling it down to the interesting stuff that fits into the larger narrative of your episode.
Speaker: My first year, I could not do that to save my life.
Speaker: I just could not –
Speaker: discern between what was useful and what was not.
Speaker: I was so paranoid that I'd leave something out that my bosses would want in the show.
Speaker: So I was writing everything that happened and then I think, my boss was like, all right, that's a doubt.
Speaker: Don't worry about doing that.
Speaker: But in my second year, it started to click a little bit and I sort of started to figure out what was interesting and what fit into the larger narrative.
Speaker: And in that sense, I start like, once you kind of start figuring out what belongs in a scene, you can start, start thinking about, well, what scenes kind of fit together?
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: And I started to see the creative, you know, the kind of the, the creative, uh, vindication of doing reality TV is like, yeah, you're not writing, you're not telling people what to say, like you would on a scripted TV show, but you're, it's like, you're putting a puzzle together.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: And that became,
Speaker: fun in its own right.
Speaker: I don't know if you kind of feel that same way about it.
Speaker: No, I get it.
Speaker: I think, well, you say a lot that I resonate with.
Speaker: in regards to when you first are introduced to the world of reality TV, you're like, what am I doing?
Speaker: You know, like how, what is this contributing to the world?
Speaker: And in some ways, it's like, in some ways it's like, it's fun.
Speaker: It's an escape.
Speaker: It's like sports.
Speaker: Like, you know what I mean?
Speaker: It's connecting because you're separating your, or stepping away from, from the, whatever might be going on in your world.
Speaker: And, you know, we have some very, very avid fans in that sense.
Speaker: And then in the second sense, I've always, and this is why I think it's interesting talking to you, because we are writers, I fully see how being a really good screenwriter would transfer over to this, to being effective at this.
Speaker: And I think that that's something that you don't think about, but it obviously was an inherited.
Speaker: And you found similarities in it that you kind of fell in love with
Speaker: with it so that you weren't like suffering through this.
Speaker: It was kind of like, Oh, I actually do enjoy this.
Speaker: It's, you know, I'm using my skills and interest in a way that I didn't anticipate, but it is kind of being articulated in this industry.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: It wasn't a natural transition.
Speaker: Um, it did take time to sort of like reconcile that instinct to the next because yeah, I don't get to just decide what these people are saying.
Speaker: I have to take what they actually said.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: But there is a little bit of kind of like recognizing what's good dialogue or what's a good moment, like what's good emotion.
Speaker: And reality TV, like it ends up becoming a wave that you have to learn how to ride rather than something that you can master, you know, or like a rest.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: It's a tie that you have to learn how to sort of balance yourself on.
Speaker: Yeah, that's good.
Speaker: So, I mean, and I think that's really cool hearing that because I think a lot of people can connect to the idea of, especially we're in Los Angeles, you know, the city of dreams in that way.
Speaker: People come out here to do a lot of things and it may not work out the way they anticipated it.
Speaker: Or it just, they're in it, but in a way different way than they anticipated, right?
Speaker: And you got to reconcile that aspect of it, all right?
Speaker: And you got to reconcile the idea that you're a failure or like whatever, like you might be working through.
Speaker: And I resonate with that because the first thing, when I first graduated college, I wanted to be a news journalist.
Speaker: You know what I mean?
Speaker: So I am not a news journalist right now.
Speaker: And so that's a process.
Speaker: And I think that that's something that people can really relate to.
Speaker: I'm curious though, and if you don't mind me asking this,
Speaker: In your heart of hearts, if all things were aligned and your money was taken care of, would you go back to screenwriting?
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: And I mean, honestly, it's like, oh, perhaps foolheartedly something I'm still trying to, you know?
Speaker: like I I'm, I'm off right now between shows and I'm trying to take this time very seriously and, you know, not just like wait for the phone to ring for the next reality show, but to, to write, I still have ideas I want to do.
Speaker: I, you know, still feel like I could do them.
Speaker: And there is like a little bit more kind of comfort.
Speaker: And then as I get older, you start to, you know, the economic anxiety kind of starts to mount a little bit.
Speaker: Like your friends are,
Speaker: getting promote, they're getting their promotions at their regular jobs, you know, they're, you know, getting a nice car or whatever like that.
Speaker: And you're still, you still have no money in your bank account.
Speaker: And you kind of start to think like, okay, like if this doesn't hit, how fucked am I, you know?
Speaker: And so,
Speaker: Yeah, doing reality TV has kind of like allayed that a little bit where it's just like, okay, like I know that I have work, I can save up a little money like in chunks, and I can afford to go like a couple, you know, a couple months without working.
Speaker: And right, I'd say probably the downside of that is, is that I do think that like there is something to be said about the starving artist mentality, you know, like having that a little bit of sense of desperation.
Speaker: to kind of, you know, to kind of focus you a little bit.
Speaker: So I don't know what the trade-off is there, but I mean, yeah, sorry to come, come around.
Speaker: No, that's real.
Speaker: I do.
Speaker: I do want to still be a writer and I'll say this, like, I mean, as you were saying earlier, like, yeah, we're working in reality TV.
Speaker: We're not curing cancer or not.
Speaker: It's maybe one of not the higher runs of, you know, artistic endeavors.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Like if you say you write movies or you write TV shows, or if you said you're like a journalist, people will be like, oh, you know.
Speaker: And when I tell people a reality TV producer, I usually get a, oh, you know, or okay.
Speaker: Like not a lot of like very impressed people.
Speaker: I would say the ratio, like I'd say for every two people that are like, oh, wow, you're a reality TV producer.
Speaker: I get 98.
Speaker: Okay, okay.
Speaker: And then the occasion, like, oh, really?
Speaker: That's real.
Speaker: All right.
Speaker: So like, okay, I like this.
Speaker: Let's actually want to stay here because this is really what I want to, this is ideally for people who
Speaker: are stuck in, I want to do this thing, but I'm scared.
Speaker: I don't feel like I'm good enough.
Speaker: I don't know if I have the space to be bad at it and release it.
Speaker: So I think that it's really dope that you're still able to come back around to this passion of writing in the format that you wanted it to exist.
Speaker: Was there some mental work that you had to do to, like, was it you didn't do it anymore because you were disappointed and you kind of came back to it?
Speaker: Or has it always been something that you're still doing on the side?
Speaker: I mean, well, the other point I guess I wanted to make, I'll come to that point.
Speaker: Let me put a pin in that.
Speaker: That statement sums up our meetings.
Speaker: Anyway, go ahead.
Speaker: So when I first started writing, I had a friend who worked for, I don't know, should I be saying names?
Speaker: Does it matter?
Speaker: I worked for a friend who worked for Adam Sandler.
Speaker: And he was just like, Hey, you know, if you write something like I can get it read, you know, by him.
Speaker: And like, I, I, you know, I, my understanding kind of was like, okay, well I'll, I'll write it or I can write it with like, you know, I had a college friend who was like my writing partner first starting out who I had like a great rapport with.
Speaker: We had great chemistry and you know,
Speaker: But my friend who worked for Adam Sandler was kind of like, he was more of the mind that I would write it with him.
Speaker: But he was not really a writer.
Speaker: He had a producer's, like a film producer's mindset.
Speaker: He had kind of like big picture ideas.
Speaker: I could give him an idea and he'd be like, you know, like yes or kind of do yes or no on that type of thing.
Speaker: But not like a collaborative writer, someone that like you could sort of pass the figurative typewriter back and forth with, which I think is like if you have a writing partner,
Speaker: is like very important.
Speaker: It seems, you know, like a, a small, a minor process thing, but I really do think like with a writing partner, you should both be able, like one person can write and then give it to the other, the other person be like, oh, I love this, but I want to do this.
Speaker: And how much you agree on each other's notes on your own work is like a great kind of indicator of like, how well do you work with this person?
Speaker: I had that with this, like one partner that really was not like,
Speaker: But with my Adam Sandler friend, that really was not how we worked together.
Speaker: It was really a lot of like, I would write something and he would be like kind of yay or nay.
Speaker: Again, like kind of some ideas, but it felt like I was doing like most of the work.
Speaker: Adam Sandler, very successful.
Speaker: He's very funny.
Speaker: Like not the kind of movie that I wanted to write.
Speaker: Like I envisioned myself writing.
Speaker: It wasn't, it's just, wasn't my instinct at all.
Speaker: And so writing...
Speaker: a script for him was a huge challenge for me.
Speaker: It's just like, yeah, it was a lot of me going like, what about this?
Speaker: What about this?
Speaker: What about this?
Speaker: And my friend just went like, eh, no, no, no.
Speaker: That's not his style.
Speaker: That's not his thing.
Speaker: And I would get like mad and be like, okay, well, what about this?
Speaker: Like, just like, like bitterly tossing on a stupid idea.
Speaker: It's like, oh, that actually could be good.
Speaker: It would be like something that like, that would be the kind of, you know, that sounds like the plot of American fiction.
Speaker: I don't know if you've seen that movie yet, but that that's hilarious.
Speaker: Oh, American fiction.
Speaker: Wait, American fiction.
Speaker: I've been meaning to see that movie, but yeah.
Speaker: Okay.
Speaker: Great.
Speaker: But that's what it kind of felt like.
Speaker: And that,
Speaker: Script took way longer than it probably should have.
Speaker: But it was just like that.
Speaker: Number one, we just did not have a strong, solid, like kind of creative, like foundation, just like the way we work together was not just the best way to work together.
Speaker: And then it was just like a genre of writing that I just didn't really feel like was my strength, you know.
Speaker: Or instinctual to me.
Speaker: So.
Speaker: But I mean, we did actually end up writing something, you know, and selling it to him.
Speaker: And then, you know, again, I was just like, great, it's sold.
Speaker: This is awesome.
Speaker: I'm a writer now.
Speaker: And then the director of the movie, he made a deal that he would get to do a rewrite in order for him to sign on.
Speaker: And kind of standard for directors,
Speaker: You know, my friend was kind of like, oh, he's going to change like stuff that we did.
Speaker: And I was just like, I don't care.
Speaker: I just want it to get made.
Speaker: I could give a shit.
Speaker: You know, like if he does, I get paid the same amount no matter what.
Speaker: And then he like he had like this process where he would like go on this, like go to a cabin in New Mexico or something.
Speaker: And like no phone, no Internet, like you couldn't reach him.
Speaker: whenever he wanted to write.
Speaker: So it gets to like two weeks before we're supposed to start shooting.
Speaker: And like, no one's heard from him.
Speaker: No one's seen his draft.
Speaker: People are starting to get nervous.
Speaker: Like, where is this?
Speaker: And my parents who were writers said like, this is an old writer's trick or like a director's trick kind of, it's like, basically you do your rewrite and you hold it onto it as long as you possibly can.
Speaker: Like until right before you're about to shoot it.
Speaker: And then you're basically daring the studio.
Speaker: Like if they don't like it, it's going to be like, well, you already, they've already like slotted the production.
Speaker: They've already spent money on it.
Speaker: There's no time to do a rewrite.
Speaker: Like you're basically just daring them to just do your, to do your version.
Speaker: That's exactly what he was doing.
Speaker: So, and they were like, watch, he he'll, he'll come back like a few days before you guys are supposed to start shooting.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: He, he, he sent it in like five days before and studio hated it.
Speaker: He completely like,
Speaker: What we had done was there was like maybe like 10 to 15% of what we had wrote that was like still in that script.
Speaker: He completely redid it.
Speaker: I did not have a ton of personal feelings about it.
Speaker: I remember reading and being like, man, this is like not funny at all.
Speaker: Like, I don't like this, you know, but
Speaker: I was like, whatever, it's going to get made.
Speaker: I just want to get paid for it.
Speaker: And then I can hopefully write a movie that I would want to write.
Speaker: Like that was kind of my goal.
Speaker: I saw this as like a stepping stone to write the kind of movie that I would want to write.
Speaker: And anyway, that didn't happen.
Speaker: The studio just like he, the studio was like, we don't want this.
Speaker: We want the original version that we bought.
Speaker: And he was like, well, I'm not going to, I'm only going to do my version.
Speaker: And so, yeah, there was this basically this stalemate over it.
Speaker: for a couple of years and like that whole kind of process.
Speaker: So it's like that whole process, you know, of like writing something I didn't really want to write in a kind of creative mode that felt like it was a lot more frustration than like that, like, you know, that dopamine,
Speaker: burst you get when you're writing, when you're, when you're working with someone or even just working by yourself and like, this is good.
Speaker: I, this is good.
Speaker: Like, you know, like this feels good.
Speaker: Like just a feeling I never really got.
Speaker: And then to feel like my life's about to change and then have the rug pulled out from under me at the last minute.
Speaker: Like I don't, that did kind of hold, like, like sat me a little bit and getting like a regular paycheck from reality TV.
Speaker: And feeling like, you know, not like a poor loser was a nice feeling.
Speaker: But, you know, I guess as I started to, you know, build a reality TV career, that itch to write did sort of come back a little bit.
Speaker: And I started to wonder, like, can I write the kind of movies that I would want to write?
Speaker: And coming back to the thing I put a pin on,
Speaker: Working in reality TV strangely taught me to be a better writer.
Speaker: And maybe not a better writer specifically, but maybe a better creative.
Speaker: Because reality TV, yes, it is kind of limiting in that you are like, it's like, here are the people.
Speaker: This is what they're doing.
Speaker: it's got to be something like this, make it into something good.
Speaker: And you might think like, well, there's only one way to show it, which is just a very stripped down version of what happened.
Speaker: But like, there are ways where you can sort of give it creative flourishes and, you know, make the highest a little higher, the lows a little lower.
Speaker: And then it also just taught me like efficiency, like, because in, you know, I don't think reality TV is alone in this, but
Speaker: Yeah, like I think when I was a writer first starting, I would have a scene that might go four or five pages, you know, because I'm thinking like, this is all good dialogue that I'm writing.
Speaker: These are all good jokes.
Speaker: And, you know, it's just like, but it's like, it gets to a certain point where it's like you're being indulgent, you know, like the audience does not have, is not going to, is going to run out of like,
Speaker: I think in any movie or scene you're watching, it's like, you can really only be anywhere for like two minutes, like tops before the audience is like fully caught up with what you're doing.
Speaker: And they're like, okay, well what's next now?
Speaker: Like, yeah, we get it.
Speaker: We get it with these guys.
Speaker: And if you just kind of keep spinning your wheels with, you know, fanciful dialogue or jokes that you think are funny, you're going to start to like lose your audience.
Speaker: And reality TV is like, or at least in the shows that I've worked for, like,
Speaker: you know, your bosses just do not have any kind of appetite for indulgence.
Speaker: Like things need to be as brief as possible.
Speaker: So you like, it's, you know, that old thing of like, just being as creative as possible in like a limited, in a limited space, you know, you might feel, think of it as like, well, I'm stuck inside of a box, but you know, there are an infinite number of points that you can make inside of a box.
Speaker: So it's kind of learning not to like be hemmed in by structure, but like kind of learning how to like thrive within it, you know?
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: And I think, yeah, and reality TV has sort of been helpful in that sense of like sharpening my creative edge a little bit, but then also just giving me confidence because yeah, I feel like I've, you know, gone to certain shows and excelled.
Speaker: And, you know, if you feel like you can excel on, you know, one arena that was foreign to you and not instinctual to you,
Speaker: You start to think, well, then why can't I be successful with where I wanted to go originally, where I do feel like my instincts work?
Speaker: And maybe if I can take what I've learned in this one thing and sort of blend them with my instincts for my more natural pursuit, you can be a better creative.
Speaker: Yeah, that's so good.
Speaker: I mean, I think that that in itself is very powerful, right?
Speaker: It's not like you knew that that's what your takeaways are going to be.
Speaker: But I think that...
Speaker: The idea, well, look, everyone can relate to a dream, a dream being deferred or not working out, or you get some progress in a dream and it just doesn't play out the way you thought it would.
Speaker: And you're turned off by it for a while.
Speaker: You know what I mean?
Speaker: Like you just, it just reminds you of the failure and stepping away and finding success in something else that has its own difficulties, but actually still is connected to some of your skill sets, right?
Speaker: Like that's what I think is really important.
Speaker: So you're kind of still honing your skills unknowingly to yourself.
Speaker: I really, I championed, I love the fact that you felt the itch, but you actually embraced it.
Speaker: Like some people would hear it and be like, no, I'm going to dismiss it.
Speaker: Like whatever.
Speaker: And like, maybe you did for a while.
Speaker: But you are at the point now where you're like, all right, okay, let's do this.
Speaker: Let's for real do this.
Speaker: And you're enduring new challenges, right?
Speaker: It's a difference when you got a little bit of money and you don't need to do this to get a show.
Speaker: But now it's literally truly a want.
Speaker: And later down the road, me and you're going to talk about how you overcame that.
Speaker: But what I really like is that
Speaker: you're open to it and you're willing to try and you, you don't see your past phase of your career as a waste of time.
Speaker: You see it as something that has actually helped shape you and make you stronger and maybe way more powerful writer than you were before.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: And I mean, look like, you know, I, other people in my situation might be thinking like, and then this is certainly how I did think at some point it's like, I tried it.
Speaker: I tried to be a writer.
Speaker: It didn't work.
Speaker: Like I can say I tried it and I failed and just, you know, grind and try to focus on working as much as possible in reality TV so that I can make more money.
Speaker: You know, I, not a lot of people, some people are built like that.
Speaker: I, you know, I feel like, yeah, I need to embrace these times, you know, take time off from work and still try to do this.
Speaker: And yeah,
Speaker: I do kind of think sometimes I could be working on another show and actually have like, you know, be making more money and saving and, you know, God forbid me to buy a house one day or something, you know, calm down, sir.
Speaker: Calm down.
Speaker: And I'm thinking, if I sell this script, then I'll make some money.
Speaker: And it's just like, well, in reality, I'd probably make as much money as I lost by not working like all those months that you put together.
Speaker: But yeah, I still, I still want to try.
Speaker: I, yeah.
Speaker: Cause I still have,
Speaker: things that I feel like I want to say through art and it's, it's worth trying, you know?
Speaker: And this was like something I like I read, I've come across now a couple of times in different versions from different people.
Speaker: I'd say this is probably what separates, you know, maybe reality, like something I can't get out of reality TV that I can get out of writing, you know, for myself, which is like, you know,
Speaker: And the rule is like when you're writing or when you're doing anything creative, the like the intended intended audience needs to just be yourself.
Speaker: Like you need to just write for yourself.
Speaker: Like don't write trying to guess what's going to make audiences laugh or what's going to, you know, what they're going to like.
Speaker: Like that's something studios do, you know, that like to make money.
Speaker: Because if you start, if you're thinking like that, you're trying to think like a studio, you're trying to think of like how to make money.
Speaker: Like you're effectively just guessing.
Speaker: And if your guess is wrong, you're going to look back at what you wrote and just think about all the time you wasted on a dumb guess.
Speaker: But if you write for yourself, if you kind of put something in your own life, maybe that you haven't fully like reconciled, something that you got to work out.
Speaker: It's like a, you know, a past boyfriend or girlfriend that you can't get over, you know, a relationship with a father, a mother or father, you know, a regret that you have.
Speaker: If you can kind of like,
Speaker: work for, put that into your script.
Speaker: And so like, well, number one, you're putting, you know, real truth into what you're producing because it's, you know, something that you lived, you know, if you can kind of put that in to your art, even if no one ever sees it or buys it and it just becomes nothing, you can at least look at it and, and it's something that at least changed you having worked on it.
Speaker: It's something that you did for yourself.
Speaker: And if an audience can find it and it resonates with them,
Speaker: That adds to the power of what you produce.
Speaker: Where did this mindset come from?
Speaker: I don't know if you already had it or if it's come over time.
Speaker: Where did the ability to... I mean, it's a hopefulness one, but it's also like an ability to look back at things that didn't play out the way you wanted to and see it in a way that is useful to you.
Speaker: Where did that come from?
Speaker: I mean, this, it's not, this, I don't want to say this was like the turning point and I don't remember who said it, but I mean, I do kind of like, I do remember reading that thing that someone wrote that it was like a writer that had said that I was just like, write something for yourself.
Speaker: And when I was the first time I tried to be a writer, I wasn't, I got, I wanted, that was my initial impulse was to like write the kind of things like I wanted to write, but it sort of got derailed very quickly.
Speaker: Because the first thing I wrote was for, you know, a sort of style of comedy that just wasn't instinctual to me.
Speaker: And, you know, when you're like a screenwriter starting out, you're supposed to do the save the cat type thing.
Speaker: I don't know if you know what save the cat.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Save the cat is this book that basically it became the Bible, not just for writers, but for studios too.
Speaker: It basically is a structure to like every genre of screenplay.
Speaker: Blake Snyder was the writer.
Speaker: I forget what he wrote.
Speaker: But he basically said there's 10 genres of movie.
Speaker: And this is the format they have.
Speaker: And if you follow this format, the movies that are successful are the movies that follow this format.
Speaker: And then the ones that seem like they would be big but then weren't, were missing a crucial ingredient from this aspect, this format.
Speaker: And
Speaker: Yeah, like writers started to use that to write and studios were also like, like now like the creatives at a studio, like felt more informed because now rather than being like,
Speaker: yeah, this doesn't really work, but like they couldn't explain why now they could say like, Oh, this doesn't work because it doesn't have this save the cat moment, you know?
Speaker: And a big thing in save the cat.
Speaker: One of the first thing it teaches you is like, you need to think of a movie that would sell, like write a pitch first.
Speaker: Like imagine you're making the elevator pitch to a producer, you know?
Speaker: So it really is teaching you to just think about what would make an audience, you know,
Speaker: the thing I talked about before is like just trying to guess what an audience would like.
Speaker: So I, I just kind of for, for years when I was trying to think of new ideas, that's what I was doing.
Speaker: I was doing the save the cat thing.
Speaker: I'm just like, well, I gotta, you know, think of a pitch and with what, what other successful movies is this like?
Speaker: And like, that was just not like fun for me.
Speaker: And I felt like I was, I felt like I'd really lost my way.
Speaker: Like whatever got me into writing initially,
Speaker: was just gone.
Speaker: And yeah, I like, I think for me, like that guesswork of what makes for a successful movie became equated with what makes a successful writer.
Speaker: And because I couldn't do that, I think I thought to myself, well, I must not be a good writer because I can't guess what other audiences would like.
Speaker: And, but I still had,
Speaker: Ideas that I thought were maybe a little more unconventional and didn't really follow that and might be tougher cells, but were still ideas that I really, really believed in and felt like felt had some kind of like, in a way, a mirror to myself, you know, and was very unique to you.
Speaker: And I think that's the thing about being a creative person.
Speaker: If you, we all, like, there are things that I can do and that you can do or say and see that we can't duplicate because it's so intrinsically part of us.
Speaker: And we have...
Speaker: For the most part, generally speaking, if you're going to be successful, it's probably going to come from an extension of just you see the world in a lens that's very different than anyone else.
Speaker: You see that in comedy.
Speaker: You see that in so many other ways.
Speaker: And so I think that you're almost reconnecting with the idea that like, oh, yeah, this is about me because I have to be connected with myself to be able to make something that I'm passionate about, that'll be good, et cetera, et cetera.
Speaker: Yeah, I think like there's in good art, there is something you recognize, like when you're seeing someone else's art, there's something universal maybe that you recognize in it, something that speaks to you, your own past, but then still something refracted or like diffracted like that is because it came out of this individual, you know, and
Speaker: And there's this like melding of like, yes, a primal universal recognition, but also like, but wow, how did it come out like that?
Speaker: You know, from that person.
Speaker: And it makes you rethink your own experience of those things.
Speaker: Like maybe you start like, man, if I experienced it, like, you know, him or her,
Speaker: do I feel differently about it?
Speaker: Or it's like a different take, a different perspective, you know, like you looking at yourself through a different lens.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: And that's just something you're not going to get or deliver.
Speaker: If you're just trying to think like, what is something that would make audiences laugh and cry?
Speaker: You know, like you're, you're just going for like a very kind of surface experience.
Speaker: So, yeah, I think that whole,
Speaker: that whole experience is, is something that I think I sort of just sort of rediscovered on the side, uh, alongside with like the growing itch of wanting to still write.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: And, uh, yeah, I think having worked in reality TV, I've, even though I've kind of been away from the game as it were, I feel like I've cultivated it, um, in a different way and cultivated a little more self-belief and yeah, as like,
Speaker: I don't want to short shrift reality TV and say it's not the vapid, mindless thing that people maybe have made it out to be, but it is also not quite the creative endeavor I initially wanted to make.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: And everyone, we know we work with some people who love, I ain't going to say no names, but love, love, love, love reality TV.
Speaker: Everybody, this is all about your journey and what your calling is.
Speaker: I am so jealous of those people.
Speaker: They exist though.
Speaker: People who cannot wait to work on another show.
Speaker: Like, God, I feel like I need, yeah.
Speaker: Like, I feel like I need to go into like a, you know, a medically induced coma every time, like I finish a show to like recuperate from it.
Speaker: And I've had the quote unquote good fortune of just as soon as one show ends, another one calls.
Speaker: And whenever that happens, I have to take it.
Speaker: I can never turn work down.
Speaker: And yeah,
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: I, there's people I know who just get like, they, that's all they want to do.
Speaker: They just want to go from show to show to show to show to show.
Speaker: And I am in awe of those people because working is hard.
Speaker: It's like, it is a taxing thing.
Speaker: It is long hours.
Speaker: It's, you know, it's, it's mentally and physically taxing.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: And, uh, yeah, I, I,
Speaker: there is a part of me that wishes I could just be the person that just works nonstop, you know, and, you know, collects those checks.
Speaker: But that's just, that's just not me.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: And you know that, and that is the most important thing.
Speaker: Like, right?
Speaker: Like, you're not torturing yourself to become something that you aren't.
Speaker: You are who you are and you're pursuing, you know, it's a process to pursue the lifestyle that you want.
Speaker: And I think that's beautiful.
Speaker: I actually want, I'm going to give you this question because this is, you know, part of your journey.
Speaker: If you were to speak to someone who was maybe a little behind where you are in regards to, the itch is still there for something that they wanted to do.
Speaker: but they feel jaded about things not playing out the way that they wanted it to.
Speaker: What would you say to them or in that scenario?
Speaker: I mean, I'm late.
Speaker: I've been late on everything, you know, like trying to be, still trying to be a writer.
Speaker: It's like, I mean, I feel like I'm kind of old for that now.
Speaker: When I became a reality TV producer, I was old for that.
Speaker: Again, I was like 32, I think, when I was a junior, the most junior level producer on my team.
Speaker: I remember there was someone on my team who was like a more senior producer.
Speaker: Like we were all having a group lunch and one of them goes like, oh guys, I turned 27 next week.
Speaker: I feel so old.
Speaker: And I was just like, Jesus Christ.
Speaker: But, and to be, I know you're going to get there.
Speaker: Everyone has their own journey.
Speaker: Late is, I get what you mean, but late is a relative term, right?
Speaker: Late is when you are looking over your shoulder and comparing yourself to other people's journeys, but we all have our own journey.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: And, but I remember in doing, when I started off just in reality TV, yeah, I, I was older than everybody else.
Speaker: I was old to be starting.
Speaker: Normally people when they're at that level are 23 or 20 or 10 years younger, you know, than I am.
Speaker: And like, I remember that, like figuring out right away, like I need to be humble about this.
Speaker: Like, even though I had like sold a screenplay, that didn't mean anything.
Speaker: you know, in this arena.
Speaker: And I can't act like I'm better than anybody or I know what I'm talking about.
Speaker: And I can't be afraid of like criticism or people telling me, you know, that, you know, I need to be better about something.
Speaker: I can't lack the humility to ask the 24 year old producer, like, hey, is this good?
Speaker: Am I doing this right?
Speaker: Right.
Speaker: I think maybe forgetting your age and forgetting yourself.
Speaker: And I think we kind of tend to tie the two things together because we think the older we are, the further along we're supposed to be.
Speaker: If you're looking at your peers, whether it's your work peers or your friends, and you're seeing how far along they are, you compare yourself to them.
Speaker: And am I answering your question?
Speaker: I feel like I want a little afield here.
Speaker: What I hear is...
Speaker: if you were to speak to someone who was, who is, they still feel this itch to do something.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Okay.
Speaker: I mean, yeah, I, I think, you know, I guess that's, maybe that's a decision that I guess has different weight.
Speaker: If like you say, I have a family, like I, you know, I don't have children.
Speaker: I, it's not something that I've ever been interested in or, you know, probably will be interested in, but yeah, if I,
Speaker: You know, there are a lot of people my age doing this that have kids and it's just not even like the itch is something they probably can't even address, you know, because they need to put food on the table.
Speaker: They always need to have the next job.
Speaker: You know, they can't afford to take a couple minutes off and indulge the itch.
Speaker: So I don't know how particular my experience is or how, sorry, how universal my experience is to everybody.
Speaker: But if they could.
Speaker: I mean, if they could, I guess it is just, it's still that thing of like, do you have, is it going back to that quote of like, you know, of writing for yourself?
Speaker: Like, is it something that you need to do for yourself?
Speaker: You know, or is it more just like the, like, well, I always imagined being famous for this, you know, like if it's,
Speaker: If it's being creative for yourself because there's something inside of you that needs to be worked out.
Speaker: I mean, yeah, I don't know.
Speaker: What's my advice?
Speaker: Like you got to find, find the time to do it.
Speaker: For me, I'm not the type of person that can work after they've been working.
Speaker: Like I can't, I can't use my weekend or after I've finished like a shift on, on my current job to write just because,
Speaker: Working in reality TV just takes so much out of me, I feel like.
Speaker: And when I get home, I just sort of collapse into a heap.
Speaker: And, you know, I just want to kind of be in a vegetative state the entire time.
Speaker: I need to be not working.
Speaker: And I need to, I think, rediscover a little bit of that fear of, oh, money's not coming in, you know?
Speaker: yeah, there's like a little bit in the bank account, but it's disappearing.
Speaker: A little bit disappears every day.
Speaker: Like I can't do this forever.
Speaker: Like I get like rediscovering the, the starving artist aspect of it a little bit, you know?
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: So I think it's those things.
Speaker: And just like, I mean, it's such a trite and cliche thing to say, but it's because it's true of just like, yeah, I don't think it's ever too late.
Speaker: And I do believe that, you know,
Speaker: The older you get, the more wisdom and experience you have to put into your art.
Speaker: That's kind of the paradox, right?
Speaker: Because we think of great artists as being phenoms.
Speaker: Like every great artist blows up at 21 or 22, you know, like.
Speaker: your favorite artists, whether it's a visual artist or a director or a writer or a musician, they all got famous when they were like 22 or 24, you know, or even if they didn't get discovered till they're 27, they had this, you know, indie film or they had an EP that they did.
Speaker: And then you listen to that and you're like, this is brilliant.
Speaker: You know, like this is brilliant.
Speaker: They did this when they were 18.
Speaker: Holy shit.
Speaker: Like, so you, you compare yourself to them.
Speaker: You're thinking like, well, I, if,
Speaker: If I was really good, would not have I like made it by now?
Speaker: And I don't know.
Speaker: I still think that maybe you just hadn't, I don't know.
Speaker: This is probably the harder part to answer.
Speaker: You know, you didn't know enough about yourself, maybe, you know, you haven't experienced enough things.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: You know, and I do think some creativity is inborn, but I do think some of it has to be honed and maybe some of us just hone it slower than others, you know?
Speaker: That's good.
Speaker: That's good.
Speaker: That's the mic drop right there.
Speaker: The church and the church and the black church and the church says, amen.
Speaker: I mean, I really think that that's, that's what I'm hearing from your journey.
Speaker: And, you know,
Speaker: always when you're in the midst of the journey, it's hard to have a bird's eye view of, oh, how did I get here?
Speaker: Or what would I say to myself?
Speaker: But at the end of the day, I think that what I hear is,
Speaker: an acceptance of this is what it took for me to feel inspired.
Speaker: And if I stay in this lane and I'm not too busy looking left and right, worrying about how everybody else went, then I can just focus on the doing part of this and I can be excited about it.
Speaker: And I think that that does take humility because when I first asked you this question, that's what you said, you said, you need to be humble.
Speaker: And I think that it really takes humility to be able to accept that.
Speaker: Cause we all, we're competitive, we all wanna be better than someone else.
Speaker: I think that that's huge.
Speaker: And I also want to thank you for your willingness to be vulnerable because these aren't easy things to talk about.
Speaker: But I just think that this is going to really serve my audience and our audience because so many people can relate to what you're sharing.
Speaker: Oh, I mean, yeah, no problem.
Speaker: You bring it out of me, D'Angelo.
Speaker: You're a very natural interlocutor.
Speaker: The journalism degree is not going to waste.
Speaker: I might be a reality.
Speaker: Yeah, you're good at asking the probing questions.
Speaker: Yeah, I love this, man.
Speaker: This is really fun, bro.
Speaker: Eugene, thank you so much for joining me here on this podcast.
Speaker: Thank you for your vulnerability.
Speaker: I think that a lot of things you shared, people can relate to.
Speaker: I am so excited to see the fruits of the products that you will, not to put any pressure on you, of what will be coming in the future.
Speaker: Oh, yeah, great.
Speaker: Now I have to write something.
Speaker: Yeah, yeah.
Speaker: Actually, that's the pressure.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: This is going to go out to the masses and we can't wait to see the next TV show that gets lost in development, of course.
Speaker: But man, I hope you guys enjoyed this.
Speaker: If you guys have any questions or you want to ask Eugene anything, you can hit me up on social media.
Speaker: I'm at D'Angelo and I'll pass along the questions you have.
Speaker: And I hope you guys enjoyed this podcast.
Speaker: We got so much more in store.
Speaker: So many more great people to talk to.
Speaker: See you guys next time.
Speaker: Peace.
