Entertainment Series 8: Billy Aronson / Creating RENT / Playwriting & Screenwriting /Kids & Adult TV

0:01 Welcome to another episode of Come Together and we're live with Billy Aronson. Billy, what's going on? How are you? Ephraim, so glad to be here. I'm so happy that you're here too. I, I'm excited for a number of reasons. Number one is I came across your site and I, I audibly laughed out loud a bunch of times. And, and then I was also struck with the holy shits of, of all the great credits that you have. So that's number one. Number two is I have been exhausted and miserable the last week and you're and just the goofiness of this beginning of the conversation is already already taking a load off.

0:53 So I really appreciate it. Thank you. Thank you. I goofiness can help sometimes. It definitely does. I, I, the truth is that I'm, I'm very aware of it. I need to surround myself with more of it, you know, because I think that it's not something that you necessarily take for granted. And it creates a, you know, a certain light heartedness that is, it's important, I think, to have every now and then. Yeah, yeah, important to me for sure. Definitely tell me a little bit about yourself, tell me a little bit about who you are and and what you've done, and then we'll kind of dive into some of the fun, creative and talk a bit, talk a little about your journey along the way. Well, I think of myself as a playwright. I kind of thought of myself as a playwright before I was actually writing plays. In fact, when I was a kid and I started doing that in college and sort of as an obsession.

1:41 I just had to, I didn't know anything about it, but I had just, my heart had been broken by a girl when I was 17. And it just opened my eyes to the world. I saw things and feelings and everything was exploding in my head and I had to do something with it. And I couldn't put words to it. So although I, I was, I played music a lot. I've played jazz flute and piano and stuff before that. I thought, I need this. I need something that, that I can control that will express this insanity that I'm feeling about the world and excitement, the pain, the joy, all of that. And so I just started writing plays and I learned how to do it by failing. And then when after college, I, I wrote all through college, I wrote plays and made my friends be in them.

2:24 And then I went right on to drama school at Yale and learned how how that I would could not that no one could tell me how to do this, that I had to figure it out on my own. And then I went to New York and learn how to do it. And while learning, I I got involved in the creation of the musical Rent. It was actually my idea. I work with Jonathan Larson. I'll just give you this the short version. You can ask for more anything that I'm saying. Yes, we're going to go back, but yeah, some. Original concept and additional lyrics for rent. I figured out how to make money with my writing while I was learning to write my plays, writing for TV a lot and children's television in particular. And that turned out to be a real adventure. And maybe 10 years ago, I actually got to write to make create my own children's television show with an artist. We made a cartoon called Peg Plus Cat that teaches math on PBS.

3:19 Nice. And having already written for Beavis and Butthead, encourage the Cowardly Dog and the Wonder Pets, a wide variety of especially animated stuff. I guess Goofy goes with animation a little bit and and yeah, so that's pretty. I think I touched them. Opera is 1 interest of mine. That led me to work on the, the Boem Opera, the Boem musical, a Rent. But also I've started writing librettos for operas and that's been a joyous thing. Music. I like to be near music and around music. I'm not a good musician, but I like to be near people who are because I think when you're, when you're dancing, you know, when music makes you feel so much so quickly and so intensely. So I like to have something to do with that. Beautiful, beautiful love that that was that was a great elevator pitch for the story.

4:09 Elevator pitch for my life. I love it. I love it. Excellent. I, I hope that what that I could have an elevator pitch that that is that that's concise and colorful. Anyway, I want to, there's a lot I want to get into because there's so much that you said that was so relatable and so much fun. Starting with your heartbreak, which is not the fun thing, but I always feel like looking back on that, I know for myself that, you know, when I was in high school, my first heartbreak at 16 took me like a year and a half to recover from. And it was really, and and I really don't know what about it struck me so deeply.

4:49 And I didn't, I remember not, I remember feeling that same sensation that you're describing, which is not having an outlet and like having all this and not knowing what to do with it, you know, and I actually ended up comforting my or working on comforting myself with my fellow hopeless romantics in my in my class, you know, the ones that were always getting rejected. And we'd find a collection of great slow, sad Billy Joel songs or, you know, some great, you know, pop rock music that we were first discovering, James Taylor and, you know, that all kind of tender and emotional rock, I guess, you know, you have songs like Summer Highland Falls. I don't know if you're familiar with that song, but, you know, it's either.

5:31 It's weird, these are not the best of times, but they're the only times you've ever known. And it's either sadness, sadness or euphoria, I think is the mine. It's like you have to. Me. It was Joni Mitchell. There you go, friend. Turned me on to Joni Mitchell and I listened to Blue when I was with her and then I couldn't get over. I've still. Listened to Blue, Yeah. And you can't listen. You can't listen. It's the song is so strongly associated in your brain. It's seared in with your with your relationships. I still have songs now that from a decade ago, you know, or, you know, bring back extremely vivid memories, whether you know, and, and just from different girls that I've gone out without my, my life. But so you, so you always loved music and you always found a way.

6:17 And you're using it kind of to find a way to express whatever you're feel, you know, whatever you're going through inside. Yeah, right. Yeah, I think, you know, we live in a rational world of rules and logic and you got to achieve things. And it's that's you're convinced, you're taught that at a young age, you pick that up. But I think that the power of the the intuitive and the emotional and the subconscious is much bigger. I mean, I think the consciousness is a little island in this huge ocean of emotion that we have and irrationality and passion and music understands that. Music connects me to that. Yeah.

6:57 I mean, do you find that you could tap into that while you're playing music because you said that you're. Yeah, yeah, the question has right. Jazz is almost it's, it's very improvision, Improvisional, yes. I love improvisation, to tell you the truth. I think everything in life if the more like improvisation it is, the better. In other words, when you're with with jazz is an extreme version of it, like comedy. Improv is, which my daughter does, where you have to be. So in the moment, you're not looking at yourself, you're not thinking about what's this adding up to. You're just experiencing where you are, who you're with. You're listening to everybody else, and you're responding intuitively. There might be a conscious part, but it's mostly intuition. And like when you're watching a basketball player, they're just there.

7:44 They're in that moment, they're responding, and it's beautiful and exciting. I think all the most important stuff in life happens that way. The best decisions, and certainly the most beauty is created that way. Yeah, definitely, definitely. So have you found that at a younger age or have you found throughout your life that you were able to kind of navigate your way through emotions or through particular chapters of your life, good or bad, through music or through playing music? Or is it mostly through consuming and sharing? Well, I've tried so hard to, to stay close to that musical, to stay honest and clear and be listening and be in the moment the way you are with music.

8:28 I'm not a musician, but with my writing, I until I was 60, I was very introverted. I was shy and I couldn't really think clearly in the company of other people. So that's, I think that's good for a playwright by yourself. You organize it only I could only write well when I was really relaxed, when I was into that, that kind of improvisatory feeling. Yeah. So I would go back and do that by myself and then share the play with the world. Yeah. I'm not sure I answered your question. But that's OK. It's because you did answer. You answered that you figured out a method of navigating it through playwriting as opposed to through playing music. Yeah, yeah, it sure is exciting though when you're when you're playing music at a party with other people and you're just, you've had a drink or something, you're all relaxing together.

9:14 It's, it's a closeness that's just a wonderful feeling to be that close to people. I now do something called after I did years of yoga and now I do this, this cult thing called, it's not an actual cult, but it's like it called 5 rhythms dance where we get and it's a little bit they they appear all over the world, but it's in New York. I do it on Sundays for two hours, 80 people in a room moving without talking to each other. But we were late through the music, just moving to music. And I, it's such a wonderful feeling to be connected to people. That's what I I seek in the theater. Everyone's laughing at the same moment. You're connected impulsively, you're connected at some deep level and it feels great it you're part of a community. You're not alone.

10:02 I mean, as an artist, you're alone what's inside me. But to connect that to other people is a joy. And especially I think the, the there, there's extra level of joy that's that's shared really by the performer and the audience when the performer behaves in a way that's particularly vulnerable and could be misinterpreted as not good. And the audience responds positively and sharing. And then it's almost like a moment like for everyone and everyone is happy and everyone kind of laughs along. And I feel like the and and and and I was actually, and I want to talk to you about the difference between, you know, the writing for stage, writing for screen and performing for stage and performing for screen because it's a different universe.

10:47 I mean, and I know with my very, very limited exposure in college, but but that was one thing that I feel like that that live feedback with the audience is something that you don't get the same way. But it's part it's almost part of the same magic. That's a concert in the sense that like the great, you know, Jerry Garcia of the Grateful Dead used to say about the early acid trips when everyone was kind of in like these big test, you know, warehouse and they're playing music. He's like the the for the from the band's perspective, the audience was the emphasis. You know, like it was just us talking to each other and sometimes they liked what we said and sometimes they did it and we'd laugh about it and that was the end of it. But like, you know, you got it with the performing arts it, you know, especially with the live card, I feel like that's really a big, big component of it. Sure is.

11:34 Even I think, you know, it's obvious with jazz that these notes haven't been played before. But even when you're doing Beethoven's Symphony and Orchestra, them, the great musicians will tell you it's like that performance is fresh. It's like it's never been played before every time you do it, which is tricky, you know, with Hamlet or with a classic. But but that's what makes it thrilling. That's what makes it beautiful. Yeah, yeah. And it's actually because I, and I actually was, I, I for a couple of years, Springsteen really saved my emotional state of mind, you know, and I connected on a very deep level to a lot of his, his albums Born to Run in Darkness, in the Edge of Town in particular, where like 3 like deep to my like when I, when I like.

12:18 It's the combination of of tragedy and and like, like almost like mourning and at the same time defiance and hope like being placed together in the same albums was so it just was so engaging to me for so many years. One, and then I was thinking a couple of years ago, I was like, I wonder how he brings this passion like night after night after night, because I feel like you're singing the same song for 50 years. You get burned out of it, I imagine, you know, And I imagine that's why a lot of bands burn out, you know, But there's something, there's something about, you know, these great live performers when they say that the performance isn't the music. The performance is a dance with the audience. And so they seem. That's what keeps it alive and fresh and going strong. It's so thrilling that they can do that. Yeah, I've heard James Taylor do Fire and Rain alone. I've seen him four times, and every time he did it, he does the hits and it's like he's never done it before. He's talking to you.

13:13 You're just the way that I'm talking to you. You know, I don't know what we're going to say, but that's the way a great performer does their even the hits. I, I dragged my wife to James Taylor with and we, and actually her grandmother found out we were going and she came to and he went to Tanglewood last year, 4th of July to watch him in, up in Tanglewood and it was such a great experience. Have you been to Tanglewood before that part? I've not. Heard about it many times. Yeah, I mean, you've heard, you've heard plenty then, but it was just one of the best venues. And the only problem was getting home at, you know, like leaving. You're just sitting in a, you know, parking lot for till 2O clock in the morning.

13:53 So tell me about when you started playwriting and you said that you failed your way through college. How did you keep pushing through writing and keep pushing through get, I guess not being happy the results that you got, because that's something, you know, I'll put down my guitar for six months at a time and be like, I freaking can't write a melody for my life or I'm trying to write a song. I'm trying to write a poem and I'm like, I can't get it done. I just walk away. You know, how do you how do you do? How did you do that? I had to, is all I can say. I imagine that's how you feel about songwriting. You have to keep coming back to it. You just have to. I needed it so badly. So I would write a play, and I guess it's partly a kind of automatic stupidity.

14:41 It's like like after finishing a play, no matter how badly it went, I believe the next time I'm going to get it right. Excuse me. It's just this feeling that keeps coming back. Got it. Now I've got it. This next one is going to be amazing, and that's probably what brings you back to writing your next song. It's like the I got no, no, you know, it might be defying all odds given how many times I've failed or how badly I failed, but this is going to be the one I still have that I can't. I couldn't write something new if I didn't fail. It was going to be better than anything I've ever done and perhaps the best thing in the world. And I totally believe, I totally relate to that. And but did you, was there a particular, for example, did you have like I have a structure that I try to stick to or try to develop when it comes to like lyrics or, or poems? Or did you have any like when you, when it came to playwriting, how did you go about developing characters, lyrics, performance, whatever, whatever it was? How did you learn to keep all these things in mind? Did you learn to keep like, did you like have any idea about this stuff or you just kind of improvising? What was it like?

15:46 Yes, I was just kind of improvising. I didn't have a formal playwriting class. I just wrote exactly what I wanted to see on a stage. And it unfortunately took me a long time to realize the connection between what you write on the paper and what's going, what an experience it's going to be on stage, right? It's like writing a recipe for a cake without you just write it and you make it. You say, Oh my God, this is awful. But I learned a ton from doing that constantly. I mean, on the page, I would write long monologues, for example. I thought, this is so powerful. This is, you know, and the minute you get it on stage or you the actor's just reading it, you say, Oh my God. Forward through.

16:29 This please stop talking. Stop talking. You know, So during rehearsal, I learned to cut a lot. I learned, for example, that storytelling on stage, it's it's the play is nothing like a novel or a short story. It's more like a dance or a fight or a sword fight, something. It's got to keep moving and leaping ahead. You can't put it down and come back. You can't take a break in the middle. You can't Daydream a little bit, you know? So I learned that very quickly, right? And I don't think anyone could have told me that. They certainly couldn't have made me feel as bad as listening to a long monologue made me feel you. Just for me. You just need to learn by doing it.

17:11 So I learned what a character was by by trying to write them. I learned what a play is or what, and it's also it's my rules there. There are things that are true for everybody, I guess. But I think if you're an an artist, I think each of us is unique is and, and the uniqueness, the weirdness of us of each person is the best thing about their art, right? So you can learn a lot of traditional things, but that weird the thing that works for you and nobody else. So the thing that you need to do that no one else would need to do is the best thing about your work. So that's something you just have to try. You have to have your hunches and your impulses and say this is how I want to do it and find out maybe you're right or you're wrong.

17:58 Right, right, right, right. That's really cool. That's really cool. And then how and then how did you start blending the concept of performing, I guess playwriting with musicals? And yeah. And I guess one thing I've personally and anecdotally, but personally notice is that I also, I, I too have a very hard time. I when I write, sometimes I'm capturing an idea and then when I say that idea out loud, I'm like, that's not what I meant to say. Like that's not what I'm trying to do. And I'm sure what your reaction, you relate, but like, I, you know, so I, I, I always tell my students, actually my high school students, I teach them English and I and I try and I, and they're like, how do I know if my paper is ready to, you know, hand in? I'm like, did you read it out loud? And they're like, no.

18:40 And I said read out loud. Like why? Like, because you're going to catch 1000 things that, that look like they make sense on paper, that don't make sense in your head. You know that's. A great idea. I wish my teacher had told me that. Yeah, yeah. I wish my teacher told me a lot of things too. But, you know, that's, I think that's what living, that's what living is for. Yeah. So what's the difference between? So how'd you integrate lyric writing and music into into playwriting? Well, again, trial and error with Rent was my first real musical, I guess. Yeah, so I'd seen a bunch, but I also knew I wanted to do it a little differently. I wanted it to be a little rough, to be very rough. And I put in the the swear words and things like that. I just thought for these characters, this is how they would would go.

19:32 And it took me. The first draft I wrote was really terrible. But then I and Jonathan told me that and then I did another draft that was more because I think the first I was trying to write it like what I imagined people would want me to write. The second one I said, OK, I give up. This is what I have to do. And so I just had those two characters sitting there in the cold, just kind of swearing with kind of a punk rock rhythm, da da da, you know, And that became the song Rent. And I wrote them the way I basically the way I write dialogue, except with the rhythm heightened in a in on the stage. You can heighten rhythm to an extent and the lyrics, I guess, but you want to be careful it doesn't get sing songy or two.

20:18 You don't want to rhyme unless there's a real reason for it. You prefer not to rhyme. What? Sorry. You prefer not to rhyme if you can. That's right. Nothing should be more interesting than it needs to be or it's a distraction. Yeah, I learned that from my playwriting, that if if characters language. Because on the pet you read a lot of Shakespeare and Beckett and all these players, these artists who are great with with rhythm and the sound of language. But if you go too far with that, it becomes a distraction. And it you're just aware that the playwright is. Yeah, I. Have. I have that issue with, with some of my students who I'm trying to show them a song or I'm trying to show them, you know, lyrics to particular song and try to examine the depth of it. And they get carried away with, you know, different aspects of the song that kind of, you know, grabs at, you know, I guess a little bit more of a superficial level of their attention that kind of pulls away from their from, from their ability to pay attention to what I'm really trying to show them, which would be the lyrics, you know, I guess. If there's one thing, there's that one germ inside any work of art, I think that you've got to be true to and you got to get a sense of, even if you can't put words to it, what sense of what that thing is and follow that.

21:30 If you start making, you know, putting bells and whistles or, you know, cutes cuteness on it, it's it's really annoying and it and it art really has to be pure or it doesn't work. If if you you can only push even with with TVI found this out because you know, you have commercial considerations or things that editors will come in and tell you to do something. And you have to be very careful with that because especially if you're doing something new in bold like a Bruce Springsteen song or a Joni Mitchell song, it's got to be just right. You can't put anything extra. They're perfect, you know? Anyway, so that's I learned writing a musical by having by trying and having Jonathan Larson still working at you guys. So how'd you go?

22:13 How'd you go up with the idea? How'd you go up with the concept? Well, when I was new in New York, I lived in Hell's Kitchen, which was then much more like the name implies, in my little crowded building. There were drugs all over the place and, and it was cramped and it was cold. But I lived nine blocks from the Metropolitan Opera. It's where you're right near the Lincoln Center. So I used to go up and that's that's where I learned to like opera, just because it was drama with a big, gorgeous stage, big sets, big costumes, gorgeous music. And and if you got standing room, it was cheap. I think it might have been $8, something like that to stand in at the Metropolitan Opera all the way in the back. And they were long and I had time. I didn't want to be in my apartment. It was too small and I didn't have any privacy. So and, and La Boheme in particular I fell in love with because it's about young artists who are really poor, you know, who are struggling.

23:16 They're burning their own work to, to keep the fire going. But they are that they fall in love. They have great friends, great friends and great love, romance, intense romances. So I, I related to that and only when I was walking home one time through the cold on my way to my Hell's Kitchen apt, I thought, wow, my boem, my, my artist world is very different. It's sharper and it's, it's like broken glass compared to the smoothness of the, the Zeffirelli sets and the luscious Puccini music. There's nothing luscious about New York in the mid 80s if you live in Hell's Kitchen. So that's when I got the idea to do something. And I don't write music I love, you know, I can play it, I dance to it.

24:03 But so I went to Playwrights Horizons, a theater that I worked at. I mean, that was doing readings of my work and and Ira Weitzman there, their musical theater guy recommended me to two composers, one of whom was John Larson. So that's where we. Hooked up. We hooked up through that. Right. Wow, amazing. I love the way that you and it's funny that you described it as gritty and a little bit more rough around the edges, but because a it is, but it's so endearing. It's in such an authentic, not kind of try way, you know, not trying to, it's not, it's not imposing, you know, the, the, the, the lyrics and the characters and, and the whole storyline.

24:51 It is done in such a, it feels so subtle and it feels so natural and organic. It's just like you're kind of peeping into these people, like the way these people organically live. And there's no kind of sense of showmanship nearly as much as just a bunch of people having fun together and, you know, kind of sharing and expressing life together. I think that's what makes it so relatable. And I think that's what makes it so much fun to so many people because I think there's, I think we, I think we almost, I think there's a certain expectation of like a certain properness, you know, to musicals. And there's, and there's such a strong tradition and it's a rich one and it's a beautiful one and it's a really deep one.

25:32 But like, this was like an individual's, you know, this is like a unique, an individual's expression of what a musical is. And I think that's really what caught what caused so many people's imagination and what caught fire to so many people. Yeah, Jonathan and I worked together on it for a year or two. We couldn't. Nobody was biting, nobody was interested in doing. We wrote 3 songs together in a in a draft of a script. So we decided to go our separate ways. We put it aside and he asked if he could go ahead on his own. So he gets the credit for this wonderful thing that it became. Aside from my 3 songs, I'm credited with original concept and additional lyrics. OK, my 3 songs are still in there. Which ones?

26:18 Rent Santa Fe and I should tell you the love duet. Oh nice. Love those. Nice, that's. Great. It did catch fire. He kept Jonathan stuck with it and and made it really great and expressed his heart through it and and it did catch fire. It I, I think you're right that it's it felt personal. It felt humble, open hearted and people could relate to it, to the characters. There and sincere for sure. And, and I think that even I think that it kind of, I would almost hope that it would almost be inspirational to kind of people today in a weird way, because despite such bleak circumstances that the characters are living through. And like you said, New York in the 80s is no picnic, you know, but there's still a romance and a magic of participation and community that, that, that, that the place had. And I think anyone that lives in New York would tell you that for, you know, for many years, that's what made it so wonderful.

27:20 And I actually think it's probably what we're missing in today's world, because today's world almost feels like there's a lot of, there's not a lot of economic comfort for a lot of, for many, many young people, many, many middle-aged people, you know, many people in general. There's a lot, there's a lot of economic insecurity and there's not really, I don't think people really, and also people are isolated in a very intense kind of way, you know, and that's for a number of reasons. And you know, and we can talk about that, but I actually think that if people looked at that and said, is this what my life could be like? Look at this joy, look at this kind of fun and authenticity and and and real and real happiness that some people are sharing and love and and meaning that there even though things are hard, community is what is a community is what people are living for.

28:13 I think that that would be that should be so inspirational to people today. Yeah, people still enjoy the show. Yeah, thank God. Yeah, because we keep getting checks and. There you go. There you go. Yeah, I, I remember I was, I think I mentioned in my e-mail to you when I introduced myself, but I was forced to go see it in Community College. I was in Rockland Community College upstate and and my and I took a class and the professor made us go and I was like, what is this? I don't know. And like I read the description. I'm like, I don't know, I went there and I'm not exaggerating. A minute, 90 seconds in, I was completely hooked. And I was like, I don't know what this is, but I'm a part of it. I love this.

28:55 This is great. So thank you. Great to hear from. Thank you. Of course, of course. So yes, let's talk about your man. Do you want to talk about your kids programming first or TV writing or what do you want to go? What do you want to go from? Here anything involving me is fine. OK, great. Or we can talk about you, too. TV writing. OK. Well, I did it. I began it to make money because I was, I'd gotten engaged to my sweetheart who lived in Boston. I was in New York. She was going to come live with me in New York. And I wanted to, I wanted to make it clear that I could pay my end of things, that we were going to raise a family. And I was serious about this. Sure. And I've been living.

29:36 How old are you at this point? About 30. Cool. Sounds really young to me now. Yeah. Then I felt old. I am too old to be having roommates and to be not knowing where my next check is coming from. And so I wanted to, I wanted to have the comforts of like ATVA big TV, you know, a big screen TV and AVCR stereo. And and I also just wanted to have some stability. So I got into and I found writing for television. If I find in general, I tell artists, if you can use your skill, your craft to make money, you'll make money much more quickly than often than bussing tables or I was doing paralegal work at night. So I, I just applied to everything. I watched all of the channels that were on TV and I looked is there anything that has that I would be interested in? If I if there was a show I thought I could write for, I would wait till the closing credits, see who produced it and figure out how to approach them and tell them how much I love their show.

30:40 Nice SO. Mostly you get no response, but occasionally people would bite and I had good writing samples. You had to have a sample. Something funny and short was usually for whatever show involves comedy, you have to make sure you have like a good three page thing. Someone you can read and go haha. Let's check out more of this guy. Did you, did you have one go to sale, you have one go to Joke or do you have a couple that you'd work on based on whoever you're applying to, no. Sketches, like comic, like little Playlit, you know, 3 pages or 4 pages. I don't. I'm not very good at writing jokes. Others are, and that's a great thing to have. You can have a page of 10 jokes that can get you a lot of work, but I had my my I had like a four rotation of four or five different sketches.

31:26 I would use Gotcha kids TVI had a Grover sketch I'd written and for grown-ups TV other more adult with stuff with sex in it. But and I I would get some work through that. And I found that it wasn't always, I wasn't always good at what I thought I'd be good at. For example, I thought that a Comedy Central would would go well for me, but it didn't because like grown up wit wasn't really my joke. As I say, joke writing wasn't my thing, but children's TV tended to be good collaborations. I tended to be good fit, which surprised me. But now, of course it makes perfect sense because I'm goofy and you know, I have a juvenile side. In fact, I think I don't have an adult side. I just have a juvenile side that's good. I got a lot of work writing for kids, television, also writing like educational books I really liked. Well, cool.

32:19 Like for kids educational books. Yeah, like or OK, young through 6th grade, that sort of thing. Like writing for Scott Forsman. I did a book about the star gravity and the stars astronomy DNA. Cool. I find that it was fun. If there's something that you you understand but you're not a scholar at, it's really fun to teach it, to go to it and say, wait a minute, here's what's cool about the way the planets were formed. Here's what's cool about DNA. And to talk and to talk kids slowly through each step and have it be funny the whole time.

33:00 That's the assignment, you know, So that was a good gig. And also a lot of children's television and some quirky cartoons like Beavis and Butt Head. Yes. Even my wife, when that first when that show first came out on TV, we loved it because it wasn't like anything else. It was just so weird and and true it that's what it's like to be a 9 or 10 or 12 year old boy 13. I guess they are. And so when I got the call to write for that, I was just thrilled. I. I don't understand how that works in terms of hiring new writers once a show has already started because isn't there a particular pace and tone and kind of, you know, like, I can imagine it's really difficult to do, no.

33:41 Yeah, I agree. It's hard to to. You're sort of learning to write in somebody else's handwriting a little bit. Yes, right. Which is tricky, but usually if they're hiring new writers, they're open to a little bit of, they expect you to bring something new to it within their rules. And again, it's hard to communicate explicitly. I mean, they'll always have a list of rules, what they are and clues to give you. But you have to sort of feel it. Again, it's like the improvisatory thing. You just sort of get the rhythm of this show. You get the personalities and you love it. And so you can get into it and take it and make it, you know, find the intersection between you and it, right? What it is and what you are, right?

34:21 That's useful. So fun. So cool. So take me through this only because I'm, I'm particularly enamoured by this because I lived on the Upper West Side for a little bit and spent a bunch of time there in my early 20s as a new single post college guy. And one of my dreams, daydreams how to walk by the ABC building and just imagine walking in and going to my writing job or going to a television job there. So can you paint to me the picture of what it's like, what a what a day of writing there, you know, for a television company or you know, for a studio at the time was like? Sure. Well, I wrote freelance OK, so I didn't always I would go in for a meeting, OK, to the MTV building or the.

35:04 The PBS, you go when you're nervous. Are you, are you dressed up? Are you, are you, are you like, who are you meeting with? What's it like? Nervous. Yes, nervous because I was used to being home alone and writing. And then you come in and you don't know what they're going to say about your work. There are going to be other writers there tossing out ideas. That whole thing was a was a scary party for me. But I did. I was a head writer of the show called The Wonder Pets much later in my career. And that was the only time, I guess, when I went in every day, all day, and I sat in an office and I wrote and I edited other people's writing and I went to meetings. And it looks from getting used to. See, you'd sit in and you have scripts in your desk and you would either start working, continue them or edit them or whatever. And then a couple of times a day you'd meet with other writers who are coming up with simultaneous ideas for the same episode or for the next episodes. How did that work?

35:57 Well, it was mostly again, I was the only in house writer. The main thing was to dealing with the show creator who was there executive producer and he knew exactly what he wanted. So it's like I was the head writer, but writing he was my head. So that was that was a source of some terror. Did you guys? Yeah, collaboration. Yeah, collaboration is hard for me, but but when you get it, it's a thrill. And I think I got pretty. I could often get what he wanted, and that made me feel great. There was a lot of that, but I also just like being around other people. There were all the animators and the artists. I go with Pike.

36:39 They were all creative and young, yeah, and and fun to be with. So I liked being part of a team that was. Great. Yeah, Yeah. What's is there a difference when you're writing for animation as opposed to again, for, you know, for the screen or for actors? Because I showed my class again and this is how I already know that time is passing a little too fast for my comfort. But they don't even they really don't not familiar who with Robin Williams and Aladdin, you know, and I'm showing them the outtakes of, you know, of the, of the different concepts that that that Disney had for, for, you know, his, for his for Genie. And I'm expecting it to, I'm expecting a similar reaction to what I had when I saw it.

37:21 And they're kind of just met with a blank stare, which is crazy. I know I have to expose them to some more culture, but I'm sure that writing is like animation gives you so much more freedom to express a point that words don't necessarily have to carry for you. And if you can often let, and I'm sure this is almost similar to playwriting, if you can let body language do the talking instead of your mouth, a lot of times that's preferable, right? Yeah, yeah, cartoons are fun to write for, I think. Animation I wrote for this show called Courage the Cowardly Dog. That was for like. Middle. I remember it. That was a Cartoon Network, right? Yeah, Cartoon Network.

38:01 Yeah, yeah. I mean every cartoon, all animation, the rules are different for what you can do. But Courage the Cowardly Dog was very stretchy and very imaginative and bold, unlike Beavis and Butt Head, which is much more like a play where the characters don't stretch, but they can. I love writing for for Dilworth for that show. John Dilworth was the creator and you put in the stage directions, very expressive stuffs, you know, his his head expands, his tongue goes out around the world, that sort. Of thing, but that's written in it. Right. It's written into the script. You write it into the script, cool, describe it and of course the then the animators make it great. But you have to put it in there.

38:48 That's that's how you tell the story. Anything is the script has to have everything that tells the story. That's needed to express the drama, the personality, the meaning of it. So I forget what I was going to say. Animation is different with everybody. I was doing it with younger kids, though. You have to have that. You want them to see, to speak and you want it. Anything that's important to be in the dialogue and in the stage directions so that they're seeing it and seeing and hearing, right? Because they haven't. Language is fairly new to them, so you want to make sure that what they see on the screen is described by words and what they say with words is is done is acted out for them. And how cognizant is the, is the creator or the studio's of this concept or are they, are you, were you cognizant of this to begin with?

39:43 And like how did how like cuz that sounds like something yeah, people, people tell you. As I would work, they say no, no, no, you can't just write that they have. We have to see it and hear it at the same time. I see. Cool. And then I imagine with the kids stories, you have to figure out a way and there's a whole another level of intelligence. And the way, you know, is when you when you have a really, really smart person and they can explain really, really complicated ideas to anyone. That's how you know how smart they are, you know, and I think so, yeah, totally. It's. A skill Einstein was pretty good, I think, at explaining his ideas, even relativity, very simply and clearly. He writes beautifully. I think not all scientists can do it, which is good for writers like me who wanted to help them. But with children's television, I find that the important thing is to express exactly what you would for adults, except in their language.

40:38 In other words, don't dumb down. I mean, friendship is. It's all still about love and friendship and fear and tension. It's hard. It life is hard for whatever age you are. Yeah. And to not dumb it down for kids or, or to think, well, kids are, you know, don't they aren't as smart as we are. So keep it simple. It's still complex feelings, but you just need to express it in a language that they can get you. Slow it down a little bit. You watch the vocabulary. Yeah. But that's been my guiding principle. I find it, it's the best when I really put my heart into it and just think of it as though I'm writing it for myself, just like I would with a play.

41:20 It's the most beautiful thing I can possibly create. And I'll find a language to keep it simple. In my case, I just, I'm, as I say, I'm juvenile. So I have the concerns, I think that overlap a lot with the concerns of a four year old, yeah. I think a lot more people do than they care to admit, by the way. Yeah, Yeah. How do you how do you have that goofy side? Like, do you feel like it's constantly like bubbling up and you kind of just let it go or like, or do you feel like it's kind of like a door you can open and close this silliness or goofiness? How do you relate to it? It feels natural to me. It doesn't feel like a door I can open and close. I mean, I write about serious things most of the time, right? You know I'm writing a a musical right now about war. OK.

42:04 But it's funny. I mean, it's kind of, you know, it's, you see that there's something terrifying happen, but you look at the people, there's something funny about it. It's just my way of looking at things. I guess at at best, my heart is in it. But at the same time, I'm stepping back and looking down at it and think, really, yeah, natural way to be for me. I don't always wish I were that way, but I make use of it. It's got to be a great balance. And I think it's, do you think it's a coping mechanism? Because that's, I feel like to find the goofiness in something, it's kind of protecting yourself for distancing yourself from, you know, taking something too seriously or making it too painful.

42:47 I know what you're saying to me, it's not a coping mechanism. It's natural. It's, it's just my truth. I mean, this is how it feels when I'm in pain, right? I've had when I, I was visiting my friend Connie in California one time and I got terrible, terribly sick on something I ate and I had awful, I mean, I was terrible cramps and diarrhea and vomiting and everything. And she laughed at me. She's it's just, you're so funny. You look so serious. The way it's like whatever my face was or you saw your rhythm just changed. So violent, so extremely. She was laughing.

43:28 That's sort of me. I mean, I found that with my first play the, you know, it was again about broken heart in the night when my parents were divorced and the way this hatred between men and women, something about the moments and there were few that it worked. People laughed. It's kind of a laugh of recognition. Yeah. It wasn't like, because I was trying to I I know you can make jokes when you're trying to avoid getting serious about things, and I've done that when I nurse at a party or something. But it's really not that with the art or with the cartoons for me. Yeah, Yeah, yeah, yeah, definitely that's. How I experience pain? The nuance for sure, for sure, for sure, because one is kind of a developed form that kind of serves to that you've kind of grown to protect yourself.

44:14 The other one is just kind of the way that you are. It's just true. It's just your perception in the way that you, you know, process reality. Yeah. That's really interesting. That's really cool. I forgot I was. I was gonna comment on something that you said. Something clever, maybe? What, were you gonna correct me? Something stupid I said, or No? No. No, no, I was gonna comment. I was gonna comment cuz I was gonna, I was gonna ask you elaborate, but now I don't, no, I don't recall. So let's talk about a couple more serious things because you mentioned that you that, you know, that a lot of people are interested in, you've started talking a little bit about, you know, anxiety and depression throughout your career. Yes, terrible problem for me, Terrible problem all my life really. But it got at its worst in my 50s I guess.

44:59 Do you wanna, do you, have you thought about it enough or looked at it enough to kind of be able to draw a narrative in your mind as to like have a storyline where it began or how it continued or developed throughout your life? Or are you not sure about that yet? Well, yeah, there. I don't know in the end, but the two ways I have of looking at it are one, it was just my chemistry, which would make sense because everyone in my family has suffered from depression and anxiety. OK, another is to say, but then I can make the story of well, when my parents were divorced, I was 7 and I felt it was my job to keep the family happy. No one told me that, but as the oldest of three children, so every all the things that.

45:43 The. Trouble. I thought it was all my fault all my life, and every time something failed that I was in, I thought it was my fault. If a play didn't work, it probably was my fault. I still think that, but whatever would go wrong in the world I thought was my fault, and then I just couldn't take it anymore. After a certain point. Whatever the reason, the psychological or the biological, it's the thing I've had to deal with. I just got used to being nervous in public, in public speaking, and I would go to parties with a sentence ready to say. So when people asked what I was doing, I wouldn't draw a blank. I wouldn't feel like I had this negative thinking, terrible negative thinking, and my impulse would say I suck, I'm bedded, everything.

46:25 Even if there was something cool that I was doing, yeah, I would think, oh, that's just for children or oh, it's I rent. It was just, I did a little bit, then I quit. Always I would see the worst of it. So I'd have to have a sentence ready so that I could say something that sounded good when people would ask what I was doing. It's a terrible way to live. Terrible. And then depression would come and go sort. I was sort of aware of it. I remember in college one time, I noticed that if I don't get out of bed, there's this thing that's going to happen to me, so I better get out of bed in a hurry. Really. Ghost that was pursuing me, What is that thing I have to get out of bed to avoid? And then it caught up with me in drama school and I couldn't get out of bed. And it came back, of course, much, much worse. In my late 50s, I had a long depression of I guess it was six months of being almost paralyzed. Oh man, it was so awful.

47:13 But I was not funny. I can imagine you think you're funny to the observer, probably. Yeah, Yeah. You know, if I start telling my problems, if I would tell somebody something, I just as a nervous person, I'm funny. So, you know, people would laugh at me. I'd go to my place. I was so nervous, I had to hide. I would hide in back and people would think this is a comical, cute thing, but it was not fun. It just sucked. Yeah. Feeling my stomach tight all the time I had, I had panic attacks, which again, a person like me with a funny face, being panicked can be hilarious. But it sucked. I didn't want to live like that, no. And then so I took a combination of yoga and medication and therapy and mainly just focusing on that negative thinking, changing the way my mind worked by any means necessary to Get Me Out of it.

48:08 And right now I'm the happiest person I know. So I'm the opposite. You know, when you get through depression, the great news about depression is when you get through it, you're stronger, I think, because of it. Then through hell. And you know what hell is like. And you know how to avoid it, right. And you realize how great it is just to be able to work to, to wake up in the morning and look out the window and just feel, Gee, things are good. Yeah. It's OK. Yeah. Or if it gets cold. Hey, that's OK. It's winter. It's supposed to get cold. It's not like the world is getting dark and evil where you're getting old and tired. I think that a lot. I think that second thought a lot.

48:49 You get tired and old yeah, I just, I just turned 30 last week and Oh my gosh, yeah well, I'll spare you my I'll spare you. But I, I, I feel, Oh no, my forever disconnected from youth, you know, is this, is this it? But then of course, then of course I hang out with my 2 1/2 year old and my 6 month old and I'm like, of course, I'm not disconnected from you. You're crazy. This is just dumb. It's something that I think that I think it's especially if it's something that you don't take for granted anymore, you start to appreciate it, you know, in a whole nother level. And I think that, you know, like this, that, that kind of, and that's, I think why part of what's fun about your personality is that like for a lot of people, they don't take it for granted. The, the, the silliness and the way to look at and, and, and that kind of way of looking at things. And so because it's not something that everyone has, it's so much more endearing and it almost feels intentional when you, when you do come across it.

49:47 So it's, it's great. Did you, was your, that second bout of depression? You say that you're familiar. You had it, you had it a little bit in college and drama school and then it came back in your 50s. Were you? I mean, that's a 30 year gap. I mean, but it was still there. I mean, it was, it was like this ghost, I could tell you. But like when I got to New York, OK, if I don't do something, I've got all my whole life free now I'm going to, I better do something. And we're sort of always writing a play I got and I got to get to the next one or something. The meaningless is going to hit. I'll have nothing. I'll be doing nothing. My life will mean nothing because everybody has a lot of that, a little of that. Meaningless. The fear of meaninglessness is what is what drove it. It was a feeling of. Yeah, of being, I guess, existential nausea. Call it what you will.

50:31 Yeah. I didn't think of it as depression so much as just. I'm hiding from the truth. There is nothing, you know, that we're alone and naked, and it's just nothing. That meaning is imaginary, that you have to create and cling to this, the story of your life, this getting somewhere, this achieving. You know, I couldn't enjoy Sundays, for example, being a Sunday on after a date. You know, I don't want to relax. I have to get right back to work. I don't want to have time to think about the meaning of it all. Wow. So I finally had to confront that. But yeah, it was. It wasn't gone for 30 years. It was. It kept coming back at my own wedding. I was terrified, you know, they're going to find out that I'm a failure.

51:15 I don't belong with this woman. I'm a loser. Wow. Very relatable. It's very relatable. Yeah, yeah, extremely relatable. But you're doing so well. You're a musician. You've got these two great young kids. You're a teaching whiz. You're good looking. You're funny. I I. Everything you're saying is deeply, deeply relatable. And I actually, I've, I've learned to recognize that sensation when I'm not creative. So if a week or two will go by and I didn't write or I didn't play, do a podcast or I didn't learn a new song on guitar. And like that existential dread that you describe really, really well, which is like, what am I even doing? You know, like what, like what is this? And, and then the scary thing of it being like, even if I do, what is it, you know, and, and, and that was that, that's something that I spent many years, a couple of psychedelic trips, a lot of, a lot of great friendships, you know, spending many, many hours discussing.

52:23 And I think that at least for myself, and I'd like to hear about maybe your, you know, what with the way that you've kind of thought about it or worked through it or different stages, I guess that you've gone through. I think I had to separate from myself the fact that I, if Ryan Hershman, am not going to be relevant or remembered even in a generation or two. But the impact that I have in the world absolutely will exist. And like the things that I do, all this, all the snowballs that I just, you know, roll down the hill that keep on packing up and keep on getting bigger and bigger and bigger that I don't even know where it's going to end up or where it's going to go. But I just have to have but, but I have faith and hope in that my actions actually lead to that, that whether anyone remembers it down the line or not is irrelevant.

53:11 The fact the world's actually a better place for my family, for my kids, from, you know, for the future, for humanity is where I've been looking like. That's that's kind of where I've settled for the moment. I'm curious about what you how you answered those kind of questions. Well, you've done very well. I mean, you've solved it at a young age. You have a really good answer. I admire that. I have to. Feel it. We have to, you know, it's one thing to say, to feel it. Believing it, having something to remind yourself. Wait a minute, how have I answered it? Now it's much easier for me. It's been much easier when I'm older.

53:51 I don't know why. I just, I guess I feel like although I'm still working really hard to create new stuff, I feel like I've done stuff so I don't need to. It's not even about proving myself to other people. It's about just I don't need to. I mean, when you're 30, it's probably good that you feel this compulsion to achieve because you, you know, it shouldn't be unpleasant, but there's a lot ahead of you that you're going to do. And that's great. And it'll take some energy. It will continue to take energy and imagination and everything you've got. And that's great. I think I have come to a sort of faith about my art. You mentioned the word faith. Yeah, I had a strange thing happen a few years ago where an opera I'd worked on I developed with a composer in the 90s that got nowhere.

54:41 We developed it and developed it and did it in churches and schools and stuff. Was picked up by a theater in Sweden. They found it on the Internet and they did a full production of it with a 70 piece orchestra, one of the largest stages in Europe. And this is in Malmo, Sweden. That was revolving and a gorgeous just blew me out there and it was just gorgeous. And it struck me that it's possible that the works that you do now that are not appreciated. We love that opera that if you do your very best, if you put your heart into it and do make it exactly what you think it should be and it doesn't get recognized for whatever reason it might be. In fact, there might be 30 years from now.

55:22 That was 30 years between the perfect production, the perfect recognition of it. You can't know that. Yeah, it probably. I don't know. I don't the odds. I don't know what the odds are that it will happen, but it might. Jonathan Larson never knew what rent would become. He seemed to have a feeling that it was huge and important. So I can only say that you have to accept that for now. The the mission is to do your absolute best, put your heart into it. Live for the moment with that work. Be in it, love doing it, love making it that that experience of knowing that you're putting something gorgeous out into the world, putting yourself into the world has to be enough because you can't always know what's next and then let it go and move on to the next one.

56:08 And then there's also the question that I deal with. I think I would like to be strong enough that I can accept that, even if that's not even about that. I don't even need to change the world with my work. That just being and going through the day and being good to my children and being kind to people on the street, saying hello to people on the street and sharing the positive energy with the crossing guard. Yeah, that alone. Changes your life, changes your life. By the way, when did, when did you start implementing that? Because I started doing that like a year ago, maybe a year and a half ago. But I just started making eye contact and saying hello to people and just being nice to neighbors and the male people and the people at the supermarket. And I go to the gas station now and if I'm in a bad mood, I walk out five minutes later and I'm just like, I said hi to three people and had four and had four positive exchanges. I'm like, this is great, man.

57:01 I don't know what's going on. But but, but, but things are good. Things are good. You know, I it's amazing. Well, this is not fair that you're know all this at 30. I was going to point out how I it took me 68 years to get to this, but there goes my story. Come on. That's great. That's I agree with you. There's no way you weren't doing this stuff the whole time. It's just a question of whether you're aware of it, you know? I mean, you couldn't have gone through all that you went through with people at least getting this positive reception of good and good vibe from you that they want to, you know, be around. You well I agree it is a great just saying hello to people making eye contact with people is a beautiful thing and it makes you feel great makes makes them feel great often. So what are some so, So what are some things that you hope to that you hope to work on now? What is some ambitions that you have? Well, I'm doing a new musical that's my main project based on a Shakespeare play called Troilus and Cressida, a not very well known war play that he wrote. That's also a odd, really odd comedy that that strikes me as about now in a lot of ways, that asks. In what capacities?

57:58 What's what's the scenarities? Well, it's about a war that the Trojan War, it's set in the Trojan War that no one knows why they're fighting it. It was about because Helen, because Paris took Helen from Greece to Troy, but no one really likes Helen and you know, on either side they don't like her. So why are, and they've been fighting for 10 years at this point and they but they just can't stop. So that the theme, the question of why we hurt each other and the romance, the toilets and crested romance is very painful to both of them, even though they seem to want to they they want to love each other and yet they destroy each other. So and it's about a world in which both sides talk at each other.

58:43 Language is really difficult. Languages makes up conflict. The more they talk, the more the the conflict grows. Even when they're switching sides of the. They don't even know what they're talking about, but they just keep fighting. What is that? Yeah. So it asks that question. Wow. And I found this composer whose music I'm in love with, G Hey Lee, a jazz composer who's from Korea but lives in Brooklyn now. Amazing. We're having a good time working on it. Wow, that's so exciting. I'd love to hear updates about that. That sounds really cool, how are you? Wow, such great themes. I think so. And so how do you modernize it? You're taking this story and you're like, you know what? I love this story. I love these themes.

59:24 Here's like my playbook for this. I'm going to go ahead and I'm going to, I want to put my own twist on this. Now what am I, you know, how do you go about that? Well. With rent, of course, for example, we said it now what we said it in. It was the late 80s. We said it then in that specific time period, which was contemporary to what we were when we were writing it. But with this, I thought it should just stay as simple as possible. I try. I considered, do we set it down? Do we set it during World War One? But that that wasn't the point. It needed to be simple and mythical and feel huge. Yeah. But feel like now, I mean, so I just, it's it's as I was writing the script, I made it my own.

1:00:09 So it it focuses on more women characters. Yeah, a world that's Half Men and half women and where the the the anger that's in Shakespeare's play, but hidden. And there's a lot of tenderness completely hidden in Shakespeare's play that I brought out. OK. That, but that's what makes it feel contemporary. And I think people are getting that when we show it to them. But it is a hard question. How do you do that? How do you make it your own? How do you modernize it? Yeah, yeah, because there's a lot that I've been thinking about. I mean, I was just, I did a a fascinating podcast last week with a woman that specialized in the history, unknown history essentially, of Japanese war crimes in World War 2.

1:00:54 Wow. I don't know anything about it. I didn't even know that that was a thing. I didn't know anything, you know, and, and, and apparently a lot of information was classified and, and there's only, and it was never even digitized. And she had single handedly almost, I think maybe a small team digitized like 1,000,000 copies or over 1,000,000 copies of information. As she said, we have Civil War documents that are in better kept condition because they were written on cotton paper as opposed to World War 2 where production was pretty much at a standstone in the States. And so the quality of paper was garbage. So as soon as these papers deteriorate, history's gone. You know, our awareness of that of that was gone. But one thing that we were talking about was so many things that were happening in the early 1900s are exactly rhyming with what's happening today. And it wouldn't even take that much to kind of make contemporary, you know, I mean, OK, trade a horse, trade a horse and buggy for, for Aston Martin.

1:01:49 And, you know, and trade, you know, I mean, you don't even have to trade the characters, like the main characters of the countries or whatever it is. That's that's who it is, you know, So I think, I think that it's more about the new, it's almost like cultural and like a little bit of like nuance of like technology. But other than that, a lot of this already lends itself to just human nature, which is consistent. Yeah, thank God human nature is consistent. Yeah, you don't. You don't have to have cell phones all the time to man. It's how you do a play. That's my next step. I got to get rid of my cell phone. I got to get. I got to get one of those flip phones. You know what I'm talking about. They don't have. Really. Yeah, that's my next goal, I thought. Your generation was quite comfortable with all that stuff.

1:02:32 We are I think that we're going to see very quickly that we were a test, a lab test generation for social media and the impact of constantly living in a combination of comparison and consumerism world where everyone is comparing themselves to everyone and purchasing everything beyond any kind of, you know, sustainability, you know, so, so I'd rather just separate myself from that off the get go. And you know what everything I got to do, I got to do, I could do on my computer. You know, I mean, there's really no reason to walk around with. I mean, if my wife used to call me, my kids need to call me. Got a phone number, You want to send me a text SOS, I'll come pick you up.

1:03:13 And that's the end of it. You know, that's, that's my ambitions. Sounds like a good idea. Definitely, Billy. I really appreciate the time. This is such a fun conversation. This is really great and I really, you're thoughtful, you're sweet, you got you tell an amazing story and I really wish you tons of luck with all these next exciting phases and hopefully you can accomplish success while treating yourself well at the same time. That's the goal. That's the goal. That's the goal. Thanks. Brian, I've I've enjoyed this very much. This is such a pleasure. All the best. Take Care now. Thank you. Take care. Bye. Bye.