Act One Podcast
Act One Podcast
Screenwriter Quinton Peeples
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Act One Podcast - Episode 29 - Interview with Screenwriter, Quinton Peeples.
Quinton Peeples was born in San Angelo, Texas, raised in nearby Abilene and remained there until 1984. His vision of pursuing a career as a painter was quickly falling apart and he found himself answering a different call – the entertainment business. He arrived in Los Angeles immediately following the summer Olympics and set his sight on film school, resulting in his graduating with an MFA from the American Film Institute. The two projects written there for his graduate thesis became “AN AMBUSH OF GHOSTS”, a Sundance Award winner in 1993, and “A HEART FULL OF RAIN”, a television movie for CBS.
Moving easily between the world of indie film and television, Quinton wrote multiple features for all the major networks and studios including Fox, NBC, ABC, Disney, Lionsgate and many others. He found his way to directing in 1995 when he shot his original screenplay “JOYRIDE” starring Tobey Maguire and Benicio DelToro. He continued to direct indie features, commercials, and web series, in addition to his writing work.
And then the WGA strike happened in 2008. While on the picket line Quinton realized everyone else had friends there and he didn’t. That’s when he discovered that television writers work as a team and the lure of that idea was irresistible. He wrote his first television spec pilot which resulted in his staffing on “FLASHFORWARD” at ABC. Transitioning to hour long drama, Quinton has worked on multiple shows as varied as “UNFORGETTABLE”, “THE LAST SHIP”, “11/22/63”, and Marvel’s “RUNAWAYS”. Most recently he ran the limited series “ECHOES” for Netflix.
Quinton is also a published author, with essays appearing in “CUT TO THE CHASE: WRITING FEATURE FILMS WITH THE PROS”, “ETERNAL LIVING: REFLECTIONS ON FAITH AND FORMATION”, and the graphic novel, “THE BIG COUNTRY”. His screenplay with Billy Crystal, “HAVE A NICE DAY” was performed live on stage at the Minetta Theater in New York City and is available on Audible as part of their Audible Originals program.
The Act One Podcast provides insight and inspiration on the business and craft of Hollywood from a Christian perspective.
If I was learning to play the trumpet, I'd have to run scales every day. Scales are boring, but I must, in order to play the trumpet, be able to do that without thinking. And that takes practice. So being able to take those unique things that only you see in the world, those really observational things that are unique to you and get them onto the page clearly is you running scales. So getting to that voice is about you practicing your uniqueness and being able to articulate it on the page clearly so that other people go, wow, you're the only person who could have done that.
James Duke:This is the Act One Podcast. I'm your host, James Duke. Thanks for listening. Please don't forget to subscribe to our podcast and leave us a good review. My guest today is screenwriter Quentin People. Quentin has been a professional screenwriter for almost 30 years. He began his career writing indie features in television films, but for the past 15 years he's written for TV shows, such as Flash Fold on ABC, The Last Chip for TNT, the adaptation of the Stephen King novel 112263 on Hulu, as well as Marvel's Runaways. Currently, he is the co-showrunner of the upcoming limited series Echoes on Netflix. Quentin is a very thoughtful person and I think you will enjoy our conversation. Quentin, welcome to the Act One podcast. Thank you so much for joining me today. Oh, thanks for having me. I'm looking forward to it. We've been wanting to talk to you for a while, and you've been busy working on uh this new show. Uh I believe it's called Echoes uh for um for Netflix, and you're the co-show runner on the project. And uh why don't we just start there? And I'd I'd love to know, uh, talk a little bit more about uh your background and things like that. But let's just start at the at the thing that the thing you're currently working on and just tell people how did you get involved in Echoes and what's the show about?
SPEAKER_01:Well, it's an interesting way in, in the sense that if you go all the way back, um I worked with Brian Yorke, who was the creator and showrunner of 13 Reasons Why on season three, um, to help break the season story arc of season three. I had a few weeks off between my um Marvel show, the show that I was working on at the time, which was Marvel's Runaways. I had a few weeks off, and he said, Can you come help this mini-room uh break the story for season three? I said, sure. So we had a great time there. Um, I went back to my Marvel job. He finished off 13 Reasons Why. And then just as kind of COVID was hitting, he called me and said, I've taken on this project from a young writer in Australia who has created the show. Um, but she's super young and inexperienced, and she needs some help. So Netflix has asked me to take it on, and I have, but I think it's something that would appeal to you. Are you interested? You know, can I send it over? And I said, sure. So he sent me her pilot um draft, which I loved. And I said, Yeah, you know, this is something I'm interested in. And so at that point, um we assembled a mini room of just a few writers and a couple of directors to answer some questions around some story issues that Netflix had. And then Netflix said, if you can answer these questions for us, we'll go ahead and bring like the show and you'll be off and running. So we did that. Um, we answered those questions. They said, okay, love it. And then all those people got fired. And we were like, okay, well, we've got to believe that we're probably done. But that was not the case. Um, the new team that came in was like, yeah, yeah, yeah, let's keep going. And so we did. And that it has taken a long time. And I would I would say that a lot of that has to do obviously with the way things progressed over the pandemic. So had we not been dealing with the pandemic, it probably would not have taken the amount of time that it has taken. Um but we spent almost five months of um last year shooting it in North Carolina. Um, and we're just in post now. The name of the show is Echoes. The premise of the show is uh identical twin sisters have been secretly switching lives every year on their birthday. Uh, and then one of them goes missing. And the other sister is left to play both sisters and try and unravel the mystery of where her sister went. Um so it's it's a lot of fun, a lot of Hitchcock twists and turns, um, a little southern gothic. Um, but yeah, um Michelle Monianne plays two roles in it. We were talking before we came on about the VFX piece. Um, she plays both sisters, which meant that every scene which she was in had to be shot twice, once playing one sister and once playing the other sister, which is very complicated from a technical standpoint. Not to mention, I'm sure she could wax rhapsodic about the her drama. I know it was a lot of work. Um, but yeah, so it was a lot of work all the way around. But it's a ton of fun. I think people get a big kick out of it.
James Duke:Well, I'm looking forward to it. That sounds you start talking about Southern Gothic and Hitchcocking, and you're you're it's right up my Yeah, I think you'll do it.
SPEAKER_01:I think I think most people will. It's it's a really fun, entertaining ride. So it's yeah, it's fun.
James Duke:When uh when you um when you you know when you're looking at a project like that to be a part of, um I'm I'm curious for you, for someone who has been working in the business uh for as long as you have, what excites you when you read a script? Like what just like because obviously I'm not to be cynical, but I'm sure you've you've you've maybe not seen it all, but you've seen a lot, right? You've read a lot, you've you know, uh at this kind of point in your career, probably not probably may and maybe I'm misspeaking here, but probably not a lot of things kind of get you out of your chair right away. And so I'm just curious, what does what does get you excited? What does excite you about other people's scripts that would make you want to be involved in something like this?
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, I think for me, and you're right in in your whole um thinking there, it has progressed, it is different now than it used to be. Um and I would say that the number one thing for me right now is it has to have that really big hook at the center of it that is entertaining. So I say to people all the time, I'm not the only person that says it, but I currently am in the entertainment business. I'm interested in things that are gonna entertain people. So let's assume that it's a super political story, um, or it's a drug addiction story or whatever. I'm not gonna go for those things. It's just not the time and effort and the personal involvement is too heavy. And so I won't go for those things. They have to really be entertaining. And you know, you can hear it inside the pitch for echoes. Um, oh, twin sisters who switch every year on their birthday. Like that's I can just I understand the entertainment value of that. Yeah, it's one of the reasons that I've been involved for so long in the Marvel universe is oh, teenagers find out their parents are supervillains. Like, I just understand that I can go to work every day and be excited about breaking that story. And it's not to disparage the drug stories or any of the political things or anything like that. It's just that at this point in my life, I need to be making the shows that I most want to watch. And they need to be entertaining. Um, I respect and admire a lot of other work out there. Um, but I'm just not I'm not the guy who can come to work every day and break some of the stories on some of these shows. It's just I don't have that in me anymore.
James Duke:You uh you bring up a really interesting, I want to kind of go here a little. We're we're getting a little early into the uh maybe the nuts and bolts a little bit, but that's totally okay. Because I think you bring up something interesting. And that is this hook, this entertaining hook. I mean, essentially you're talking about uh the premise. And you're and for you, you're saying, I want a premise that just like like you said, every day it's like boom, it gets me excited. So for the aspiring writers out there, when we say to them, you know, log lines and premise, um what's your advice on creating and conceptualizing and then actually then executing like on it? Well, execution is very different, but what do you what's your advice on on uh conceptualizing that entertaining hooky premise that's gonna get uh people excited about your project?
SPEAKER_01:Well, it has to entertain you first, right? And so if it probably if it entertains you, it's gonna entertain a lot of other people. So this comes from what it is about the the initial idea that you are passionate about, and so you have to um know yourself well enough, you have to know what your loves are, what you're really passionate about, so that you can really articulate that clearly and distill it in your story, meaning that um you're answering for the audience. Well, for first for the studio, the network, the movie studio, whatever. Why should I come here? Why should I listen? And if if it doesn't hook you first, if you can't explain it to a six-year-old, then you're never gonna get there. So you need to be able to have a lot of passion around what that is. Like if you're a sci-fi person, you have to be able to clearly articulate what it is about this sci-fi premise that makes you so excited. Oh, I'm gonna take you this place and you're never gonna believe it. It's gonna be so great. It has to set you on fire. That's the primary thing. Like, if you get too far ahead of yourself and you make it a super intellectual exercise, or you're opening up this deep corner of the human psyche, that's for later. You know what I mean? Like, that's later. Right now, it's like two sisters switch lives and one of them goes missing. You gotta you like that has to make you lean in as a creator first. And if you're not there yet, then you're not there yet. You you haven't actually been able to tap into something that's super exciting and can be articulated to everybody that you come into contact with.
James Duke:That's really good. I I almost, in a sense, so much of your job as the the writer is to try to simplify the complex, right? Like you, like you, of course, you're gonna have this sweeping story, you know, like, but in the end, what you're pitching, that premise, that hook, I kind of like what you said. Uh a six-year-old's got to be able to hear it and go, huh? I mean, obviously there are stories that six-year-olds, so but but to but the point I think you're trying to make is uh we have to figure out as screen artists have to you have to be able to tell a complicated story and but pitch it simply. Would that be a good way to say it?
SPEAKER_01:Yes, and that never stops. So that's why you should start with it from the very beginning. Like I know a lot of people, and again, we could argue this. I could probably argue both sides, but I just know that over time, you're going to have to talk to so many people who are then going to have to go to someone else where you're not going to be in the room, and they're going to have to explain it to their boss or to their crew members or to their marketing team, and you're not going to be there to be able to clear up any, you know, inconsistencies or discrepancies. So, what you need to be able to do is give them something that they can clearly articulate to possibly hundreds of other people. And particularly in my position now, where I'm running a show where I'm constantly talking to the editor, or I'm talking to the actors, or I'm talking to the DP. I have to communicate clearly what I need to them in a way that is not amorphous, because if there's wiggle room there, then the whole show starts to get a little bit squishy. And actors in particular, like I heard a great thing, Matt Boomer, working with Matt Boomer on this um show. And he said to a director who was kind of confusing him, you need to choose one of these two things that you've told me, because I cannot give you both. Right? So all he is saying is, I need you to clearly articulate what you want, and then I will give you that thing. If you're just leaving it up to me, we're going to burn up a lot of time and energy and spend a lot of money kind of flailing around, and nobody in the movie and TV business is interested in that.
James Duke:You you remind me of, in a sense, you're talking about it in a very pragmatic sense, what I've always said, which is art art has to have an opinion.
SPEAKER_02:Yes.
James Duke:And and and that opinion comes from the artist. And you can disagree with the opinion, you can you can feel, you know, whatever you want, you can have whatever uh opinion about uh what that artist's saying, but art, great art has an opinion, and and the reason why I think a lot of films, a lot of TV shows that maybe start to fall apart is because they don't really have an opinion. And I hear you saying you kind of have to take that all the way down to its most pragmatic sense in that uh they're on set with other crew members, uh, you know, like especially as a writer for a television show, and maybe you're there representing all the writers for the writer's room. And it's like, no, we have to get this idea across because this idea matters four episodes later. And if we don't, and so it's uh it's a fascinating uh thing to think about. The where does where then do you leave room for uh disagreement or change or um uh you know, where do you leave room for when um you know uh Christians might say when the sp when the spirit moves, you know, like where do you leave room for that?
SPEAKER_01:Right. So that should all happen before you reach the stage, right? Because the the the piece that people need to understand, writers in particular at the beginning of their careers, need to understand that when we step onto the stage, there's a timer running, just like in a taxi cab, and we are paying for every minute. There is money flowing out the door for every minute that from you know the call time until wrap. So that is not the time for disagreement and discussion because we're on the clock. There's money flowing out the door. Now, in in preparation, what you should have done is you should have created time with the actors, with the director, with the DP, with the studio, whatever it happens to be, to have all of the discussion and the disagreement that we're talking about now. Yes, that that time and that back and forth and consideration of other points of view and being agreeable to hold ideas and consider them that coming from all these different places, that's part of the preparation part. But once the cameras start to roll, once the crew is there, there's very little wiggle room.
James Duke:Yeah. Now, to go back to because even money's money's already been spent just having those people there on the sets, but the sets are no doubt about it.
SPEAKER_01:Now, being open to like you said there at the end, about the spirit moves you on the day, and there's something, there's a little adjustment that you want to make, or you see something in a performer's performance that maybe takes it in a different direction. Yes, you want to provide a little bit of room there to accommodate some of those things, but to be brutally honest, they rarely pan out in my experience. And I'm not having like I'm not having the Federico Fellini or the John Casabetti's experience of like we're rising our way through this. That is not in my experience. My experience is the studio and the networks and my other showrunners, and a bunch of people put a check mark at the top of every single page, meaning their expectation is that they're going to see executed what they put a check mark at the top of that page. If they don't, then I have to answer why. And I don't like to spend my day saying, yes, I promised you vanilla, but boy, chocolate was great on that day. Because they really they they said okay to vanilla, they did not say okay to chocolate, and now that's a thing which I am uncomfortable with in general. So while there is a little wiggle room, most of that spirit moving of creativity happens all in prep. It happens in the writing, it happens in the notes process, it happens in discussion with actors and directors. But on the day, we need to finish this shot in the way that we promised and move to the next one, and the next one, and the next one, and the next one, because that's what production is.
James Duke:That's really good. Um, let's talk a little bit about your background, let people get to know you a little bit. Um, I was doing a little reading. You're you're from Texas originally, is that right? That is correct. Um, so ding ding for me. There you go. Um what where did your interest, where did your interest in in screenwriting come from? Were you always uh did you grow up a film nerd, a TV nerd? Like where did this uh interest and passion for screenwriting come from?
SPEAKER_01:No, not at all. I came, it was funny, I was talking to my wife about this a little earlier in the day. There's what I've come to find out about. This business is there's no straight line, nobody gets a straight line. But if you think there's a straight line, I'm telling you, let me disuse you that. So I was originally Texas, and um I had some talent for drawing, and I and I really thought I was gonna go for it. And I and I got my undergraduate degree as a painter. I I was gonna be a fine artist. Um, and then I was in my second year of art school um and had a really, really um difficult peer review. And a peer review is when you put your work up and everybody in the class gives their opinion on it, and your teacher has opinions and all that. And I'd done a big photo essay. This was a photography class, and it'd been particularly difficult peer review. And the photography teacher pulled me aside and said, the reason you're so unhappy here, meaning art school, was because you're in you're interested in telling a narrative, and fine art does not tell narrative stories. And that was literally a record scratch. Wow. Six months later, I was in Los Angeles. Wow, so I came to LA.
James Duke:Did you know? I'm sorry, I don't mean cut you off. Did you know what they meant by that? Like, I did.
SPEAKER_01:I absolutely knew the minute it came out of her mouth. I was like, Oh, I know exactly what you're talking about. And I was interested in movies, I would watch movies and so forth. Um, but this will tell you how old I am. This was all like pre-premiere magazine, there was no movie line, there was nothing like getting information about who did what and how movies got made in Texas was like, forget it. You there was no, you didn't. I mean, I knew who Alfred Hitchcock was because of the TV show, right? But like I didn't know what he did. Yeah, so so I had a vague idea of that Steven Spielberg was a director, and I knew who George Lucas was, and like I knew that there was a thing called directing, but I didn't know what that was. So, anyway, I came to Los Angeles with the intent of going to film school and learning how you do this, and so that ultimately led me to uh an interaction. This is another incredible story. Um, I was going to UCLA Extension, and I had a teacher who was running a class called Directors on Directing, because that's where I thought I was going to go. And the class was she had been an old school film editor here in Los Angeles, and so she knew a lot of directors, so she just invited her friends in, and you got a different director every week. So this one night, she's like, Oh, we've got a very special guest tonight. You know, we're very lucky. I was very lucky he was in town, and we could get him. Um, ladies and gentlemen, it's Sir David Lean. What? So he was beautiful, he was lovely, so gentle and so funny and so great. But then I was like, oh my god, like I'm gonna be the guy. Like, there's no way David Lean is getting out of this room without me talking to him. Like, I if if I go down in flames here, that's fine, because this is never gonna happen again. So I cornered David Lean and I said, I'm sorry, I have to ask you the question that I'm certain everybody asks you. But if you were me in my spot, what's the best advice that you can give me? And he said, if I was doing this all over again, I would have been a screenwriter, I would have started with screenwriting. Wow, and I was like, Oh, because I thought he since he had come from editing, I thought that's where I thought that's where the answer is going to be. Like, no. He said, and I was like, Well, why? And he said, Because that person, that job is the only one who can make their next gig. That's the only person who can sit down and make their next job. The rest of us are waiting for somebody to call us. Wow. So if you can do it, and there's no guarantee that you can, but if you can do it, that's where I would start. I don't think, well, if that's what David Lean says, that's what I'm doing. Um, and so I applied all around town to film schools, and I got into the the AFI as a screenwriting fellow, and I got my master's degree from the AFI. Um and, you know, as I got into that program, and really someone, and I was lucky, I guess, that I knew absolutely nothing. So I I had no expectations about a screenwriter is supposed to be this or they're supposed to do that. Like I was like, I don't even know. Are they they wear their hats backwards and they wear hoodies? Like, that's all I know. So I anything anybody told me as an instructor, I just accepted that that was right. You know what I mean? I was just like, okay, that's what I'm doing, that's what I'm doing, that's what I'm doing. And I happened to be surrounded by at the AFI a bunch of really great screenwriters. Frank Pearson was one, um, David Sontag was another, uh a bunch of really great guys. And I was okay, I'm just doing what he says, I'm just doing what he says. And I was lucky that I had the temperament, um, that I was able to learn the skill set and then have the discipline necessary to carry it off. I never in my childhood or up until that moment thought myself a writer. I did not. I was a visual person. I still am a visual person. I think that's important for what I do as a writer. But I thought my my world would be in the visual arts some way, not as a word person.
James Duke:Well, I mean, it's props, I'm sure, I'm sure it's helped you tremendously as a writer to be as visual as you are. By the way, did you get into AFI because in your application, did you say, my good friend and mentor, David Lean, once said to me?
SPEAKER_01:No, what was really interesting though, you know, that's I don't know how they do it now, but at that point, what you did was you gave them your transcripts, you gave them a writing sample, and if that was approved, you came in for a committee meeting. So then when you got in the room with the people with the department, that was a little hectic. That's one of the tougher meetings I've ever had, right? Because it's really you're gonna go forward or you're not gonna go forward. And it they sweat you a little bit, and they don't tell you what questions they're gonna ask you. It's cold, it's a cold read. You're like, and I was lucky because one of the people that I really admired um was Patty Chayevsky, right? Um Network had been a huge influence. I loved Network, and um Marty had really moved me, and um so I was a huge fan of his. So somebody during the course of the in I hate to call it interrogation, but it was the course of the interrogation. I was like, Well, who would you most like to model your writing after? And I just said Patty Chaevsky. Two of the guys burst out laughing, and I was like, What's so funny? And like we both worked with Patty Chaevsky, Playhouse 90. He would be so pleased to have somebody come in and say they wanted to be like him. Wow, and I think that's the point. I think like I was like, Oh, I think I might get in now. Um, and I I think that was the turning point.
James Duke:That's great. I love that. That's really cool. The uh talking about a little bit about your kind of your visual aesthetic and how did that develop? Uh was your fan, did you grow up in a family a family of artists? Or um, you know, as you as this as you were developing this aesthetic visually, was it something that just came naturally to you? I'm just curious what your influences were there.
SPEAKER_01:You know, I think again, well, there were a couple of things, which is comic books were a huge thing for me, and I learned to read through comics. So I always identified um reading and pictures as things that went together, words and pictures as things that went together. And then as a little kid, um, you know, I wanted to live in the world of those comics. And so I just asked for pencils and paper and everything so that I could draw the superheroes or the comic strip or whatever I was interested in. So I spent a lot of time, a lot of imaginative time, just duplicating the stories that I loved in comics. And so then that match since comics are sequential storytelling, that just led to this picture needs to come after this picture, after this picture, in order for a story to be told. So that's really kind of, and then you know, just the social nature of it, other people started to see that I could really draw, and then they started to praise that. And of course, as a kid, you want to do things that people praise you around. Um, and then it just then it just became identified with my personality, and then it just grew from there.
James Duke:So when you first came out to Los Angeles and and you got into AFI and you were there, and then when you came out of AFI, um did you immediately start um looking for um television? Was that something that was like in your radar, or was it feature films on your films?
SPEAKER_01:It was interesting that the AFI at that time had no television program at all. You work strictly in features. So the um in order to get your MFA, you had to write two features. And I did, and one of them went to Sundance in 1993, and the other was made into a TV movie. So I had those two trains running for a long time. Uh, independent film and then television movies, and um, you know, TV movies at that time.
James Duke:Um they actually made them back then.
SPEAKER_01:Oh my god, yeah. So most networks had them on twice a week, like Tuesday nights and Sunday nights. Yep. That meant that's a lot of movies getting written and made. And I think in 1998 I wrote six. So it was it was a huge business. Um, and then the indie film business, Dan Light now was crazy and whatever. Um, so I never looked towards regular hour-long drama as an opportunity for me because I was really, I mean, TV movies are just a regular movie cut up into six acts, you know. But the feel of them, the storytelling is the same. You just do these little curtains, you know, whatever. Um, for the commercial breaks. But I was writing movies.
James Duke:Were you were you because you know, there was you remember this. There, there was a mindset back in the day that television was less than. Okay for television what did feel for a lot of people for in features to be a step down. It was and it wasn't just writing, it was directing, it was, it was uh, it was acting, it was everything, right? And obviously that's not the case now. The the glass ceiling for television was shattered long time ago. You could I don't know if the I don't know if you put that on the sopranos or whatever, but but but basically we're in this a very different time than what you're talking about. So for you, was it literally like would your agents and managers would they even consider putting you up for television? Like, would you tell them don't even like what was it in terms of your thought process? Is it did you see television at the time as a lesser thing?
SPEAKER_01:Definitely. I mean, outside of a thing like maybe Twin Peaks or um, like you said, by the time we get to Sopranos and Mad Men and stuff like that, the changes already started to happen. But for the most part, you're just talking about network TV or a few cable things, and the stuff seemed kind of junky and clunky. And I'd been educated at a blue ribbon institution and had very specific ideas about what quality was like and what I needed to stick to my artistic vision and blah blah blah. And I'm not saying that my TV movies were any great shakes, they are not. Um, but they are still essentially feature ideas, right? Still feature writing, right? Which had a certain cachet over, oh, I'm I'm a guy working on TJ Hooker, or you know what I mean? Like you can see there's a I mean, I mean you had to pick that show, but yeah, I guess right? So that's why you have to like yeah, that takes you right back to the moment. That's not even like night rider, that's not even like a call with a call. So it's so you can see where the disparity was there, but since movies were still essentially events, and I think the Thanksgiving movie that I wrote, the movie that I wrote at the AFI that became a CBS TV movie, my very first one, screened on Thanksgiving, and over 22 million people watched it on the night of. Wow. So it was like that was hectic, that was big. That's huge, huge. That's you're not that's not an episode of TJ Hook or whatever. So you could kind of carve out that life, and it seemed like um that that was a great avenue. And I had that business not collapsed, I probably would still be there. Um, but it did collapse, and that's really the thing where I started to think, you know, I have to think seriously about our on TV because all of my regular feature work, the development process takes so long that, and I had two small kids at that point, it it there was just not enough money in it, it did not generate enough income for me to be able to um finance my family. So I had to look at um diversifying my um my abilities, and that's that's what drove me to write my first spec pilot. I was like, I have, and by that time Mad Men was on and the Sopranos were raging, there was a bunch of really good hour-long TV out there, and I was like, okay, well, I gotta go over there now.
James Duke:Yeah, you touch on something that I think is really valuable for aspiring screen earners, and that is um, you you have to be generative, like you have to write. And and I meet far too many people uh who say, you know, oh yeah, I've been working on this one script for three years, and I'm like, great, what else you got? Well, you know, I have an idea for a couple other things, but I'm really trying to get this one down. And my thought is, I don't know, maybe you'll make it, but you I don't think so. Like, like you have to be constantly creating. And and to your point, a lot of it is is um, is that a necessity? You know, just as you you got to keep creating content so you get paid, so that you can provide for your family, so you can eat. But it also I think teaches uh writers this this value of constantly creating, constantly being generative. And so for you, how have you been able to do that? What what what is what is it about that process that you've been able to continue to be so generative in your career uh over these years?
SPEAKER_01:Well, I think that you've hit the nail on the well, two things have happened. One is the the business became more chaotic, it's more chaotic now than it ever has been because everything's disrupted, right? So if we just look back at what won the Academy Award this year, um the people who make your phone won the Academy Award. So if you told me five years ago that the iPhone people were gonna make the movie of the year, I would have laughed you out of the room.
James Duke:But that's what they are, right? So the or the people and or the people that delivered you know that package to your house, you know. That's right.
SPEAKER_01:Or the rent your DVDs by mail that those people change the TV business. So the K, the chaotic nature, now that it's been a little bit like that forever. So that's the message, which is the business is constantly transforming. You can wish it wasn't that way, but it is. So as the business transforms, you must, because you're providing content for that machine, you must tune yourself towards that. Now, I'm not saying that, oh, I need to be reading the trades every day and figuring out what people are buying and blah, blah, blah.
unknown:No.
SPEAKER_01:But what I am saying is if you're still writing the mid-level romantic comedy for Hugh Grant and you know, um name any actress that you want, um, then you haven't noticed that basically movie theaters aren't in business anymore. Now, part of that has to do with COVID, but it it predates COVID. So the mid-level romantic comedy, which may be your passion, um, is probably a poor uh avenue for you to pursue unless you really go, like, hey, I'm gonna get this on Netflix, whatever, it's gonna be Channing Tatum and Sandra Bullock, and it's really gonna be Romancing the Stone, but it's just different. You know what I mean? Like, so that's fine. But 10 years ago, you might have been able to sell that movie and have it go into theaters, but those options just aren't available to you now from the business standpoint. So when you have to figure out how to spend your creative capital, spending it on an avenue that is probably collapsed is not a great thing for you. So I've had to constantly readjust my focus throughout my career to go, okay, the business of entertainment, like we said before, is tilted more in this direction now. So, what kind of stories can I go with right now? Like I was super lucky, as we talked about a couple of minutes ago, that I was a comic book nerd. It's just the world that's just coincidence that these kinds of stories caught fire at the moment in which my skill set was in order. That's just fate. I'm super lucky that way. But as I said before, Okay, I can't do TV movies anymore. I've got six of these on my desk that I would have gone out and pitched, but there's nobody doing it. So now where is the job? Well, the job is an hour-long TV. That side is exploding. So how am I going to generate stories for that? Um, you need to look at this world now of streaming. What do stream what does a streaming hit look like? What are the elements involved for making a great streaming show? If you go, if you went out today and you pitched a series that was 22 episodes long to a streamer and that was a procedural, they would laugh you out of the room. That just says you don't know what's happening. If you go and you say it's a character-driven cop drama and it's six episodes, and he's got an evil twin, then okay, we got it. Um, but that's that's part of your responsibility as a screenwriter to know what is going on in the industry today and gear whatever your passionate story is towards that avenue. Otherwise, you'll you'll never get your wheels on the ground.
James Duke:That's really, really good advice. What does a what does a professional screenwriter do other than actually writing? Uh you know, we talk about this a lot at Act One in terms of you know your career. Um so much of so much of your job sometimes has very little to do with the actual writing. That's just a small part of it. There's other parts that you have to be really good at, such as pitching and things like that. So I would ask you, for you, having been in the business as long as you have and worked in film and television, um uh talking to aspiring filmmakers, film aspiring writers, um, what are the skills they need to be developing and investing in other than the most obvious, which is writing?
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, one of the things I tell people all the time is you have to really get your mind around the fact that you are a small business owner now. You have to think like a small business owner. I am in the Quentin Peoples Incorporated business, right? Which means I am research and development, I am manufacturing, I am the sales and marketing division, right? So I wear many, many hats over the course of the day, and my day gets organized around with whatever division needs the most amount of work that day, but I can't leave the marketing division, the sales and marketing division off because I just don't like doing that. Because going out and having to sell and be a salesperson is not my personality. So it just won't work for you, and you have to gain or gather people around you who can do it, um, that kind of holistic view, holistic business view of what you do. So if we say that manufacturing is strictly the writing piece, that's you sitting down and you're typing and you're making the thing. Then research and development, which is the pre-part, is all the thing that we've just been talking about. What's going on in the business? What stories are out there? What am I reading? Where am I getting input for the manufacturing piece? Oh, I think these are right. I think this book is really cool. I'm going to adapt this novel, or I heard a story from somebody, I bought those life rights, whatever that research and development piece is, that needs to take up a certain amount of your day. Manufacturing piece takes up a certain amount of your day. Then after you've built it, it's the pitch, it's a story idea, it's a script, whatever it happens to be. Then there is the sales and marketing piece, which is you pitching, interacting with agents and managers, getting to know uh studio executives, who's where creating that network of buyers that you can then go and say, look at the 2022 model. What have I got to do to get you into that car today? Now, it's very rare that any screenwriter, any person who's actually really good at going off in a room and writing something for eight hours a day by themselves is also really good at the sales piece. That is hard, but there are a lot of people out there who can give you tips and train you and get you into a spot where you can adequately do it. And the expectation isn't that you always be fantastic and wonderful at it, but you do, like we talked about earlier in this interview, you need the skill. You must have the skill of bringing my passion for this story and clearly articulating it across the table. If you can't do it, you're really gonna have a hard time in this business. You just are. So you have to find people or instructional programs or whatever it happens to be that can give you that. Um, because you are in charge of the sales and marketing for Quentin Peoples Incorporated. Nobody's gonna do that for you. They're just really not. You you bury the largest burden on that. So it has to, you have to get some skills together. And those can be learned. I learned them.
James Duke:That's really good. Yeah, that is excuse me. Yeah, that is something that I find is a constant um conversation I'm having with aspiring writers, which is um, and and by the way, uh actors too. Yes. Um, just uh and everyone, you know, like the one of the hardest things that people don't talk about is directing in this town because you know, you know, a TV show, maybe it has eight, ten writers, uh you don't have one director. And so, you know, and and so breaking into directing is even tougher. But the only way you're gonna get better is to direct more, to get out there, get yourself out there, sell your stuff, sell your vision for things, and and try to acquire projects that you can come on and be a part of. And um, and it this is a this is something that when you see people who are successful in this business over time, what you see is you see that hustle, you see that constant uh and in reinventing themselves as well, which is something you spoke about um earlier. So let me ask you this this is a conversation that we have a lot at Act One, and that is this idea of finding your voice, and you know, uh that's really big right now, right? Like there's there's this big push in the business. I'm not saying it's new, but there is a big push right now to find new unique voices. Um, and um, and so having said that, so we know that. So we know that we know it's important to to be original, to be creative, to have this kind of unique voice. However, at the same time, you have a lot of these like big IPs, and so like I think you're the perfect person to ask this question because you've worked on some fantastic, you know, big name IP content. I mean, whether it's uh Stephen King work or uh all of all the Marvel shows that you've worked on, and so there must be some sort of balance here that has to take place in terms of how how does someone bring a unique voice to the table while essentially writing someone else's idea or someone else's concept, so this IP, this other IP. So my question to you is how have you been able to do that? And and and uh what is that process like? Right.
SPEAKER_01:So the um the I use this example all the time. It's not particularly a personal example, I'll get to that in a second. Um a lot of people had attempted superhero movies for on and off for a while, and some had been successful, some had not. Then when you went to see the very first Iron Man movie, you walked out of that movie and you were like, whoa, like that's it. Yeah, that's because John Favreau loved Iron Man and knew what made a perfect Iron Man story. Now he brought his own flavor along with Robert Downing Jr., but he knew what the genetic components, what the what the classic, classic qualities of that were, of the Iron Man mythos. Like, it would be so cool to fly around in armor, like you know what I mean, like and be a billionaire and be able to have all these things. Like he just knew what was essential to the story and made sure that those got onto the screen. Now, behind that was his voice, which is a little cheeky, a little comedic, a little sarcastic, but super poppy. I mean, even if you watch swingers, you can see it happening. So there's not a big jump between swingers and Iron Man. You know the same voice is there. So that's what we're talking about here. If I come to Stephen King 112263, I know because I love Stephen King, I know what makes a perfect Stephen King story. I know that element is immovable, that must be there. I don't get to make a choice about that. Now I could, but I risk failure. So why do that? Just understand what it is that makes Stephen King stories work. Then behind that comes my personal voice, which is what you're talking about. And that voice gets discovered by you reflecting on what do I see in the world that other people miss? Where are the things that I am soaking up, the details that I see, the music that I hear, the color that I absorb that the average person misses? Because I've been tuned a certain way to respond to those things. And now I must master the technical ability to get that onto the page clearly. Right? So I talk to people about this all the time, and this comes from music. If I was learning to play the trumpet, I'd have to run scales every day. Scales are boring. There is nothing expressive about going. But I must, in order to play the trumpet, be able to do that without thinking. And that takes practice. So being able to take those unique things that only you see in the world, those really observational things that are unique to you and get them onto the page clearly is you running scales. Now that means you're going to have to write a lot of pages that won't be very good. They just won't. But that's the practice. You must practice. And then after a certain amount of time, and I can guarantee this, you will never think about it again. Your voice will naturally come out in the way that if we listen to Miles Davis, we listen to any Miles Davis record, if it had no sticker on it, you'd know it was Miles Davis, because the way in which he interprets any song comes through his filter naturally. He's not sitting down to go, oh, what is the Miles Davis version of My Funny Valentine? He knows My Funny Valentine, he plays it through his unique perspective and he does not think about it. His voice naturally comes forward because he ran a lot of scales. He played a lot of music and he did a lot of, made a lot of mistakes before he got here. So getting to that voice is about you practicing your uniqueness and being able to articulate it on the page clearly so that other people go, Wow, you're the only person who could have done that.
James Duke:That is really good, Quentin. You you remind me of I have a friend, a good friend who he's a Juilliard trained um uh I don't know, he plays the clarinet. I don't know, is it a clarinetist? I don't know what it's called. Yeah, but um he had not, I was talking, this was several years ago. He had not performed because he's he's he's also a he's a successful actor, and um, but he's this classically trained, like at Juilliard, just this amazing next level clarinet player. He had not performed the clarinet publicly in years, like he had told me it had been years because he's doing other things, right? And um he said, uh, but he gets up every morning and practices his clarinet. Yeah, and I was like, Are you certain? He goes, Yeah, he said I have to, and uh and I I just was blown, I was just blown away by that kind of that level discipline and focus. And I love what you're saying because I think there's something here to the to the kind of the greater point, which is um you can't avoid the hard work as a writer, that hard work of the doing, the getting up and the writing, just getting something on the page and then just doing it over and over again, and how something over time does eventually you know click, and it but it takes that perseverance to just to do the work. You can talk about theory, you can read all these, you know, all these books, you know, you can take all these programs and all this kind of stuff and listen to all these podcasts. But in the end, you you kind of you just gotta get down and do the work, right?
SPEAKER_01:It's just put your button and share. You know what I mean? That's the only way it's gonna happen with one word after the other for thousands and hundreds and thousands of words, so that it almost becomes um a just a natural outgrowth of who you are. I people ask me all the time about tricks and blah blah blah. And I I've taught at the university level and taught college students and all that. And I say, if you can make it an activity like brushing your teeth or putting on your pants, that will be an advantage because you don't go at the end of the day and go, you know what, man, I really did not brush my teeth well today. That was really a failure on my part. And I tomorrow I just don't know if I can brush my teeth again. So if it's just this is what I do, and if I don't have to have binary thinking about it, it wasn't a good day, it wasn't a bad day. I just showed up and I did the work, then after a certain amount of time, it will be a natural expression of who you are, and you'll there will be flow there that you never thought was possible before.
James Duke:Yeah, wow. I was gonna say that uh during the pandemic, some of us uh did have to debate whether to put pants on. Yes.
SPEAKER_01:But uh it was debatable whether But you didn't get into an argument with yourself about well, was that a good pair of pants? Or I love it.
James Duke:So speaking to some of your um some of your process a little bit, do you have a particular way you like to approach uh a script? I mean, obviously, when you're writing for television, um, I've always said that deadlines are are are a creative's friend, you know, when you're creating it's like deadlines are a good thing for creatives, but um, but in your process, uh do you have you learned kind of a basic way of doing it uh doing every screenplay in terms of do you do you do an outline first? Do you do a beat sheet? Um uh talk just a just a little bit about your process for that.
SPEAKER_01:I mean, it's yeah over the course of the years, and I know everybody's gonna be so bummed when they hear it because it's super boring. Um there's the initial idea. That thing is written down in long hand on some paper nearby whenever I'm having the idea. That's just rambling, blah, blah, blah. Then the next piece is is note cards, and I use them in the writer's room, I use them a feature. I just, I just I'm just using a three by five card, and I'm and I'm starting act one, scene one. This is what I think it is, and I'm carding that thing all the way out, right? So the great thing about cards is it's portable, I can throw them away, I can move them to different spots in the structure, whatever. They're great, great tools. So everything goes to cards first.
James Duke:And what's on your and but what's on the card? What are you what what is each card?
SPEAKER_01:Is it so basically what happens is on that card is the setting, right, for the scene, and then what I think is going to happen in that scene. Right. So there's no dialogue, it's nothing like that. It's like Joey gets the gun, Mary sees him get it. You know what I mean? Like that's just super uh basic. In conjunction with that, often I am creating character biographies off on the other side. Like let's say I get a little stuck with cards or I don't know what the next scene is. Then I'm also filling out some details about who I think the characters are. This is where I think they came from, these are the personality traits. It'd be good to do this, that, and the other. So the character bios are growing kind of at the same time as the story is growing. So I have plot things happening and I have personal things happening. That way, when I get stuck on either side, I got someplace else to go. Once that's finished, meaning I've I've written the end on the final card. Now I'm ready to go back and actually outline. And this is a traditional outlining process, right? Now it's a scene. Well, what is this scene? Okay, got a gun. Where do you get a gun? Was there somebody else there? Oh, there's a store clerk, you know, whatever it happens to be. I'm actually outlining there. So the whole outline is created at that point. And again, things fall away, bad ideas present themselves. I'm I'm in the midst of that. But I'm getting that all worked out in the outline. Then once the outline is tight, I'm I'm ready to write, I'm ready to write a screenplay, and now I'm I'm into draft mode. That makes for me, and I can only speak for me, that makes the writing of the draft the easiest part of the process. All of the heavy lifting, all of the work has already been done. Right. So the typing part is actually a joy. I love it. It makes the draft, for me, anyway, there's no writer's block that ever happens inside a draft. Because if something isn't quite working, I just have the next scene to go on to. I have the outline, I just go to the next one. Oh, I'll come back and I'll fix that later, but I know where I'm going next and I don't lose any momentum. So I can generate a draft very, very quickly. Very quickly. That part of the writing goes quickly. Um, and then from there, once I have the draft, now you're into notes and revisions, and back that can go on endlessly.
James Duke:That's a that's a really thank you for breaking that down that way. It was really insightful. You you've written for the lack, you know, a lot of your shows here in the past couple of years have been for streamers, Hulu and Netflix. Yes. Um, does Hulu and do they have similar approaches to the to the networks in terms of do you have to shoot up your um shoot up your outlines to get approved by the by the networks and then come back? So that's that's still the same conversation.
SPEAKER_01:Well, it's the same, like I said, nobody likes surprises, right? So they may be slightly surprised by things they see in an outline, but they should not be surprised by a draft. They never should be surprised by a draft. Like maybe they don't like a joke or some of the tone of what you did, but they are you're you should not be wrestling with the story really at that point. That all should have been taken care of in the outline piece. Should be, doesn't always work that way, but it it should be. So, yes, there's a lot of back and forth on outlines, and hopefully less back and forth on drafts. That's the way they prefer it, and I happen to prefer that the same.
James Duke:Now, did you have a room for echoes or did you have a zoom room? Yeah, yeah, you had a zoom room. So uh as the co-showrunner, when people were pitching ideas up to you, um what is that what is that process like? Because I'm you've obviously been the one who's been pitching up to a showrunner and now you're a showrunner hearing. Um is there is there something to the process that you have maybe learned or grown grown in? Or I'm just curious about now that now that you're at that level, uh, what's your uh how are how is the process maybe different for you now?
SPEAKER_01:Well, the it's different in that I have been tasked with knowing what the show is. You by the time you assemble a room, the network or studio assumes and they are investing in your version of the show. They're expecting you to deliver the show you have been talking to them about that they bought. So many of the pitches that get knocked down uh in a room are because that's not the show. Not saying it's a bad idea. I'm saying that's not our show, right? So I've already had this history with a bunch of people. Some people have spent money, they're spending money on you on the version of the show that I sold them. So when you pitch to me that they should all dive to the bottom of the lake and be down there for this whole episode, and what I pitched them was a soap opera, I'm like, no.
SPEAKER_02:Right.
SPEAKER_01:Like, we're not, that's not our show. That's a cool idea, but that's not our show.
SPEAKER_02:Right.
SPEAKER_01:Whereas before, when when I was just a staff member, often I didn't understand why some pitches got on the board and some pitches didn't, or I didn't understand the ratio. I didn't entirely understand why some things were making it through and some things weren't. But now that I know from from my POV that the show has been pre-sold to somebody, they have an expectation about what that show is. I'm in charge of delivering that. Then I am really the first filter for that that idea is not going in here because it doesn't fit my vision of what was promised to Netflix or Hulu or whoever happens to be. Um, so that's just that's part of it.
James Duke:What gets slapped down most often, and obviously I'm I'm asking questions here that are you know fairly generic, but um is it plot? Is it more character? Is it more it's like that's not it's it seems like the way you're describing it, it would be more character-based. Because it's like, no, no, no, that's not our character. They our character wouldn't wouldn't make that choice, or am I kind of um mixing?
SPEAKER_01:No, I think that it falls into three categories. It's not the correct tone of the show, it's not um character. That's not how I see the character that you're pitching on, right? I don't think we have an understanding about who this character is, and then that I'll knock down a plot, the third category, I'll knock down a plot pitch usually around logic, or it opens up story avenues that we don't want to go down.
SPEAKER_02:Right.
SPEAKER_01:So you right, so often people will pitch things that they haven't thought thoroughly enough through that just knock too many dominoes down in a direction that we're not going. Yeah, so say, you know, that that that won't work because then we got to talk about this, that, and the other. And that that's not where we're going. Because I have an idea of where the show, because I've already pitched to the network and sold to the network a certain series of arcs, and I know where we need to end up, and I don't want to go down this side road. So again, that's all about me keeping everybody in the right place, making the same show. Um, and often if it's not a logic problem, it's a Pandora's box problem.
James Duke:Uh, I'm a first-year, I'm a first-year staff writer. What do you what do you want from me?
SPEAKER_01:I want you to pitch like crazy, and I want you to pitch things that could only have come from you. Like I I brought you onto this show because, like we said before, you can think in a way that I cannot think. Because I don't want to fill a room full of me's.
James Duke:Okay.
SPEAKER_01:Otherwise, I would have just written all the episodes myself. People got hired into a room because they think in ways that I don't think. I want to hear from that. Um, and yes, that means that a lot of the stuff that you may pitch, certainly if you're a first-year writer, are not going to get on the board. But what I want to hear is your unique perspective.
James Duke:So you don't necessarily hold the view that, you know, hey, you need to wait a year or two to earn it. You just need to sit there quietly and observe. Like you want them day one, you want them to be engaged and pitching it with everyone else.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, there's too much work. There's no free ride. Like, you know what I mean? Like, there is no coming in and sitting on the bench for for two years. That's that's lame. No way. Everybody's got to carry their own burden. Um, and we have to do a lot of work, and generally we have to do it very quickly. So every many hands make light work. So that's why you got into this room. Um, I did not hire you in order to pay to train you, not at all.
James Duke:That's good, that's good. No wallflowers, you got to get in there and you do.
SPEAKER_01:And if you're doing it wrong, then it's the showrunners' responsibility to take you aside and say, Don't do that, only do this, blah, blah, blah. But don't sit back and wait for an invitation. You you got hired to pitch, so let's pitch. Let's go.
James Duke:Yeah. Um, I want to touch bases on this, has been a great conversation. Yeah, I've I've you've you've you've dropped uh quite a few um gems for our audience here. I want to kind of wrap up our conversation and shift focus just a little bit, and uh and reading a little bit about you. We have so you and I have mutual friends like Scott Reynolds and Tim Kruger, and these are buddies that you know first connected us. And um, but I discovered that you and I have uh one more person, um, and that is uh our dearly beloved uh Dallas Willard. Oh yes. And I I'd love just to know a little bit about um just um I got to spend time with Dallas uh towards the end of his life. Yes, and um his wife, I'll never forget that she sent me the kindest note. And anyway, I I I I wonder if you could just speak just a little bit about your um, you know, your just appreciation for Dallas and and and and just and some of his works and the influence that he's had on had on your life and and uh just speak a little bit about that.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, I'd have to say Dallas is the biggest male influence on my life outside of my father. Um and I was lucky enough to uh be around Dallas over an extended period of time, um, from about I'm gonna say 2005 until the end of his life. Um, and I am a graduate of the Renovari Institute of Christian Spiritual Formation, which is basically a seminary that he created with Richard Foster and John Orberg and a bunch of other super smart, lovely people. So it was there that I really, really got to mix it up with him. But I met him first when I at All Saints Beverly Hills, which Episcopal Church, um, in in here in Los Angeles, Beverly Hills, when he taught for a weekend and then preached on a Sunday. So I went to all the seminars that he taught on the Friday and Saturday and then listened to him preach on Sunday. And literally that that was a such a massive that weekend signaled such a massive turning point in my life because the way in which Dallas spoke about um the transformation of character, the creation of the inner life made such perfect sense to me and seemed achievable. Like it didn't seem super woo-woo, like weird. It seemed like something that you could actually do and become a better person. So Dallas's work as a philosopher, as primarily as a logician, as somebody who was built on logic, could carry you through very complicated ideas step by step, so that you were like, Oh, I see how that works and I see why it works. And it was the key to everything that came about for me in terms of um I say to people all the time, I said I was a Christian before Dallas, but I was only a Christian after Dallas. Wow, wow, um, because I did not really understand um apprenticeship, right? I didn't really understand what was necessary and what was being asked of me. Um and that there was a method to transforming my inner state, my inner character into Christ-likeness. Um because nobody'd ever explained it to me, right? That nobody had. And so being in his presence, reading his books, um, talking to him, studying his teachings, certainly being a part of Renovare, um, he was the white hot center of all of that. And then I I tell people this, I tell this story on Dallas all the time because it was really transformational. Um he came to speak at Renovare in our second year, and this is probably two or three months before he passed away. So he was very, very sick with cancer. And he stood up in the front of that room, and for three to four hours he spoke non-stop. And I'm telling you, he glowed from within. Like you could see there was something different happening in him. And people were weeping by the time we were done because we had witnessed something that was supernatural, and everybody in that room was like, if that's what it looks like to have cancer, then I'm not afraid of cancer. Wow, wow. And I was like, that is what that's the life he has been talking about, which is a spiritual life which transcends physical existence, that physical reality is not all there is. And he just got up there and he demonstrated it. And I was like, that is for real. Like, that is for real, and that's where I want to go. Um, and that was just my experience of him always was like, that's where I want to go. I want I want what he's got. So, whatever it is that made that, I want to go in that direction.
James Duke:That is beautiful. What a beautiful story. It's a great way to end our conversation. And I I hope that uh maybe our audience will be inspired by that little uh anecdote, and they'll go out and get some of his books and read.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, Renovation of the Heart has, which is the book that changed my life, has just been released. It's 20th anniversary edition. I highly, highly recommend that book. Um, so it's a brand new edition. Go out and get it. It's lovely.
James Duke:Uh, will it make you jealous to know that I have a signed copy of that book? It will. Mission accomplished. Yes, I finally, yes, I have one on you, Quentin. I have something on you. I'll let you down and say, Hey, this has been a fantastic conversation. I'm so grateful to you. And um, once again, I think that people are just gonna really be influenced by a lot of things that you're saying. Uh, we like to close our act one podcast by praying for our guests. I wonder if you would allow me to do that for you. Oh, yes, please. I'll let it. Okay, let's pray. Our most gracious Heavenly Father, we just pause and thank you. Uh thank you for men like Dallas Willard who have had such tremendous influence um for the good. And uh, God, thank you for Quentin as one of those men. And we just pray a blessing upon him, a blessing upon his life, his work, his family. Uh, God, I pray that um just so grateful for just his generosity of spirit and kindness to be able to come and uh spend some time talking with us. And God, as as he as he sets about to do the work that you have crafted him to do, uh, we pray, God, that he would just fill your presence and your and your pleasure as he does those things and fill him with uh just uh spirit of uh confidence and uh of your creativity and just help him to write great things and tell great stories and uh be a uh pray for a blessing upon his family. Pray you'd watch over his family and uh just thank you for this time. And we pray this in Jesus' name and your promises we stand. Amen. Thank you for listening to the Act One podcast, celebrating over 20 years as the premier training program for Christians in Hollywood. Act One is a Christian community of entertainment industry professionals who train and equip storytellers to create works of truth, goodness, and beauty. The Act One program is a division of Master Media International. To financially support the mission of Act One or to learn more about our programs, visit us online at Act One Program.com. And to learn more about the work of Master Media, go to mastermedia.com.