It's Never Too Late with Comedian Aaron Foster

Today’s guest is Aaron Foster, a standup comic who brings humor to topics like mental health in his stand-up shows. 

Aaron is touring now with his show “Mostly Jokes,” where he shares honest stories about being clinically depressed, his experience hosting an HGTV show, growing up with a bipolar father, and having a schizophrenic brother. At fifty, Aaron decided to follow his passion for stand-up comedy. I’m genuinely excited to introduce Aaron to you all, writers. Remember, it’s never too late to chase your dreams, and I believe Aaron’s story will inspire you to do just that.

The PAGE International Screenwriting Awards sponsors the WRITERS HANGOUT.
Executive Producer Kristin Overn
Creator/Executive Producer Sandy Adomaitis
Producer Terry Sampson
Music by Ethan Stoller

Transcript

0:11

Hello, my name is Sandy Adamidis, the social media director for the Page International Screenwriting Awards and your host for the Writers Hangout, a podcast that celebrates the many From inspiration to the first draft, revising, getting the project made, and everything in between. We'll talk to the best and the brightest in the entertainment industry, and create a space where you can hang out, learn from the pros, and have fun. Hey writers, it's Sandy. I'm coming to you from Studio City, the jewel of the San Fernando Valley. We are in the dog days of summer with a full moon and unbelievable heat. Boy do we have a great show for you. Today's guest is Aaron Foster, a standup comic who is currently touring with his show about being clinically depressed. hosting A-H-G-T-V show. Growing up with a bipolar father and having a schizophrenic brother. At 50, he decided to pursue a career in standup comedy. we all need that reminder that it's never too late and Aaron will inspire you to feel that way. Aaron Foster, thank you so much for joining us on The Writer's Hangout. Thank you for having me. Happy to be here. Hey, we connected in, the modern way I found your comedy online and I followed you. I just thought you were just so funny. And then I saw a post you put up on July 25th. And it starts with, you quit your job at 50. It has been three years, and you go on to say you've been ignored by dozens of bookers and countless festivals. Now, Erin, can you take it from here what the rest of the post says? Sure that post goes on to say that I, wrote a 90 minute show about my mental health or lack thereof, and did my own 40 city tour. Sometimes people come, sometimes they don't. But I also just booked my first ever headline gig at a comedy club roosters Comedy Club in Sunnyvale, California, September 11th. It's never too late. I love this post so much. Congratulations, by the way, on Roosters at Sunnyvale's. Can you tell me about what went on behind the scenes? did you just hit play Did you do edits? Did you think about it for a while? Did you write it? What went on behind that post? Yeah, it's funny that that post, caught your attention because it's really one of the more, I guess, simpler posts that I've made. I'm still trying to navigate my way in social media and find a voice that is repeatable and authentic there. But that was just me reacting in almost real time. Like having a discovery of oh, I got booked at this club. And then I should record a reaction to this. Because that's the way our brains get wired. Now. We spend all time on social media. Oh, this be good for social media. Stop. Let's make it, let's make it a post. But that's the world we live in, especially as aspiring comedians. Right. Angling for content. But yeah, I just set up the camera and really thought about, I had a little bit of, what is the text of that video? It's not a, there's not a voiceover or words being spoken, but the text is what we covered, as I said, quit my job at 50, rejected from festivals, bookers won't call me back. And then, just booked my first headlining spot and, breaking out into a big smile. So it's one of those things of Just trying to figure out what works on social media. And I think there is hopefully, a level of authenticity to that.'cause it definitely came from a place of truth and of being very excited. And I don't get excited a whole lot even when good things happen. So the idea that, a club reached out to me that somehow had seen something I did somewhere, I don't really know how it happened and I figured I'm not gonna ask them until after the show. Good. That's good. Because I don't want them to second guess their decision. But it's just one of these things of you just keep putting things out into the world and most of them seem to, land on, on deaf ears or not go anywhere. But I've had a couple of things lately that, these moments where like, oh, somebody is paying attention to something. They saw me somewhere. I always like to share with the writers out there that when you do, how does this go doing things get lead you to doing more things putting yourself out there when you don't even think anyone's paying attention. Well, if you don't, then nobody will pay attention. And I would love for our writers, I don't know if I can put it up on my socials or I'll just direct them to your socials. They might go, I don't know what to do on social media. Well, your voice isn't even in that post. It's all captions. It's done with music. And any writer can do that. Any writer can get on Instagram and go, Hey, a producer asked to read my script. I'm really happy about that. Absolutely. Yeah. I've certainly done it of, you, I'm sure we all have creators that we like and don't like. And I think to start out, emulate somebody that you like, copy their style, copy their,'cause most very popular creators do one thing and they do it over and over again. And that's, all of the advice of, find one thing and do it well. And I've been told a million things of like, well, you have comedy clips, you have day in the life clips, you have a cooking recipe clips, like you need to make separate pages for all those things and just do one thing on your comedy page and one thing on your cooking page. It's like, I'm not gonna do that. But that is the conventional wisdom, which is to just do one thing over and over again, because then people know what they're gonna get on your page. And that's interesting. can we put a lantern on that? So I think. I'm going back in my brain, and you're absolutely right. We've been told to keep it, get your what is it, your brand or whatever it is, and just, beat it to death. I like what you are saying and I think social media is with you on that. create a page and show up make it interesting content and they will come. I hope so. I think, the biggest thing is getting over that sort of just the fear of posting the kind of cringe factor and the embarrassment. And the reality is, and I struggle with this absolutely to this day, it's a huge, huge obstacle that I'm still trying to get over. But the reality is that nobody cares. Especially if it's, I mean, what's, what's the word? What if nobody watches? Okay, well then nobody watches it. What if it goes viral? Well, then it goes viral. I mean, then a bunch of people like it. And yeah, you, you're always of course open to those negative comments and those are never fun to get. but, you hopefully build up a tolerance to those two. I'm still working on that as well right now. I once posted a video of Bowen Yang. He was the Titanic iceberg, Have you seen that video I have, yes. We can update. He tells the story Yes. From the point of view of the iceberg. That is brilliant. And I posted it because it's perspective, it's point of view. There's another way it coming at the Titanic and a person wrote a comment saying what does this have to do with screenwriting? Why do you think people do not understand that standup is writing? I think it's because when standup is done well. Which is when most people see it, most people see standup on a special, a Netflix special, HBO special, whatever it might be. And by that point, that material has been written and rewritten and workshopped and tweaked and edited to, as close to perfection as can be. And when a comic does that. When they're comfortable in their skin and on stage, it doesn't feel rehearsed or pre-written, comedy is a magic trick. it's, it's been written, it's been memorized over and over and over again, but somehow it doesn't feel like that when it's done well. And I think, that's the best answer I can come up with that, of why people might not consider it writing. And certainly there are comics who do lots of improv and things like that, but I think certainly the comedians that I really love are writing and rewriting and, down to the comma, down to the, everything. When you're writing your bio, what do you like first? do you like actor? Do you like comedian? Do you like writer? Because you're all three of those. well, I guess if you're gonna submit to a comedy club, you're gonna put comedian, but the New York Times is knocking on your door. How do you want them to say your name? Oh boy. these days I would certainly go with comedian. Yeah. But that's been a really challenge for me to not admit to, but, it's hard to write that because it's like, well, do you make your living that way? I don't not right now. I do a lot of shows and I book my own shows and I've been touring and sometimes I make money on shows and sometimes I don't. And that's just the reality. And that's not, it's certainly not the way I make a living right now. So to say that is very tricky. I made my living as an, artist. Years and probably took me at 10 those to ever say that I was an artist can you define artists sure. Yeah. In thousand and one I was in the wholesale home furnishings business, which is a whole other story, but I made for my business partner a map of the United States that was made out of recycled license plates. So every state was cut out of that state's license plate. It's a giant jigsaw puzzle of old license plates. Cool. And that took off and became my career for the next 20 years. And. it, I had massive imposter syndrome. Like, people like, oh my God, how'd you come up with the idea? I'm like, I dunno. It seems obvious to me. How do you do it? I was just, because I can't draw and I can't paint but I can make just, especially now 20 years in, I can make just about anything outta license plates. And so that was a long challenge for me of literally, funding my life, moving to Los Angeles, buying a house all with money I made from art and still struggling to be able to call myself an artist. I've been very fortunate in that, the very first thing I made artistically, basically made me a living for the next 20 years and sort of funded a pursuit of acting, pursuit of writing and stand up and things like that. So I, I was very fortunate with that, You live in Reno now? Now I drove to Tahoe once, did I go by Reno? From Los Angeles? No, it's near, yeah. I'm about, 45 minutes from, lake Shore at one one point South Shore. So not far. Why Reno? Why are we not? I mean, that's a long story, but the short version is I left la I moved to LA in 2005. I left in oh nine. I did that TV show for a while and then just nothing really happened after that and got frustrated and, it's a lot of rejection. And so I moved to Boulder. I started a business out there with my college roommate. I left that in 2015. And I started a restaurant in a tiny little town, about an hour west of Reno where I had grown up going camping and whatnot. And then, that was really great for a year. And the second year was like, this is lonely. It's really only busy there for about 90 days out of the year during the summer. So I closed that up and wanted to open up a place where that was not seasonal and had at least. Some chance of a social life and things like that. So I moved to Reno and I also was like somewhat affordable, certainly more than like, going back to Boulder, going back to Los Angeles or San Francisco where I grew up, that kind of thing. Now you mentioned your TV show. That was HGTV, right? HGTV, yeah. Home and Garden Television. It was one of these home makeover shows that were so popular back in the day. Who doesn't love HGTV? not my, my favorite, but again, that's another long story. I mean, I don't wanna get off on too much of a tangent. I was fired and subsequently banned from the network. It's a long story I talk about in my show, but and not for, bad behavior, well, bad behavior of telling the vice president. I, I thought he was not a good person. But I signed like, the worst contract in the history of entertainment and, which at the time I was fine with, I was, my art was doing great. I got this opportunity. I'd been in LA less than a year. Hey, do you wanna host your own show? Here's the contract. It doesn't pay anything. And it's a pain in the butt. You're gonna have to get to Minneapolis every other week for, forever. Essentially, at the time it was 195 episode contract. Wow. so I didn't know if I had any leverage,'cause I had never had a job before in entertainment and in retrospect I, it wasn't a great deal, but like I could have gotten an agent with that. I have a contract on the table. It's not for a ton of money, but it is a legitimate contract with the television network. I could have reached out to an agent and got, but I, it's like I gotta give these guys an answer. And, we did negotiate a little bit, but I signed a bad deal, which is totally on me, but I was doing well with my art and I thought if you just get on tv, if you're any good, it'll lead to other things. And if you're not, it won't really matter in the big picture. That was how I justified it to myself. But then it, went from bad to worse as they wanted me to do and more and more work that was outside of the original scope of contract for no money. And I also, I wanted to be an actor. I wanted to do real work. I didn't wanna be the host of an interior design show. I just saw it as well, it seems like you should take any job you can get. You've been here for six months. Didn't seem like a thing that you should turn down at that point of your, couldn't even call it a career at that point. I'd been in acting class for six months. I think and I know a little bit about this'cause I watched your show and you go into more detail and I think you made the right move your first job in this town. I mean, I could line up 20 writers and they would say, oh, we had to take a magnifying glass to the contract to find the compensation. You just get beat up. And that doesn't mean it's right, but I think you did the right thing and then you did try to negotiate But I mean, wow, congratulations just getting into town and doing that. I can see you hosting a show and just being so charming and me just wanting to watch it just to see what you are gonna say next. thank you. I really didn't expect to be good at it because, at that point I had, I certainly hadn't done standup. like I said, I'd been in acting class for six months and before I moved to LA I'd never been on stage in my life. So I felt again, imposter syndrome where I had gotten this job hosting the show, I felt like I had fooled everybody. And I thought, well, they'll fly me out to do the pilot, and then halfway through that they'll fire me and this'll be like, all right, I did half of a pilot once, and that's a, the first rung in the ladder of trying to build this career. But I ended up, I think, to no, nobody more surprised than I was, that I was pretty good at it. And I discovered, I think I'm more comfortable. On camera, on stage than I'm at a party or something like that, or in day-to-day life for whatever reason. now you, we've been talking about imposter syndrome and you are self-proclaimed sensitive. I too am sensitive, and by the way, I just wanna say this to the world out there yelling at a sensitive person, you're being too sensitive. Doesn't help us. it's not ideal. It's not ideal. Do you think being sensitive helps or hinders when you want to write, act, and do standup? I think for the most part, I think it helps immensely, but only if you're willing to share it in your writing or in your performance. I mean, if you are sensitive but you don't let onto that, then I think, there's gonna be some inauthenticity in your writing or in your performance. that's one of those things, especially as a standup stand that the audience, they might not know, but they know somehow if you're not authentic or if you're not really in the moment. And it can just be such a small change where I've had nights like fantastic, amazing sets next night, same exact set, and like, it just doesn't work and something's off and you just can't quite figure it out. and I think sometimes comedians, you can be afraid to be sensitive on stage or unwilling to, I mean, I spent a ton of my life like wanting to be, and like trying to be cool. And there's nothing less cool than someone who's trying to be cool. And I think, one of the ways I went about that, was to be, or at least seem to be like indifferent, unaffected, unbothered. And I, think. Whatever cool is, cool is, is not the leather jacket and the sunglasses. It might be like, James Dean was cool, but Peewee Herman's pretty cool too because he's authentically himself, I mean, I know it's a character and all that, but, cool is, or authentic, being passionate and being vocal about who you're, and just being real. I think that's, people find that attractive, especially on social media. I mean, obviously not everybody, but it's just'cause it's so rare nowadays. Everything is just so performative and especially social media. Mm-hmm. And I don't know that I've found a way to do that online in my social media, not in a like, repeatable way. I do find moments and I, it's, I really strive for it, but I also struggle with content because I'm afraid of being cringe. I have a friend of mine who works in social media manages huge accounts for corporations with millions of followers. she understands social media in a way that I think a lot of people don't. But she says, you have to climb Cringe Mountain and you just have to post and post and post and find your people and your people will find you and not worry about the sort of embarrassment or the not being cool, like I said. And, and I think being sensitive. I think everybody's sensitive. I think everybody has emotions and some people certainly don't admit it and that's fine. Erin, I just love what you just said and I whoever this woman who's your friend what a great, you gotta get over Cringe mountain for our writers out there. You've gotta get over Cringe Mountain if you wanna learn how to pitch, if you wanna learn how to network and start with your social media, it's just a great place to do that. And I think you showed your sensitivity in that post that drew me. To call you. I love standup. I have tons of standup people on my algorithm, but that just hit me that night of like, oh my gosh, Erin, it would be just perfect for the podcast. And I'm glad you are sensitive, Erin. Well, thank you. It's taken me a long time to not to be sensitive, but to lean into it in any kind of a public way. you wrote a 90 minute show about mental health, which I watched and I loved. It's funny, the theater looks, at first I thought you were up somewhere on Hollywood Boulevard But you were in Idaho and Wow. that was? Some dark stuff But you know, those are tough people and they enjoyed it. Can you tell the writers about your process from the initial ideas till you know what you did on stage and. Again, this is some of the darkest stuff I have laughed at or heard heard in a long time. Well, that's great. I'm glad you laughed at it.'cause Yeah, It does get a bit dark here and there, which is why I call the show mostly jokes. It's mostly jokes, but yeah, that, I mean that most of that show I wrote over the course of several sessions with a group of comics that I write with and that I started with in January of 2023. I opened a restaurant in Reno. A month later, COVID happened. That was the next two years of my life. I kept my restaurant afloat by doing all kinds of crazy, silly stuff on social media, which made me fall back in love with writing and performing. And I was lucky enough to sell my restaurant, get out under. And then I got in with this writing group of a bunch of brilliant comics people that write on TV shows that have done late night spots, all kinds of people. And we do these sessions that are about 10 weeks and you write together and it's, and you get feedback and every week you bring in five or six minutes. Like, here's what I wrote on this topic. And you essentially do a sat, it's on Zoom, and so it's an open mic, but an open mic. You just have 14 comics with their arms crossed who refuse to laugh at anybody who's funny because they get jealous and better, whatever. I mean, they're not all like that. But yeah, I mean, I live in, I live in Reno and I in Reno, they're all like that. I'm like, what am I getting out of being here? I mean, I'm getting a little bit thicker skin I guess. This is a completely different monster where you do your, here's what I wrote this week, and everybody comes back and says, Hey, like, this was great. I didn't understand this. What if you change this? What if you talk more about this? What about this for a punchline instead of that? And so it's a communal effort, which is, it's really just an acceleration of the process because, stand up. editing obviously, I mean, editing any writing, editing is obviously, hugely important. And ultimately the audience is the ultimate editor to an extent. you can write and sit at home and write genius. If they don't laugh, they don't laugh. you can't keep it more than a couple shows if it's not working. You have to either change it or drop it. and working with so many really smart, talented, experienced people, you accelerate that process of getting feedback and not completely having to figure out every single beat entirely by trial and error. It helps a bit. So that's how I started writing. But I wasn't writing with the idea like, I'm gonna have an hour or an hour and a half show. I was just writing to start doing standup. And I wrote so much in that first six months that there was a point when all these note cards on my wall, and I don't know, saw the matrix of oh, I think this could all fit together into one thing. Because I, mostly what I write about mental health and my family and my father passing away and my brother passing away and all the stuff that I realize it sounds hilarious, but stay with me. So an unknown comic with no following, I can't get five minutes at a comedy club, let alone an hour. I, someone told me about the Hollywood Fringe Festival and I looked into that and, booked a theater to do nine shows. I mean, a 22 seat theater, which is perfect. So I'm on the hook to do an hour, six months from now, and that gave me the extra push to really work on it. The deadline. And it changed, it changed from the first show to the ninth show, and it changes every day a little bit. So, standup is all about just these kind of endless little tweaks over and over again. And sometimes a joke that is 25 words becomes nine words, or it becomes two jokes, or it, disappears altogether. And doing the show over and over again, it gets more jokes and it gets more refined. And that's been my process of trying to do the major work with this writing group that I'm in to get sort of 80% of the way there. And then the rest of it is just a matter of trial and error in front of audiences, so you didn't sit down and say, I'm going to do a one man show about mental health. About mental health in my family. You were putting yourself out there and I'm repeating this because I just really want our writers out there who are trying to break into the business. you just cannot do it just sitting in your living room. You just have to keep throwing things at the wall. So you were basically throwing things at the wall and then one day, like your license plate, it became the United States. It became your 90 minute show. And it is so honest. Did you leave things on the cutting room floor? Sure, yeah. and the show, initially was an hour at the Hollywood Fringe. was an, I had a 60 minute Heart out. They cut your mic basically.'cause they have another show coming in 15 minutes. So it's grown over time. And this chunk about my brother and his suicide. I mean, that, I guess obviously it started as one joke and you write two jokes, but it started as three or four jokes in 2023. And that my comedy group loved and that when I did them live did not go great because people on a Friday night at a comedy club are not really in the mood for that necessarily, especially in a 10 minute set from somebody that they don't know. Like, wait, what is he, what is he talking about? Suicide. Like, I don't wanna hear that. So that took me two years to figure out and is now almost a 20 minute section of the show to figure out how to make it work, to give it a through line, to give the audience permission to laugh at it, but also give the audience permission to not laugh at it under understand why. I do comedy about it. you put it in a really good spot, it's towards the end and you talk about your mother and your father beforehand, and your mom's. Okay. Your mom's out there. Hi, mom. Right. Do you wanna say hi to your mom? Yes. Yes. My mom just, she will hear this. I thought that you placed it beautifully. It gave me a time as an audience member to get to know you and to get lulled into the sense of, oh yeah, he's dark, but I can handle it and then bam, it gets darker. Yeah. It's, and then, there's a section in the first couple of minutes where I mentioned that there are gonna be some jokes about this topic, but they're gonna come later. And that's a part that got added in, really only in the last couple of months I realized, That I had to set that up at the top. Interesting. Did is, was that a note or something you sensed It was something I sensed and it was a really interesting experience because when I promote my show I'm just renting theaters in small to mid-sized towns for the most part. And I post Instagram and Facebook ads and I post everywhere I can, but I, all of my posts have something to do with either, a quote or a review or, I never laugh so hard about mental health or, dark comedy with a huge heart. Some of these quotes that I've had from reviews that I feel like just I need people to know that it's not crowd work and, dick jokes side note. Do you like to do crowd work? No, I hate crowd work. And there's multiple reasons for that. would you explain to the writers what crowd work is? So Crowdwork as a comedian is, Hey, where are you from? What do you do? Who are you here with? What do you do for work? It's, stopping your show and talking to the audience, engaging the audience, and I get it. And there, there are comics that are good at it that are amazing and it's impressive, but it has really impacted comedy in a big way because that is what comedians like to post on social media because then you don't have to post your jokes because that's, crowd work is a one-time thing. It happened that night. And if you get a funny reaction, you can post content to engage your audience. Yeah. That makes so much sense. are you happy with the outcome of the show? The outcome. Hmm. Yeah, I'm proud of it, which, is a big thing for me to say. I've done a lot of things with my life and I've struggled to accept that I was good at them or that they turned out well, or, that I might be good at something. That's been a difficult, like I said, it took me more than 10 years of making a very good living as an artist to ever call myself an artist. Yeah, I'm, I mean, especially, the one you saw, it was in Ketchum, Idaho a couple of weeks ago, and, thank you for watching. there are a couple things that I think it still needs. I think it's good. I don't think it's great. And when I say great, I say it's not, I just watched Mark Marin's new special. It's not that, of course, mark Mar's been doing this for 35 years and he's one of the best ever do it. So like, well, maybe I shouldn't be comparing myself to that, but it's not that, and it's not Mike Lia, his new special. The good life is great. And so I want it to be that. And I have ideas of how to get it there, but it's just a long process for me. But overall, yes, I'm happy with it and I'm proud of it. And, and you saw one of the best shows I've ever had. I loved it. Now you mentioned in that special that you learned love from comedy films. Yeah. That's funny. That is some new material that I dropped into the middle of that one that I've done a few times and I'm sort of like, yeah, romantic comedies. I'm exploring that. I, the stuff that I'm writing now is, it all seems to be coming from some version of all of this talk these days about the new masculinity and alpha males and all this stuff. Whereas like, I'm a sensitive guy. I grew up watching romantic comedies and I still like watching romantic comedies and trying to navigate that There's a new male loneliness epidemic, which, first of all, I have no sympathy for a new male loneliness epidemic. I have been lonely for decades, so I'm getting lonely guys. But I mean, that's a joke for the most part. But I just, I'm like, if you guys would stop worrying about your abs and sitting in freezing cold water and just like, learn how to roast a chicken and make a creme brulee, you would never be lonely again. they're going about it all wrong and they, the romantic comedy as part of that, of, of like being a sensitive guy and learning all the wrong things about relationships from those movies. Yeah. Do you have a favorite romantic comedy? Oh boy. I don't flip around the channels anymore'cause who, I don't have cable or any, but, back in the day, there's something about Hugh Grant that really is magical. He's just, he's such a curmudgeon in sort of real life, and he's such a sweetheart in his movies. it's hard for me to say out loud, like nodding hill. Like I, if that's on, it's, there's something about that movie Aaron, I still hear this in my head at least once a week, I still hear this Oopsie daisy, right? Yeah. That's him going over the fence, right? He's going over the gate. And it's a weird thing because, there's a lot of, sort of men being emotional has come a long way and being able to talk about it and being sensitive and all that, but there's a fine line. Everybody has a different sort of limit, women, I love an emotional guy, okay, but Do you mean a single tier at the end of Field of Dreams when Costa gets to have a catch with his dad? Or do you mean sobbing on the floor at the end of Nodding Hill? Because like those are two different things. Exactly. Hey, I'm gonna list a bunch of movie tropes about falling in love. Okay. All right. I want you to decide which one writers should keep or delete, never to be seen again. Now, here's the trick. The makeover, the main character goes under a noticeable appearance change that makes them more attractive. I mean, yeah. Doesn't that imply that they're only like worthy if they're hot? Yes. 100% Aaron? I think all those movies probably have a reveal where then they figure out that no, I actually do really, even though but you're not. Yeah, you let your hair down, you took your glasses off. Like she was like a nine before she did that. Now she's a 10. Like, I mean, you think about the people that play those parts in those movies, they're not exactly, unattractive to start out. They, they do what they can. They put'em in, frumpy clothes and glasses, but it's like, come on. The one exception and see if you agree with this one. The one exception that I liked about a movie makeover was Sandra Bullock and Miss Congeniality. Oh, oh yeah. That one is, yeah. That's a great. A great movie. You got Michael k her the power at the end. She meets up with Benjamin Brat and he's whoa. And she's like, you like me? Yes. Yeah. Which again, I don't care what Sandra Bullock's wearing, she was hot at the beginning of the movie too, yes. She was. Okay. Here's another, the trope. A rich person falls in love with a poorer person. of course you've got Pretty Woman. Usually the man is rich and the woman's poor. I think that's probably the trophy aspect of that. So again, I mean, I think if you break these things down far enough, they get somewhat problematic of. Of all you're rich. What do you care? Who cares if she has money or not? Or she's from the wrong side of the track. So I'm wonderful that, where does that go? I just watched that recently. That's Rich. That's Rich girl, poor boy. Eric s That's a great movie. Yeah's poor. And she's, well, she's actually not rich. She's also poor. But she hangs out with the rich people'cause she's so hot. It's, it's very, these are all very problematic in retrospect, these movies. I think I, the only thing I can remember is she wore gloves with fringes hanging off of them.'cause she was a drummer and I really thought those, that is the other character that is Mary Stewart Masterson. Yeah. I thought those gloves were cool. Yes. Oh wait, I, I totally messed up our game here. Let's go back to number one. Are we gonna keep the makeover or are we gonna delete it? I think my answer, I hesitate to say that there's an answer to all of these that's the same. I think, you have to find a unique way to do it, or you, or. Or you have to do it? Well, I mean, I, I realize that's such a, like, well, yeah, obviously, but, I'm on the board of a film festival here in Reno, so I watch a ton of short films and I think a big mistake that I see is people try to like re reinvent the genre and just like do something that's so unique and it's like just you can do something that is a story that we've seen a hundred times, but if you do it really well. That still can be great. It, a simple love story where the families don't want them to be together. Okay. We've all seen that since Romeo and Juliet. But if it's done well, it's acted well and it's written well. It still works. I mean, there's a reason I think we're like, oh, there's only six stories. Or, whatever they say about, plot lines and things like that. I think, you just have to find a way to do it that we haven't seen before. I agree with that 100%. Okay. Number three, the trope is the big time player meets the one, the main character, Has a history of dating many people until one day they meet that someone who changes all their views. Two weeks notice, which we are, we're talking about Sandra and Hugh. That would be one. Do you like that trope? I'm trying to think of this. Okay, so again, I'm trying to break these down. So this is, this is a person who has been, lived their whole lives in a very shallow way. And then I'm taking these negative spins on all of these tropes. I apologize. But, and then decides to see the new person in a, in as three dimensionally. Yes. Which is, I mean, did, were, were all the sort of people you were dating before this, really not worthy of respect and being treated kindly and not one night stands and whatnot. I mean, I get it. You have to, you have to have some kind of a plot line, right? Like what's the, what's the story? It's like this guy meets, this meets that or whatever. Yeah. I can speak for myself. I'm 53 now, but my thirties living in la, making a great living as an artist and being on a, granted a super cheap TV show, but I'm still on a TV show and nobody else in my acting class was on a TV show. So like, I, I, I dated around a bit. I had a good time. Aaron, let's pause the show. Pause the quiz. Where did you go during that period of time? What restaurant? What club? I'm just fascinated to know where now? Oh my God. Back in my LA days. Oh yeah. That's, I did not go to a lot of different places. I worked from home with my artwork, which was nice. I never really had to deal with the chaos of traffic and whatnot. My favorite first date place was a restaurant called Jones on Santa Monica. Yes. It's open late. It's very, it's probably not. I do, I have been back there a couple times recently when I do shows and stuff, because they're open late and there's a bit of a nostalgia to it for me, it's a bit loud for me these days, but it looks exactly the same as it did 20 years ago inside. is that near it's across from Formosa. Yes. That's it. It's across from, yes. I, I went to Jones. Once and I liked it Yeah. It's, cool booths and there's a vibe, there's an la vibe happening there. And there's a great jukebox where there used to be, I'd go on these first or second dates there, and I look, if you're gonna have Bob Dylan blonde on blonde on the, on the jukebox, I'm gonna play, the 12 minute song three times and you're just gonna have to deal with it. But so that's a nostalgia place for me. Now, I didn't go on a, I don't know that I went on many dates or any to a restaurant called a OC. That was really one of my favorite haunts. they used to be on third, down towards Fairfax, but at some point, I dunno, it's probably 10 years at least. They moved, they're still on third, but they're way down towards like, the Beverly Center down there. So they're, they're still around. But I used to go there every Sunday night. It was pretty close to my house and ended up becoming friends with, everybody that worked there on Sunday night. And it was really a nice way to end the week and weekend for me to go. But I would, I went there by myself probably 99% of the time. When I was, I'm okay one-on-one, but I'm not great. Outside of that. Socially, when I was going out with my friends and stuff, if we were going dancing, it was always like a group dancing at the crush Club or something, and there was no dress code. There is no right.$25 drinks. It really was just fun. I don't currently know what the kids are doing in LA right now. But one thing that I do envy the kids have is Uber, because yeah, I would've liked that when I was going out, when I was younger. Yeah, I mean that's, that's certainly a game changer. I'm not, I've never been a huge drinker, but I, not that I'm paying attention, but I'm not sure I've, last time I heard of a celebrity getting a dui. I'm sure it still happens, but that seems, well, thanks for making it seem like I'm a big drinker, Erin. I really appreciate that. You bet. You bet. Okay, back to our quiz, the trope best friends to lovers main characters in love with their best friend. They don't realize it. they either pursue them or they don't. There's a obstacles in the way. Do you like the trope the best friends to lovers Yeah, I like those movies and I think we've all had those experiences and relationships and I certainly when I was younger, especially like as a very shy kid, and the girl that lives around the corner that you've known forever and you, but you don't know how to do anything. And because you're so close in these other ways and friendship ways and, and yeah. Yeah, I think it's, I think it's great We're gonna keep that one last one. The trope, the contract relationship. The main character finds themselves in a fake relationship, but ends up falling in love for real. I would say like the proposal, another Sandra Bullock, right. Right. God, I'm drawing a blank. It was one of my favorite movies when I was a kid that Patrick Dempsey can't Buy Me Love. Oh, that one. Yes, I remember that. Where he's just the nerd with no friends and again, the girl he's had a crush on forever, although they're not really friends. Maybe they were friends in like elementary school, but now she's the popular cheerleader and she gets in a jam and he helps her out financially to Greece to date him for, a month or something like that. again, they're tropes for a reason because I think people identify them within some way. And they work out the way we want them to, right? they have the arc of either forced together. One of'em doesn't like it. And then of course somebody screws up and then they end up, figuring it out and being decent human beings in the end. Erin, I have two more questions for you. Are you watching, reading or listening to something that you enjoy, that you'd like to share with us? Listening to, I mean, I guess real briefly, I have my favorite podcast WTF, mark Marin, which I'm heartbroken is ending because I'm never gonna be a guest on it, mark is hanging up the police. He's hanging it up. Yeah. 16 years. I think in the end of September, I don't think there's not an official end date announced, but he has said in September, like, we're, we're packing it in. Hey Aaron, if I find out his address, do you wanna just go and break into the garage? That, I don't feel like that would end well. the cats won't bark. The cats won't bark. I do have a half a, I have an a completely, I mean this, I haven't looked at this for years. I have a, an unfinished script that opens with essentially me. On essentially Mark Marin's door with a gun saying, put me on your podcast. But that never went anywhere. Which is probably for the best, mark. don't worry. Well, you're gonna have Mark on your podcast, so it'll work out. Sure. let's go with that. And just because this is for writers and creatives, in case anybody has not does not know of Mike Burley's podcast called Working It Out is really great for creatives. It's all about the process of writing and refining and all that kind of stuff. So I think people, if people are not familiar with that, you might find it interesting. And I, lately I've been watching a lot of standup specials but watching them in a different way, not just for the jokes, watching it for. Mannerisms and facial expressions and eye lines and what they do with their hands. And the biggest thing that has really, I've noticed, not that I ever thought any comic with an actual special was not confident, but the level of confidence on these comedians that have been doing it for 20 or 30 years is really just, it's so impressive. I feel like I'm confident on stage, but it's another level and it's really fascinating to watch, mark Mar's new special. And I went back and watched one I had in Gadsby's her second one, Douglas. And Gary Goldman is really my favorite comic, I think in terms of like, just sheer joy. He's so smart and so brilliant and I have, so I identify with so many things about his sort of perspective on life. And so that's been a really interesting thing to see. And, from a writing standpoint, Mike Burley's new special called The Good Life is fantastic. And I saw it about a year before he put it out. When was working on it, it was still called The Good Life, but his dad had not had a stroke yet. His new specialist, the through line is his father having a stroke and mortality and kind. So it was really amazing to see how he had pivoted to this entirely new through line when I, when I saw the show in LA a year before, I was like, oh, he's done. Like, he must be taping this soon, like he's done. that's amazing. So that was really interesting to see that he was able to just be like, Nope, I'm gonna do this other thing. And obviously, he leaned into it and decided that was what he wanted to talk about. So that was interesting from a. Perspective of a comic of like, man, that's, and I dunno, maybe his next hour will just be all the stuff that he didn't use in this one. I dunno what he's gonna do. I doubt it. I dunno that he's necessarily wired that way, but maybe. But it was just, it was really interesting to see, like, I think he's got a done thing and then to see how much he changed it was inspiring and sort of kind of terrifying. Like, oh my God, you dropped 45 minutes of really solid material because, this other thing came up. It's like, wow. So it's, I mean, watching people who are really, really, really at the top of their game and do it the way that I, would like to ultimately do it it's mostly inspiring. It's a little bit intimidating, but it's mostly inspiring. But it's cool, it's educational, yeah. Would you like to share your social media and where could our writers find you? Sure. Instagram is probably where I'm most active, which is Aaron Charles Foster. But you can find everything just through my website, Air and foster com. That's probably the easiest way to find all of my stuff Aaron Foster, thank you so much. You've shared so much of your time, so much of your journey, so much of your artistry. I really think our listeners are just gonna walk away with, the desire to get out there and just keep creating. Thank you so much. Thank you so much for having me. And that's a wrap for the Writer's Hangout. Thanks so much for listening. If you enjoyed the show, please take a moment to leave us a review on Apple Podcasts. Your positive feedback will help us keep the show going so we can continue bringing you more future episodes. Remember, keep writing. The world needs your stories. The Writers Hangout is sponsored by the Page International Screenwriting Awards, with executive producer Kristen Overn, producer Sandy Adamides, and myself, Terry Sampson. And our music is composed by Ethan Stoller.