Showrunning: an obsession in the fast lane

The Hollywood Reporter - December 27, 2000

By Rachel Fischer

LOS ANGELES -- The devil is in the details for Joseph Stern.

On any given workday, Stern, the executive producer of CBS' sophomore drama "Judging Amy," generally finds his head bursting with all the individual elements that together make his show run. From editing this week's episode to casting and location scouting for future shows, checking in with writers on the direction of story lines, completing paperwork and conferring with everyone from directors to prop masters, Stern is awash in the details of the Emmy-nominated series about a divorcee (Amy Brenneman) juggling judgeship with a young daughter and a tough mom (Tyne Daly).

"It's a beast of job," said Stern, 60, whose credits also include "Law & Order" and running his own theater, the Matrix, in Los Angeles. "I've done everything on this show from fighting for Tyne Daly to be cast to concerning myself with performers' hairstyles. There's nothing tougher than one-hour television drama -- you're making 22 minimovies a year. There's too much work, there's never enough time -- and it's a great feeling."

Welcome to the glamorous, grueling and occasionally giddy world of the television showrunner.

Though the term is bandied about rather loosely in this era of programs with practically as many producers as there are crew members, the showrunner is defined as the executive producer (or producers) who has day-to-day responsibility for a program -- everything from the sublime (what the show will look and feel like) to the ridiculous (getting a sulking actor out of his trailer).

Some call it the hardest job in Hollywood.

As the representative org of writer-producers, which most showrunners are, the Writers Guild of America represents this hard-working constituency. Richard Stayton, editor of the WGA magazine Written By, said showrunning is cut out only for those who can thrive in an intense, deadline-heavy environment. "There's a lot of money (on the line)," Stayton said, "and it all starts and ends with the showrunner."

Statistics gleaned from WGA breakdowns indicate that the average showrunner is white, male and earns well above $260,000 a year. However, it should be noted that salaries vary greatly according to individual development deals.

Also, female showrunners, though not the rule, are definitely less of an exception these days.

The showrunner is in charge of the overall creative vision and is accountable to the network suits for every nuance of a show. He or she is all things to all people at any given time, which means that workaholism is simply part of the territory.

Just listen to what the ever-harried, weekend-working Stern and his equally intense showrunning partner, Barbara Hall, have to say. She's the writer-producer, molding "Judging Amy's" literary voice, while Stern tends to production matters. Stern's joke with Hall is that the only way he ever sees family members is to work with them (his son Luke is the show's camera assistant).

The thirtysomething Hall, meanwhile, can top that. In reference to the kind of driven personality it takes to run a series, she cites the time that, while working on the NBC series "I'll Fly Away," she was making script revisions even as she was in labor with her daughter.

Showrunners who have given birth to a hit show have been known to get rich quick -- "Dharma & Greg" creator Chuck Lorre signed a $30 million-plus four-year agreement with Warner Bros. Television last year -- but many will never hit such a jackpot. Anyway, so goes a common showrunning joke: The money you make is nice, but it can't give you back all the years the job takes off your life.

An absolutely unscientific poll of the showrunning community shows that the side effects of having a series on your shoulders are not pretty. Weight gain, worry lines and gray hairs are the battle scars of the typical first season. Most showrunners told of waking up in the middle of the night, worried about their product, and of suffering from back or stomach pain. Several mentioned going into therapy.

"Oh, it's an enormous job," stresses veteran agent Jack Dytman, who, as the former head of ICM's television and literary department and now at the helm of his own L.A. agency, has over the years represented showrunners or writer-producers from the likes of "Northern Exposure," "The X-Files" and "Frasier."

"A showrunner is the CEO of a very unique world: You have to be a great manager of people, plus a great writer (or creative person) and politician -- qualities that are hard to find in the same person. The job is 24 hours a day, and the list of things to worry about is long, from getting a bad time slot to fighting the studio over budget and motivating the network to promote the show."

Even though the showrunner is the glue that keeps all the various pieces of the show together -- the network end, the writing end, the production end -- the job itself is strangely anonymous.

Unless you're a David E. Kelley or an Aaron Sorkin -- so-called "star showrunners" who have distinguished themselves by their ability to handle more than one project at a time, and somehow handle it all well -- much of the world doesn't know exactly what you do. Tell the average civilian you're a "showrunner" and they're likely to see if you're wearing track shoes. (The job title actually derives from the fact that you are, undeniably, "running the show").

After all, it's the show's stars who become the faces of a series and who act as its ambassadors to the media and the public.

"I absolutely relish the anonymity," said Mark Alton Brown, executive producer of UPN's freshman sitcom "Girlfriends," along with longtime collaborator Dee LaDuke.

Brown and LaDuke, best friends from high school, have worked on such shows as "Designing Women" and have come aboard to shepherd the vision of "Girlfriends'" young creator-executive producer Mara Brock Akil and show her the showrunning ropes for the future. The sitcom -- the story of friendship between four very different black women -- is also being executive produced by "Frasier's" Kelsey Grammer.

Brown, 45, noted that unlike his previous passion, acting, showrunning allows you a relatively normal life of recognition-free grocery shopping (unless, of course, you're married to a movie star, like Kelley is) while still granting Hollywood-style financial rewards.

Not that Brown has time to go to the grocery store. Ever. In fact, he has been trying for weeks to take a lunch break so he can get his hair cut. And the only kind of plate Brown has eaten off of in ages is a Styrofoam one, the result of dinners spent tweaking scripts over takeout.

"The hardest part is wearing so many hats," he said. "Today, I've had casting, a run-through, a meeting about the theme music, two sets of notes from the network and personnel issues to deal with. It's exhausting, and I never get home -- I have a 13-month-old daughter, and my goal is to get out of here so I can see her before she's asleep, which hasn't happened in weeks. I have tremendous anxiety about that."

But having previously been a staff scribe, Brown added that he can truly appreciate showrunning's perks, such as control of the stories you create. "Plus," he noted, "on 'Girlfriends' we have a bit of a cause" in that he and his colleagues hope to prove that a story about black women can be universally relatable.

Brown's voice drops as he talks about the most devastating part of the job -- when the show in which you've invested so much time and energy fails. And when your show fails, you can't get arrested. Brown has been through it, has had seasons where he hardly worked and worried about the mortgage, and knows he's lucky to be on "Girlfriends," at least for now. The show may not have been his creation, but he loves it as an adoptive parent, and it's tough knowing his baby could be gone tomorrow in this cancellation-happy world.

That's why he tries not to take his job too seriously. "If you don't have a life, you won't have anything funny to write about," Brown said. "And the bottom line is, I'm selling someone's soap."

Such advice could probably be helpful to Jack Kenny, the first-time showrunner (along with Brian Hargrove) of Fox's hit dysfunctional-family sitcom "Titus." Working with star Christopher Titus (who is also executive producing), Kenny and Hargrove are in the fortunate position of having created a hit. Except now, in their second season, they really have to deliver. "Fox is considering 'Titus' and 'Malcolm in the Middle' the linchpins of the season, and that's pressure," said Kenny, 42.

After stints on "Dave's World" and "Caroline in the City," Kenny and Hargrove dealt with a learning curve in assuming the top positions. "Suddenly, 150 people are looking to me for answers," noted Kenny, who at any given time is finessing no less than nine future "Titus" scripts simultaneously.

"You can't walk down the hall without getting 10 questions -- everything from the plants on the set to a star's makeup. Literally, your only time alone is in the bathroom. (Showrunning has) been like jumping out of an airplane."

Rob Burnett and Jon Beckerman, the creative team behind NBC's critically acclaimed new drama "Ed," are also experiencing showrunner shock. The duo, who met writing for "Late Show With David Letterman," have been trying to get their own project off the ground for years, but the sudden success of "Ed" has left their heads spinning.

"(As a showrunner), your life becomes freakish, no question about it," Burnett, 38, said late one Friday night from the New Jersey production offices of the quirky comedy-drama about a big-city lawyer who returns to his hometown. "We went in originally pitching the idea of feature-quality one-hour drama that has the feel of a good Tom Hanks movie, meaning it can be funny and moving at the same time. The only thing is, now we have to be (funny and moving) 24 hours a day."

Burnett, who is married and has two little girls, admitted that his personal life is bearing the brunt of it all. "The show was picked up in May, we started production in July, and one day recently I left the office and realized it was cold outside. I literally had not had enough time to notice that it's winter."

Lucky thing that Burnett and Beckerman, who handle most writing chores themselves with the help of only a small staff, like each other's company. Beckerman estimates that he has spent more time total with Burnett than with his parents or girlfriend. Burnett said that with the two of them pulling 18-hour days to make "Ed" as good as their initial pitch, Beckerman is more like a cherished war buddy than a colleague.

"Our lives are 'Ed,' eating and (sometimes) sleeping," Burnett said. "And, yes, we've both gained weight from sitting at a desk all day and night. Thank you for reminding me."

Fittingly, Dave Flebottte from ABC's new sitcom "The Geena Davis Show" uses an example from another television series to describe what showrunning feels like. "It's a huge monster that has to be fed continuously or you'll get behind," he said, "like (the 'I Love Lucy') episode with Lucy in the chocolate factory, trying to keep up with all that candy coming down the assembly line."

Flebotte and co-runner Terri Minsky (who created the series with Nina Wass) are both taking their first shot at showrunning with the Davis project, a comedic look at stepmotherhood starring the Oscar-winning actress.

Minsky, who previously worked from home, consulting on such shows as "Sex and the City" while raising two kids, has found it tough to adjust to never-ending office hours -- even with the luxury of having other executive producers on staff to help out. Recently, her son lost his first tooth -- while she was on the set.

"There are weeks where (you're missing out at home) and the script isn't working out well," Minsky said. "Those are the weeks where you look at the other people in the room and think, 'I could so eat you if we went down in a plane crash.' "

Adjusting to a world of all work and no play may be difficult, but literary agent Dytman noted that few showrunners leave the field once they have gotten hooked on the rare creative control the job provides. "I have loved this so far," Minsky said. "It turned out to be as fun as it looks."

If Flebotte and Minsky are lucky enough and "Geena Davis" dwells for longer than a season, they can look forward to finding their showrunning groove -- in other words, learning to get things done faster and get home sooner.

"We have reasonably normal lives and sometimes leave by 6 p.m.," said the surprisingly serene-sounding David Kohan, the 36-year-old showrunner of NBC's popular "Will & Grace" along with Max Mutchnick. "We have good people around us, and we collaborate instead of trying to do it all ourselves."

Kohan and Mutchnick said the secret to their considerable success has been, strangely enough, never to think about just how successful they are. "We try to write for each other, not the rest of America," said Mutchnick, who splits duties evenly with Kohan and has his desk right next to his collaborator's. "What's most important to me is that David thinks a joke is funny."

And by the way, the two never watch their own show: Not only are they too busy, but they get too self-critical about it.

"Judging Amy's" Stern also tends to be tough on his own work, obsessing about the show in the small amount of time he's not toiling on it. But he's making progress. "Last weekend, I did something I've never done before," Stern said with a laugh. "I took the phone off the hook. I didn't talk to anyone from work, and it was like a vacation."


Copyright © 2000 The Hollywood Reporter. All rights reserved.