article by E.R. Womelsduff
- When the bell rings, be ready. Either you deliver, or you’re gone.
- Just because you don’t end up doing what you set out to do doesn’t mean you’re not going to do something awesome.
- A set of basic skills can be applied to many different occupations.
- The industry is full of people who switched careers.
- The first draft is yours. After that, it’s theirs.
When Tom Blomquist was twenty-four years old, he left a lucrative junior executive position with an ad agency in Chicago to come to LA to be a writer. A year of looking for jobs found Blomquist scrounging for pennies in the couch cushions and lying to his parents about how awesome life was in Hollywood. Finally, it came to that terrible, terrible low: applying for food stamps.
You sit in this awful room on this folding chair. This little man with a bad toupee asks me the perfunctory questions. “What is it that you want to do?” I said I wanted to be a writer. He literally took off his glasses, looked at me, and said, “Well that’s never gonna happen. Let me tell you something, kid--I came here thirty years ago to be a writer and it didn’t happen to me, and if it didn’t happen to me, it sure as hell won’t happen to you.”
I was crushed. I was about to throw myself off a freeway overpass. And then I got mad. I vowed in that instant that I was never going to be that man, issuing food stamps in a crappy government office in Glendale. Whatever his problem was, it wasn’t my problem. I’m not going to be this bitter, useless piece of shit little man. That moment defined my life.
Blomquist is currently a professor of film at Cal State Long Beach, and has been teaching full-time for the past eight years. He spent thirty years as a full-time writer and showrunner, and forty years total in the industry. “Since I was an embryo,” he quips. On Rate My Professor dot com, students have a deep and heartfelt respect and admiration for Blomquist that any educator would envy. “BY FAR THE BEST TEACHER AT CSULB,” one student says. “Great class. Great teacher. Great everything. Just take the class,” says another. It is obvious that the passion for writing that allowed Blomquist to have such a successful writing career has transferred to his role as a professor.
Blomquist, without a doubt, is one of those people who is good at everything he puts his hand to, and always has been. “Everything came easily to me,” he says. His first job was as a professional musician. He was a drummer in a rock band and they played dances and parties and events, which ended up paying for his entire college education. In college, he decided to major in film and television and minor in music.
My sense was that I had pretty much piqued as a musician. My prodigy years had run their course and I really didn’t have the depth or enduring need for perfection as a drummer to really go the next step as an adult. It’s like the high school basketball star, he may be the best, but he knows he’s not NBA material. We all have to know where we are in the food chain at various points in our lives and be realistic about it.
For him, this was knowing that he had an insatiable itch that only writing and production could scratch. While he had planned on being a musician up to that point, he had the wherewithal to realize that something else was in store for him. He remarks that the industry is full of people who either shifted their gears or the industry shifted gears for them: actors who became producers, directors who became executives, agents that became actors. A huge turning point in his life was realizing that just because you don’t end up being the thing you set out to be doesn’t mean you’re not going to be something awesome.
Initially, however, Blomquist admits he wasn’t prepared for his own dreams.
I literally didn’t count how many people I was up against. I was wallowing in self pity and confusion and fear and terror. And this was before answering machines, so I would literally have to wait by the phone, because if I missed it, that was it. I’d write all night and work out, swim in the pool, and listen for the phone through the door. I was devastated, because I realized I wasn’t special. And I’d always been special. And realizing that is not a pleasant feeling.
Flash forward thirty years. Blomquist arrives for this interview wearing a palm tree-patterned polo, a shirt that looks like an old favorite. He suggests meeting at the Sportsmen’s Lodge Cafe, a place where the waitress greets him by name, brings him his usual ice tea, and asks him about his daughter.
My first question has never gotten a particularly strange answer before, but with his, the tone for the whole interview is set. “What is the name you would like to be used for the article?” I ask. Without skipping a beat, he replied, “His majesty. Royal highness. Tom Blomquist. Oddly, I’d like it to be Lucinda Jones, but that’s my private life.”
Blomquist has the air of a man who is well-satisfied with his life’s work. He is cheerful, relaxed, free of the tension and stress that so many in Hollywood carry around like badges of honor. How did he succeed--and come out on the other end with what appears to be most of his soul intact--when so many others have failed? He tells me that when he was in a writing workshop, there were definitely better writers than him. “But writing is hard, it’s not instant gratification, and they got discouraged and they disappeared.” Some of them were not very good and you could see it in their writing and the nature of their ideas. They thought they wanted more than they were prepared for. They just didn’t have any special panache. This coming from a guy whose early writing was “pure shit.” And even others had writing that was pretty good—but it was only pretty good. It didn’t “jump off the page, smack you on the face, and demand your attention.” A writer just starting out can’t just be “pretty good,” he says. They have to be great. “This is the major leagues,” he says. “It’s unfair on every level. There were eight of us in the workshop. Five of them were discernibly better writers than me. None of them made it.”
The gist of Blomquist’s message seems to be this: either have the tenacity to stick it out and beat everyone by sheer force of will (and discernible talent), or have the foresight to alter your goal to fit the opportunities that come along. He also warns that you should be prepared for the possibility of actually getting what you want. Once Blomquist made it as a showrunner, he was working a hundred hours a week, often seven days in a row.
There’s no break. If you’re smart, you try to get a Sunday. The problem with being a showrunner is that you’re the head writer and the head producer. Your day is full of writing, editing sessions, casting, staff meetings. They’re paying a premium for your writing. So you have to rewrite other people’s scripts, but if you’re in meetings all day long, when do you write? I wrote between five am and ten am, then worked from ten am to seven or nine at night, then I went home and read scripts for a few hours and made notes on them. Then the weekends you would write all day long. And if you’re on set, you gotta help them get the day started, it’s just endless.
He says that learning to manage the workflow and having some kind of down time is imperative. “I missed several years of my daughter’s life. It’s not particularly healthy. I saw a lot of marriages break apart, certainly people got in trouble. It’s just not a normal way to live your life. How do you manage your life when all it is is work?”
With an answer like that, I had to ask, “What makes it all worth it?” He takes a sip of ice tea and thinks a moment.
The truth is that when you do something and thirty or forty million people are seeing it, it’s very gratifying. And it is a privilege. Someone is giving you an hour of their life every week. If you take that seriously, doing something productive with that hour is very satisfying. Once you realize what an audience wants and you give it to them, it’s very satisfying. When I left Walker [Texas Ranger] we were top ten, it was the third highest-rated show. It started out as number forty. It served me well in validating my work to the network. The cast was happy. To be the architect of that is really satisfying. You did your job, you did it well, and the people you’re doing it for got what they came for. The audience abandoned shows on other networks to watch our show. It makes it worth it to me, a job well done. I was content.
With the economy still looking grim and parents more and more wary of their children going into the arts, I asked Blomquist if he has reached a place of financial stability, and whether there even is such a thing in Hollywood.
Sure. There certainly is financial stability. The truth is, when you’re working at a reliable professional level, they pay you ridiculous amounts of money. It’s absurd. No one is worth what they’re actually paid. So one of the reasons I can afford to be a professor, which is horrible pay, is that I was able to make decent money when I was writing. The word “stability” is interesting because it’s hard to get in and it’s hard to stay in. You get on a show, but then the show ends and it may not be another few years ‘til you’re on another. My pattern was do one or two series in a row, then a year or two off, then another series. When I had time off, that’s when I’d go teach a class at USC or write a novel. If you save and spend your money wisely, you don’t need to worry. The financial stability is threatened by people who think it’s going to last forever. They’re making six figures and buy a house they can’t really afford. I know guys who went from nothing to six figures a year and that can be disorienting. At one point I actually sat them down and said, “Slow down. You’re going to have great careers ahead of you, but you can’t assume you’re going to make this kind of money consistently.”
Along with financial stability, I ask him how he balances his family and personal life. With his usual comic timing, he immediately responds with, “Drugs.” He smiles. “All I can say is, aside from the stress management, with family the key is make the time you do have with them count. If you’re not gonna make them count, then spare them. If you’re gonna work, go work. If you’re home, be home.” He points at a formica-topped counter to our right. “I had breakfast at that counter every Saturday morning with my daughter from the time she was two to, well, even now. Whenever we’re in the same city. Even when she was fifteen and I was dad, on Saturdays, it was the neutral zone, she would talk to me. I found ways to make it work.”
I ask him if it’s a good idea to date or have friends outside of the industry. “I think hookers are the best solution,” he says. Noting that I am, in fact a woman, he adds, “In your case, male escort service.” He smiles and, as usual, follows up with a serious answer.
I think it’s best you find someone who understands what you’re going through. They don’t have to be in the business, but they do have to understand. It’s different than most fields. I’ve seen marriages fall apart because they became resentful of the commitment their partner had to make to their work. You have to be a bit self-indulgent to do this kind of stuff. My wife and I would go to a movie and I’d be so energized and we’d get home and I’d lock myself in my office and write ‘til dawn because I was inspired. Not exactly Mr. Romantic, but it worked because she understood it. She’d ask, “Are you going to work all day?” and I’d say, “Yeah, I’m on a roll.” And she’d say okay. And sometimes she’d say, “Hey, why don’t you stop for a while, you’ve been working for twenty hours.” She just knows when to back off and when to tell me to stop. She can look at me and know if I’m in the zone. If you’re not with someone who understands, they’re just going to get pissed off. They either get it or they don’t. And if they don’t, it’s not going to work.
Blomquist was the first person in his family to go into arts, and into the film industry specifically. I ask him for a piece of advice he received when he was just starting out that ended up being totally wrong. “Well they said you shouldn’t sleep with everyone in the business and dammit, I should have! Sleep your way to the middle!” He notices that I am actually typing this down. “Don’t you write that, don’t you dare!” He sighs and settles back into the corner of the booth.
I was lucky, other than the food stamp guy, because I had people who connected to what I was trying to do and encouraged me. I have heard a lot, though, that there’s a mindset that you can’t do it, it’s too hard. And I’m living proof that you can. If an idiot like me can live every single dream he had, then you can, too. The reason I did it is not because I was the best, it’s because I worked harder than everybody else. Other people said, “Fuck this, I’m out,” That was right for them. But you should be able to invest everything, or you shouldn’t be doing it.
The people that don’t hang in go away with hurt feelings and crushed spirits, but they’ll never know. You can’t know how long it’s going to be or what form your payoff is going to take. So you just dig in every day and invest. But I guarantee that if you keep reaching for a standard of excellence that’s always over the horizon, the perfection of your craft, the perfection of your people skills, eventually it will reciprocate. And then you have to be willing to accept the form that the reciprocation takes. Have a dream, but be open to what comes your way.
I flip the question and ask about a piece of advice he received that ended up being really helpful.
Everything in production costs something. There’s never enough money, there’s never enough time. What I learned is that creativity costs nothing. The writer can think through a problem creatively. I learned this from our production designer. His department was most put-upon by our ambitious scripts. Instead of whining about it, he would think and say, “Yeah, I think I know how we can pull this off.” He would apply this overwhelming creativity to everything he encountered. It would often look like it was fifty times bigger and more expensive than it was. This is a business where people get very used to throwing money at problems. And it was on that show that I realized there everything I could think of (the Old West, Civil War battles) all actually somehow got implemented because we learned, the directors learned, the production designer learned to apply creative solutions to every obstacle.
I ask him what he would tell people who are waiting for their big break, or waiting to be “discovered.”
Be careful what you wish for. They’re not going to coddle you or make excuses for you. Either you deliver, or you’re gone. When the opportunity comes, if you get that meeting, you want to be ready, your skill set, your stamina, your attitude. I had a couple of false starts when I was starting out. I sold a couple stories but didn’t write the script because they said I didn’t have the experience. Then I got a job on a new series as a staff writer, a baby writer, and the show just didn’t work. I couldn’t quite get a feel for what it was they were trying to do. As it turns out, nobody could, the show was cancelled. That didn’t count as anything. It was in and out in twelve episodes. The next time the bell rang, I drilled it right between the eyes. It was the right show with the right guy at the right moment. I was born to write that show. When I read the pilot, I said, “I love this. I can do this.” I wasn’t terrified. They gave me three weeks to write the first draft, and I wrote it in a week. I didn’t know what to do with myself, I just polished it and polished it and polished it. I sent it to a friend and said, “This was too easy, is it any good?” And they said absolutely. The bell rang and I was ready. I had been writing every day for ten years without fail. Being ready and confident is the key. You have to know what you’re doing.
There are as many reasons to come to Hollywood as there are people. I ask Blomquist for one bad reason and one good reason.
A bad reason is money and fame and power. Do not come here for that. Yes there’s money, yes there’s fame, yes there’s power, but they’re residual things that come, they’re not the reason.
A good reason is that you absolutely must tell stories for a living. You are content to be someone with a drawer full of unpublished novels. I’m still gonna be that guy who writes nights and weekends. That’s what I told my wife and she said, “Yeah, I know.” Even if they don’t hire me to do it, I’m still gonna do it. I’m obsessed with it. You will be very smart to have a similar motivation. You understand that you may never sell a word that you ever type, but you somehow have to find contentment in the doing of it, not in the paying of it. Don’t come here expecting that it’s going to support you and your family. Do it because you love it. Like actors and dancers…do it because you have to do it. Mary Tyler Moore still goes to dance class every day. She’s gotta dance. No one’s going to pay a woman her age to dance. And writers have to write. And then one day someone may say, “My God, I need someone just like you.”
I ask him what writers, specifically, should not do when they’re starting out.
They should not look to their family and friends for critical validation, because it’s almost completely useless. Logically, they should find objective, third party, knowledgeable sources for their validation. You want to hear that you’re a genius, but if you want feedback that will actually make you better, that will empower you to learn how to process and take notes on a professional level, then you need someone else. Writers need to know where to get notes from and how to take the notes. The only way to learn how to do that and process it effectively it to do it over and over and over again. It’s the hardest thing to do, when you’re creating something from inside you out of nothing and you put it on paper and you get feedback.
It’s the difference between the disease and the symptoms of the disease. If I start coughing right now, you may offer me a cough drop, but the coughing could be a symptom of a heart attack, and if you give me a cough drop, it’s not going to help my heart attack. Unfortunately, people hand out cough drops to each other all the time. You have to get through to the real cause and find out why you got the criticism you got, and why they’re responding the way they are to what you’ve written. You’re not an idiot, you know what you’re trying to say in your writing, so why aren’t they getting that? Even if it hurts, you’ve got to go through it to eventually become a professional. The professional is equipped to navigate and negotiate. Grad school, writing groups, writing workshops. I got my ass handed to me every week.
After nearly four and a half hours and three refills later, I finally ask if there’s any last piece of advice he would give to new writers.
Everybody is always looking for a reason to say no. When you go pitch a story, that person has to advocate for it to their bosses, which puts them at risk. They have no incentive to say yes to what you’re selling, because it’s easy to say no. Then when they do say yes, it’s backed up by a best-selling title or a star or whatever. You always want to minimize reasons for people to say no to you, and maximize reasons for them to say yes. People can quickly draw an impulsive conclusion. Ideas are a dime a dozen. So, ironically, it’s not an idea-driven business. Newbies think it should be, and they’re right, it oughta be, but it isn’t.
This is where social media is not helpful. People are going to be in a world of hurt if they don’t separate their personal and professional image. Because you don’t want to share with just anybody all the things you think and feel, so that when you do share it with somebody, it is meaningful. This is where the Facebook generation goes way wrong, it’s like good God, save some of that.
Telling stories is very satisfying, you can work out a lot of your demons. We all do that, we act out our dramas in our scripts. Many great writers basically tell the same story over and again. They’re working it out and it’s a really cool thing to get to do, and even cooler to get to do it for money. But then you’re letting people in and they become your collaborator and your boss and that can be hard. Mostly it’s hard. But whatever it is, it’s yours. And then it becomes theirs. And once it’s theirs, you have to respect that it’s theirs.
He stops and looks at me. “You want an analogy? It’s not original, someone told me this.” I nod.
A guy walks into a tailor shop and says, “Hey, I’d like you to make me a suit.” The guy says, “Okay, that’s what I do.” The customer says, “I want the left arm shorter than the other, I want the back to be bunched together and stapled, and I want the pants to be two sizes too small and made with the scratchiest material possible.” And the tailor says, “You sure you want that?” And the guy says, “I just said that’s what I want.” And the tailor can say, “I’m sorry, that suit does not meet my standards.” Or he can say, “All right, sir, if that’s what you want, I am perfectly capable of making that suit.” And two weeks later, the guy comes back and says, “These pants are scratchy.” And the tailor says, “Well sir, you asked for the scratchies material possible.” And the guy says, “No, I didn’t. This is terrible.” And on and on and on. And the tailor says, “No problem, sir, I’ll revise this suit.” And that’s what a professional writer does. Once it’s their money, you make the suit they want. Even if they’re idiots. We do it over and over and over and over and over. Once in a while, the guy’s smart and it’s a great suit and he ends up on the cover of some fashion magazine. You’re a writer on your first draft. After that, you’re a tailor. Figure it out and make it work. Even if you hate it, make it work. Find something about it that you can be enthusiastic about. Yeah, I never made pants out of burlap before, but hey, it could be interesting.
Bio taken from: http://www.csulb.edu/depts/film/faculty_blomquist_t.html
Tom Blomquist is an award-winning Writer, Producer, and Director. His prime time television credits range from science fiction (FARSCAPE, QUANTUM LEAP, SWAMP THING) to action adventure (THE A-TEAM,WALKER TEXAS RANGER, HUNTER) to family drama (FAME L.A., TWICE IN A LIFETIME, CATHERINE MARSHALL'S CHRISTY). Professor Blomquist was also Executive Producer, Co-Writer, and Second Unit Director of the critically acclaimed six-hour network mini-series sequel to CHRISTY, and Producer-Director of the comedy film PRISON LIFE, which was cited by the Houston Chronicle as one of the ten best shorts of the year.
Professor Blomquist counts among his most valued memories the extraordinary opportunity, at the ripe old age of 22, to work with cinema icons Orson Welles and Vittorio DeSica on THE MAN WHO CAME TO DINNER and THE SMALL MIRACLE, respectively. Of that amazing experience, he says, "I had just finished studying CITIZEN KANE, UMBERTO D, and THE BICYCLE THIEF in college only to inexplicably find myself on location in London and Rome three months later engrossed in daily conversations with the two gentlemen who actually made those masterpieces. It was surreal."
A graduate of Southern Illinois University, Professor Blomquist teaches Film and Television Production, Directing, and Media Aesthetics in the Department of Film & Electronic Arts. He is a member of the Directors Guild and Writers Guild of America, and Writers Guild of Canada.
Music videos Blomquist directed for Kellie Coffeya
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JqfGqOx2iDQ&feature=related
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZrCaunRCRbM
Music video Blomquist produced for Mariah Parks
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DKofZhsLMlA&list=UUsQRjN9mYoH6dml1Q7xUnyQ&index=0&feature=plcp
IMDb
http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0088981/?ref_=fn_al_nm_1
