Cinderella Under Pressure

HANK PHILLIPPI RYAN: Happiest day after pub day to the brilliant iconic and fabulous whirlwind that is Ann Garvin. She is absolutely fabulous you all, generous and wise and I'm just not sure how she does it. You can read her bio below, but she is the queen of the Tall Poppies, and I am honored to be her colleague. She simply leaves joy and magic dust wherever she goes. And when she reads this—I’ll bet she’ll say "Oh that’s just dust, honey."

 

Her new novel, THERE’S NO COMING BACK FROM THIS came out yesterday!

And it is already the Number One best seller in friendship fiction. And that is not only cause for celebration, but profound.  She is a number one perfect friend.

 

Cinderella Under Pressure

   By Ann Garvin

 

I write books about women who do too much in a world that asks too much from them, and I saw one of these women just the other day.

 

The woman I am thinking of was at a gas station, responding with incredible grace and dignity while under great duress. After filling her tank, this woman saw that she’d locked herself out of her car with her small child inside. She didn’t shout for help or make a scene.

I noticed her because I am not a dignified person when stressed. I’m a flustered crier who talks to strangers when things go wrong.

 

It was a nice day, there were not many people around, and she solved her problem with a placid look on her face and some fairly impressive flexibility.

 

While I stood, nozzle in hand trying to figure out which button to push or pull for gas, she moved to the trunk of a beautiful SUV, where a thick film of plastic wrap covered her back window. Presumedly, she’d been in an accident, and fresh cellophane functioned as a back window for a time. She pulled the plastic apart with zero fanfare, no grumbling, and a lot of strength. I considered offering to help, but she didn’t look like she needed it. Besides I was still trying to get my pump to take my credit card.

 

Once the plastic was yanked free, she began climbing onto the bumper and easing herself inside. She had to clear the back seat headrests, slither her whole body through the window and slide from the back seat over the dividers to the front seat. All while her child slept soundly.

 

Once inside the car, she checked on the baby, kissed the little one on the forehead then drove off. I checked around. I’d been the only one to witness this athletic, motherly feat, but the woman left a memento on the pavement, without so much as a look over her shoulder. There on the stained concrete I saw one brand new, white and blue Nike tennis shoe on the ground. This Cinderella must have kicked it off during the exertion of getting into the car.

 

Maybe she wasn’t as unstressed as she appeared. Maybe she was in a terrible hurry. Maybe, she was too embarrassed to walk partially barefoot across the stained pavement to collect her shoe. I’ll never know, but I wish I could have told her, Never, never, ever be chagrinned about anything when you can display this kind of grace under pressure.

 

This is the kind of person I want on my side when the world ends and precisely the kind of person I write about. Women are amazing. I’m sure you know this already, but I’m writing to remind you.

 

My newest book is right here if you want to read about another person who learns how to pivot with a little more grace. It’s called There’s No Coming Back From This and the Kindle version is available, too.

 

I’d love to hear about a time when you were graceful under pressure. It will give me something to work for!

 

 

HANK: Aww. Love to hear your stories, you all. And yay, Ann! You have done it again.

And reds and Readers, do sign up for her newsletter, it's entertaining and touching and revealing!

Ann Garvin, Ph.D., is the USA Today Bestselling author of five funny and sad novels. She writes about people who do too much in a world that asks too much from them. Her most recent book, There's No Coming Back From This, releases August 1, 2023. After twenty-five years of teaching in the UW system, Ann runs the professional development residencies at Drexel University’s Low-Residency Masters of Fine Arts Program. She is the founder of the multiple award-winning Tall Poppy Writers, where she is committed to helping women writers succeed.

THERE'S NO COMING BACK FROM THIS

“The show must go on” takes on a whole new meaning for one single mom in a

witty and emotional novel by the USA Today bestselling author of I Thought You Said This Would Work.

It seems lately that Poppy Lively is invisible to everyone but the IRS.

After her accountant absconded with her life savings, newly bankrupt Poppy is on the verge of losing her home when an old flame, now a hotshot producer, gives her a surprising way out: a job in costumes on a Hollywood film set. It’s a bold move to pack her bags, keep secrets from her daughter, and head to Los Angeles, but Poppy's a capable person—how hard can a job in wardrobe be? It's not like she has a choice; her life couldn't get any worse. Even so, this midwesterner has a lot to learn about the fast and loose world of movie stars, iconic costumes, and back-lot intrigue.

As a single mom, she's rarely had time for watching movies, she doesn't sew, and she doesn't know a thing about dressing the biggest names in the business. Floundering and overlooked, Poppy has one ally: Allen Carol, an ill-tempered movie star taken with Poppy’s unfiltered candor and general indifference to stardom.

When Poppy stumbles upon corruption, she relies on everyone underestimating her to discover who’s at the center of it, a revelation that shakes her belief in humanity. What she thought was a way to secure a future for her daughter becomes a spotlight illuminating the facts: Poppy is out of her league among the divas of Tinseltown.

Poppy must decide whether to keep her mouth shut, as she's always done, or with the help of a scruffy dog, show the moviemakers that they need her unglamorous ways, whether the superstars like it or not.

Lucy is Ready for her Close-up @LucyBurdette

LUCY BURDETTE: I can't say that I'm writing much of anything other than press releases, to-do lists, and emails. Though I did turn in the first draft of A DISH TO DIE FOR on September 1st, and I've been catching up on life since then. I have another book to write in the Key West series, but I have no title and no plot. I do have some idea fragments about what will be going on in Miss Gloria's life (involving the scone sisters from A SCONE OF CONTENTION.) And those ideas make me rub my hands in anticipation.

Other than that, I am super excited about the upcoming launch of UNSAFE HAVEN. Severn House is a new-to-me publisher that mainly targets the library market in both the UK and the US. (Though I am hoping many fans of the Key West mysteries will consider giving it a try.) This was a bonus book that I had about given up on when my agent sold it. The publisher designed a wonderful cover, and the book tells a great story (she said modestly.) Here’s what our Hank had to say about it: 

Devastating, heartbreaking and completely immersive. This riveting story of fear and redemption, motherhood and second chances, and our responsibility to strangers is a powerful thriller proving one split-second decision can change our lives forever.  UNSAFE HAVEN has Hollywood written all over it!   Hank Phillippi Ryan, USA Today bestselling author of HER PERFECT LIFE 

And that started me thinking: What if it really was made into a TV show or a movie? Of all the books I've written, Unsafe Haven is probably the story most suited for that. I thought I might post a bit of what Kirkus said about Unsafe Haven and then see if you’d help me brainstorm. 

Kirkus said: In a major departure from her lighthearted Key West mysteries, Burdette invites readers into the world of a chilling thriller. A page-turner highlighting the problem of exploited runaways.

New York City medical student Elizabeth Brown was jilted by her fiancé a few days before their wedding, and she's taking the subway to visit a friend who'll commiserate when a frantic-looking girl hands her a bundle that turns out to be a newborn baby. After phoning the police, she makes the mistake of calling a number she finds in the coat wrapping the baby. This call immerses her in a dangerous cat-and-mouse game with people she naïvely believes want to help. The baby’s mother, 16-year-old Addison, is running for her life from a woman who took her in as a young runaway and turned her into a prostitute. Unable to forget the baby after turning her over to the police, Elizabeth, herself adopted, gives an interview to a reporter that only exposes her to more danger….Only quick thinking and grit will save their lives.

Here's how I picture the logline: After a teenage runaway gives birth in a subway and thrusts the baby into the arms of a newly jilted bride, all three must run to escape danger. (Hmmm, or should I end that sentence with Kirkus's last line above?)

In addition to a little word-smithing above, these are the questions I’d love to get opinions on…Is there an actress who comes to mind to play Addy and/or Elizabeth? Addy is a teenager, small and fragile-looking and dark-haired. Elizabeth is more stocky, in her twenties, with blonde curls and blue eyes. Another character who might be fun to cast is Detective Jack Meigs (originally from the advice column mysteries.) He’s in his fifties, with reddish curls tinged with gray. He’s gruff and intimidating on the outside, but tender underneath, reeling from his own kind of pain. (My husband suggested Michael Kitchen from Foyle's War--who might be a bit too old, but is otherwise perfect.)

And while you’re thinking of characters, can you identify a TV show or movie that sounds somewhat similar? Even if none of this goes anywhere, it’s fun to think about.

Ways to pre-order your copy of UNSAFE HAVEN:

Book depository 

Indiebound 

Barnes and Noble 

Amazon 

Severn House 

And if this is not in your budget (which I totally get,) you can invite your local library to order a copy!

The Last Legwoman

 HANK PHILLIPPI RYAN: Did you ever read movie magazines where you were a teenager? (Are there still such things?)   I remember Photoplay, certainly. What were the others? I would read them when my mom went to the “beauty shop,” and always wondered about the movie stars’ glamorous lives. Back when the gloss and glitter made everything seem wonderful, and back when Hedda Hopper and her ilk ruled the world. Or thought they did.

So when author and journalist Penny Pence Smith told me about one of her first jobs—as a “legwoman,” I was enchanted. And, I fear, I began deluging her with questions.  What was that job, and why was I so fascinated? Read on. And I bet you’ll have questions, too.

 THE LAST LEGWOMAN

  by Penny Pence Smith

The postponement of Broadway’s 2020 Tony Awards is sad, suggesting cloudy forecasts for the Oscars and Emmys in September and early 2021. I feel a lot of nostalgia for those glittering events, having covered them for nearly a decade, first as a “legwoman” or reporter/assistant for Marilyn Beck, the most widely syndicated Hollywood columnist (several hundred worldwide outlets) for nearly three decades. With her, I was a movie magazine editor, then a by-lined feature writer for two major media syndicates, including the New York Times Special Features Syndicate.  They were heady years and in spite of other subsequent career paths, still account for some of my professional “peak” moments.

Thinking about the Oscars reminds me of myself as a 24-year-old journalist ingenue, “covering” those awards in 1968  for my boss, unable to attend that year. I drove up to the bustling entrance (then the Santa Monica Civic Auditorium) in my VW Bug and was rudely directed to a self-parking spot. My participation was limited to the press briefing room along with hundreds of other reporters. Awards to In the Heat of the Night, Cool Hand Luke and Guess Who’s Coming to Dinner were nevertheless an exciting launch to many years of glittering adventures. Subsequently, I would enjoy audience seats and after-parties.

It was joyful to reminisce about those days, using them as inspiration for the stories in my recently released The Last Legwoman: A novel of Hollywood, Murder…and Gossip! Among many memories, the first is always spending time with John Wayne, on horseback, on the set(s) of movie(s) filming in Mexico, talking about his critics and his love of movie making. He was intensely loyal to his crew and cadre of costars, nearly always surrounded by them.

I was one of only two women allowed on the set of The Longest Yard, relaxing on the prison sports bleachers with Burt Reynolds, laughing about the script, while my own personal guard, “Jelly”, flicked his baton, assuring our safety. He was beside me when I interviewed the prison's warden, and two convicted murders.

Nothing really said “Hollywood” in my recollection more than arriving for a lunch visit with Natalie Wood and Robert Wagner at the height of their own vitality and popularity. She, pregnant and glowing, he suntanned and handsome. Together they were a vision of glamor that took my breath away.

With Jack Lord for Hawaii Five 0

There were continual “quick” trips—to Las Vegas to meet Elvis Presley after his show, to London, changing into formal wear in the airport restrooms and cabbing to a Disney movie premiere, to Mexico City to lunch with Rosalind Russell on the set of her last film, to Hawaii to interview the cast of the original Hawaii Five 0 series. In those times, I rarely bought a movie ticket or visited an exotic location without story assignments. London, Paris, Spain, Monaco — a publicist was always waiting.

But entertainment journalism was not without its share of minefields, as well.  George Peppard threatened to sue and “ruin” my career because I had described him as an “aging actor” after he arrived two hours late for a breakfast interview grumpy, weary and disheveled. Two studio publicists had been present and calmed the star storm. Hollywood nostalgia is always stained by the memory of the Charles Manson cult murder of Sharon Tate and friends. The early morning phone call from a writer colleague who lived across the street and described the scene as police were arriving was chilling. The public lives of many celebrities went quietly underground for a while, fear and distrust tinging the atmosphere. Over the years, there were other lawsuits threatened, deaths and misfortunes of people I liked and had covered.

Ultimately, I evolved into another career path and seldom spoke about the Hollywood time because many outside the entertainment bubble were incredulous or considered such discussions arrogant. But many of my life’s “peak events” occurred during those times and it was great fun plumbing them as I developed my book and its forthcoming sequel.

What are your peak events and are you writing them down for the future?

HANK: See? Told you. Okay, Penny, dish.  Come sit by me! And we all  want more of all of this. What say you, Reds and readers? What do we want to hear more about first? And which of these encounters do you wish you’d shared?  

   

THE LAST LEGWOMAN – A NOVEL OF HOLLYWOOD, MURDER…AND GOSSIP

Meredith Ogden is at the top of her game in Hollywood as Legwoman (assistant in modern terms) to Bettina Grant, the country’s most widely read celebrity gossip columnist. But life changes for the 36-year-old journalist when she arrives for work at Grant’s Bel Air home-office on a December morning in 1983 to find her famous boss dead, murdered. A book manuscript lies on the floor next to the death bed. Partnering with High-Profile crimes detective T.K. Raymond to find out who killed Grant and why, Meredith faces more than questions or answers.  A volatile TV night-show host lobs threats because of a damaging news investigation about his background, Grant’s children have demands on the office and valuable celebrity files. Meredith’s home is broken into and searched, and she is assaulted.

With “High Profile” detective T.K. Raymond’s help, and that of an unlikely team of colleagues, Meredith deals with the threats to herself, her future and even ghosts from her own past brought up by the emotional chaos.

Penny Pence Smith began writing professionally during high school for the Indio Daily News, in Southern California. She went on to receive a Communication and journalism B.A. at the University of Washington, an MA from the Annenberg School at the University of Southern California, and Ph.D. from the University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill. From the beginning, she was engaged in the entertainment industry:  Warner Communication movie magazine editor, correspondent/LA Bureau Manager for New York Times Special Features Syndicate covering entertainment, Hawaii Correspondent for The Hollywood Reporter, and later, author of best-selling tourism books, Under a Maui Sun and Reflections of Kauai (Island Heritage).  Along the way, she managed advertising, public relations agencies and marketing consulting firms then became a professor at UNC Chapel Hill and Hawaii Pacific University. Her current work appears in Sun City News & Views in Palm Desert, CA, and in Hopper (former Mokulele Airlines magazine), and in-room books for SPG Hotels (Hoku) and Alohilani Resort. Penny lives in Hawaii with her husband and two cats (depending on who’s counting!)

BREAKING NEWS: From Friday's 3-book contest, Barbara Waloven is the winner of Liz/Cate's book and Gloria Browning wins the book from Maddie/Edith. Barb will be back July 2 and will pick hers after that. Please email edithmax @ gmail dot com to claim your books...

The Island Where It Happens

HANK PHILLIPPI RYAN: Nantucket changed my life. Truly. It’s where Jonathan and I met, and my every memory of the place is wrapped in gossamer happiness. So when I heard about Steven Axelrod, who sets his mysteries (from the amazing Poisoned Pen Press) on the island, I was instantly hooked. 

So—welcome Steven! And I laughed and laughed when I heard about his main character--a bad poet! Brilliant.

HANK:  Your protagonist, Henry Kennis, has to be the world's most literate police chief, bar none. How did you decide to create a cop who writes poetry on the side? 

STEVE: First of all, I write poetry myself -- very much like the accessible reality-based verse that Henry composes, which is not really in fashion now. The wife of one of my MFA program professors, a very prominent modern poet, read Nantucket Five-Spot (which was written as my creative thesis) and remarked. "I love the fact that hero is such a bad poet! So charming." I guess I couldn't resist the urge to let some of these "bad" poems see the light of day. 

But it's an appropriate hobby for a detective. Crime solving and poetry require the same leaps of intuition, the same ability to make and recognize odd connections and relationships. Beyond that a poem is a good x-ray of a character's heart and soul. The poems help the reader get to know my Police Chief a little better.  

HANK:  The backdrop of your new book is the backstabbing world of local theater, in this case Nantucket's. The vicious confrontations between the characters who populate this  novel feel quite authentic... Have you yourself participated in local theater and experienced this level of drama?

STEVE: I did a fair amount of community theater acting when I was Henry's age, and I saw my fair share of high drama and low comedy in that milieu. The theater scene on the island seems much more serene these days. But  that's okay -- inventing conflict and setting crazy characters at each others' throats is part of my job description.

HANK:  You spent a portion of your childhood in a Hollywood environment, with your father being the famous writer/director George Axelrod. (Listen to this, reds and readers. His father is  best known for his play, The Seven Year Itch, which was adapted into a movie starring Marilyn Monroe. He was nominated for an Academy Award for his 1961 adaptation of Truman Capote's Breakfast at Tiffany's and also adapted Richard Condon's The Manchurian Candidate.  MY total FAVORITE. ) Anyway. So cool! 

STEVE: My Hollywood ties have frayed somewhat over the years though I remain a member of the WGA(w) thanks to a development deal some years ago with a big TV producer. There is currently some interest in the Kennis books as a series from different "content providers" I guess I should call them, to be as vague and cryptic as possible ... but it's hard to tell how serious any of them are. I keep my fingers crossed, though it tends to interfere with my typing.

HANK: I know the feeling!  So--When you prepare for a new novel, do you first outline everything from soup to nuts? Or are you a write-by-the-seat-of-your-pants kind of guy?

STEVE: I'm a combination of the two. I've always envied writers like Stephen King who apparently just charge into a book and let the plot details sort themselves out, with what Nabokov called "the velocity of intuition". 

HANK: Oh, I’ve never heard that. I love it. Is that what you do? 

STEVE: I tend to be more cautious. I need to know the ultimate outcome before I start -- who done it and why, and at least some of the clues red-herrings and detours that will lead Henry to the culprit. You're always telling two or three parallel narratives in a mystery, with several of those scenarios throwing  suspicion on the wrong people. The links between these versions of reality are the clues, which can be interpreted different ways -- the RACHE written on the wall in blood that Gregson and Lestrade assume to be an almost completed name -- Rachel. But Sherlock Holmes knows it's the German word for revenge.

HANK: Oh, we have to talk. More I cannot say. But wait til you read my new book The Murder List. J  But we digress.

STEVE:  So ... within that macro-structure, the big picture of the novel, I attack the story one chunk at a time, carefully outlining the piece I'm working on and usually emerging from it with only the vaguest idea of where I'm going next. So I read through the notes, refresh my memory about the larger story and start outlining the next bit of the plot. 

This gets simpler as the story goes on. Tales narrow down and pick up speed as they approach their climax and the writing becomes easier as more and more decisions have already been made. 

My father always told me, "If you have a problem with act three, the real problem is in act one." He referred to those final blissful writing days that sweep to the end of the story as "picking the daisies" -- flowers you meticulously planted many pages ago. All that being said, the actual content of each scene remains wildly improvisational. Except for a few essentials, I really have no idea what my characters are going to say to each other, or which way their conflicts will go. 

And that makes every writing day fun.

HANK: We are the same! But you are so eloquent about it. I just freak out and cross my fingers. Last question:

With Nantucket being so tiny, is it a challenge to come up with new plot concepts that don't tread on the ground already covered?

STEVE: I wrote a thriller twenty years ago and my agent at the time warned me "You better know what your next couple of thrillers are going to be. I'm branding you as a thriller guy." That scared me. I had literally used every idea, gimmick, action set-piece and plot device I had ever come up with in that book. I had been pebble collecting for it since high school. Now I was supposed to write another one? I had nothing, and told her so. Maybe I should have faked it -- the book never sold. Anyway, it's just the opposite with Nantucket. The little resort island teems with stories, plots, feuds, grudges, history and conflict. I'm always learning new things, from the existence of secret cock fighting clubs (Which I used on the first page of the new book) to the fact that the dump was built on an Wampanoag Indian graveyard. Spooky! The material seems inexhaustible. 

Nantucket is America in miniature, with all the wealth inequality, immigration issues, opioid addiction, gang crime and bureaucratic malfeasance a crime writer would wish for. The island is experiencing massive tectonic social changes. The larger aim of my books is to chronicle those changes  -- and try to make sense of them.

HANK: Yes, yes, this is so thought provoking! Reds and readers, have you ever been to Nantucket? Would you like to? What’s your image of it? Or where’s one place that changed your life?

 

Nantucket Counterfeit by Steven Axelrod 

The fifth Henry Kennis mystery takes us into the closed, gossip-riddled, back-stabbing world of Nantucket’s community theater.            

Horst Refn, the widely disliked and resented Artistic Director of the Nantucket Theater Lab, has been found stuffed into the meat freezer in his basement. Most of the actors, all the technical crew, and quite a few of the Theater Lab Board members, whom Refn was scamming and blackmailing, are suspects in his murder. The island’s Police Chief Henry Kennis has to pick his way through a social minefield as he searches for the killer.

At the same time, Henry’s daughter’s new boyfriend, football star Hector Cruz, has been accused of sexting her. Carrie knows the offending pictures didn’t come from him, and Henry has to prove it before the boy gets suspended, which means probing into the family secrets of Hector’s father, a firebrand agitprop playwright, who happens to be a prime suspect in Refn’s murder.

Every story is a fiction, every identity proves false, and every statement a lie. The counterfeit bills found at the scene of the crime are the most obvious symbol of the deceptions and distractions that obscure the investigation. The truth lies buried in the past, in Refn’s earlier crimes and the victims who came to Nantucket seeking revenge.

When the culprit has been revealed, the last masks torn off, and final murder foiled—live, on stage, during the opening night of Who Dun It, the eerily prescient opening drama of the Theater Lab Season—Jane says to Henry, “Is everything counterfeit?” He smiles. “Almost.”

Steven Axelrod holds an MFA in writing from Vermont College of Fine Arts and remains a member of the WGA, despite a long absence from Hollywood. His work has been featured on various websites, including the literary e-zine Numéro Cinq, where he is on the masthead; Salon.com; and The Good Men Project; as well as the magazines Pulp Modernand Big Pulp. A father of two, he lives on Nantucket Island, Massachusetts.

Hannah Canter Goes to Hollywood

Hannah, Lucy, and David

LUCY BURDETTE: I love all of our guests (or we wouldn't have them visit!), but today's is especially dear to me. Hannah Canter is my darling nephew's bride--we figured he'd choose someone cute and smart as a whip, and boy were we right! Hannah's a Hollywood woman with so many exciting projects in the works, it was hard to narrow down the questions.

LUCY: You worked on the Netflix's SEEING ALLRED, a documentary about women's rights activist, Gloria Allred, which made its debut at Sundance last month. What a moment for that to happen, with #metoo going viral! Can you tell us a little about making the film, and then the experience at Sundance?

HANNAH: The synchronicity of the entire filmmaking experience could not have been better or more profound! In fact, the directors Roberta Grossman and Sophie Sartain approached Gloria three years before Gloria eventually gave her blessing for the documentary, and I find myself constantly thinking about how if she had given the go-ahead when she was originally approached, we would have made an entirely different film – one that still captured her tireless fight for the oppressed but I doubt it would have felt as resonant and relevant as it does in this #metoo era. And when we did eventually start shooting, the Cosby case wouldn’t break for another couple of weeks, an event that we see as the earthquake that brought on the tsunami of #metoo. 

L to R: Marta Kauffman, Hannah, Roberta Grossman, Gloria Allred, Sophie Sartain, Robbie Rowe Towlin

We feel really lucky and really proud to have been able to capture a soldier on the front line of this movement as it was building. And then, on top of this production journey, to be in the US Documentary Competition at the first post-Weinstein Sundance Film Festival – Gloria happens to also represent a few Weinstein accusers – on the one year anniversary of Trump’s Inauguration and the Women’s March, with Gloria making impassioned remarks at the Park City Rally for Respect… it was kismet. An absolute dream.

LUCY: The TV show Grace and Frankie launched its fourth season on January 19th and its fifth season was just announced. Congratulations! Tell us a little about your role as this launches and what it's like working with those icons.

HANNAH: Thank you! It’s hard to believe we’ve been at it for over four seasons now. I am a producer on the series, but my involvement actually goes all the way back to the development of the show, over four years ago, when we at Okay Goodnight (our production company) caught wind that Jane Fonda and Lily Tomlin were interested in doing a television project together. I had just starting working for Marta Kauffman at the time, and we were in the car together and I turned to her and said “What if their husbands are gay and leave Jane and Lily for each other?” 

From there we fleshed out the concept that became GRACE AND FRANKIE, pitched it to Jane and Lily who loved it, and not long after we set it up at Netflix. That whole process was totally surreal for me, a veritable newcomer to producing. I felt like it was the epitome of beginner’s luck. Since then, my role as producer is essentially to maintain the vision for the show throughout all the elements of the creative, always in deference to our Showrunners, Marta Kauffman and Howard J. Morris. In practice, that means everything from giving feedback on stories and scripts, to working with the production departments like art and locations to make and approve creative and budgetary decisions, to working in the cutting room with the editors to execute our internal and studio/network notes. Luckily, between myself, Marta, our colleague Robbie Rowe Tollin, and our incredible crew, we are able to divide and conquer to preserve our sanity, and the creative collaboration is off the charts. 

Devorah Herbert (production designer), Lily Tomlin, Jane Fonda, Allyson Fanger (costume designer)

It’s hands-down the most fulfilling and inspiring professional experience of my young career, in no small part because of Jane and Lily themselves. They are consummate professionals, always prepared, always on time, always eager to do their best work. They are so immensely talented and elevate everything they touch with their work ethic and their spirit – it makes you feel like you’re a part of something big, something meaningful. And work aside, they still manage – at 78 and 80 years old! – to carve out time to volunteer and organize for causes they hold dear to their hearts, that benefit the victimized and underserved. AND they’re hilariously funny! I have nothing but the utmost respect and admiration for them, and I hope a small fraction of their vitality and amazingness has rubbed off on me over these past couple of years.

LUCY: We have both writers and readers who regularly visit our blog. I suspect we'd all be interested in the process of how you choose projects to develop. Where do the ideas come from, and how many books do you look at, and what catches your eye about something that might translate well into film or TV?

HANNAH: For us, it’s all about passion. The ladies of Okay Goodnight (myself, Marta Kauffman, Robbie Rowe Tollin, and our two amazing coordinators) are voracious readers, so the way we typically find the books we want to adapt is just by working through the towering stacks of leisure-reading books on our nightstands. When one of us falls madly in love with something and we think it might be a viable adaptation, we stop the presses and make sure everyone at our company gives it a read to see if there’s consensus. An adaptation is really hard work – it requires so much heavy lifting creatively – so whatever the book is has to completely consume us, mind and soul. Being a small and very hands-on production company, we only have the bandwidth to pursue a handful of projects at a time, so we only take on the projects that we feel in our bones, the stories that we can’t imagine not telling, content that has an important and rightful place in the culture at this moment. We tend toward female-driven content, which I don’t think is a coincidence, us being a company of women, but I think it’s also because we see a need in the culture for more stories by and about women. 

So to answer your question more directly – we are constantly reading fiction, but at any given time we are seriously considering only a few books to adapt. These books would ideally have some dynamic female characters, compelling visual setting or style potential, something about it that feels totally unique or never-before-seen on screen, and the story would have substance and sophistication and its telling would promote our core value of common humanity.

LUCY: I could ask a million more things, but here's one last question. You've had a little experience with screenwriting and are probably interested in doing more. what are the challenges of adapting a book to a script?

HANNAH: I’d say the biggest challenge I personally faced is how to externalize or dramatize internal thought and character development. For example, if you have an introverted protagonist in a book, the way you get to know her or him on the screen would have to be creatively reconceived in order to achieve the same intimacy with the character. In a book, being let into a character’s thought processes, or an anecdotal memory where its significance is explained to us in its unfolding, or any tangential musings that are never spoken aloud can hold our attention for hours and hours on end. In a visual medium like film or TV, we learn about them more by what they’re doing and saying, unless you employ voice over narration, which is a slippery slope but when used thoughtfully can be very effective. I also think that translating tone provides a special kind of challenge – because so often when we fall in love with a book, what we’re enamored by is so much more than the beats of the story or the arcs of the characters. It’s the unfolding and intertwining of it all, the atmosphere and world building, the unique combination of our synapses that fire off in symphony. And sometimes in order to recreate that intoxicating experience you have to move away from the source material, which can be a painful but necessary step in honoring the book you fell in love with in the first place.

LUCY: Reds! Isn't she amazing? She's got a busy busy day and is of course on California time, but will try to pop in to answer comments and questions as she can, so fire away...

Happy WHAT Day?

HANK PHILLIPPI RYAN: So, birthdays. My thought is that we are required to celebrate, because yes, of course, we are glad we were born—which is what they’re about, right? But I really don’t see why we have to give each annual event a number. How about having, you know, Hank Day. Susan Day. Rhys Day. Whatever our “birth” day is, that’s how we figure out when our celebration day is, and who cares about the actual passage of time. See what I mean?

(October 17—yes, my Celebration Day. Much better. "Which one?" you ask. "Why, this year’s of course!")

One's birthday—or whatever we’re going to call it—is also a lucky day, that’s for sure. (And when we were kids, we’d try to extend to birthday WEEK, which my mother never acknowledged with anything but a sneer.) And I always felt October was “lucky,” too, by extension.

Now the fabulous Shawn Reilly Simmons—you know her from her incredible work at Malice Domestic right?--has a couple of birthdays coming up.

Wait—she has more than one birthday this year?
Yup.

Happy Birthday to Me, and Me Again

By Shawn Reilly Simmons

I’ve been thinking about birthdays a lot lately. It seems every week I’m wishing a friend Happy Birthday, or a Happy Book Birthday, in some small way sharing in their excitement on their special day. Tomorrow happens to be my birthday. I’ll be turning 45, so it’s one of those milestone years, one of the ones that ends in a five or a zero.
A few days later on February 23rd, I’ll be celebrating another birthday when the first two books in my Red Carpet Catering series will be published by Henery Press.

I had nothing to do with the scheduling of the book releases, but I wasn’t surprised when I was told they would be in February. It’s always been a lucky month for me, and I’ve often thought it had some kind of magical pull, like it’s my own special month for major events.

 Great things have happened in my life during the shortest month of the year: I met my husband (on the very last day, the 28th, 9 years ago, so just under the wire), three years later we got married in February (on my birthday, in fact, which seemed like a good idea at the time, but in retrospect just causes him a lot of anxiety, especially since it’s the same week as Valentine’s Day). Many years ago right out of college I was hired for my first real marketing job in New York City during February. And now I can add “became a published author” to the list of significant milestones that have occurred during the month.

I will now always remember my 45th birthday as the one where I achieved my lifelong dream of becoming a writer, the dream that I’ve had since I was eight years old. That’s a pretty great birthday, taking second place only behind my wedding day six years ago.

Some women don’t mention their age. They keep it to themselves for various reasons, many of which I completely understand. My books are set behind the scenes on movie sets from the head caterer’s point of view, a job that I have done myself. Acting is one profession where ageism (and sexism, not to mention inequality in pay) is still a driving force in a woman’s career. 

A woman’s age is used to define her, pigeonhole her into a certain type of role, and is sometimes used to exclude her from becoming a love interest, even to a much older male actor (we’re talking a 20 year age gap sometimes!). Actresses are under a lot of pressure to appear a certain way, for fear they won’t be considered for the roles they’re pursuing. 

When I was cooking on sets, I would watch many of the actresses eat like little birds, picking at vegetable trays and salads, while their male costars shoveled whatever they felt like onto their plates.

Luckily I’m not auditioning for a film role, so I can say proudly that I’ve earned every one of my 45 years. Not only that, I can say I’ve improved over time as a friend, wife, mother and now a writer. I see a few wrinkles around my eyes these days, but along with them I’ve accumulated a hugely supportive base of friends and fellow writers, so much love, a bit more knowledge, and lots more experience. 

So bring on the birthdays!

What’s the best birthday that you’ve ever had? Are you particularly fond of a special time of the year? How do you like to celebrate your milestone birthdays?
HANK: Do you even celebrate your birthday? J But here’s a present for you, either way! Shawn is giving away a copy of Murder on a Silver Platter and Murder on the Half Shell (ebook versions, your choice of platform) to one lucky commenter. SO even simply say: Happy Birthday! And you’re entered.

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Shawn Reilly Simmons is the author of the Red Carpet Catering series featuring Penelope Sutherland, on-set caterer and chef to the stars (Henery Press). Murder on a Silver Platter and Murder on the Half Shell will be released on 2/23/16 and are available for pre-order now. Murder on a Designer Diet, the third book in the series, will be published in June. Shawn is on the Board of Malice Domestic and a member of Sisters in Crime. When she’s not writing, Shawn is running, cooking, drinking wine or reading. She lives in Maryland with her husband, son, and English bulldog.

www.ShawnReillySimmons.com

@ShawnRSimmons

Facebook.com/shawn.reillysimmons