On Writing : Getting Fired

No, I didn't just get fired. But I saw a bit on television about actress Annabelle Gurwitch and her new documentary, Fired!. Most people know Gurwitch from her years as the original host on TBS's "Dinner & a Movie" - but after she was fired by Woody Allen from a play she was in, she started to collect stories about people getting fired. The stories provided the material for a book and now a documentary.

Of course, we all know Gurwitch's REAL claim to fame is that she was an animation writer. When she was in college, her best friend got her a job writing on the original Thundercats series. What a great gig, huh? I earned drinking money in college working at the Jewish Community Center - she wrote dialogue for Lion-O, Mumm-ra, and Snarf. I think she wins this round pretty handedly.

But even before I heard about the documentary, I was thinking about what happens when writers get fired. You see, writers get fired all the time. We may not get the Donald Trump-type "You're Fired" moment, but writers often lose jobs. It happens. So I started to think about how to get fired. Not HOW to get fired - but how to handle it when it happens. Because if it hasn't already happened, someday it will probably happen to you. Case in point-

I know of a writer who was recently fired. After they were fired, they thanked the story editor for giving them the chance and chalked it up as, "We just weren't on the same page." It was handled in a classy, professional manner - and while the situation is cruel and unfair, the writer's good reputation is intact.

I know of another writer who was recently fired. After they were fired, they threatened to sue the story editor, the production company, the studio, the union, etc. It was handled in a spiteful, unprofessional manner - and the writer's reputation is completely shot.

I wish I'd gotten a chance to tell that second writer how to better handle things in case they were fired. With that in mind, if you get fired from a writing gig, please please PLEASE keep these in mind.

1. It's not the end of your career. It may feel like it, but the odds of it being the end are pretty unlikely. Everybody gets fired - chances are that you'll bounce back.

2. You will work with them again someday. Hollywood is a small town and as long as the same bosses are in charge, chances are you'll get hired again and again by the same people to work with the same people. Unless you threaten to sue them, which brings us to-

3. Don't sue. It's uncool.

Believe me, I wasn't always so zen about this. Early on in my career, when I was let go from a project, I thought it was the end of the world. But it's not. As long as you can keep your wits about you and continue doing good work, it'll just be a bump in your rear-view mirror.

I'll end this with this. After Joe Barbara's recent passing, Margaret Loesch told a story where she asked Barbara what she needed to learn. He told her, "The ability to handle disappointment."

And there it is in a nutshell. Joe Barbera - one of the most successful creative forces to ever walk the face of planet Earth - stressed the need to handle disappointment.

Keep that in mind. Especially if you found this blog post disappointing...