Shawn Schepps
@Shawn_Christy · 0:39
From screen to screen it's me Shawn Schepps.
Hi. My name is Shawn Schepps, and I grew up in Los Angeles. I was a child actor until about age 25, when I wrote my first play. And then I became a writer. I wasn't that good of an actor. Anyway, I'm so excited that I'm going to be interviewed by Deborah. Pardon us, who I'm going to be in conversation with
Deborah Pardes
@DBPardes · 0:51
And I guess my first question to you while I finished my cookie is, can you tell us about your experiences? The best ones? I guess as a child actor, I know it's a tough road, but a lot of people know you from Terminator, and I want to maybe talk about that and talk about your experiences around that time. So looking forward. And thanks for being here
Shawn Schepps
@Shawn_Christy · 2:08
Well, being a kid actor was fun because I was a kid. So I got to play on the set with the through grips and people like that. And I was on The Brady Bunch and very disappointed to learn that the Brady Bunches house was not an actual house, but a set inside a studio. And I also did Golden Girls, where I played Blanche's daughter. And the first day I was supposed to work, I got food poisoning and I couldn't stop throwing up
Deborah Pardes
@DBPardes · 0:19
Did you have an inkling when you were in those situations that you one day actually wanted to write? Or did you always want to act? And then something happened that was pivotal for you and made you say, no, I better move on and right. I love to know that transition point
Shawn Schepps
@Shawn_Christy · 1:11
What was pivotal for me was boredom. Acting got really boring. Sitting in honey wagons for hours waiting for your scene. I wasn't a big star. I was just the best friend or what have you? So it just got Tedious. And I was in a play. A girl from Detroit came to La and wrote The Rise and Fall of the City of Mahagoni Brecht and Kurt Vile rock Opera. And I got a part in that play musical
Deborah Pardes
@DBPardes · 3:41
But before Covet movies started to become something less interesting because there weren't any movies about people. It was all Disney or heroes or what have you and writers who didn't write that flocked to television? And then television became this booming industry with the advent of streaming channels that wanted content. So television became a much stronger place to be a writer in than movies did because they really weren't making a lot of movies anymore
Shawn Schepps
@Shawn_Christy · 0:51
I don't tell my students what to write because they come to me with a notion of what they want to to do, whether it be television or feature or web series. And I feel like, who am I to tell these writers what they should be writing? And you never know. You never know what could get sold. So limiting them just doesn't seem like a good idea. So I let my students fly with their work
Deborah Pardes
@DBPardes · 0:40
Can you talk about how you feel about that process versus what you do and how I how important is it for somebody to start getting good at a genre versus just being a master of Jack of all, when do we have to become a master of one
Shawn Schepps
@Shawn_Christy · 1:05
And then you just sort of dig in and start writing. And if you're still attracted to it, stay with it. But your voice needs to be original, and you need to have something different to say
Deborah Pardes
@DBPardes · 0:54
Do we want to morph and change, or is our voice our voice from the time we were born in the Adirondacks or whatever format our DNA? Or do you think that as we evolve, as humans, we evolve and our voice evolves? That's kind of a convoluted question. But I think that you get it
Shawn Schepps
@Shawn_Christy · 1:01
And for those of you who it comes naturally to that you feel it working through you. You're really lucky and take advantage of that. And don't be scared
Deborah Pardes
@DBPardes · 0:55
You just brought up something really interesting, which is about fear and people's inability to move inside fear. So we have to not let it control us and then bust through it. And I'm not talking about, you know, I'm going to go to Hollywood, and I'm going to knock on a bunch of doors like, not that kind of fear, the marketing fear. That's not what I'm interested. I'm interested in what you just said
Shawn Schepps
@Shawn_Christy · 0:28
I don't entertain students obsessions with audience or if something's going to sell, I quickly we have them put that to the side so they can concentrate on what they're writing, because if you don't write it, it's not going to sell
Deborah Pardes
@DBPardes · 0:37
I just had a big laugh, but I didn't get it on swell fast enough. You're so right. You're so right. If they build it, if you build it, they will come if you don't build it there. Nor did they know that you exist. They're not going to come. So just give us a little tease ease. I know you're teaching and you're working in COVID times in your space
Shawn Schepps
@Shawn_Christy · 1:40
And I'm about to send it to a producer in New York who is trying to get Drumline, another movie that I wrote up as a musical and has deal with a record company and the Apollo, which is probably where it would premiere before it went to Broadway. But these things take lots of time. I'm just working on getting stuff out there and you do it all through Zoom meetings
Deborah Pardes
@DBPardes · 1:02
But I'm so excited you're here and that you're talking with us and huge fan love you a lot. And let's just keep on talking because that's what Swell is all about. Looking forward. Anybody else is listening to this? Please join in. Shawn is a really huge resource for knowledge about so many things connected to television and film and acting and writing and being and also just the creative process
phil spade
@Phil · 2:32
Hi, Sean. Welcome. You know, I had to stop listening and just comment before we even get to your writing. You had mentioned you were a child actor. I had to go look you up. And you were on three of the most iconic shows, maybe of all time with The Golden Girls, Family Ties. And, of course, The Brady Bunch. I just am just kind of blown away
Shawn Schepps
@Shawn_Christy · 0:57
Hey, Phil. No, I did not know that Barry Williams was stoned. I don't remember seeing him. Did not know it would become a famous episode. And I did not know the Golden Girls would become iconic. Also, I didn't know a lot of things back then. To me, they were jobs that you showed up for. So thanks for letting me in on that dirt about Barry Williams. That's pretty cool. And I hope you're well, stay safe
phil spade
@Phil · 0:35
Yeah. Sean, I am going to post a link to the scene that they filmed where Barry said he was actually stoned in. And at the opening scene, he's pumping his bike higher with air, and he trips over the pump. And then he sounds a little bit like Jeff Spicoli. But then he's kind of overly laughing a little bit. And then at the end he gets ultra serious. But I posting the link to the actual scene that he talked about in his book
Shawn Schepps
@Shawn_Christy · 1:31
You want to talk about Stone? I was working on a show called Weeds, and I got an episode that Snoop Dogg was in and to write it. And we ended up shooting in a really small recording studio. And he brought a bus with all his followers. One guy had all diamond teeth. Another guy was his, quote, unquote him, who asked me if I wanted to go on the bus with him. I was like, Pass, I wrote this one