How To Write Effectively for Television and More with Shonda Rhimes
“The discovery that you can make a living writing is like…I don’t know, it’s like your birthday every day or something for me.”
Shonda Rhimes adds, “I was a person who, I was writing endlessly in my journal every day. I was also writing stories every day…writing every day, no matter what.
“It was what sustained me. It’s my air, it’s my food.
“So then to discover that I could make a living at it felt fantastic, and that I can make a living at it in a way that I enjoyed felt fantastic.”
She notes, “I wasn’t writing stuff that I hated, I was telling my own stories…stories that I felt strongly about.”
Shonda Rhimes is the creator and writer of multiple television series including Grey’s Anatomy, Private Practice, and Scandal.
She leads her large production company Shondaland, with teams of writers and producers creating TV and movie projects including The Residence, Bridgerton.
Quotes are from a section of her MasterClass on writing – here is the trailer:
“Here’s what’s awesome about being a writer: people will follow you if it feels like what’s happening to the characters feels emotionally honest.
“I mean you really can make almost anything happen.”
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The power of facing fear and difficult conversations.
In a podcast interview with Adam Grant, Shonda Rhimes noted:
“What I learned most of all is that the thing you’re afraid of, doing the thing undoes the fear. It truly does.
One of those things I said yes to was difficult conversations, because I used to avoid them like the plague.
I always feel like peace is now on the other side of a difficult conversation, so you have to say yes to having the difficult conversation no matter what that conversation is.
If it’s you are underperforming and this is not working for me, if it’s you are in the wrong business, like you shouldn’t be doing this job that you think you wanna do, if it’s, you know, telling somebody that something doesn’t work or something is hard, or if it’s me telling some people I’m not gonna do this, and here’s why.
It was really revolutionary to me to do that.”
From podcast ReThinking with Adam Grant, “Shonda Rhimes on saying yes to what scares you” – Source [2] in Perplexity search results list below.
Like other accomplished artiss, she has had a long – and ongoing – journey, with challenges including racism and insecurity:
“Shonda Rhimes has spoken candidly about insecurity, both in her personal journey and in her work, offering a nuanced perspective on how it shapes ambition, leadership, and creativity.
“Rhimes has described the unique pressures she faced as a woman of color in Hollywood, often being underestimated or overlooked in professional settings.”
From Perplexity search results for Shonda Rhimes on insecurity, with links to multiple source articles.
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Rhimes has commented on being a working mother:
“If I am succeeding at one, I am inevitably failing at the other.
“That is the trade-off. That is the Faustian bargain with being a powerful working woman who is also a powerful mother.
“You never feel one hundred percent okay. You never get your sea-legs. You are always a little nauseous.”
She also said of creative ambitions:
“A lot of people dream. And while they are busy dreaming, the really happy people, the really successful people, the really interesting, powerful, engaged people? Are busy doing.
“I wanted to be Nobel Prize-winning author Toni Morrison. That was my dream.
“I blue-skied it like crazy. I dreamed and dreamed. And while I was dreaming I was living in my sister’s basement.
“Dreamers often end up living in the basement of relatives.”
[Quotes from her imdb profile.]
See text and videos about her online class on learning how to be a successful writer, screenwriter, filmmaker:
Shonda Rhimes Teaches Writing for Television
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