Saturday, May 16, 2009

Well, in this economy ...

I have followed Career Service's advice this semester and applied for jobs. Lots of jobs. Over 50 at this point, everything Monster, CareerBuilder and Craigslist could give me for the Chicago Area. I've sent my resume everywhere from the American Girl Place to the American Nuclear Society.

Last week, I got an email asking for a phone interview about a comedy writing position. I'll call the interviewer "Gary." I was slightly suspicious to begin with, since Googling the nonsense words in Gary's email signature pulled up an inordinant number of furry event calendars. I didn't want to jump to conclusions, but I did spend most of the following conversation trying hard to avoid imagining Gary in a fox costume.


Me: What kind of comedy writers are you looking for?

Gary:
Funny ones.

Me:
Right. What kind, though? Stage? Screen? Sketch?

Gary:
Screen. We're working on a sitcom.

Me:
What's the premise?

Gary:
I can't tell you a lot, since it hasn't come out yet, and there are intellectual property laws. I can tell you it's about an oddly matched set of roommates.

My head:
Like Friends or Gilligan's Island or Laverne and Shirley or the Odd Couple or Three's Company or Will and Grace or ... or ... or ...


Me:
What level of content are you looking for?

Gary:
Dense. Juicy. More Simpsons than Family Guy.

Me:
How will it be rated?

Gary:
Highly, I hope. We're shooting for a big audience.

Me:
I guess I'm trying to find out what your target audience is. What kind of comedy is this?

Gary:
Why do you care? Is there any kind of comedy you won't write?

Me:
Well, I'm a Christian, so there are some boundaries I'll want to respect.

Gary:
We are into pushing boundaries here. Why don't you come by the office, and we'll see if you're a good match for our team. Is this weekend good?

Me:
Would next week work? I'm graduating from college this weekend.

Gary:
Congratulations! What college?

Me:
Wheaton College.

Gary:
Oh. So the Christian thing ... that wasn't a joke?

Me:
No.

Gary:
You're serious?

Me:
Yes.

Gary:
Christians make me want to gouge out my own eyes.

Me:
Ok.

Gary:
Also, you might as well know, this sitcom is going to be mostly NC17/X. A Wheaton graduate wouldn't be a good fit for us.

Me: Probably not. Thanks for your time.


That is one for the Career Services webpage.

I'm glad he told me he was looking for comedic porn (pornographic comedy?) writers before I took a trip into the city to interview in person.

And so job search continues.

8 comments:

Unknown said...

you left out the bit about furries. That's kind of crucial.

Greg said...

Haha, as soon as you said "furry" this story lost all chances of ending positively.

Keep trucking on, Miss Alyss. Something will come through! And congrats on graduating! Wish we could've roadtripped up for it.

You going to be in Texas any in the foreseeable future?

Ryan H. said...

Makes me laugh every time.

LR Burt said...

Crying with laughter at the furry bit almost made it impossible for me to finish reading this. What I want to know is, does Gary just email every address in every resume he gets without reading further to see if they're from colleges likely to turn out animated comedy porn? Seems like reading would be a lot quicker than doing phone interviews...

Congrats, My Lyssa! I'm so proud of you. :)

lrburt said...

Also, I don't know where I got that the comedy porn was animated.

Jennifer said...

I miss you. Congrats on graduation. Be praying for you and life and such.

Ted Hall said...

um... wow.

good luck?

Becca said...

Too funny...

keep in touch! I miss you girl!