Ep 37: Changing Course. Bouncing Back. w/ Nancy E. Krulik

Episode Transcript
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Indra Klavins (00:06):
Hi, I'm Indra, and I'd like to welcome you to
the messy middle matters, wheremy friends and I explore all the
twists, turns and challengesthat arise in the messy middle
of work. So today, we're talkingabout something that I think
everyone has faced when plansdon't go as planned and you need
to pivot and change and evolve.And confession time, this is

(00:29):
take two on this episode with mydear friend Nancy. So this is
the first time that we've hadsomeone with a Wikipedia page,
and first time we've had a NewYork Times bestseller. So, so
exciting. So Nancy, I will notdo it justice. Can you tell
everybody who you are and alittle bit about yourself?

Nancy Krulik (00:47):
Okay, I'm Nancy Krulick. I'm probably best known
for writing chapter book seriesfor kids. Yeah, some of you may
know Katie Kazoo Switcheroo orGeorge Brown, Class Clown, Magic
Bone, Princess Pulverizer,that's what I'm most known for.
But recently, I have been doingsomething completely different

(01:11):
and outside of publishing, andthat's where I made my turn,
because the publishing industryhas definitely had a downturn,
at least in kids books.

Yeah, it's your latest turn, but it's not your
only turn that you've had inlife. So, so why don't you tell
everyone eat a little bit abouthow you got into writing like
you had a career before this?

Right? Majored in investigative reporting at
Temple University. I was thenews editor of the temple news,
which has rather largereadership because it's a big
college. And then I went intoworking at Scholastic for kids.
I had never written for kidsbefore, and I was the editor of

(01:56):
magazines that were sort of fanbased, sort of interviewing
stars that kids want to hearabout. And then I started
writing nonfiction books, and Idid biographies of celebrities.
And you know, this was in a timewhere there wasn't a lot of
internet access, so it was a lotmore research, a lot of

(02:19):
interviewing people. Even if youcouldn't get to the stars, you
had to interview people aroundthem. One of them was a was one
of my best sellers, because itwas on Leonard DiCaprio, and it
came out the same week asTitanic. Oh, I didn't know about
that. One did not sink. It didnot sink. And then somebody said
to me, have you ever triedfiction? And fiction was great

(02:40):
because I didn't have to checkmy quotes, right? I made them
up. And so for a lot of years, Idid all of the series that I
told you about, and more. Andthen chapter books weren't that
great. And now I have made themove into animation.

So I just want to, I want everyone to
understand the size of your yourtome of books that you have,
right? Like it's, it's over. DidI use that word? Right? Keyword?
It's an S, A, T word, yeah. 250bucks over. 250 books you've
written?

Yeah? I mean, some of them are very short, and some
mobilizations, but they are allpart of my you know,
collections,

they are, and you've gone internationally
touring on these books. You'veseen lots of countries on it,
like, it's amazing.

I've seen countries. I've seen most of the
50 states. Yeah, I do a lot oftalking to kids. I still do a
lot of talking to kids. It's oneof my favorite things to do,
even though they ask the samequestions all the time, how old
are you? How much do you make? Ipersonally like the ones that
say, did you come here in ahelicopter or a limousine? You

(03:57):
know? Like, yeah, they have avery skewed version of what the
royalty system is.

Oh, my goodness. Well, you know, and somebody
who's had so much success, likewe, we've all seen it, or maybe
we've lived it ourselves. Youget so stuck in your work, being
your identity, and the havingthat one thing as like this is
what I do, and and, you know,having the, having the ability
to be able to recognize thatit's time to pivot is one thing,

(04:28):
and then actually being able topivot into something else as a
whole nother. So I know a littlebit about this story, but, like,
the story of, like, how did youwind up in your latest chapter
of animation, right? Like and,and this whole thing, right?

I, I had done some television work. I had done a
series in the 90s calledEureka's Castle, yeah, but I
hadn't done any television in avery long time, and I got a
phone call. That somebody wantedto create a cartoon show around
my series, Princess Pulverizer.And at the time, it was a big

(05:07):
studio, not so much. A studio islike a house, I guess, recall.
And what they wanted to do was ashopping agreement, which meant,
if they sold it, I got, I got tobe one of the executive
producers, and I could work onthe scripts, and I could do all
this, but if they didn't sellit, I didn't get anything. And I
thought, You know what? I knowit's going to be a lot of extra

(05:28):
work, because at the time, I waswriting a series called The
Great math of a chicken, andthose were books, and I had to
get those done as well. But Ithought, you know, this could
pay off. And so we started, andI learned a lot. I learned like
terminology that I didn't know.I learned how things are sold to

(05:50):
big studios. I learned how towrite an animation script, which
is very different because youhave a lot more freedom than
when you're working withpuppets, which is what Eureka
Castle was.

Oh, like, logistically, they can do
something altogether different,like they're not anything you
want in animation. They're nottethered to the ground,

right? And what happened was the strike, and I
am in the Writers Guild, so Icouldn't write at that point,
and they didn't want to, becausewe were supporting the actors.
We were supporting, the writers.However, what happened
afterwards was that the majorstudios stopped taking meetings
on cartoon shows for this agegroup, which was like five to 11

(06:33):
year olds, and the Stu the housethat I was working with, which
was a major house, went out ofbusiness. So that was kind of
the end. However, one of theproducers, Emmy Award winner,
David Levin, was the one who hadfound the princess pulverizer
books, and he called me one dayand he said, you know, why don't

(06:53):
we try to do a series byourselves? Let's do an indie and
that's what we're working on.And so even though I didn't make
any money on that series, and Idid a lot of work, the reality
is, excuse me, one second,somebody wants to come off. This
is, this is my co writer,Scooby.

I love Scooby. Yeah, totally

fine. Okay, so at that point, I had the knowledge
and I had the opportunity, andDavid and I are working on a
series called monsters aren'treal, and it will be originating
on YouTube. It's doing extremelywell. Even though we are only in
production, we have been puttingout little pieces and little

(07:42):
teasers, and we have a lot ofsubscribers ready for the series
to go. Yeah, we have been askedto do a stage show, even though
the series itself is not up. Sowhat happened was, I didn't lose
anything because I gained somuch knowledge. I gained a great
contact. So sometimes you justhave to take a gamble, and it

(08:04):
may turn out that it doesn'tturn out the way you think it
will. It turns out better.

I think it's, it's something that you always
say to me is, nothing is everwasted. That's right, nothing is
ever wasted. It's, it's in yourquiver, it's in your arsenal.
It's in your, you know, toolbox,a toolkit of like tricks and
whatever like resources that youcan grab from. And I love
contacts.

You make a lot of contacts, yeah, and let's face
it, in any industry, in anyindustry, contacts are, are
everything

in this market, especially, I think that that's
true. Like we've had a fewdifferent episodes on networking
and the value of it, and it'swhich is not comfortable for
everyone, right? And but it's sonecessary, especially in this
job market, a lot of ourlisteners are more on the
corporate side of things, butwhere it's the number of

(09:02):
applicants that are availablefor any role at any level
outpaces the number of rolesthat are out there. That's just
the reality right now, which iswhere having people within your
network and knowing, havingstaying top of mind for people,
you know, the way that Davidthought, like, oh my goodness,
Dave, it was just more of this.You couldn't have planned that.

(09:24):
You couldn't have planned theway that that

came together. His daughter liked the princess
pulverizer books. That's howthis started. You don't know
what on your resume is going tolead you to the next thing. My
first job at Scholastic, I hadbeen the news editor of a paper
in Philly. All right? It was acollege paper, but it was a
paper. Yeah? I got hired forthis Kids magazine because I had

(09:46):
been a counselor at Camp to theage group that the magazine was
catering to, and I knew thatgroup you don't know do it all
take a chance. Yeah?

And the other thing that I think is real.
Important is that, and I want todig into this a little bit more,
is that you are constantlylearning and adding to your
skill set. Like because I've,I've, you know, you and I have
hung out regularly during thisarc of your latest project,
right? And so I understandeverything has been going on

(10:18):
behind the scenes of of theproject, like all the different
things like you've had to learnKickstarter, you've learned
social media in a different waythan you've learned it. You've
learned you've learned so manydifferent pieces of the

puzzle, merchandise, merch. I had never
written a stage show before.It's very different. It's
certainly different thananimation. I you know, these are
all new skills, and they'rescary. I'm not going to tell you
it's not scary. I'm not going totell you that. You know, I'm not

(10:51):
often, oh yeah, and I jump in,and I have a partner who has
never done it either, butbetween us, we have been able to
figure out so much and had anopportunity to create something
from the ground up. Yeah.

So, you know, when there are those moments of
fear, frustration, whatever,like, the way the recovery,
like, you're very resilient. Howhave you built up that
resiliency muscle? Or do youhave any sort of stories around
that or not? You know, you'vealways got some story because
you're a writer. After all, Ihave a lot of honey, funny

(11:27):
story. I've got my words mattermug because I'm talking. I

used to say that just putting my kids tuition
bill on the wall in front of mewas motivation to write. Yeah,
but then they graduated, and Ihad to find new motivation for
me. I think I love what I do,and I'm only good at one thing,
and that's writing. And so Ihave to find other ways that are
appropriate to the time also awriter is who I am. Yeah, I know

(11:57):
that for a lot of people, a jobis just a job, and I don't know
if it's because I'm in the arcs,or if it's because it's a
passion or because it's just alot of fun, but I have to find
ways to write, and I also haveto find ways to eat. And so
resiliency comes from necessity.I find that a lot of people who

(12:18):
don't need the income they runinto every they put every block
in front of them. The realityis, most of us have to earn a
living, yeah, and so you bounceback. I've been kicked in the
head. I can't tell you how manyproposals I have worked months
and months on and then only tobe told, Oh, well, we're not

(12:38):
buying chapter books now. Yeah,you know my first response is,
well, you came to me. And thenmy second response is, but the
market won't bear another seriesat this point. So you just have
to say, Okay, you kicked me inthe head. Take one day to drown
your sorrows, yeah, get up inthe morning. Go look for another

(13:00):
way? Yeah, maybe you have atalent you don't even know
about. You really have to thinkabout, what do I know, and how
can I apply it to this newworld? I mean, part of the
problem for us was we couldn'tafford an animator, David, David
Levin, who is, to me, a geniushas learned how to mode, how to

(13:23):
use AI, just for the animation.All the writing is done, you
know, by people. All the voicesare done by people. And in fact,
we have a couple of celebritiescoming up, which is very
exciting for me. I wish I couldtell you who they were.

No, not yet. Not yet. We don't want to tea. Well,
we'll tease the fact thatthere's a

demo. Yeah, I'm just teasing. And David writes
the lyrics to most of the songs,but we have to use AI for the
animation. We have to use AI formost of the music, because the
reality is, we can't afford it.AI can be very scary, and it is
taking a lot of stuff away frompeople, but it's giving people

(14:07):
opportunities also, yeah, wecould not afford to do what we
are doing without it. Would welove to use real animators?
Sure, we are not Netflix, we'retoo creatives. There are ways to
use AI to help yourself. Youhave to grow with the what is
happening that genie is notgoing back in the bottle, so you

(14:30):
have to figure out how to use itto your advantage.

Yeah, it's it's making me think of my favorite,
a quote that I use as atouchstone in my life. To
succeed, it's necessary toaccept the world as it is and
rise above it, right? Michaelcorda said that I have to, it's
just because it is, and thereality of it is, is that is the
world that we're in right now.We're right now in micro

(14:55):
entrepreneurship. We're in aworld of like the world is going
into what's her. Referred to asfractional labor, right? Which
is much more it could inprevious incarnations, it could
be thought of as the gigeconomy, like fraction pure
fractionals are going to screamat me for the way that I'm
defining this, but that's okay.But the reality is, is that this

(15:17):
is, this is the AI has shiftedus. We can't stand on our
principles. One of the thingsthat I heard recently, too, is
that women are less likely toadopt AI than men, because we're
thinking about the ethicalpieces of it. We're thinking
about the ecological pieces ofit. But the reality of it is, is

(15:38):
that we are living in thisworld, and, you know, we can't,
we can't do injustice toourselves. So like that is
amazing that you guys are doingthis right, and found a way
through in this world to get theproject, get as much of it as in
humans, as you were sayingbefore, as much of it as you
can, but acknowledging the partsthat it makes more sense to go

(16:00):
the new path, right?

It's a hybrid. Now, obviously the stage show is
not a hybrid. Theater. So far,we haven't figured out a

way. Only Abba's done that. That's the only one
who's done it well. I

mean, I'm an adaptable person. You have to be
an adaptable person, and yousometimes have to leave your ego
at the door. I know for a factthat I can write chapter books.
The fact that no one's buyingthem has nothing to do with me.
The fact that your employer isnow saying, well, we don't have
that division anymore. You haveto go somewhere else. Has

(16:37):
nothing to do with you. It hasnothing to do with you. So let
go of it. Take a look of whatyou've learned there and say,
well, thank you. That wasawesome, but I'm going to take
it and show you what I can dowith it in another direction.
It's important to thinkpositively, yeah, because that's
the secret,

but it's making me so you were saying that you
identify as a writer. To me,that's not identifying with your
job as much that is as owningyour craft, right? Like this is
your craft, the label thatsomeone sticks on. It might be
different in different phases ofyour life and different phases
of technology and differentphases of business, whatever it

(17:19):
might be, but that's your craft.And identifying with your craft,
I think, is, is really healthy,because it's what you know, and
you're figuring out, how do Ibring this and how do I leverage
this in this world, which is howyou've been constantly able to
reinvent yourself, right?

My craft is writing. I am identified by
other people as a chapter bookwriter, sure? Why had if you can
write, you can write, you'llfigure it out. I prefer to stay
in the kids realm for now,because I prefer children to
adults. I just find them moreinteresting and also inside. I'm

(17:56):
10 years old, so I can relate,you know, well,

and you're very punny too. You're funny and
punny, which is really good forkids.

I write comedy. That's what I am. I'm a comedy
writer for that five to 11 yearold group. But, I mean, I have
written for young adults, and Ihave written for little kids. I
have written picture books andboard books, and I have written
comic books and I have writtencoloring books. I try to take
everything I have and figure itout, but I also do a lot of

(18:27):
research, and before you makethat pivot. Now, sometimes
you're just forced into a pivotbecause you need the cash,
right? Let's be honest. You needthe insurance, whatever it is.
But sometimes you you can pickwhere you want to go, right? And
so I did a lot of research intois YouTube really the way to go

(18:48):
with kids? And the truth is,today, most kids between the
ages of five and 11 are gettingtheir entertainment from
YouTube. They're certainly notgetting it from network
television. There's no Saturdaymorning cartoons. Netflix
doesn't have a lot of them.Neither does that prime. I mean,
they have, you know, you canrerun Spongebob, just so many

(19:11):
times, right, right? This issomething new. This is something
different. And I did theresearch to make sure that's
really where where kids arewatching, and it is where kids
are watching. And I also didresearch on, can you make money
on YouTube? And you can, butreally, the money then comes
from the merchandise. And thendo we want to sell the rights to

(19:31):
a publisher for to write thenovelizations like I used to
write when I started my career?Yeah, you know, we're going to
get money from this stage show.The merch is a lot of money,
especially, you know, whenyou're doing it for kids
theater, because those kids willgo up to the table and say,

Mom, I want my souvenir. I want my souvenir.

So I did a lot of research, and David did a lot of
research, and so that's how youknow we're finding out, and now
I'm getting calls from otherpeople. Who might want to do
animation. So it's taking off acareer in a different path. But
do your research. If you reallyhave the time, some people don't
have the time, and I'm not, I'mI acknowledge that. But if you

(20:15):
have the time to figure out thebest next step, take it. Do your
research. Research the company.Research the job. Research how
your skills match. And for womenin particular, do not
underestimate yourself. I haveread all kinds of articles about
how men will say, Oh yes, I haveall the skills for this, even if

(20:39):
maybe they don't, and women willsay, I have all but one, I'm not
going to apply. Yeah, apply.Trust me, that what you do have
may be more important than whatyou think you don't.

Yeah, yeah, no, I think that that's that's really,
really important because, yeah,that's real. That hits home,
that hits home, that hits homehard. So any other we've covered
a lot of the we've kind ofcovered a lot of ground so, and
these are, this is really allabout. There's so there's so

(21:15):
many pieces to this. Any otherthoughts, anything that I missed
that we should be highlightingfor everyone? Any like nuggets
from your past. You're like,Ooh, I want to make sure the
world knows about this. And thenI'm going to ask you more
details on your current project,so how people can find you.

You know, I think we've covered pretty much
everything. Do your research.Yeah, remember that you have
more skills than you think youdo. Yep. Do not take a
disappointment as a loss. Takeeverything you've learned and
take it to the next step. Thoseare the big three, I think,
yeah, yeah, and pivoted andpivoted and pivoted. So yeah,

(21:54):
you're standing, to quote EltonJohn,

you are, you are. So I know that we're not allowed
to talk about all the details.But how can people find the and
we'll add it into the shownotes. Tell everyone more about
monsters aren't real. Questionmark, question mark two or
three.

Questions three, question marks, monsters aren't
real is the new series. It gotstarted when David called me and
he said, Do you have any ideas?And I said, you know, it's
funny. I had done a four bookseries called ms, frog bottoms
field trips, which was about ateacher that took these field
trips all over the world, andkids confronted monsters from

(22:32):
different countries andcultures. And I was waiting for
the fifth book. I had an outlinefor the fifth book, and they
killed the series, partiallybecause the series came out
during the pandemic. I couldn'tgo to schools, I couldn't tour.
It's not the same on Zoom, youknow. So when David called me, I
said, you know, I have thisstoryline about Frankenstein's

(22:58):
fear Park, which is an amusementpark I had it taking place in
Germany, because that was goingto be the next I said, what if
we had two friends and onebelieves in monsters and one
doesn't believe in monsters, andthis town is suddenly taken over
by monsters? So we had sort oflike an X Files for kids. And,

(23:21):
you know, we have all this stuffgoing on, and we played off each
other. David has a companycalled brainstorm Inc, which is
perfectly named, because if I,you know, brainstorm with
myself, I'm usually one brainshort. So this is better, and
that's how it all started, wasbecause I took something where
it had been turned down orended. And I thought, how can I

(23:44):
use what's sitting in my drawer?And then, you know, of course,
David took it one place further,and I took it one place further.
And so now we have all thesecrazy monsters. We have
everything from a two headedshark to, you know, a pizza
creature to a mummy toFrankenstein's monster. I mean,

(24:07):
we have some traditionalmonsters, and we have some
really weird monsters thatnobody's heard of, and we're
just having a lot of fun doingone episode after another after
another, and then we talkedabout doing songs, because we
wanted to do something that madeus different. Yep. Well, we sort
of have a music video that willcome after every episode.

And wait, hold on, let's it's boo Springsteen
springstein and the eek streetband,

yes, boo springstein and the eek street
band, you know? So we have a lotof puns. David is also a
punster, and I'm having a blastwriting these scripts. I mean, I
can't stop writing them. I'malready into season two, and we
haven't started season one onYouTube yet, so I am excited, if

(24:55):
you go to monsters aren't realcartoon on. YouTube, you will
see what we're working on. Youwill be able to trace the steps
of how an animated cartoon ismade, because we started with
the Kickstarter, and then we hadsome very short videos, and now
we're starting to introducecharacters, and we have some of

(25:16):
the music videos, the scriptsare being written. So um, yeah,
it's very exciting. And I'mlearning so much, and you have
to remember that life is aboutlearning. When you stop
learning, you may as well giveup, you know, and you never know
where stuff is going to go.

No, no, and I'm excited. It's well. And what I
love about it. Besides, yes, Ilove seeing some of my favorite
things are watching the creativeprocess grow. Because we don't
know, we always see the endresult and what you guys, but we
don't see the journey along theway. What this has shown,
whether it's, you know, throughI'll add the links to YouTube,

(25:56):
etc, etc, so everyone else cantake a look at it too. But you
can see how the animation hasimproved. You can see how the
audio gets overlaid. You can seeall these different pieces of
the puzzle. And as I've beenwatching, my favorite part of
this and is the fact that itreminds me of something that
Sesame Street has done reallywell. It bridges the it bridges

(26:17):
the gap, it creates the content.Is something that the kids will
love, but the parents will belike, Oh, that's funny too,
right? You know, like, again,boo springstein and the eek
street band, yeah,

family experience. And that is street model. I
mean, if you're going to takesomeone's model, take the best
one, except that we're notreally educating. I'm not big on
that. I just want kids to laugh.And really, and I think kids
need to laugh. We don't laughenough. Yeah, I agree, and I
don't think parents laugh enougheither. So this is something

(26:50):
that parents can can enjoy withtheir kids, yeah, and they can
feel their kids are safewatching it, because we don't,
you know, we're notproselytizing, we're not
politicizing. This is just funand not enough, and so we are
filling a void. And also, don'tforget, David and I are

(27:12):
experienced. We've done this foryears. Yeah, we know what makes
kids laugh. We know you knowwhat makes parents left? Because
we're parents, you know?

No, I love it. I'm just so excited because I
know in the coming months it'sall it's all slowly coming
together, and then

have patience. I'm not very big on patience, and
this is taking to me forever.But if you knew how long major
studios take, because there's somany, you know, cooks in the
kitchen, there we are on a fasttrack in comparison. Yeah, so
you keep watching, because Ithink you're gonna have a lot of

(27:56):
fun just watching us grow. I amand I'm there. So

so much fun. It's so much fun. Every week, there's
something new, at least behindthe scenes that I get a glimpse
into, which is just a lot offun. So, Nancy, I adore you. I
adore you, and I know and I amso grateful that you joined me
on the podcast. I know this isyour first podcast ever, so yay.

Now it is my first podcast ever. Anyway, if anybody
wants to, you know, get in touchwith me. They can get me through
my website, which is real, Nancykrullik.com which I named that
way because some kid did a bookreport called Nancy krillick.com
and took it away from me. So I'mreal Nancy crew, like.com

(28:41):
really? Yeah, years and yearsago, I think it's probably gone
by now, but

you're that famous. Which I love? Which I
love,

yeah, which I love. Books are famous. I can
still walk down the street.

Okay, well, Nancy, thank you for everything
I appreciate. I know that our mylisteners, our listeners, are
going to get an awful lot out ofthis. You've given us just a
glimpse into a world that we,most of us, I don't think, have
access to. So thank you forthat, and thank you for

sharing. I mean, talent is talent, whether your
talent leads towards thebusiness side, the art side,
talent is talent, believe me, Iwish I had more of a business
sense.

Well, thank you for everything, and I hope that
everyone joins us next time. Foranother topic from the messy
middle, bye, everyone bye, bye.
Thanks for taking time with usin the messy middle. Word of
mouth remains most powerful wayfor people to find us. If this

(29:46):
episode sparked something foryou, we'd love it. If you'd
subscribe to the podcast on yourfavorite app, download a few
episodes and share it withsomeone else who's navigating
the in between. Do you haveideas for future episodes or
topics you'd like us to explore?You can find our feedback form
at the messy middle matters.com,or in the show notes. Thank you
for joining us on this journey.This work is better when we do

(30:08):
it together, until next timeyou.

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Ruthie's Table 4

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Ep 37: Changing Course. Bouncing Back. w/ Nancy E. Krulik

Stuff You Should Know