Haris Orkin, Novelist-Screenwriter-Game Writer-Episode #385

Haris Orkin is a prolific novelist, playwright, screenwriter, and game writer.  His play Dada premiered at The La Jolla Playhouse. His feature film, A Saintly Switch, was produced by Disney and directed by the great Peter Bogdanovich. Haris has written screenplays for Universal, Sony, Fox, and Paramount.  

He’s also has written numerous video games, many of which have been nominated for the WGA and BAFTA Film Awards. Games he’s worked on include Call of Juarez, Red Alerts, Shadow Warrior, Black Hawk Down, and many others.

Haris recently released the sixth book in his James Flynn Escapade series, called From Lompoc With Love. I’ve read the first book of the series, You Only Live Once, which is one of the cleverest, wittiest, and most fun takes on the superspy genre I’ve had the pleasure to read. I’m a huge James Bond fan, and I was thoroughly caught up in James Flynn’s hilariously delusional and unexpected exploits. The book series has been optioned by producer Sherry Marsh and Will Arnett’s company and is currently being shopped to streaming studios.  

Episode Transcript

Steve Cu (00:00):
On today's Story Beat.

(00:02):
Hardest part about writing is just keeping yourbutt in the chair. Discipline and persistence. I
recommend people do it every day. And you justhave to just keep at it. Can't wait for
inspiration to strike. You have to do it longenough until you kind of reach this kind of flow
state like athletes do. And it takes time and youhave to kind of learn to do it. And it's from

(00:22):
repetition that you get to that point.
This is Story Beat with Steve Cuden. A podcast forthe creative mind. Story Beat explores how masters
of creativity develop and produce brilliant worksthat people everywhere love and admire. So join us
as we discover how talented creators find successin the worlds of imagination and entertainment.

(00:50):
Here now is your host, Steve Cuden.
Thanks for joining us on Story Beat. We're comingto you from the Steel City, Pittsburgh,
Pennsylvania. My guest today, Haris Orkin, is aprolific novelist, playwright, screenwriter and
game writer. His play Dada premiered at the LaJolla Playhouse. His feature film, A Saintly

(01:15):
Switch, was produced by Disney and directed by thegreat Peter Bogdanovich. Haris has written
screenplays for Universal, Sony, Fox, andParamount. He's also written numerous video games,
many of which have been nominated for the WGA andBAFTA Film Awards. Games he's worked on include
Call of Juarez, Red Alerts, Shadow Warrior, BlackHawk down, and many others. Haris recently

(01:39):
released the sixth book in his James Flynnescapade series called From Lompoc With Love. I've
read the first book of the series, You Only LiveOnce, which is one of the cleverest, wittiest, and
most fun takes on the super spy genre that I'vehad the pleasure to read. I'm a huge James Bond
fan, and I was thoroughly caught up in JamesFlynn's hilariously delusional and unexpected

(02:03):
exploits. The book series has been optioned byproducer Sherry Marsh and Will Arnett's company
and is currently being shopped to streamingstudios. I, for one, will eagerly await, to see
how Harris's books are brought to life on thescreen. So for reasons and many more, it's a great
privilege for me to have the screenwriter andauthor Haris Orkin as my guest on Story Beat

(02:25):
today. Haris welcome to the show.
Well, thank you for inviting me.
Yeah, it's a great pleasure to have you here. Solet's go back in time a little bit. When did you
first notice things like movies, TV shows, plays,books, the entertainment industry? When did you
first think about it as something that you wereinterested in?
Well, I, you know, I was very into all that from aVery early age. You know, the James Flynn books

(02:48):
are based on James Bond Bond. Someone, adelusional patient who believes he's James Bond.
And, so I remember I really was dying to see theJames Bond movies. I see them advertised. I was
probably 9 years old. My parents wouldn't let me,see them. They were, you know, in the theaters,
and not until I was, like, 11, I think I finally.
I finally bored them down. And I remember theyactually, At the shopping center where they showed

(03:12):
it nearby, where I lived in Chicago, they had, aguy there with a jet pack like James Bond wore in
the. In the mov. Who actually flew in the jetpackin the parking lot. And that was very exciting.
so, you know, it just really stuck with me.
Those. Those jet packs could only go up and down,right? It was basically, you were up for a few
seconds and you were back down.
You could probably go forward and back a littlebit, but you did not have a lot of control over

(03:36):
them. You had, like, little. Not exactly sure howthey worked. The guy looked very uncomfortable
doing it, though, that I remember.
So those kinds of shows, those kinds of storieswere. Were your early influence then it was James
Bond and action stories and that kind of thing.
Yeah, yeah. I loved action movies, and I lovedcomedies. I loved both. So I was kind of into

(03:57):
both. I remember watching the Producers, and myfather was very much into comedy, so he would take
me, we would go to see comedies. we'd watch MontyPython on TV when it came to us, and, so all that
stuff, though. And my father made a living doingcomedy radio, so I did see it as something you

(04:17):
could probably do for a living, since he seemed tobe doing it for a living.
Haris I was gonna save that for later in the show,but I'm happy to talk about your dad now. I was a
big fan of your dad and Radio Ranch and Orkin andBurtis. I thought that was one of the great comedy
teams of all time.

Haris Orkin (04:35):
Oh, well, thanks.
And you grew up under that influence, right?
I did, yeah. When I was a, kid, he was working at,WCFL radio in Chicago, which was the big rock
station with wl. he, created a show called Chickenman, played on that show, but then got, syndicated
all over the country and even Armed Forces Radio,Soldiers in Vietnam at the time. And, so I

(04:58):
remember him, you know, sitting at the kitchentable writing those in the morning, you know,
before he'd go into work. And, I'd go with him tothe studio and watch him Record. So, yeah, no,
that was a big influence on me, I'm sure. he hadso much fun doing it. It just looked like, you
know, if I could do a job that was that much fun,I should probably try to find one like that.

(05:19):
Though, I have to say, I didn't really consider itseriously until I was in college. You know, some
reason I decided I was going to be a lawyer. And Ithink my. I think my dad probably pushed me in
that direction, thinking that, you know, you know,it's very insecure life being a, creative person.
So he sent me, you know, he kind of. He didn'ttell me that I had to be a lawyer, but he kind of

(05:42):
nudged in that direction. And so, you know, I wasin college and I'd worked at law firms in the
summer in Chicago, though most of me, I worked inthe mail room. And one, of my main jobs was to
retrieve the senior partner's hat, because he'd goto lunch and forget his hat all over town in
Chicago, and I'd have to go pick up Mr. Hopkinshat and bring it back.

(06:04):
So you grew up. You grew up in a comedy centrichouse. Your father was a very funny man, and you
had that influence. And I think that shows in yourwork. Clearly that's something that you had around
you. Do you think that being around someone likethat is important to be facile in comedy?

(06:25):
No, I don't, because I know so many people who arecomedy writers or comedians who didn't grow up
around a comedian. I mean, sure. It doesn't hurt,though. You have to. You know, a lot of times
comedians at home aren't that funny. You know,that whole, idea that, you know, they're funny
out. Out in public and they're performers, butwhen they're home, you know, they're kind of

(06:47):
tortured. And there's a little truth to that, Ithink, you know, so. But, you know, but he could
be very silly when he wanted to be. And, you know,and I probably did learn a lot from just, you
know, being with him. And also, you know, I workedfor him for a while, too, as a teenager. He'd
bring me in to, like, write things to help him orbrainstorm stuff with him and Bert. And so I, you

(07:08):
know, I picked up some skills doing that, I think.
And, m. What I majored in in college was, creativewriting and economics, which is like, it couldn't
be more diametrically opposed, really. But, I did.
I did spend some time working with WBBM News Radioin Chicago. Like, as, they call it a field term.
And they'd send me, on, you know, I was like ajunior reporter. So they sent me to a Catholic

(07:30):
Bishops convention and like a, it was like a pressconference where they're announcing the new
fishing licenses. So I admit it wasn't the mostexciting things to be, but I kind of realized that
I really wanted to make stuff up. I didn't want tohave to like, rip things off the AP and just
regurgitate them. So by the time I graduatedcollege, I realized I wanted to do something

(07:52):
creative.
So your dad knew. Clearly, as anyone that's in thebusiness for any length of time, your dad knew
that it was very difficult to make a living at itand to keep sustaining all that, that sort of
forward momentum. And he wanted you to go intosomething that was steady and regular. Like, many
parents of people, many parents that are in theentertainment industry, they want their children

(08:14):
to do something else. But I'm going to guess, andyou correct me if I'm wrong, that, it's. It's in
your blood. You wanted to do that. It was apassion of yours.
I'm almost obsessive about it. I couldn't reallyprevent myself from. When m. I was in college, I
did a lot of creative writing. I wrote plays andsketches for like, reviews and things. And it was
just the thing I love to do the most, really. So,But, you know, I wasn't sure how to make a living

(08:38):
at it, you know, when I graduated college. And he,like you mentioned Dick and Bert, they did comedy,
radio, advertising. And so I thought, well, maybe,you know, they'll pay you to do advertising, so
maybe I'll get a job in advertising. And that'skind of where I started. So.
And you've clearly, worked in many differentdisciplines and genres. You have, written a number

(09:01):
of novels. You've written screenplays that havesold and been produced. Ah, you've had plays
produced and a lot of games. How did you get intoso many different disciplines? How did that
happen?
desperation really. At least for some of them. Youknow, I had to make a. I had a kid, you know, I
was married. I had to make a living. And so I, ah,kept trying different things. you know, I really

(09:22):
wanted to be a screenwriter. That was my intentionwhile I worked in advertising. And that took me
seven years before I finally sold a script. Imean, I wrote like 15 scripts probably before I
sold one. And then I had a pretty good career as Ascreenwriter for, you know, about 10 years. Any
kind of business like that. It's, you're hot for awhile, then you're not hot. I had a couple movies

(09:44):
made, but nothing that was like a giant hit. Iended up like going back into advertising and I
kept writing screenplays and I kind of got backinto it again. I sold something that got made as a
Bogdanovich, directed that one. But, I, you know,and I, and I, I started as a playwright. So I did
that in college and I did it after college. Andand I loved, doing theater. I love. And I belonged

(10:08):
to a theater group in Chicago and I belonged toone in, Los Angeles. I, you know, good friends in
theater. So it was fun to have plays produced andkind of, you know, it's very hands on and very
collaborative, but.
It'S very hard to make money at that.
Oh, I couldn't make any money at.
Playwriting is, ah, almost impossible to makemoney at. So yes, you've got to go off and find if

(10:31):
you're going to be a professional writer. And Iassume at some point you made that decision
whether you were in college or after that you weregoing to go make a living at it. So you had to
figure out how to do it. And you say it took youseven years before you started to really, catch a
little fire. What was it that you did in theinterim? How did you keep pushing yourself
forward?
Well, that's what I, well that's when I wasworking in advertising, honestly, and I would just

(10:56):
get up. You know, advertising agencies don't startat the crack of dawn a lot of, so I would get, you
know, a lot of partiers and such in advertising,especially in the 80s, I would get there like at
10am So I had time in the morning before I wentinto work to like spend two hours every morning
just working on screenplays. And that's what Idid. And I got a lot of encouragement, you know,

(11:17):
people, a lot of close calls, but, you know,nothing. So, you know, I got an agent eventually,
but it still took a while before, you know, thatfirst sale. And I, you know, I sustained myself
with advertising and also I was doing the plays,at least creatively. That kind of also kind of
satisfied me.
So you were writing every day then, even thoughyou weren't selling any of it yet, that you were

(11:40):
writing every day?
Yeah, it was a real discipline for me. I, I feltlike, you know, I didn't know the idea of the
10,000 hours, that idea that you have to put thatmuch time in to get good at something. But I just
did it every day. Like I said before, I wassomewhat obsessive and once I had an idea that I
really liked, you know, it was hard to keep meaway from it. So I just, you know, and I've done

(12:04):
that, you know, my whole life. Now.
Would you say all of your creative writing tendstoward both action and light hearted comedy or
something? Witty stuff. Is that your, your forte?
Is that your wheelhouse?
It's probably my main wheelhouse. So I justfinished a novel that's like a straight thriller
that, you know, there's some characters in it thatare, have that have a lot of funny lines but it's

(12:28):
much more of a straight ahead thriller. And myagents just taking that out now. And and for the
games I write, I've written everything from youknow, World War II stories to things centering the
Civil War to westerns to horror to zombies. Youknow, in the movie business you tend to get
pigeonholed as being able to do one thing prettywell. And I was pretty basically a comedy writer

(12:54):
and I like doing it and that's what I mainly did.
But in video games I've kind of really spread outinto all different kinds of genres.
So that's, that's clearly evident from the titlesthat, that, that I read earlier and there are many
more that you, you wrote. and do you enjoy writinggames?
Oh, I love it, yeah. It's really fun. Honestly. Iwas a big gamer before, before I started writing

(13:16):
them. I play with my son because it's, I just lovethe interactivity of it. I mean it's like no other
medium. It's the player who's you know, receivingthe story is immersed in it in a way that you
can't really be in any other medium. And it makesit tricky writing for games because a lot of times
you want to give the players some m agency so theyhave choices but then you want the story to be

(13:39):
consistently good in whatever direction they takeit. So I find it, you know, especially when I
first started, there hadn't been a lot of reallygreat stories in games. you know, and that's part
of the reason why I went into it. I thought, wellthese stories could be a lot better and the acting
could be a lot better because I also ended upcasting and directing the voice actors as well as

(14:02):
writing the scripts. And I just wanted to try toimprove stories in games. right around the time I
was doing that There were a lot of other peopledoing it as well. It's just, it's just like kind
of an undiscovered territory. It's like wherescreenplays. There's like a certain structure that
people are, used to and especially movie studioswith games. I was like, there is no set way to do

(14:23):
it. Every game is different. I don't know if you.
Do you play video games much?
Probably not much to my chagrin. I am not a gamer.
I have. I've played almost nothing, no kind ofgames whatsoever of a video game, variety of other
kinds of games, but not video games. And so Idon't know that world real well though. I know m.
I have many friends, from my days in Hollywood whoare video game writers. So it's not. I'm not

(14:48):
foreign to the concept of it or have hadconversations about it, but this is interesting to
me. What are the similarities and the differencesbetween writing video games and screenplays, aside
from the fact that screenplays are very rigidlystructured? you're saying that each video game is
different in the way you approach it. So that's ahuge difference because most screenplays doesn't

(15:12):
matter the genre. You're going to write it in acertain format. You're going to write it, with a
certain structure in mind. What are thedifferences?
Well, I mean, one way to show that is like whenyou write a movie script, you're writing in a
particular way form using final draft or someother program like that, which, which will format
it a particular way. In games there is no formal.

(15:33):
I mean you can write parts of the script in finaldraft, but I write a lot of the script in Excel
because, you, you know, it's. It, it kind of justworks better in Excel because there's thousands
and thousands of sound files and lines of dialogueor that have to be inserted into the game and
depending what the player does, will heardifferent things. it's a little bit like three

(15:56):
dimensional chess in a way, writing for videogames. But so the way they're similar is that is
the creating characters because you want to. Interms of creating a character, you go through the
same process whether you're writing a video game,novel or a movie. At least I do. you're kind of
just working out all the details of who they are,why they do what they do, other motivations, their

(16:19):
backstory, all that. For certain games that aremore linear, you do work out. You can work out an
outline that kind of takes the rest of the storyyou know, throughout the whole, from beginning to
end, knowing that, you want to also create inthose kind of stories the illusion of agency. Even
though the player is going to all gonna, they'reall gonna go down the same path eventually, you

(16:42):
want to give them the illusion that they can takewhatever path they want. so it's, you know, then
there are some games that are like open worldgames, where they can go anywhere they want in
this world and they can go to a different town andthey'll meet new people and you, and you have to
have dialogue and you know, little stories for allof them.
So do I understand correctly that video game, forlack of a better word, scripts or the documents

(17:06):
that go with it are much denser than a typicalscreenplay, which is usually somewhere between 90
and 120 pages.
Yeah, like I would say a linear, like a linearkind of video game would probably be like six or
seven screenplays in length. An open world gamecould be like 20 screenplays. and so when you
write open world games, for the most part you workwith the team and it's like writing TV season,

(17:31):
like a TV season almost, because different, youknow, tv, they assign different writers, different
scripts and it's the same kind of thing with thatkind of big video game. And then there's like an
over somebody who's like a game director who kindof oversees it all, a narrative director and makes
sure that there's a consistency to it.
It all has to all look like, and feel like it'scoming from one place.

(17:53):
Yeah, the characters have to be consistent andyeah, and the tone has to be consistent, you know,
and I've worked on a lot of like franchise typegames that have been around a while. So I had to
kind of learn all the Lord and the franchise andthose characters and make sure I was true to them.
Like, I worked on the Resident Evil game that cameout two years ago and you know, so I had to like

(18:18):
learn all that lore and all those characters. WhenI was first offered that job, I was, I really
enjoyed the Resident Evil games because I thoughtthey were so kind of campy and funny, you know.
And I remember telling the team at Capcom that,you know, I really enjoyed how funny and campy
they were and they were like funny campy. I meanthey were like, you know, I think when it's

(18:43):
translated from the Japanese in English, somethingwent awry there a little bit probably. But so the
game I worked on was a little less though. Itstill was a little campy. But a little less so.
So, so where do you begin when you're going towrite, for instance, a screenplay? You know,
you're gonna have, you're gonna have somewhere tostart. It's usually for most people, either a plot

(19:04):
or characters. Which is it for you? Is it usuallystory first or characters first?
I'm pretty much for almost everything I write, I'mkind of characters first because, you know, the
characters then kind of drive the plot. thoughsometimes, you know, I'll have an idea of a plot,
but it's like without, without the really deepcharacters or really, you know, complex

(19:27):
characters. To me, if I start with the plot beforethe characters, sometimes it feels like it just
kind of lays there. It doesn't really have asmuch, drive to it. because, you know, the actors
need something to play. The actors have, you know,and so pretty much as you're writing the
characters, the characters have something theywant and that's what drives the plot, you know,

(19:49):
so. Or something they don't want. It could workeither way.
I was always trained. Simple plot, complexcharacters. Which is what you're saying.
Yeah, that is true. And that's true for, games andfor movies actually. You want to try to keep the
plot fairly simple because, it's too hard for.
You're playing something over the course of 20hours, you're not going to remember what you

(20:10):
played 15 hours back. If it's too complex andthere's enough complexity within just the game
mechanics and such, I think sometimes. But thereare games that are, you know, so that way they're
similar. Now novels, I find, can be more complex.
You can have, you know, we can have a lot morecomplexity in the plot.

(20:31):
Yeah, well, a, novel can go sprawling. It can gofor a thousand pages if you wanted to. whereas a
screenplay has to be much more contained. I'veread, as I said, I've read your first of the James
Flynn books. it's so much fun to read because ithas a really strong pace and the characters are
extremely well drawn and it's very funny.

(20:52):
Obviously it's very James Bond esque. While at thesame time you managed to. I don't know how you did
it. To me, it was a miracle. As I was reading it,I didn't know what I was going to read until I
opened page one. And suddenly a short while later,I knew I was reading something that was spoofing
not only James Bond but also Don Quixote. And thatjust kind of blew my mind. How did you come on

(21:14):
that combination?
Well, I actually, the idea was, before I started,before I came up with Flynn, is I wanted to do a
modern day version of Don Quixote. It's like oneof my favorite pieces of literature, you know, of
all time. I just love that character. and I wantedto do something modern day for that, you know, and
I really, honestly, I didn't realize till laterthat, that my father had done that, with Chicken

(21:37):
Man. I mean, Chicken man is kind of Don Quixotetoo. It didn't even occur to me, honestly until
years later that I did the same thing. But Ididn't want it to be a superhero. Ah. I was trying
to find something a little bit more grounded inreality. I loved James Bond movies and I just
thought that would make sense. Someone who feelsout of control in their life would want to become

(22:00):
somebody who feels like he could do anything, youknow, and then those movies he m. Could. Right. So
in the books, so, so you've.
Told us, you've told us, in this show, already alittle bit about James Flynn and the fact that
he's a psychiatric patient and that he'sdelusional and all those good things. He thinks
he's in a, in spy agency of some kind, but he'sactually in a psychiatric hospital. But tell the

(22:24):
listeners a little bit more about what this, notjust the series is about, but, how you got to that
first, story of him breaking out of thepsychiatric hospital and doing things that are
very spy esque.
Well, I originally wrote it as a screenplay, whichyou may be able to tell because it's very kind of

(22:45):
visual and action packed. I think when I first satdown I just wanted, I wanted to create a Sancho
character and Dulcinea. And it just made sense tome that Sancho would be a orderly at the hospital.
And I didn't really know what Flynn would get intowhen I first wrote it, when he first started, when

(23:07):
he first escaped from the hospital, you know,after I wrote that initial, at least had that
initial idea that he was a psychiatric patient whobelieved he was James Bond or someone like him. I
said, I did sit down and outline the whole thing.
I'm unlike a lot of novelists I know, which isunbelievable to me. some of those people just
write, sit down and just write without an outline.

(23:29):
I always like to have a detailed outline and thenI kind of throw the outline out as I go somewhat.
If I come up with a better idea along the way I'lltoss it, I think I just kind of take the story
where the characters take it.
Well, outlining is a big part of screenwriting.
There are very few screenplays that are written,certainly in the studio system and certainly for

(23:50):
tv, that don't come outlined first. So that'swhere your background is. And it was natural, I
assume, for you to start to outline your book. Doyou also outline the games, your video games?
I do. You kind of have to, because it's a veryexpensive process, building a video game. And it's
a lot of people doing a lot of work. Giant teamsof, like, hundreds of people for the big games.

(24:14):
All right. So in the James Flynn books, you. You,You wrote it as a screenplay first, where you. I
assume you tried to sell it and it didn't sell.
Yeah, I actually had it optioned. and I had a lotof interest, and it actually got me, like,
assignments. but it didn't. It didn't, you know,get to the point of getting made or getting, you

(24:35):
know.
So I want to. I want the listeners to understandwhat you just said, which is very important if
they're interested in going to Hollywood and beinga screenwriter. You wrote something that got
interest in Hollywood. It didn't get produced. Itdidn't get through to that stage. But the fact
that you wrote it and people liked it got youother work. That's a really important thing about

(24:57):
Hollywood writers, is that you. Your work shouldnot ever be thought of as wasteful because it can
get you other things, even if that never sells.
Yeah, I mean, I had drawers of, you know,screenplays that didn't have got made. Files and
files of them. you know, and honestly, that's partof the reason I wanted to start working in games

(25:17):
is because I was just kind of tired of developmenthell in this screenwriting world. And I didn't.
Yeah, I didn't work in tv. M. I had some moviesdone. There were TV movies, but I've never worked
on a series. it's.
That's more. That's much more of a grind. that's.
You know, you get into a rhythm on that thing, andyou're churning out one after the other. That's

(25:41):
more of a grind versus, you're writing a novelfrom a screenplay. So you had. Not only, correct
me if I'm wrong, you not only had an outline towrite the screenplay, then you wrote the
screenplay. And the screenplay probablyessentially was like a big outline for you.
It was. But, it's interesting. You Know when theprocess of writing a novel based on the

(26:04):
screenplay, you know, it's a very interestingexperience and a little scary. I wasn't as comp.
Well, I wasn't as confident with, about my prose.
you know, I was very confident about, with mydialogue. You know, writing a novel is like, it's
a lot more writing than a screenplay. And I, But Irealized once I started getting into it that I had

(26:24):
an opportunity to go so much deeper into thecharacters and so much deeper into the world. And
you know, you have to describe, you know, youworked in animations, you know this, and I've done
a little bit of animation writing. You have todescribe everything in detail in a way you don't
in a regular like live action screenplay, for theartists. And you know, and so in a novel even more
so, you know, you want to create every sense. Youwant to like, pretty much describe, but you don't

(26:49):
want to do it to the point where it's like,becomes tedious. So you have to kind of know where
to, you know, you kind of have to treat a littlebit like haiku, just touches of it. But you do
have to have all the senses kind of, you know,described so that people know where they are,
what's going on, what it feels like. And innovels, which you can't do in screenplays or stage

(27:09):
plays, you don't have any. You don't get theinternal thoughts of the characters, where in a
book you can like just go right in the head andget all the internal thinking and things that they
never verbalize.
So that's why you only write sight and sound inthe screenplay. You don't write what's going on in
a character's head or their thoughts. But I'lltell you what, if you ever, if you ever get a

(27:30):
chance, if you ever get a chance to write amusical, you'll find out that there is a device in
a musical that allows you to go internal andthat's called a song, which is a whole other
animal.
I would love to write a musical. That's the onlything I haven't worked on.
Well, you probably would be pretty good at itbecause, you have that kind of sensibility. And
musicals are much more akin to screenplays,screenwriting than they are to plays, because a

(27:57):
play can not move forward. But a musical like ascreenplay, has to move forward horizontally and
have that thrust forward at all times. I amcurious, in the books, did you know when you sat
down to write the first one based on yourscreenplay, that you were going to turn it into a
series. Did you know that then?
No, I didn't. I had no idea I was going to dothat. You know, I was just trying to just create

(28:23):
that one book. And so I wish I would have realizedI was going to turn a new series because I would
have like, planned better. and because writing thesecond book I had to go back and figure out
because now I was like, kind of stuck in certain.
I had to like, kind of just extend from the firstbook out. And if I would have thought about it, I

(28:44):
would have like kind of planned for the future andI didn't. that's the thing that self writing for a
series is a book series is challenging. where youhave to, with every subsequent book you have to
kind of like, you have to assume that noteveryone's read the first book. So they may, you
have to give them enough information that theyunderstand what's going on, who the characters

(29:05):
are, what's happening. And you have to mention afew things from the past because for the people
who had to read the first book, but you don't wantto mention in such detail that it gives spoil, you
know, it gives spoilers to the people who haven'tread the first book. So it's a very tricky,
balance.
And you don't want to bore, bore the readers whoread the earlier books with the same information.

(29:28):
Exactly. And my editor actually, yeah, was veryhelpful with that because, when I gave her the
second book, she was like, you don't have to, youknow, she's the one who was telling me, you don't
have to go into such detail explaining all this.
And you know, for people who read the first bookand the people who haven't read the first book,
it's going to just be nonsense to them. They'renot going to, you know, so it took some time. Now,

(29:52):
you know, now I'm on the. I'm writing the seventhbook right now. The sixth book's coming out in
February and the process is a little bit easierfor me. I have a better handle on how to do it. So
without giving everything away, I.
Assume that you know nothing about being a spyother than what you've absorbed through the
culture. You weren't ever an actual spy, were you?

(30:16):
Yeah, that's true. I do love spy novels and I lovehistory and I've read a lot of like, history of
all that stuff. But you. Same with the Westerns.
Like, I wrote a Lot of Western video games. I lovethe history of all that. But, you know, in a way
it works out because this is a mental patient whodoesn't really know what it means to be a spy
either. But a lot of the humor comes in himbumping up against actual people who are actual,

(30:42):
you know, actual spies. so I did have to reallylearn about that to get a good sense of it,
because everyone, the whole rest of the world, islike this straight man to him, in a way. So.
And so did that require you to do a lot ofresearch?
Oh, yeah, I do. I do a ton of research for the.
For those books.
So where do you begin? Is it. Is it online or doyou go to libraries? Where do you research stuff?

(31:04):
Well, yeah, used to do it all in libraries. nowit's. Of course, I just do it all online. yeah.
And, you know, I'll order a lot of books.
Sometimes I'll go through Amazon. I'll, you know,do searches on Google. I'll read like, like
biographies. I read a bunch of biographies ofactual people who are like, spies or commandos,
things like that. I, I do a lot of reading. Iprobably read a book a week. I'm. I'm working on a

(31:28):
idea for a, Western right now set in 1915, andit's actually gonna be set in Hollywood. And, so
I've been reading tons of books on. On that era inHollywood and. And all the different, Western
stars of the era and a lot of the outlaws andlawmen who came to Hollywood to, act as,

(31:49):
consultants to the studios. And, it was just afascinating era, but I love doing that research.
But I found a bunch of books on. On all thesedifferent. All these different subjects.
Well, I believe the early cowboy stars wereactually cowboys. They came from that world.
Yeah. I mean, somewhere and somewhere. Or theylearn to be, at least eventually. yeah.

(32:13):
And. All right, so how long does it take you towrite the following? How long does it typically
take you to write a book? How long does it takeyou to write a screenplay? How long does it take
you to write a video game?
Okay, well, a screenplay. A lot of times when I'vebeen hired to write them, I contractually have to
finish them within a couple months. I mean, like,so those. I usually write in two, three months,

(32:36):
though. I, you know, I've written a screenplay in,like, two weeks before. and, you know, because
it's just pouring out, and then I'll do a lot ofrewriting. But, a Book, the first book took me a
couple years. Now, you know, I can write one ofthem. If all I'm doing is just working on the
book, I can write it in about four, to six months.
Including the outlining the development ofcharacters and all that. That's the tote, the

(33:00):
total deal.
Oh yeah. I mean, you know, but I'm doing a seriesthough, so a lot of that's already in place in
terms of the characters and such. But there's alot of new characters every time as well. So.
Yeah, no, I can do that pretty quickly. But it'svery rare that I'm only working on one thing at a
time. I usually have like a game project or otherthings I'm working on. if I, if I get one, I try

(33:23):
to get one done a year, one novel a year withinthe series because that feels like if I wait too
long between, between books, you know, the peoplewho I do have as fans are going to kind of, lose
interest possibly, or whatever. So So I try to doone a year. Yeah.
I'm fascinated by the fact that you work onmultiple projects at the same time. I do the same

(33:44):
thing and I know a lot of writers do. I'm curious,from your perspective, what do you do to manage
your time and how do you do that to get from thebeginning of a project to the end while you're
working on other things, how do you time manage?
I have to kind of work out a schedule to do it andthat's. I do. I. And I usually will. Only I'll

(34:05):
work on one thing in the morning and somethingelse like in the afternoon. I can't jump back and
forth like within the same hour or somethingbecause it takes me a little while to get into the
correct mindset of what I'm working on. andsometimes I'll just work one day on one thing and
then another day, another thing. Or I'll, I'llwork on like, ah, if I have like a deadline for

(34:25):
video game, like I just, just had for somethingwhich I can't reveal because hasn't been announced
yet. But I had to like put the book away for liketwo weeks to just work on that. But you know,
with, with writing for games, sometimes you know,I'll write a bunch of stuff for them and they'll
then, and then they have to kind of put it alltogether in the game and then there'll be some

(34:48):
time in between. It'll give me time to work on mybook.
I truly appreciate the fact that it's verychallenging to have two totally different projects
or more in your head working at the same time. doyou ever find that as you're say, for instance on
Deadline on one that somehow the other is leakingin that you ever conflate projects? Has that ever

(35:09):
happened to you?
Yeah, I'm sure. I have a feeling they do affecteach other. I'm not sure I can point to any one
particular thing that. You know, the trickiestthing for me is when I'm going between like, like
a really dark horror to like comedy. and I'll havea tendency to like, try to get too funny in the
horror and then get too scary in the comedy. So Ihave to like, I have to be kind of go through it

(35:32):
again on a rewrite and it's hard when I have agood joke, it's hard to cut it, you know, even
though it's in a horror movie but. Or horror game.
Well, you don't want to lose your. Your truedarlings, but sometimes you have to lose your
darlings, don't you?
Yeah, sometimes you can kind of, you know, justput them aside and use them somewhere else though.
I think it's important with horror movies or gamesto have moments of humor just to help leaven that.

(35:56):
So it's not just constant like tension andsuspense and fear. You know, it's like it makes
it. If you have a lot of up and down rising kindof action, I think it makes it much more
effective.
Absolutely right. You. It's almost requisite thatyou put in moments of release relief and then
eventually get to the ultimate relief beingcatharsis at the end of whatever your story is.

(36:18):
Hopefully you get to that catharsis. You raisedsomething a moment ago that I think is very
important and you're a great person to talk tobecause you have so many, such a wide range of
disciplines, that you work in, is tonality. You'vealready alluded to it. There's very different tone
in the James Flynn books than you would fromBlack, Hawk Down. Those would be two totally

(36:40):
different tones. And you have many differenttones. How do you for yourself determine what the
tone of the story is? I'm going to assume it'sbased on the characters in the plot. But how do
you get that tone in your mind's eye for eachdifferent project? How do you figure that out?
Sometimes what I'll do is I'll. Like for BlackHawk Down, I read a whole bunch of I read the book

(37:06):
Black Hawk Down. I read a bunch of, biographies,autobiographies by some of the special ops who
were involved in Black Hawk Down. Watch the movie,of course, watch documentaries on it. And for me,
one of the things I really work to get is thevoices of the characters. and that'll help. Help
determine the tone, you know, So I get that withdocumentaries like Blackout Down, I did. I got

(37:31):
that from just reading their autobiographies. Likethe Western I'm talking about now. I read this
book by, that was written in, like, 1880 bysomeone named Charlie Siringo, who was a,
Pinkerton and actually was a cowboy before then.
He wrote a book about being a cowboy. And, And itwas written. You know, he wrote it. It was in his
own voice, and it was, like, really crudely kindof written in some ways, but it was really kind of

(37:56):
entertaining for me. And he was like. He did some,like, horrible, despicable things. He was pretty
much pretty racist, you know, and so it's like,oh, wow. It's like, you know, and, everyone. All
the women he dated were like, 15 years old or 14,and that was a little shocking to me. I was like,
wow. Really? That was how it worked. Okay. Yeah,but. Yeah, but getting. Getting the voice of the

(38:19):
characters. It's like I want to. Because I want toable to hear how they speak. And I'm definitely.
I'm not a good. I'm not an actor. I'm a terribleactor, as a matter of fact. but I can. I think I'm
good at recognizing decent acting, good acting.
And I can tell when I have the voice in my head,you know, it just feels right to me. and there's
like, every character has, like, almost a musicalquality that's different from every other

(38:44):
character. And if I can get that rhythm and musicdown, then I feel like I have the character down.
Are you able to, find your way to a character justby quietly contemplating it, or do you look for
inspiration or how do you get to your characters?
You know what? I have to write the character toget to it. I remember having telling this to,
like, a game company I was working for. Theywanted me to kind of explain, you know, just give

(39:09):
them the characters. And I said I have to kind ofwrite it first before I discover who the character
is. Even though we don't use what I'm going towrite, it's my way into. I have to kind of hear
them speaking with each other. And that's how Ikind of do it, just writing dialogue.
Do you know who Kali Khoury is?
I do.
She wrote Thelma and Louise. So she famously oncesaid, and I may be misquoting it, but it'll be

(39:32):
very close, that she needs to find the quiet tohear the characters talking in her head.
Exactly. That's basically it. Yeah.
And once they start talking, once you've got themgoing, they're just going to work you through the
whole thing, aren't they?
They do. That's how, you know, it's, If you canget the characters down, they'll take you through

(39:53):
the story pretty much, you know. And, when you'reoutlining it, you can. At least when I am, I can.
If I know the characters well enough, I'll knowwhat they will do and what they won't do. And that
really will kind of steer the plot.
Oh. Have you ever had the experience of, someonein the studio system, tell you how a character
would talk?

(40:13):
you know. Yeah. I have games too, as well,actually. You know, one of the things you have to
learn, I think, as a writer, either that system orgames, I would say I spend half my time, half my
writing is writing, explaining why I'm doing whatI'm doing, at least in the game world. You know,

(40:34):
it's like long emails explaining why it is I'mdoing it and why the character is this way. and
then, you know, because it probably feels likemagic to them, or I'm just, you know, m making
crap up. And I am just making crap up, but I havea reason why I'm making it up a certain way.
You know, my assumption is, as you, like everyother writer that's had any success, you have

(40:57):
received voluminous notes over time on everyproject you've ever worked on, especially if it's
in a collaborative nature. I assume you don't gettoo many notes except from an editor in your
novels. But on a screenplay or on a video game,you're going to get notes from people for whatever
reasons. So what is your advice to those that aretrying to figure out how to become writers, how to

(41:18):
take notes. Do you have a methodology for takingnotes?
I do. I had to learn that the hard way, honestly.
when I first would get notes, I would be veryresistant. When I worked in, you know, writing
assignments for movie studios, I'd be veryresistant. Very resistant. I would sit there kind
of like, sourly, and I, you know, and, and I wouldjust like, I don't know how this is going to work.

(41:40):
And I was just very negative about it. And, and, Ilearned that that was not a good way to go about
it because they would just hire another writer,which is what they did. Exactly. So I learned to
like, go, oh, okay, that's an interesting idea. Iwould just like, say, oh, okay, that's
interesting. And I would, like, take all the notesdown and then when I rewrote it, I would just use

(42:01):
the ones that made sense to me. And they were finewith that.
Yeah, that is a perfectly wonderful way to dothat. It is my philosophy. And it's the
philosophy, I think, of a lot of people who havehad some success in that business because you have
to make them think that they got their way insomehow, some way. And yet you can't allow them to

(42:25):
pull that one thread in your very nicely knitsweater. That pull lets the whole thing fall
apart. So you, you have to protect your propertyat some somehow without insulting the other, side
of the table.
Yeah, my wife had to live with my, you know, withmy, you know, irritation about it all, you know,
you know, even though I don't show it to thepeople who are giving me the criticism, my wife

(42:47):
hears it all.
Unfortunately, there's nothing more disconcertingto me than when, when a person who has not worked
on the project at all maybe has read one draft andthey say to you, that character would never say
that. And you go, what do you mean they wouldnever say it? Of course they would say it.
It's like, how do you know that it's not even areal person, It's a made up character.

(43:09):
Exactly. So. So I think that's really excellent,an excellent thought about note taking. Take the
notes, don't fight the notes. And, and thenhopefully you'll actually get some kind of help
from them. Maybe you will.
you will. And a lot of times what I learned isthat the note, even if the note, the specifics of

(43:30):
the note are wrong, it may be talking about alarger problem. And, it may be pointing to
something that's not working. And even thoughtheir solution for it may not be correct, it may
show me an idea of a. Give me an idea of what Icould do to fix it.
All right, so you have been in both worlds, boththe entertainment industry in Hollywood and also

(43:53):
in the publishing world, as well as you also, youknow, are in the advertising world as well. What
are the big differences between those two worldsin terms of how you work with them? Is it a huge
difference or is it very Similar.
It's pretty big difference. I mean, you know, themovies and video games are much more
collaborative. It's much more back and forth allthe time. And things happen really quickly

(44:18):
sometimes and sometimes they take forever. Butthen when they do happen, they can happen really
quickly and you have to get things done. You haveto, you know, hit a deadline or get something
rewritten really fast. With publishing, everythingtakes forever. It's very slow. It's a very slow
process. It's a lot of like, you know, no one's ina hurry and you know, I'm a little bit of Type A,

(44:41):
so it can be a little frustrating sometimes.
But what was you say are some of the things that awriter ought to think about doing in order to
secure even a chance at getting published? Arethere tricks that you've learned at this point
that would be helpful?
You know, I don't know. I think it's a very toughbusiness. to me all you can really do is try to

(45:02):
write the very best book you can write. I don'tknow if anything else will work honestly. and you
know, that's still no guarantee you're going toget it published. Yeah, I think it's still, it's
good to kind of understand the market a littlebit, understand genres. I mean, I didn't do that
very well. I wrote a book that doesn't really fitin any one genre. It's humor, humor, you know,

(45:24):
comedy, thriller. And it's not a lot of people whodo that. Carl Hiason, Donald Westlake, there are,
you know, but there aren't a huge number ofauthors in that category. You know, if I would
have wrote a straight ahead thriller, I probablywould have had an easier chance. But that really
wasn't my thing. You know, I just like combiningcomedy with action. this last book I wrote though

(45:47):
is much more of a straight head thriller. So we'llsee if that has, that makes any difference in
terms of getting a publisher interested.
So it's a, it's a shame that it's hard to havesomething that's different because that's the old
cliche about screenplays, but also it's true aboutbooks that they want something that's really

(46:07):
unique and different but exactly like everythingelse.
Exactly.
Because they know how to sell X. They know how tosell a murder mystery, they know how to sell
comedy, they know how to sell, romance, novels,they know how to sell those. And then when you
start to mess with those formulas, if that's theright word. I think formula is probably the wrong
word. But if you mess with what they understand,then they get all confused and don't know what to

(46:32):
do with it.
Yeah, I mean, it's true of readers, I think too.
I've gotten a lot of reviews on the first book youread where people were like, I started reading and
I had no idea what this was about. It just didn'tmake sense to me.
And oh, I got it right away. I got it right away.
Haris Oh, I'm glad you did. And, and then, butthen eventually people, you know, some people

(46:52):
would get it and really like it and then otherpeople would be like, o, this isn't like a
straight ahead thrillers. This guy's crazy.
I will tell you, I don't usually laugh out loudwhen I'm reading. I laugh out loud when I'm
watching a, TV show, movie, whatever, but, but Irarely laugh out loud when I'm reading and I
laughed out loud very early and throughout yourwhole book.

(47:15):
Oh my God. It's a huge compliment. Thank you verymuch.
Yeah, absolutely wonderful to read because I'mbecause I am like you, a massive early on James
Bond fan. So I'm reading all of the ways that youspoofed it and parodied it and it was very funny.
I really got a great deal of joy out of readingit. So I'm glad you did. If you were starting out

(47:36):
as a writer today, would you do things differentlythan when you first got into the business? And if
so, how?
Yeah, well, I mean, because I know so much morenow about how business works. I mean, it's changed
quite a bit since I started when I started, but Ithink I would be much more kind of focused on, on

(47:56):
like one. I've done one thing I'd like it. Ibecome an expert at like writing one kind of thing
to start with and then just maybe spreading mywings later. Instead of writing so many different
genres and different kinds of things, not knowingwhat I was going to be good at, I would pick. I
think that that's the main thing I do. I'd pickone thing and really hone myself, hone my skills

(48:17):
and get good at that one thing.
You would, you would try not to be so diffuse inyour, abilities at genres?
Yeah, I think so. Starting out, you know, but Ithink it. Part of the reason I did is because like
I said, desperation was like, not sure where I fitin, what I could do when I, you know. And so I

(48:37):
just kept trying Lots of different things. and,you know, now, in hindsight, I'm glad I did. I
mean, it's really been a very varied career andkind of fun that I was able to do that.
You haven't been stuck or pigeonholed down oneroad. you've been able to do many different
things. But it is. I agree with you, by the way,that if you aren't, for lack of a better word, a

(49:00):
specialist, if you don't have a particular thingthat you're known for, it's really hard to keep
moving down different roads because they want youto write what they think you know how to write,
even though you know you can write many differentthings. I think some of that has dissolved over
time, but it's still quite, quite much there.

(49:20):
But it's still not as. Not as much as you wouldimagine. And it's true of actors too. It's hard
for actors to switch kind of genres and switchwhat they do.
Or directors, you know, all of that, if that'swhat they think that you do. If you had success
with something, they want you to do more of whatyou had success with, even though that might not
be your passion.
Yeah, well, it's because they're. Honestly, it'slike what I noticed when I worked in the film

(49:44):
business is because the executives are trying tokind of COVID their ass. If they're making a
choice, they say, well, see, they did this beforeand it was great and it was very successful. And
if they take a chance and it fails, it's like, oh,they're the ones who get their butts kicked. So.
All right, tell me what your philosophy is onpitching. I assume you've pitched lots of things

(50:07):
over time. movies, books, games and so on. How doyou pitch? How do you prepare to pitch? What do
you think about when you're going to pitchsomething?
Yeah, I mean, I don't do it in games. That's notsomething you have to do, really. or even books,
but movies. I had to learn how to pitch, becausethat's how they were sold, and I was terrible at

(50:27):
that. And I ended up taking acting classes, tolearn how to be better on, like, just on stage and
be more comfortable talking to people in my body.
And, And I did, you know, my wife. I got my wifeto do it with me, and she ended up becoming an
actress because she was really good at it. Iwasn't that good, but. But it did teach. It did

(50:49):
relax me and made me a, better Better at pitching.
And so I think my, my thing is I would get intotoo much detail. I'd get into the weeds too often
when I first started doing it. And I finally, Ilearned the, you know, the thing where you do the,
the one minute pitch of the whole story and thenif they're still interested, then you do like a

(51:09):
five minute version of the pitch. And then ifthey're still interested, you can go longer, even
15 minutes maybe.
But so you have to be well prepared, right?
Oh, it's very well prepared. I, yeah, I have toreally practice it and work it out. I write it and
then I practice it. I know there are some, peoplewho are just great off the cuff at pitching, which

(51:31):
is interesting because sometimes they're not thebest writers. You know, they're good at pitching,
but not necessarily writing. I remember reading mysister's a stand up comic and I would bring her. I
remember I had a pitch at Showtime, it was acomedy show and I brought my sister with to me to
help me pitch it because I thought, you know,she'd make them laugh.

Steve Cuden (51:48):
So did it work?
Well, it was a good pitch, but we didn't sell it.
No.
So, so comedy is in your family. Your father wasa, a, very fine comedy writer and performer and
your sister is a comedian and you write comedy. Sothat's clearly in your genes.
It is. And my two other siblings are teachers andthey're both very funny though. So I think they're

(52:10):
good teachers because they keep the kids laughing.
So I've been having just an absolutely fantasticconversation with Haris Orkin, and we're going to
wind the show down just a little bit. And I'mwondering, in all of your experiences and you've
had many, can you share with us a story beyondwhat you've already told us that's either weird,
quirky, offbeat, strange, or just plain funny?

(52:32):
Okay. Well, this was a strange thing that happenedto me. I was just out of graduate school and I
was. And you know, I was working in advertisingbut looking for screenwriting jobs. The guy who
was named Bill Jackson, who did a puppet show,children's puppet show in Chicago, had come out to

(52:53):
California and ran the, the film department atCalArts. And he was looking for a screenwriter for
a TV pilot he wanted to do. And and he can. I'm,not quite sure how he connected. I think it was
someone through the school connected with, with mebecause they knew I did comedy. And so he hired me
to help him with this TV pilot, he wanted to do anadult puppet show that's like, combined live

(53:16):
actors and puppets. Wouldn't be for children. Itwas going to be about a gang, two nightclubs, both
owned by gangsters. And, one group of gangsterswere humans and one were puppets. And they brought
in. Broderick Crawford, was playing the, like, thebig heavy. And, he was, you know, he was very old
at that point. but, And did you see Bad Santa? Didyou ever see Bad Santa? That movie?

(53:41):
I have seen Bad Santa, sure. Billy Bob Thornton.
Yeah. So I can't remember the name of the actorwho played the elf. He was the henchman for,
working with Broderick Crawford. And then the guyswho financed it were a bunch of producers. They
weren't producers. They had car dealerships inMichigan and they wanted to get into Hollywood,

(54:02):
and so they decided to finance this pilot, butthey wanted to do it. They wanted to hire women
from the Playboy Modeling Agency to be in theaudience, like at the nightclub. And so I remember
they just hired all these Playboy ex. PlayboyPlaymates. And I remember driving around in a limo
with them as we went all around la, picking themup to take them to the shoot. And I, was like, you

(54:26):
know, I don't know, I was 23. I'm like, oh, myGod, this is great. Yeah. It may not be great for
the show, but it's a great. Yeah, it's great forme, you were.
You were in a limo with a bunch of Playmates. Holymackerel.
Yeah. And these guys from. These car dealers from,Michigan and, you know, and they shot the whole
thing. I wish I had still had a copy of the, Inever got a copy. I don't think it never did sell,

(54:51):
surprisingly.
And so you had it. It's kind of like Roger Rabbit.
You had the human world, the actual human world,and then the fictitious. In this case, puppet
world. Not cartoons.
Yeah, that's. Yeah, exactly. It was the puppets. Iknow. I think there have been things made like
that now.
Well, they're for kids. For kids. HR Puff andstuff, you know, that's. Those sorts of shows.

(55:15):
Yeah, maybe it does. You know, there is that wholebig furry movement. Maybe they'd be into that, the
Furries.
In fact, where I live here in Pittsburgh, theyhave their annual convention here. The Furries are
in Pittsburgh every year. Yeah.

Haris O (55:26):
That'd be fun to go to.
I've been to one. It's a very interestingexperience. I'm not sure I need to do it again,
but I really enjoyed the one experience I had. Allright, so last question for you today, Haris
you've shared with us throughout this whole show aphenomenal amount of information that I think
would be very useful to anyone trying to get intothe business or, try to improve themselves in it.

(55:49):
I'm wondering, do you have a single solid piece ofadvice that you like to give to those who are
starting out and want to know how they can getinto the business or, ah, maybe they're in a
little bit trying to get to that next level.
What I tell people is, the hardest part aboutwriting is just keeping your butt in the chair.
Discipline and persistence. I recommend people doit every day, and you just have to just keep at

(56:11):
it. Can't wait for inspiration to strike. there'sa. A book by John Gardner called On, Becoming a
Novelist. It's a great book about writing, andthat's what he talks about. You have to, like, do
it long enough until you kind of reach this kindof flow state like athletes do. And it takes time,
and it, you know, you have to kind of learn to doit. And it's from repetition that you get to that

(56:33):
point.
I think that that is, about as sound a piece ofadvice as anyone could give for, especially for
writers. I was always told that the formula forsuccess as a writer was but liberally applied to
chair. That was what I was always told, and Ithink that that's it. If you want to be a great

(56:55):
writer, you can't do it any other way than towrite and write and write well. Haris Orkin, this
has been an absolutely wonderful Story Beat today,and I can't thank you enough for joining me today
and for your time, your energy, and for all thisgreat wisdom that you've imparted on us.
Oh, it's been really fun talking to you about thisall. Yeah, that's great. Thank you for bringing me

(57:16):
on.
And so we've come to the end of today's StoryBeat. If you like this episode, won't you please
take a moment to give us a comment, rating, orreview on whatever app or platform you're
listening to. Your support helps us bring moregreat Story Beat episodes to you. Story Beat is
available on all major podcast apps and platforms,including Apple Podcasts, YouTube, Spotify,

(57:39):
iHeartRadio, TuneIn, and many others. Until nexttime, I'm Steve Cuden, and may all your stories be
unforgettable.