(audio read by me)
I’ve pitched lots of TV shows to networks, production companies, etc. I’ve sold 4 pilots in the span of my career, which just means I was paid to write the pilot episode of a TV show idea. Then it would get discussed and dissected by the people who bought it, along with their BIG BOSS(ES), who weren’t in the room at the pitch, to see if they wanted to film it.
I never made it past the selling and the writing. Hey, no complaints here! That’s a great way to make half a living some years. I never felt bad about myself when my pilots didn’t get filmed, either. Why? It really never felt personal, or like I wasn’t ‘good’ enough. It always went something like this:
I go to the pitch meeting, where a handful of TV development executives, all women, are very excited to hear the idea, because it fits right in with what the BIG BOSSES have told them the network wants this year. A show with a strong female character POV. Or a show that centers around friendships and not family! Or a show where someone doesn’t have kids! Whatever it is… there were some years when my pitches really lined up with what the BIG BOSSES said they wanted and what the female development executives really wanted and believed in.
I pitch. They delight. I sell it in the room, meaning that when I finish my forty-five-minute pitch, they say, “Let’s do it!” (in other words, they’ll pay me to write it up as a script). Or I get the call a couple of days later that I sold it. I begin writing. I get some notes during the process from said women. I implement the notes, or pretend to, whatever I think is called for. (You might think the ‘pretending to’ is why things don’t get filmed, but successfully pretending to implement their not-great notes is a skill, and if done correctly, they’ll tell you that you did a great job doing so.) Then the final draft is turned in, and I wait weeks.
Eventually we get the call that it will not be going forward to filming, but the handful of female development executives loved it, they championed it, and, as it turns out, the BIG BOSSES have decided they want all nuclear-family-oriented pilots this season, or that they want more shows about the school sports team. They’re not lying. It all checks out when I see the pilots that are going forward in the trades. Really, I’m only left wondering why the BIG BOSSES thought they wanted the opposite of what their network does at all.
ANYWAY.
This one particular year (honestly, I don’t remember which one) was the first time that I actually had to let the executives know that
women are literally humans.
See, what I didn’t mention above is that even though I’ve sold ideas, I still had to pitch those eventual sales to networks and production companies that said NO as well. Sometimes two networks said YES, and I had to decide which one to go with; I always chose the one that didn’t seem to think my idea was weird. Other times you can tell a network says YES because they know someone else said YES and they don’t want to look uncool, but they don’t really believe in it and don’t really get it.
So, with all those No’s and Cuz-I-Had-To-Yes’s in my experience… what did they all have in common? The development executives, both men and women (but usually mainly men, and I’m sorry, fellas, yes, even gay men), did not understand stories about a woman who wasn’t looking for a man, didn’t want kids, and maybe was happily divorced; a woman questioning her life choices, but not from a hating-herself place, more from a ‘how can I figure out what I want to do, in the way that’s the most fun and the least amount of work’ place.
One thing my ideas always had in common was that the shows were about a woman trying to live in a world where it seemed like everyone around her valued different things. She was often the only single person at a couples’ dinner, or the only childfree person at a baby shower, and she’d frequently get pulled aside by people who were ‘doing things right,’ people who confessed that they wished they were more like her, only to put their masks back on and go back to their lives. This confused a lot of TV execs, who would ask me how it was a comedy. It wasn’t as rude as I just made it sound. They have to ask; even if they’re cracking up laughing, they’ll want to know how it stays a comedy throughout the season, even as the characters face conflict.
But a lot of the time, I had this conversation:
“Is she a strong woman?”
“Oh, yes. A very strong woman, with a strong POV. Strong, strong, all day long.”
“How?”
“Because she doesn’t question herself, even though the people in her life, and society at large, question her life choices.”
“So, people are confused by her?”
“Kind of! Everyone thinks she’s a hot mess, but she doesn’t think that!”
“Is that going to confuse the audience?”
That’s the part where I’d deflate (only on the inside), like a day-old balloon.
It felt like a child asking me an absurdly simple question, like, “Why does the mailman deliver mail?” It’s like: How deep do you want me to answer this, kid? Do you want me to say, “Cuz that’s his job”? Or do you want me to go into a detailed history of the United States Postal Service? Or do you want me to get into why people even write letters? Or have to pay bills?
So I’d answer the children executives with:
“No, the audience won’t be confused. What’s funny is how she reacts to the world reacting to her, because she truly doesn’t seem to fit in anywhere, even though she’s a functioning adult! Which is very relatable! Don’t we all feel that way?”
See, there’s usually no template for a woman like this, unless, of course, she’s a slut or a drunk (nothing wrong with either, but that wasn’t my angle).
I’d usually say, “Imagine if this were a man; it would be like a character Seth Rogen might play.”
They’d light up. We know that name! Seth Rogen! A man!
Then they’d go dark again. “But it’s a woman.”
Yes. It’s a woman.
At one point, a man said to me, “I don’t get it. How could she be a woman but be like Seth Rogen?”
That’s when I grew so exasperated that I said:
“WOMEN ARE LITERALLY HUMANS!”
Silence. Then I did my usual cover, where I said that so many people (of course, no one in this room!) think women are either mothers, or wanna-be mothers, or powerful executives who are bitches, but most women are just humans, doing their best, making tons of mistakes, and feeling judged (like me, right now, in this pitch!). The room would be like, “Oh, totally. We hate people who don’t understand that. Well, thanks for coming in.”
That’s the origin story of the “Women Are Literally Humans” tank top, designed with a 1970s-ish font and color scheme. A lot of people think it’s a deep political statement, like a “Get Your Laws Off My Body” kind of thing. That works too, if that’s what you want to wear it for. But the original intent was simply to state that women are humans. Period. I’d love to make a shirt that says, “Dear God, can women be mediocre sometimes?” or “What’s with this Strong Female POV bullshit?”
If you’re a woman who is literally a human, perhaps you want to wear this tank top at the gym while you’re selecting those 5-pound weights, or at home while you’re having a hot flash. Big shocker, even men can wear these, too! All genders are welcome. There are two styles of tank: a sleeveless top and a racerback.
These are made by Seen Merch, produced in America and shipped to you from their warehouse, where they live. It’s a great company, and I’m trying to get rid of all my merch since I don’t tour anymore. So if you want one of these tanks, conceived of by me and my true Hollywood story, get them before they’re gone!
I’ll make it super easy with details below.
In the blue racerback tank see below for how many are left in each size:
S (sold out), M (8), L (5), XL (7), 2X (sold out)
In the black sleeveless tank:
S (5), M (15), L (10), XL (7)
xo, jen
An extremely Jen Kirkman experience.
Oh gods, I feel this in my SOUL. I remember trying to explain why a woman character wanted to have sex. I'm, thinking, like, "well, see, there's this sensation you get in your body... for me it's the clitoris..."