Television Show Creator and Writer
Now before you go off and say, “Hey, that’s two careers,” let me explain what a Television Show Creator and Writer does. As a Television show Creator, you would create a television show, write the pilot (very first) episode of the series, and from there, you would dictate and orchestrate all creative aspects of said television show. As a Television Writer, you would write for that television show, as well as work with its creative aspects.
As far as working conditions go, normally, it is a clean and comfortable environment. But as a television show writer (especially a science fiction writer), you would be required to go to many locations, outside of the studio. Since this career involves a significant amount of travel, endurance and stamina is required. You must be ready to journey to several places, even with adverse weather, and unpleasant, sometimes dangerous conditions. In the studio however, it is not much easier, both actors and crew must be able to withstand the heat produced by the stage lights. As a creator, I would also most likely be a produce, which means a GREAT deal of stress to meet deadlines and do what needs to be done. As a writer, it’s not much different, stressful deadlines, but you must also deal with a great amount of criticism. Your employers don’t always want what you have, they want what they WANT you to have, which means turning a few scripts into different ones. There is no questioning that this career entails a demanding and uncertain nature.
As the head writer, creator, or any writer on the writer’s staff, it would be my duty to make sure an episode of the show I’m working on is ready to go by each deadline, without any problems or complications. As a creator, I would write the pilot episode, and the practical Bible of the entire series the other writers and I to follow to make the series what it was intended to be. As a writer, it would be my job to find new, fun, and exciting adventures for the cast to take on for every episode. Under all the pressure of deadlines and so forth, I must always do the best work I can.
Unusual hours are to be expected in this kind of work. Given the unusualness of the entire career, hours can be un predictable, and 42% of the industry having part-time or variable schedules does not help in finding a generic amount of working hours. However, a study showed that in 2006, workers averaged about 29 hours of work per week.
There are several similar careers to this, novelist, columnist, journalist, the list goes on forever; but my most favorite one is, Screenwriter. A screenwriter writes movies instead of television. Screen in the word screenwriter comes from the word, screenplay, which is the skeleton, if you will, of the entire movie. A teleplay is what makes a television show episode.
My interests make me quite qualified for this career, especially as a science fiction writer. I’ve loved science fiction for a long time, and I’ve always been fascinated by the doors that it opened. Plus, I love to entertain people.
As a writer you need to be imaginative, fun, and VERY fast with a keyboard. You need to love what you do, telling stories and entertaining the masses, otherwise it just becomes a constant exercise in exhaustion and is just no fun.
As far as education goes, High School education is to be expected. A theater tech degree can help greatly with getting you onto the set of a television show. A degree in English or Journalism doesn’t hurt a bit either.
Television writers earn, on average, $85,000 a year. The top 10% of America’s television writers earn approximately $97,700 a year. In my opinion, this is not a large pay check, which means, like teachers, you’ve got to love what you do.
The need for writers, producers, editors, etcetera has been a rapidly growing dilemma ever since 2006, and they expect that this need will keep growing until 2016.
People may ask, “Why pick this job? It pays low, you work abnormal hours, you’re constantly overstressed,” but I still think that writing is for me. In my opinion, I think television has shaped our society a great deal ever since its beginning. Arguments about if television has raised violence in people aside, television has inspired people to do things, maybe not through its fiction, but through other things as well. Television allows us to spread the word around the world, sharing our stories and our events with one another. As a television writer, I want to be someone who inspires people, who shapes a generation.
After doing all of this research, I can safely say that I still do wish to be a Television Show Creator and Writer when I get the chance.
