As promised, I'm passing on some more of the lessons I learned following the career of Brandon Tartikoff. It was easy to follow. He worked in the public eye much like an athlete or actor. When NBC's shows were hits, he was praised. And when they flopped, the critics roasted him. Under those circumstances you have to develop a tough skin and a sense of humor to survive.
Brandon Tartikoff knew televison was a business of ideas. In his memoir, The Last Great Ride, he wrote "Ideas are the key to everything ... Good ideas don't come along very often and they can't be constructed at will. I myself have had at least one Misfits of Science and one Manimal for every Miami Vice. That's to be expected, and it's nothing to get depressed about. It takes just a few good creative flashes to work economic wonders."
That's why I urge you to work on multiple projects. You probably never saw Misfits of Science or Manimal (I did, but I was TV junkie) but they certainly weren't hits. But NBC didn't know that until they aired them. You never know which of your ideas will find an audience until you put it out there and get a response.
The second lesson is that, no matter how good your ideas are, the details of how you create the show are crucial. Tartikoff gave producer Michael Mann a two word phrase of an idea -- MTV Cops -- from which Michael Mann created Miami Vice. His execution of that idea changed the way dramas looked on television forever. What would you do with that idea? What would another producer do? It's not just the idea, but the show you create, that becomes the hit. Ideas are important, but the show you create from the idea is what people will see.
So keep developing your ideas, and don't worry if one or two of them don't work. You will develop one that will work, if you keep at it.
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