Film Sh!t

Waiting for Hollywood to “pick you” can rot your brain. So we sit down with our friend Sydney Steinberg writer, actor, comedian, and unapologetic maker and talk about what actually happens when you try to build a real career in TV and film without a linear path or a safety net. Sydney takes us from growing up in San Diego, using comedy to cope with a dark and lonely stretch, to finding freedom at...

I love talking to people who prove that a creative career is built, not “found,” and Adrian Todd Zuniga is exactly that kind of artist. He is a novelist, a live show creator (Literary Death Match), and now a filmmaker, and our conversation starts where the real story always starts: childhood, attention, and that first moment where you realize you can make something out of nothing. We talk about ho...

A single yes can change your life, but so can a no. I’m joined by Emily Pendergast, Groundlings Main Company performer, writer, and actor on Veep and Amazon Prime’s Company Retreat, to talk about the long stretch between wanting a creative career and actually building one. We start in Ohio with cornfields, big family energy, and early comedy education from SNL and the people who could turn a heavy...

A creative life rarely moves in a straight line, and Brett Maline’s story makes that clear real fast. We start in Minden, Nebraska, where he grows up with a rare spinal condition and something even rarer: a community that practices true inclusion and expects him to compete, contribute, and lead. That foundation becomes a quiet superpower later, when the film industry and TV industry test confidenc...

The entertainment industry loves a clean label it can sell. Real artists are messier than that, and that mess is often where the best work comes from. I’m Nate Caywood, a Los Angeles cinematographer, and I sit down with actor, writer, dancer, choreographer, and musician McKenna Melvin for a raw conversation about what it actually costs to build a life in Hollywood. McKenna takes us from Saratoga t...

A career can start with a plan or it can start with a hard left turn. Jerry Ying’s story is the second kind: pre med in New York, zero interest in drama, then one decision to step into a more creative life and everything changes. We talk about the unexpected on ramps that actually build an acting career, from waiting tables in Soho to modeling gigs to booking major commercials when there were few...

Heather LeRoy’s career path doesn’t follow a neat map, and that’s exactly why it’s useful. We sit down as friends and working artists and trace how a kid on a dead-end road in Alabama turns Saturday Night Live obsession into a real creative life: New York acting classes, Emerson film school, Los Angeles stand-up, and eventually a feature film that refuses to play it safe. We get into the messy, pr...

What does it really take to turn heartbreak into a career breakthrough? We sit down with actor-writer Michael Strassner for a raw, generous conversation about the long road from Baltimore movie kid to leading an indie feature that filled 500 theaters and won the South by Southwest Audience Award. It starts with early laughs—Robin Williams, Jim Carrey, wrong-shoe bits—and the thrill of seeing his o...

We trace Echo Kellum’s path from Chicago theater kid to network TV mainstay and Groundlings main company member, unpacking the reps, routines, and recalibrations that made the career possible. We talk tests, pilots, improv breakthroughs, and why making your own work is the new default. Echo opens up about bullying, a life‑shifting hip‑hop summer, and stepping into (and out of) organized religion w...