With a US population of over 300 million and a world population of 6.5 billion, there are many more than 10,000 people who could do just as good a job. Anyone who ever was a stand up comic could take the place of a TV writer. I have friends in the business who tell me there are many out of work actors, writers, directors and producers who could do this kind of work. Just like there are many good performers who will not get there chance to show what they can do. Most of these folks have the job they have because they had a mentor who knew someone with influence as well as being talented. I am not standing with management at all but let's be realistic about this. Every once and a while I watch an old movie on TCM. This experience serves me well. It is a constant reminder as to how bad the writing is on today's state of the art TV soaps, sitcoms and movies. When they are not making remakes, they are making sequels to remakes.
The arts has very little to do with the ability to do the job, and everything to do with the desire to do the job. I’ve seen amazing artwork on the walls of mid-level executives who are weekend painters. They just don’t want to take the necessary risks required by the art world. I can’t blame them — their home, family, car, kids’ futures etc. are more important than the art. The poet, Wallace Stevens, of course, was the exception: An insurance lawyer who wrote and published brilliant poems “on the side.”
That eliminates about 99% of the people capable of doing the work.
Of the other 1% — which is still a large number of folks —many of them just don’t know the process of getting to the work. I’ve know a bunch of comics who were brilliant writers, but they spend their best creative years in a daze of one club date after another — basically a decade or more of club dates in a haze of alcohol and waitresses. At the end of the run, they’re standing in an empty parking lot late at night, alone, thinking, “Wha, wha happened?”
As for the rest, it’s like any other job. Yeah, a mentor helps, but so does offering a “comfort level” to prospective employers — does the guy look right, sound right, present themselves right?
It is a constant reminder as to how bad the writing is on today’s state of the art TV soaps, sitcoms and movies. When they are not making remakes, they are making sequels to remakes
The writing is usually bad for the same reason Red Lobster or Olive Garden is bad — they have to appeal to the greatest number of people to get eyeballs on the screen. And, there’s too much money involved to take a risk on the unproven.