SOC'S OFFICIAL PODCAST

Hosted & Produced by Grace Ibrahim & SOC's Communications & Outreach Office.
LISTEN NOW

Contact Us

(202) 885-2058

McKinley Building on a map

School of Communication 4400 Massachusetts Avenue NW Washington, DC 20016 United States

American University School of Communication

Media in the Mix

Welcome to "Media in the Mix," the only podcast produced and hosted by the School of Communication at American University. Join us as we create a safe space to explore topics and communication at the intersection of social justice, tech, innovation & pop culture. Stream on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Anchor, and Amazon Music. Watch on Spotify and YouTube.

Now Playing:

Videos in this Playlist

Videos in this playlist

To play a specific video, use the playlist icon in the player or view each video on YouTube.

LATEST EPISODE

Advice with SOC's Very Own: Erin McGoff

Join us this week on Media in the Mix as we sit down with SOC alum Erin McGoff (SOC/BA'17), an award-winning documentary filmmaker, director, and content creator.

After graduating from AU, Erin received a prestigious fellowship from the Pulitzer Center to create her debut feature documentary, THIS LITTLE LAND OF MINES, which shines a light on the unexploded bombs still impacting communities in Laos. The film went on to receive international distribution, playing at festivals around the world, including Mill Valley and Stockholm.

In addition to her documentary work, Erin is the founder of Grey Films and has directed a range of short documentaries, including SOUTHERN SUSTAINABILITY (2018) and NEW YORK IS SILENT (2020), collaborating with clients like Google, National Geographic, and PBS.

Beyond filmmaking, Erin has built a massive following on TikTok and Instagram, where her niche is providing candid and humorous life and career advice to an audience of over 4.5 million followers. She’s known for demystifying the job market for Gen Z and Millennials, offering tips on everything from resumes to interviews through her platform, AdviceWithErin. Featured in publications like the New York Times, CNBC, and Fortune, Erin’s content has made her a go-to voice for career guidance.

This is a conversation you don’t want to miss—tune in as we explore Erin’s journey from filmmaking to content creation, and her mission to educate and inspire.

LISTEN HERE:

Transcription

00:00:00:00 - 00:00:23:11

Erin

So imagine this. This is what I teach. Your life is like a sandwich. And your job is like a tomato. And so if you are only having a tomato for lunch every day, it can be the juiciest, ripest, most amazing tomato in the world. And you're like, oh my gosh, I'm so lucky to have this tomato. But if you're just eating a tomato every day for lunch, that's not good for you.

00:00:23:11 - 00:00:40:03

Erin

It's not nutritious. You're going to get sick of it. And also, what if one day that tomato’s soggy, then your whole lunch sucks? So what you got to do is you got to work on your sandwich. You got to put in exercise, a little bit of lettuce. Oh, okay. Now we're talking about a caprese salad with some balsamic vinegar.

00:00:40:10 - 00:01:05:03

Erin

Ooh, maybe that's knitting. You have to add more to your life. Seeing your friends, joining a volleyball club, walking your dog, and volunteering is massively helpful. Getting perspective. The less work becomes the center fold of your life. You have to decenter work from your life.

00:01:05:05 - 00:01:43:27

Grace

Welcome to In the Mix, the only podcast produced and hosted by the School of Communication at American University. Join us as we create a safe space to explore topics and communication at the intersection of social justice, tech, innovation, and pop culture. Welcome back to Media in the Mix. I'm your host, Grace, and today we have an exciting guest, Erin McGoff. She is an award winning documentary filmmaker, director, editor and focuses on impactful storytelling. After graduating from our very own School of Communication at American University in 2017, she received a Pulitzer Center Fellowship for her debut feature documentary, This Little Land of Mines which was on Amazon and garnered festival accolades in international distribution.

00:01:43:29 - 00:02:04:04

Grace

She's also directed other shorts like Southern Sustainability in 2018 and New York Is Silent in 2020, and has done commercial work with major brands, which we can talk about today as well. In 2021, she gained popularity on TikTok and Instagram for her career advice channel advice, with Erin amassing over 5 million followers. She's been featured in major publications.

00:02:04:04 - 00:02:33:23

Grace

And what I just saw recently that you had your very first TV appearance about that as well. I know we shared that on our SOC page. Everyone is super excited to see it and recently launched a YouTube show called No One Knows What They're Doing, which I feel that I do definitely. Anyway, yes, I just want to say how excited I am to have you on, and I'd really love to just kind of dive, take you down a little memory lane, kind of with your time at SOC.

00:02:33:25 - 00:02:48:07

Grace

So if you don't mind just starting with that kind of telling us a little bit about your time at SOC. If there were, like, any highlights or a class you loved or a project that stood out to you, kind of where you're at there, of course.

00:02:48:10 - 00:03:17:18

Erin

Yeah. Well, first of all, thank you so much for having me. I'm so excited to be talking to another Eagle. Yeah. So I actually transferred into American. I went to Drexel University in Philadelphia. My freshman year didn't love it that I went to Scotland for a semester, and I studied wine, which is really fun. But I yeah, but I was there during the Scottish referendum when Scotland was trying to actually leave, the UK, and that was when I kind of made my first documentary and got into documentary, and I realized that AU was a great place for me to maybe transfer.

00:03:17:21 - 00:03:37:15

Erin

I was from the DC area, and so I transferred back there and immediately it clicked. It just felt so right. I loved everybody I met, found everybody so interesting and fascinating. I loved living in DC. And yeah, I just I'm so happy that I ended up there.

00:03:37:17 - 00:03:56:06

Grace

And can you tell us a little bit about this Pulitzer fellowship that you got? Is that through you?

00:03:56:08 - 00:04:13:13

Erin

Yeah. So my senior year, I sign up for an alt break. I don’t know if this is still a thing, but it was over Christmas break. I think. And we went to Laos to study the impact of unexploded ordnance. Allowed sources. The most, heavily bombed country per capita in the history of the world. The US bombed labs during the Vietnam War, during the secret war. And I joined that program because I actually visited Laos in high school and found it to be the most beautiful place I'd ever been in my life, and I hadn't heard much about it. But when I was there, I didn't see any bombs. Everybody there was incredibly kind, so I had been very interested in this topic.

00:04:13:15 - 00:04:29:25

Erin

So I went there, you know, we met with the ambassador and it was just this incredible program where I got to really learn a lot about Laos, like we met with monks and politicians, and it was just it was life changing. And I realized that I had so much information. I had all these connections to Lao people.

00:04:29:25 - 00:04:46:22

Erin

And I was like, you know, I'm going to bring this story back to America. And it was Bill Gentile is one of my favorite professors in American. He's amazing. And, he he made it happen. I made a little short teaser, and I just said this is something that I want to cover. He was, like, Erin you’d be a

00:04:46:22 - 00:05:10:08

Erin

great fit for a student fellowship. at the Pulitzer Center. And I can swear he actually recently just left the Pulitzer Center, was a great mentor, and they supported my project, and it was, fantastic. Yeah.

00:05:10:11 - 00:05:24:26

Grace

That’s amazing. We’ve had the our last three guests have mentioned Bill in their like, their SOC career. And it’s just so awesome to hear those shout outs because he’s still doing that and he’s still doing that for our students. It's so cool to hear. Yeah, he really is. He really is. And I guess I'm going to jump to this question just because that kind of plays off of this. But do you have any advice for our students? In terms of like networking with your professors and kind of like getting to know your professors?

00:05:24:26 - 00:05:42:19

Grace

Because we try with this podcast also to kind of like break that barrier a little bit. I know sometimes it can be intimidating or you're extremely introverted, so it's just not something you want to do, beyond class, but can you just kind of shed light on just the positives to that?

00:05:42:22 - 00:06:03:24

Erin

Oh my goodness. I went to office hours as much as I possibly could. I remember I would go to Chris Palmer's office hours all the time. I think it was like once a week, maybe every other week I go and we would just talk about our careers, and he would just give me like general life advice. And I don't know why anybody wouldn't go to those. It's like one on one mentoring with people who have been where you have been and they have connections, industry connections in DC.

00:06:03:24 - 00:06:20:17

Erin

And it's just like, that's a great way to get internships and get opportunities. I mean, I think the network that American provided was actually more valuable in a lot of ways. And like the things I actually learned in class, I mean, I learned great things in class, but getting access to the professors was actually what made the largest impact in my life.

00:06:20:19 - 00:06:49:03

Grace

That's awesome. And you're right in DC too. So yeah, that's really valuable as well. And then just a little side note on kind of this, project that you did when you went to Laos. So what advice do you have? Because we get this question a lot when you're stepping into another culture, maybe, or a group of people that you might not be around every day or might not know even let's say you don't know much about it, but you want to do this project. Is there kind of any advice on how you navigated that?

00:06:49:05 - 00:07:04:06

Erin

Oh, absolutely. Hire them and get out of their way. That's exactly what I did. And I can't I don't see another way of doing that. I hired a Lao production company. I worked with a Lao producer. Every I they I had them do most of it.

00:07:04:06 - 00:07:18:00

Erin

I raised the money here, and then I sent it to them. I didn't even pay for me to go over there for development, cause I was like, what am I going to do? I don't, I mean, I speak a little Lao, but like, they're the people who are gifted and talented and they they know. But what I really brought to the project was an American perspective.

00:07:18:00 - 00:07:37:11

Erin

Like, for example, my Lao producer, he didn't understand that Americans didn't know. So we actually had to collaborate and work together to make a product that Americans would actually be able to understand. So that's what was really beautiful about that project was it was a collaboration between me and Lao people to really make something that would translate and write, you know, and educate Americans properly.

00:07:37:13 - 00:07:59:17

Grace

That's awesome. Good for you. That's actually a really good point, because sometimes it's like we would just even if we tried our hardest, we still wouldn't know kind of what to do or. Yeah, that makes a lot of sense. I love that. Any pointers on how to like pitch ideas? Like when you come up with a documentary idea and you're pitching or you're kind of like bringing this idea to light, do you have any advice there?

00:07:59:20 - 00:08:22:07

Erin

Yeah. So the documentary landscape has dramatically changed in the past four years. And it's like very, very different. So like when I graduated from a AU, it was like, okay, you know, you pitched like a sales agent or you pitch a, production company that already works with Netflix a lot, and then they greenlight it, and then you go make sure you get a pre-sale nowadays.

00:08:22:07 - 00:08:42:12

Erin

So the, the big financiers, and distributors, Netflix, HBO, Hulu, all of them are more internalized. So you really have to get into the companies to really get anything greenlit, and they like to work with people they've already worked with. So I would recommend anybody out there who's, like, really trying to get some. There are two different approaches you can take.

00:08:42:12 - 00:09:02:10

Erin

You can get something pre-sale like pre funded, which is incredibly difficult if you're early in your career because they're just not going to gamble on you like the amount of people who've tried to shove me off my own projects because they're like, it's just semantics. And I'm like, okay then. Yeah. Anyway, and try to put somebody like a big notable older male director on.

00:09:02:12 - 00:09:22:16

Erin

It happens a lot, it happens a lot. So getting a presale is really difficult if you're early on in your career. The other way to do it is to like, raise money, grants are usually waste of time, you can try grants. They are really slow and usually not that much money. Fundraise, you know, on Indiegogo or something like that.

00:09:22:23 - 00:09:39:09

Erin

And then you can kind of fund to make a sizzle, and that's how you can kind of ship it out. But nowadays, like the most the most of the film that you can make yourself the better off you are. I would avoid, like if you have the choice between two projects, one that you can just kind of go make and one where you like really need funding to do it.

00:09:39:12 - 00:09:56:25

Erin

I would pick the one that you can just go make on your own, like Bing Lou made Minding the Gap, which like crushed Sundance a few years before the pandemic. And he just made that on his own and with his own camera. And it just, like, boosted his career. And you see that over and over again with Sundance.

00:09:56:28 - 00:10:25:05

Erin

So I recommend, like this Little Land of Mines. I ran like three crowdfunding campaigns. I applied to hundreds of grants. I stayed up until 4 a.m. all the time. I didn't get any of them like I got a few, but like, you know, it's really, really hard. Yeah. And so you just got to figure out, like, what films recently got made and how did they get made and who made them, and then message those people and be like, hey, I have a concept drive and unique access is a big thing.

00:10:25:10 - 00:10:49:13

Erin

A notable figure attached to those are things that people are really looking for nowadays. And if it's having to do the sports or, music niches or any type of celebrity money, but if it's having to do with anything like in the environment or politics, they don't really want.. It's very sorry guys if that’s disheartening, that’s just very like

00:10:49:13 - 00:11:09:13

Erin

No, this is a part of it because I feel like we do. The reason why I started this podcast is because things like that that I really appreciate when, you kind of get a really transparent look, just for anything, really anything but more so, like what to expect when you go into the process.

00:11:09:13 - 00:11:29:15

Grace

I think that sometimes can help, like ease a lot of anxiety of like, I have this idea we're going to go forth, but what to expect, you know, and I feel like that like there are some blows and it like lessens the blow a little bit, you know?

00:11:29:18 - 00:11:45:25

Erin

Yeah. And you’re totally right. Like, just don’t look abandoned projects just kind of keep them in your back pocket and maybe like something big will happen on film, you know, when you can. Documentaries are just a labor of love. And there was a golden age, I think, for a while there, and the Golden Globes unfortunately, kind of dulled a little bit. Yeah. But there's still a lot of money in the film industry and a lot of money to be made, but it's just more about who, you know now more than ever.

00:11:45:28 - 00:12:06:06

Erin

So the more people, you can know, don't ever burn bridges. Just yeah, just get to know a lot of people. That's really like, it's really going to help you.

00:12:06:08 - 00:12:26:00

Grace

Yeah. And kind of like, move with the times, I guess. I really appreciated that you said that recently, too, about AI. I’m just like how I think we were so scared that was just gonna, like, take over. But now it really is like, do you know AI? Like, can you use AI? Because that's probably likely going to be the next step of like, okay, who can use it? Who can run it, who can kind of you know.

00:12:26:05 - 00:12:43:11

Erin

It’s like any new technology, I think it’s overblown short term, but under blown long term. I think now people are kind of realizing that all these AI systems aren’t as great as people thought they were going to be. But they will be like in ten years. They're going to be incredible. But right now it's like it's sloppy. It's like when the first MacBook came out and now we look at it, we're like, oh, that thing was ugly. We're just in the beginning stages of it. And it's scary, but it's the way it is.

00:12:43:13 - 00:13:05:00

Grace

It is, I know, but it's like the more, you know, I guess the better at this point. So it's like more you can learn, I don't know. We'll see, we’ll see. Yeah. Exactly. We'll see how that goes. Reading your bio, there's so much that you're doing in all aspects of media. So can you kind of just give us like a look into kind of a day in your life or just like a week into your life and how you sort of touch on all these aspects of media?

00:13:05:00 - 00:13:27:04

Erin

Yeah. So I'm self-employed. I run my own, production company called Gray Films. I'm in New York City, and then I have Advice with Erin, which is, my like social media side. So I kind of split up my professional career into two categories. One side is documentary filmmaking, and the other side is running this like media platform where I give career life and not financial advice, but education.

00:13:27:07 - 00:13:41:17

Erin

And I help people just learn about kind of like the hidden curriculum of adulthood, things that we don't learn in school. And maybe wealthier kids learn from their parents, but the rest of the kids just kind of have to fend for themselves. You know, how to make a resumé, how mortgages and credit cards work, things like that.

00:13:41:19 - 00:14:00:20

Erin

And that's something that I'm really passionate about doing. In addition to documentary filmmaking. But to be quite frank, documentary filmmaking isn't a sustainable career. It's not. You can't do it full time unless you have financial support from outside, right? A spouse, you know, who's willing to do that, or you're willing to live on the cheap, or you have parents.

00:14:00:22 - 00:14:18:17

Erin

And the documentary film industry in general has been going through a really, really rough period the past few years. So, I have projects in development, everybody's projects in development. I have some projects in production. But mainly I've been focusing on Advice with Erin, because what I've realized is that, I want to make a positive impact in the world.

00:14:18:19 - 00:14:40:08

Erin

I want to, like, empower people with information, to unite humanity. That's why I got into documentary. I wanted to make positive documentaries that told truth and and revealed stories, but at the end of the day, made the world a better place. And I realized that if that's my overall mission, a great way to do that, and actually a more efficient and effective way to do that is through social media.

00:14:40:11 - 00:14:59:18

Erin

And so from 2020 to 2022, I actually worked at National Geographic. They hired me to creatively direct and launch their TikTok account. And that was a really great way for me to meld my two passions together. But yeah, I mean, you know, working in media these days is definitely interesting.

00:14:59:21 - 00:15:16:07

Grace

It’s up and down. It’s just like up and down. You never really know what to expect. Follow up question to that, kind of based on how the world came to be after the pandemic. And then it was just kind of like we're slowly trying to still, I feel like ease back into it. And they're saying, like Covid has taken another turn now, so it's just a lot going on.

00:15:16:07 - 00:15:33:25

Grace

How did you navigate that kind of I guess it was only really just two ish years after graduation. So it's like it was that also part of the reason why you kind of launched Advice with Erin? Because you were like, you know what, this is a tool I can do at home. I can do from anywhere. Can you just kind of shed light on that as well?

00:15:33:27 - 00:15:54:17

Erin

Absolutely. So I graduated and I couldn't get a full time job because I was headed off to Laos in a few months to film. So I started to freelance in the DC and Baltimore area just to make ends meet. I moved back home with my parents and I just was hustling. I mean, I was working on reality TV, commercial. I was spending so much time in my car, 14 hour days.

00:15:54:17 - 00:16:09:28

Erin

It was it was a grind. And I liked it, you know, it was it was really tough. But I was just trying to make, you know, maybe like 200 bucks a day. Like it just was a grind. Learning a lot about the film industry. And, I went and made my documentary. I'm very, very proud of what I accomplished.

00:16:09:28 - 00:16:26:26

Erin

It premiered it in 2019, bootstrapped every last penny to pay for it. And, yeah, we premiered it. It was it was fantastic. You know, it played at Mill Valley won all these awards. And then I moved to New York City off of the heels of that. And I was like, had all these meetings set up, these great production companies.

00:16:26:26 - 00:16:45:12

Erin

I had my freelance editing career. I was, you know, charging great hourly rates. I was working on projects I liked. Life was so good. And then three months later, the pandemic crushed New York. And it I had a few projects that were lingering, but then pretty much everything dried up. And fortunately I had a little bit of an emergency fund.

00:16:45:14 - 00:17:03:27

Erin

That I could use. And I was living with my husband, but it really, really dried up there for everybody. Yeah. And, so I downloaded TikTok just like every other millennial. And I got scared and deleted it. And then I re downloaded it, and I thought it was cool how people were using the platform to tell stories.

00:17:03:27 - 00:17:21:29

Erin

And, I thought was really cool how videos could reach people through this very powerful algorithm. And I thought it might be a cool way to help people educate them about the film industry, because I find that the film industry is an incredibly unequal place. It's just not a meritocracy at all. So it's like, what if I could, you know, help people like, learn how to actually get on set?

00:17:21:29 - 00:17:39:14

Erin

And so I make these little videos about like, what's a producer versus a director? So that some kid who maybe couldn't afford to go to film school could just, like, maybe learn something for my videos. Anyway, so I was given career advice for the film industry, and it was just going viral. People were loving my advice and they were asking me to make it more general.

00:17:39:21 - 00:17:59:20

Erin

And getting career advice is always something that I've been passionate about. In college, I would sit in the Dav and I would help people with their resumes. That was like a hobby of mine. So, it's always been a passion. I started making the videos. They just started going really viral. I was very up against taking it seriously because I was like, I'm a documentary filmmaker.

00:17:59:23 - 00:18:25:26

Erin

I'm not an influencer. I don't want to be an influencer. Then I realized you can just be both. I can have both aspects of my career. And I left my job at Nat Geo in 2022, and now I've been doing Advice with Erin more full time.

00:18:25:28 - 00:18:44:01

Grace

Wow, I love that. That’s awesome. And I guess just a quick, follow up question to that should people fear freelance and being self-employed, can you I know we’ve we’ve actually talked about that a lot. And people are like, it's like the inconsistency in the making money. And you know what? Like how what does that look like. And I know it clearly is going so well for you. So just any, any advice on kind of not just don't fear it, try it. And it could be the lifestyle that's right for you.

00:18:44:04 - 00:19:04:20

Erin

Yeah. So I think there's two things. The first thing is that I don't think freelancing or being a business owner is for everyone, I really don't. I think that if you're not motivated or driven by like money, or independence and being able to control your time. So for me, time is a big thing. I just, I did the corporate thing and I was like, I hate someone telling me to come in and having to ask permission to go on vacation.

00:19:04:20 - 00:19:24:17

Erin

I was like, this is gross. So that's like, why I really love freelancing. And I've been doing it for seven years. And then the other side of it is that people say, you know why I want a job? Because it's it's stable. And I was like that because I'm like, being a freelancer. Being self-employed is actually more stable, in my opinion, than being employed by somebody else, because no one can lay me off.

00:19:24:17 - 00:19:40:01

Erin

Nobody can fire me. I, I if I want more money, I go out and make more money. It's actually very, very stable. What you need to do is be extremely good with money. You need you need to be on top of your shit when it comes to money. You have to have a good emergency fund, and that isn't going to happen overnight.

00:19:40:01 - 00:19:58:07

Erin

You kind of need to ease into your freelancing career as you work your day job. Don't quit your day job. And then once you can beef up that emergency fund in case of a global pandemic, and you have your retirement fund, and if you're over 26, have your health care fund figured out, it can be the most liberating thing in the world I've made.

00:19:58:08 - 00:20:18:22

Erin

I made six figures, and I was 25, and I was taking off basically the entire month of July, you know? Yeah, it can be really liberating. So if anybody's listening to this and you're thinking about freelancing, I would say like, just try it on the side. And if you start getting clients and you start getting to a point where you can't balance both jobs anymore and you have that emergency fund take the leap, it might be the best thing you've ever done.

00:20:18:25 - 00:20:33:11

Grace

Yeah, I love that. Such good points there too, that we don't really think about. I it's like, you know what? It really is, the way you look at things. So I think that's another good point for people. Yeah. It's all about perspective. And, you know, it's all relative to like what makes you happy. But I do agree with a lot of that.

00:20:33:11 - 00:20:52:24

Grace

And then would you say that you had a lot of repeat clients, like was it once you like networked with somebody that that work was kind of like, oh, we have Erin. Let's reach out to Erin.

00:20:52:26 - 00:21:10:17

Erin

Oh yeah. That’s for the being great to work with tool comes in. People hire people they like. So, I’m a big perma-lancer. People. This is something that I teach. I have a freelancing, webinar that I do, but, where you want to get it is to a point where you're relapsing with companies where you're on, like, three month contracts, or maybe you're on, like, you know, a retainer model. And so people think, like, when you're freelancing, you're constantly clawing for new clients.

00:21:10:20 - 00:21:25:12

Erin

That's maybe true if you're a bad freelancer, if you're a great freelancer, the companies are going to be begging you to be full time. The amount of companies that tried to get me to sign up to be a W2 worker for them, and I was like, no, stay away. I'm not coming to your all hands meetings, okay?

00:21:25:12 - 00:21:45:15

Erin

Yeah. Separation church and state. Oh yeah. You need to yeah. Eventually you want to get to the point where you have, like, 3 or 4 clients who are paying big bucks to have you on their retainer. And that is like when you are coasting.

00:21:45:17 - 00:22:00:21

Grace

Okay. That’s good to know. I really love that. You just said, it’s kind of like how you are to work with it. Do you have any advice for students on kind of like what skills they can be working on right now? Because that all kind of plays into right after graduation. It starts. It could also start. I know a lot of students that we work with that are freelancing right now, which is like so awesome. Like, oh, that I would have been like, no, okay.

00:22:00:24 - 00:22:18:01

Grace

But yeah. Just any advice on like what skills they could be working on right now, even though maybe they're not in the workplace yet or they're kind of like not out there doing their thing yet.

00:22:18:03 - 00:22:33:16

Erin

These are great questions. I can so tell that you're an SOC student because they’re so great. So something that I try to teach, but it’s kind of hard on the internet. I'm, I’m, I mainly do it like one on one is to have a freelancer mindset. Even if you're trying to get a full time, like corporate job, a lot of the times people go into job interviews and they think, okay, I'm going to try to make my case to this company. And fingers crossed they're going to hire me.

00:22:33:24 - 00:22:55:03

Erin

No. When you're a freelancer and you interview with the company, which is why, like, I've done hundreds of interviews, when you're a freelancer, you're constantly interviewing, you know, you are a package deal. So, like, I am a professional video editor, I specialize in these things. And I'm seeing if this client would be a good fit for me and if I'd be a good fit for them.

00:22:55:03 - 00:23:15:24

Erin

It's a mutual decision. And I am like, I'm like a little company. I'm like a little package deal. Like they get my services and like, that's the mindset that a freelancer has. And I think that everybody should go into their career thinking about what, like what product are they like, what package are they? What is the company getting from you?

00:23:16:01 - 00:23:36:01

Erin

Like for example, with me as a freelancer, I say, yeah, I'm going to edit your video, I'm going to deliver them on time and I'm going to work with you until they are like, exactly what you want. And also I am going to be a pleasure to work with. When we get on meetings, I'm going to be present with you and I'm going to ask who your weekend was, and I'm going to have a joke and I'm going to, you know, not be in my pajamas.

00:23:36:01 - 00:23:53:07

Erin

You're going to like, working with me. And I think that's something that people have to, kind of like, shift your mindset. You know, when you're graduating college, you go in and you think, what do I have to offer? You have a lot to offer. When you first graduate, you have your youth, you have your time, you have your energy.

00:23:53:09 - 00:24:10:11

Erin

You are a sponge. You're like, that is so enticing to employers. So you just have to be confident and sell yourself. Again as like a imagine you’re specialist and they're hiring you for something.

00:24:10:13 - 00:24:30:09

Grace

And it’s, I guess all about self branding to, you know, kind of like how you want people to see you, which is so important.. So safe to say you're working on a lot, all the time. Any pointers on kind of how to avoid, like, burnout the best way you can? Obviously it can happen, and it's really good to listen to your body and your brain and everything that's kind of going on, while you're in that, like, cruise control mode. But yeah, just any advice on that?

00:24:30:09 - 00:24:50:10

Grace

Just kind of like, you know, I think we get caught up sometimes when we're working for ourselves of like, I can do this, I can keep going, I can hustle. But we do like to give advice on that work life balance because I think that's super important. So yeah. Any advice there?

00:24:50:13 - 00:25:07:26

Erin

Yeah, I speak on burnout a lot, and I also suffer from burnout a lot because I’m a total workaholic. So the way that I think about burnout is that there's two different types. There's physical burnout, and then there's emotional burnout. And a lot of times people suffer from both. But the physical burnout, for example, is like a stay at home mom. Like she's really passionate about her children. She loves her children, she loves caring for them, but she's just, like, physically exhausted.

00:25:07:29 - 00:25:23:13

Erin

And that can also be true if you're like a travel consultant or you work in the film industry like you love working on the set, but you are like physically depleted, like your back hurts, you got a headache, you're dehydrated. And then there is, emotional burnout where you're not physically depleted, but you're like, emotionally, just like, dead inside.

00:25:23:15 - 00:25:45:26

Erin

And you just like, you hate waking up in the morning. You get the Sunday scaries. You just feel like, like paralyzed. And that is a bit more difficult to address because there's not an easy solutions. Like with physical burnout, you can you can sleep you they're like they're objective solutions. But with an emotional burnout, you have to figure out what's going to work for you.

00:25:45:29 - 00:26:07:12

Erin

And they're many different things. Meditating in the morning, drinking more water, quitting your job, setting boundaries. I'm going to tell you one thing that I've consistently seen work over and over and over again. And nobody believes me unless they've done it or, unless they they do it and then they believe me anyway. Get a hobby. Get a hobby is.

00:26:07:12 - 00:26:25:12

Erin

Get a hobby. So a lot of the times what I see with burnout is that people's jobs are their luves like. They wake up, log in to their computer. You see this a lot with remote work. They log into their computer. They have no morning routine, no work life separation. They log off, turn on Netflix, go to bed.

00:26:25:16 - 00:26:43:23

Erin

There's no problem with working hard. You can work a ton and not get burnt out. There are people who work in the film industry who work 14 hour days consistently, and they don't get burnt out, and it's because they feel fulfilled in what they're doing. Okay, would you indulge me in my metaphor? I have a metaphor on burnout.

00:26:43:26 - 00:27:03:13

Erin

So imagine this. This is what I teach. Your life is like a sandwich, okay? And your job is like a tomato. And so if you are only having a tomato for lunch every day, it can be the juiciest, ripest, most, like amazing tomato in the world. You're like, oh my gosh, I'm so lucky to have this tomato.

00:27:03:19 - 00:27:20:14

Erin

But if you're just eating that tomato every day for lunch, you, that's not good for you. It's not nutritious. You're going to get sick of it. And also, what if one day that tomato soggy, then your whole lunch sucks? So what you have to do is you got to work on your sandwich. You got to put in exercise a little bit of lettuce.

00:27:20:18 - 00:27:48:03

Erin

Oh, okay. Now we're talking about a caprese salad. Put some balsamic vinegar. Ooh, maybe that's knitting you to add more to your life. And people hate this advice because they're like, Erin, I'm so exhausted. I can't add any I'm exhausted when I come home from work. It sounds so counterintuitive, but the more that you add other elements in, seeing your friends, joining a volleyball club, walking your dog, volunteering is massive for you.

00:27:48:06 - 00:28:19:02

Erin

For getting perspective. The less work becomes the centerfold in your life, you have to decenter work from your life. There's also an author named Arthur Brooks who writes on happiness, and he has some great articles on, like what makes you happy in your job? So I think it's also important to improve job satisfaction. But people focus, I think, a little too much on trying to make their job enjoyable, and not enough on trying to just adding more color to your life, more elements of that sandwich to just make a richer life outside of work.

00:28:19:05 - 00:28:45:29

Grace

I love that, and I actually just thought about one of the videos you made recently, which was like my before we even scheduled this podcast. It was like my epiphany moment because you made a video on like kind of like lifestyle versus do you want a career life or do you want a lifestyle life? And it just hit me that like I was leaning towards one when I was so unhappy, and I think I'm I should be on the other side of it, which is kind of like building things around my lifestyle.

00:28:46:19 - 00:29:01:25

Grace

Because I'm the same way. Like, I if I don't have a lot going on or if I'm not like, and I'm very like introverted too. So it's very interesting. But yeah, I have my days like it's like a mix, but yeah, I, I have recently gotten to stand up comedy, like, just like adding all these little things.

00:29:01:25 - 00:29:17:12

Grace

Yeah. It was so like it really. And it, I mean, I did it for two years now I'm kind of like taking a little break, kind of seeing what's next. But I've always wanted to be a comedy writer. So I was like, you know what? They always require that any job I've seen, they always say you have to have stand up experience.

00:29:17:15 - 00:29:35:08

Grace

So I felt like I was like checking off a box that was going to like, build another block on top of that block, you know, and it was such a game changer. Because I realized that a lot of it was like building my life around this career when it's the opposite for me. I'd rather like build everything around my lifestyle.

00:29:35:10 - 00:29:52:21

Grace

And so thanks for that. Yeah. I was like, I watched that and I was like, oh my God, I'm doing one and I want the other.

00:29:52:24 - 00:30:07:00

Erin

So you can still be incredibly ambitious and want a very specific job and be lifestyle oriented because, you know, for example, you said that you want to work in comedy. That’s great. You want to work at a job that's fun and that's based around comedy. I want I want to do that, too. That's why I use humor in my videos. That doesn’t. People get it confused because it's like, that doesn't mean that you, if you're like, self-centered, doesn't mean you're not ambitious in your in your job.

00:30:07:06 - 00:30:22:22

Erin

You want to do. I’m lifestyle centered. But if I wasn't lifestyle centered, I'd be living in L.A. working on a, Universal set right now. I don't want to be doing that with my days. I want to be home with my dog on my couch. So I found a way to work in entertainment, to work in media. And still be home with my dog on the couch.

00:30:22:25 - 00:30:39:03

Grace

Yeah, I love that. On the topic of burnout, comes the other side of that of like any just advice on time management because that's like a really big factor when you're managing your own time.

00:30:39:06 - 00:30:52:13

Erin

Yeah, especially when you’re self-employed and you’ve got no one telling you what to do and you’re going to be your own bad boss. Yeah. I mean, like when, when you're freelancing, it's easy because you have clients telling you what to do. But when you're running your own business, like me, and you got to tell other people what to do, oh my gosh, my assistant, I'm like, do we have to work today? And she's like, Erin, you got to work. And I'm like, oh, okay.

00:30:52:16 - 00:31:14:20

Erin

No. But I’m just kidding. Something that I two things that I really like and that I found after having to manage my own time for years and just not wanting to work, is one thing is, time blocking. So I go into my Mac, you know, MacBook, iCal or whatever it is, and I'll just block off, you know, everything that I'm doing, that day and I, I follow that.

00:31:14:20 - 00:31:28:11

Erin

I set little alarms so that if I'm writing, you gotta stop writing at 11 or. And you gotta go do this. So I set a little rule of myself like that. I have to eat lunch every day. I can watch a Ted talk while I eat lunch, but I can't scroll social media. You know, I've always like little rules for myself.

00:31:28:14 - 00:31:41:28

Erin

The other thing that I really like is this thing that I. This little thing that I made up called the 3 to 1 method. And basically every morning it lists out three work priorities. It's like three things that must get done. And if they don't get done, I'm going to be in trouble like they have to get done.

00:31:42:00 - 00:32:05:27

Erin

I can have other things that are secondary to that, but if I'm done with these three things, I can move on. But these are the priorities. And then two, health priorities, which can be as little as, like drink a glass of water in the morning or as big as, like, go run four miles and then, one fun thing every day. I think people should prioritize laughing every day. I think it’s a crime that we all are so sad all the time.

00:32:05:29 - 00:32:17:24

Grace

Yeah, yeah, that's that's a great way to put it. I feel like we're all really just sad all the time. That might be where my humor came from or just kind of like, well, I'm just gonna learn to laugh through this rather than cry.

00:32:17:24 - 00:32:34:02

Erin

You gotta laugh. I think learning how to laugh at things is emotionally intelligent. It is. And it's like, don't take yourself too seriously. You know? I just feel like I have to ask, how is it being on TV? That was so exciting. Oh yeah, you're all like, freaking out in the office. We were like, oh my gosh, Erin went on Fox today.

00:32:34:04 - 00:32:49:11

Grace

It is. And it’s like, don’t take yourself too seriously. You know? I just feel like I have to ask, how is it being on TV? That was so exciting. Oh yeah, you’re all like, freaking out in the office. We were like, oh my gosh, Erin went on Fox today. How is that different than kind of everything else you've been doing?

00:32:49:13 - 00:33:06:24

Erin

Yeah, it was a surprise. So Fox emailed me. And for the record, CNN has not emailed me. NBC has not been. Naomi Fox is the first one to reach out to me. And at first I was like, like, do I really wanna go on Fox News? But then not, you know, because it's just like, yeah, no matter where you stand politically, objectively, Fox News is polarizing. And I know that because I worked in journalism. And, but then I thought, wait, this is the most watched network in the world, and they want to interview me about Gen-Z in the workplace.

00:33:06:24 - 00:33:21:05

Erin

If I don't say yes, they're going to ask some other person and who knows who that's going to be. And this is my opportunity to speak to an audience. And yeah, I don't know, I was I was kind of flattered that they even somebody said my name in a meeting and they were they were open minded. And they want to they want to hear.

00:33:21:05 - 00:33:37:25

Erin

The thing is, it was wild. I live in New York. They sent a car. I went over, I know, and it was it was honestly a very pleasant experience. And also, they couldn't have been kinder. It was stressful because they don't tell you what they're going to be asking you before you go on.

00:33:38:08 - 00:33:57:19

Erin

Yeah, they they don’t prep you at all. They want you on the spot. And I didn't want to look like a fool. CNN called me. You know, everybody else can call me. But Fox called me first.

00:33:57:21 - 00:34:15:12

Grace

Shout out to anybody listening. Congratulations on that. That’s very cool. It’s like cool to just know that you’re reaching people, you know? And that's that's awesome. I guess now we're actually, you know, coming to the end. Where do you I know you have the production company. You have advice with Erin. Is there anywhere you see it going? Anywhere you want it to go? It just the next steps are kind of where are you at? Yeah. In your in your own professional growth.

00:34:15:14 - 00:34:32:11

Erin

It's a great question. I definitely have some very exciting projects, in the works that I can't quite announce yet. I hate when people say that, but I think it's actually true. Like, I feel like I have sympathy for that because it really is true sometimes. Like, you really can't say it's like such a diva, but like, I like, I'll get in trouble.

00:34:32:11 - 00:34:55:26

Erin

Like I'll say things like, Erin, you weren’t allowed. And I'm like, oh, sorry, sorry. But I have a couple irons in the coal. What is it? Rods on the fire. Had some juggling. I'm, like, so bad at saying phrases like. But, you know, overall, I think my goal is to read Reese Witherspoon.

00:34:55:26 - 00:35:17:02

Erin

It. I would like to eventually just start my own, like. I mean, I have my own production company, but like, fund my own projects, greenlight my own projects. Something that really bothers me about the film industry is how you just have to ask permission to do everything. And I feel like there's this club, and if you didn't get into this club before, like 2020, that you're just like not going to be able to be successful.

00:35:17:05 - 00:35:42:16

Erin

And so I would like to be able to take like listen to pitches and say, okay, let's do this. And then, you know, I don't know what the distribution is going to look like, in ten years. But I'm really interested in financial literacy. And like scams and fraud. That's something that I'm really fascinated. Yeah. And so, you know, maybe that could be some big projects down the road. Definitely working on some stuff there.

00:35:42:18 - 00:36:00:06

Grace

Yeah. That's awesome. And so important because they're really doing a good job these days with these scams. And so I've gotten a few of them and I'm like, what is going on? And you get so excited, which is why it's like such a crappy feeling, but that's awesome. That sounds great and good luck with everything.

00:36:00:13 - 00:36:18:25

Grace

Is there one piece of advice you would have liked to know early on in your career that you kind of know now that you wish somebody told, like young Erin, this piece of advice. And then the other question is, what is kind of the biggest lesson you've learned in your career specifically? Or it could be life, too.

00:36:19:01 - 00:36:37:00

Erin

The thing is, is that there's nothing really that I wish I knew because learning the things is what builds character and experiences, and I wouldn't be where I am without making mistakes and learning things along the way. So that's something that I wish I knew. I think something that's been that would been beneficial for younger Erin understand is that money is liberating.

00:36:37:03 - 00:36:55:07

Erin

So like a lot of the times you're like, follow your passion, don't just do it for money. But the thing is, is that money, when you have money, you have more choice and you have more freedom. And that's like a fact. Like if you have like a financial backing and system, it gives you more leverage to quit that job when it's the point of it being toxic.

00:36:55:13 - 00:37:24:04

Erin

And I think it's just really important for people to really prioritize having savings accounts and having that back up. You know, if I didn't have that during Covid, it just wouldn't have been great. So I think, like, you know, follow your passion for sure, but don't like, go broke, you know, just trying to be a full time documentary filmmaker, maybe get like, you know, a corporate job for a year or two and do gigs on the side. There’s nothing wrong with that. Nothing wrong with with making money. You’re not a sellout, you know.

00:37:24:06 - 00:37:41:02

Grace

Yeah, for sure, for sure. That's such a good point. And it's like, if you want to Reese Witherspoon pay you need that. You know, it's like that's that's kind of how it goes. And yeah I think about that all the time. Like the money would open up the doors to do the passion projects.

00:37:41:07 - 00:38:01:11

Grace

Yeah, absolutely. And then just any life or career lesson, that you want to share with everybody that you feel like might be helpful or just something, you know, pertaining to the entertainment industry, whatever it may be.

00:38:01:14 - 00:38:27:03

Erin

The common issue that I hear a lot from people, and I don't blame them, I truly think it’s a direct result of Covid. It’s this feeling of like, I don't know what to do next. And I think there's a misconception that clarity creates movement. It's like once I have clarity, I'm going to go do this thing, but it's like almost never the case. Movement will create clarity, so you just have to get it off your phone and get off your laptop and get out of your room and go out and like, do literally anything like bartend.

00:38:27:06 - 00:38:50:15

Erin

I drove Uber, I drove Uber in D.C. at AU. Yeah, I nannied in DC, I did, I organized closets, I dog sat so much and I met so many people. The girl a nannied for, she worked at discovery. Like that's how you meet people. It's out of context. Networking. That's how you really meet people, make connections, and you just want to.

00:38:50:16 - 00:39:08:23

Erin

You want to collect connections, you want to collect contacts. And that's going to make you more powerful in the future because you go on LinkedIn and you look up this job, and if you never met anybody in your life, you're not going to know anybody who works there. But if you were a sorority, like I was in a sorority, now I have hundreds of connections and I can say, hey, we're in the same sorority, you know?

00:39:08:26 - 00:39:29:16

Erin

Do you have an internal referral program? So it's just about collecting connections and associations, and, you know, it can be part of a volleyball team or part of a certain faith. It can be all these different things. So just finding ways to make a lot of connections with people in the way that you do that is by getting off a screen, because everybody's applying to jobs on these massive job boards and it's it's called a firehose effect.

00:39:29:16 - 00:39:45:22

Erin

It's clogging them up. And it's a terrible way to try and get a job. The way to get a good job is through personal connections. And people hate to get that because it requires them not to just click easy apply. You actually get to have a conversation with someone. But it makes it a lot easier actually to, to get it.

00:39:45:22 - 00:40:04:26

Erin

I haven't submitted a resume. Yeah, I mean, I'm a freelancer, but if you just know the person. Yeah, you can just skip over submitting a cover letter. So it's.

00:40:04:26 - 00:40:27:23

Grace

that out of context networking that you said that’s so important because, I mean, I don’t know if you agree. They are saying this year is the worst year for job hunting, like keeping a job. There's been so many layoffs everywhere. It's it's really stressful. But you're right, I feel like people are more likely to remember the person they actually met and had a conversation with versus like getting lost in the pile, you know?

00:40:27:26 - 00:40:47:23

Erin

But also this is really interesting effect that happens. So for example, if you’re a student at SOC and you email, the CEO of Nat Geo and you’re like, hey, I'm a student, can I pick your brain over a coffee chat? They’re gonna be like, no, like I get that every day, like 20 times a day. But. Oh, they need somebody to wash their goldendoodle in Bethesda. That's so funny. I signed up on Rover to watch dogs. Oh my gosh, you're CEO of National Geographic. You're now in their house watching their dog, looking at pictures of their kids. Like you're just in a different context.

00:40:47:23 - 00:41:06:03

Erin

So they're more willing to talk to you like a podcast, for example, is a great way to get to know people. I mean, look at this. We've been talking for like an hour in context, networking. People tend to kind of close up a lot. But out of context, networking is a great way to like, get to know people in, more loose environments.

00:41:06:06 - 00:41:21:15

Grace

I was going to say, and it's like it kind of takes away that pressure of like the professionalism and kind of like, how am I how am I looking right now? How am I sounding? How am I, you know, all that stuff? I love that. That's out of context. Networking. Okay. I'm I'm going to remember that. I love that.

00:41:21:15 - 00:41:41:04

Grace

And then just last thing, is there anything you would like to talk about, announce or any, you know, special projects happening? Feel free to kind of give whatever shout out you'd like.

00:41:41:07 - 00:41:59:00

Erin

Yeah. Well, people can follow me on Instagram, Advice with Erin and on TikTok at Erin McGoff and on YouTube. I post a lot of great, like, free stuff on YouTube. I have my YouTube show. No One Knows What They're Doing where I interview, just like interesting people about interesting things. And yeah, people can can follow me there. I do have some exciting projects. So those will all be announced on the platform. And if you ever want to reach out, you know, you can DM me. I get a lot of DMs.

00:41:59:03 - 00:42:15:14

Erin

You can dm my personal account. It's probably more likely I'll respond there. Or just shoot me an email.

00:42:15:16 - 00:42:33:06

Grace

Awesome. Perfect. And we will put all your handles in the episode description as well, so everyone can kind of find you and follow you, do what they need to do. Thank you so much, Erin. This was so fun. So fun to meet you. Finally. I feel like I know you because it's like when you follow someone for so long, you, like, feel like you know them. You know? This is really cool. But, yeah. Thank you so much for coming on. I'm sure this episode is going to be a hit. I hope everyone was taking notes and listening.

00:42:33:08 - 00:42:48:20

Grace

Well, thank you everyone for listening. Thank you, Erin, for coming on the podcast. Really appreciate it. And, if you would like to donate to American University School of Communication, go to giving.american.edu and I'll see you next time. That's a wrap.

Previous Episodes

Click here to see more episodes.

From Punchline to Timelines with Isaiah Headen

Tune in to this week’s episode of Media in the Mix as we sit down with Isaiah Headen, a double eagle (SOC/BA'06, MA'10) and seasoned senior creative editor. With over a decade of experience in broadcast postproduction, Isaiah has worked on an impressive range of projects, from documentaries and promos to music videos and short films. Join us as we explore his journey, his passion for storytelling, and his work for clients like PBS, the World Bank, and even the Bloomberg 2020 campaign. You won’t want to miss this insightful conversation!

LISTEN HERE:

Transcription

00:00:00:02 - 00:00:32:12

Isaiah

Life is what you make of it. Like, you can't wait for other people to kind of give you things or doors to open and you kind of have to just build it yourself. And in the process of building it yourself, other things will happen. Good things will happen. You will attract that kind of energy and stuff. Like I didn't get into sketch comedy to start a sketch comedy festival and to have all these new friends as an adult and kind of have my world grow and spend my nights laughing with some of the funniest people I've ever met.

00:00:32:18 - 00:00:46:11

Isaiah

Once I started building that world and leaning into it and committing time to it like the other stuff grew and blossomed and the trees bearing fruit. And now that exist, that that's something that’s the shade of the tree I get to live under.

00:00:46:13 - 00:01:12:14

Grace

Welcome to Media in the Mix. The only podcast produced and hosted by the School of Communication at American University. Join us as we create a safe space to explore our topics and communication at the intersection of social justice, tech innovation and pop culture. All right, Welcome back to Media in the Mix. I'm your host, Grace Ibrahim. And today we're welcoming Isaiah Headen a double SOC alum to the podcast.

00:01:12:15 - 00:01:13:15

Grace

Thanks so much for being here.

00:01:13:20 - 00:01:15:02

Isaiah

Thank you so much, Grace. Appreciate it.

00:01:15:03 - 00:01:35:13

Grace

Absolutely. So to give you a little background on our guest, Isaiah has built a career in broadcast post-production as a senior creative editor for over a decade, combining his storytelling passion with his technical skills. Isaiah's work includes promos, documentaries, commercials, music videos and short films for clients like GCA, Public Building Service, American Heart Association, PBS, and the World Bank.

00:01:35:18 - 00:01:54:16

Grace

My sister works at the World thinks that's pretty cool. Notably, he edited documentaries for For the Nation to Nation exhibit at the National Museum of the American Indian and was the lead editor for the Bloomberg 2020 campaign. In his spare time, Isaiah is a photographer and comedy writer, which I'd also love to dive into today. And yeah, let's let's get it started.

00:01:54:16 - 00:01:55:16

Isaiah

Yep, ready to go.

00:01:55:20 - 00:02:10:18

Grace

So I'm going to start with some questions that are going to kind of take you down memory lane. If you don't mind. Can you just tell us a little bit of your time at SOC, you're a double alum correct? So undergrad and grad was at SOC. So what made you come back?

00:02:10:20 - 00:02:31:23

Isaiah

I was lazy. You know, they have that. I don't know. They still have it, but they had the ability to where you could like skip a lot of things by just coming back for a fifth year, right? And I was like, Yeah, I'll just do that. All my friends are here and I don't have to leave. Yeah, So I just applied, got in and just kept going.

00:02:32:01 - 00:02:39:01

Grace

That’s awesome. And then did you have any like favorite classes or any professors that stuck out in your mind? You still remember? Till this day?

00:02:39:03 - 00:03:05:03

Isaiah

I think the best class I took was a class by Chris Palmer. Wildlife guy. Documentary Documentarian, kind of a life Coach. I would say that class bonded very well. And not only do we enjoy the class and got to know him, but like, we all got to know each other very well. And I'm still connected to a lot of those people where we've kind of like, helped each other out throughout our careers.

00:03:05:05 - 00:03:21:21

Isaiah

And it's like a lot of the film classes I took growing up through here, people went off to different things. But for some reason, that class was like you were locked in. Whatever next project, Like even after class ended, we kept working with each other. And I just didn't experienced that in the other class.

00:03:21:21 - 00:03:39:01

Grace

That's awesome. We always stress on this podcast because, you know, for any prospective students or current students that you like network not only with your professors, but with each other, because you never know, you know, who is going to help you out or how you can get in contact with for a project. So love hearing that and then really kind of diving into it.

00:03:39:01 - 00:03:49:03

Grace

Were there was there a point at AU that kind of shaped your career aspirations or kind of led you to know like, Oh, this is what I want to be doing right when I graduate?

00:03:49:05 - 00:04:08:11

Isaiah

So I applied to one school and AU was the one school because I knew I wanted to go and the direction of film video. And at the time AU was the only school in the area that had any kind of film per program. It was all documentary work. So like, I didn't really understand that.

00:04:08:12 - 00:04:27:13

Isaiah

Or broadcast journalism. But yeah, they had the studio, which we're in right now. They had the student run studio, ATV. And they had so much other stuff that I could just get access to it immediately. And I was coming out of high school where I was shooting weddings on the side for, for fun. So I had a lot of camera experience.

00:04:27:13 - 00:04:49:08

Isaiah

But like the other side of it, I just didn't have as much access to. So you were like, got the tour that just kind of jumped out at something like I really gravitated to. And so when I got in, I spent probably my first two years at the ATV studio just helping every show, editing every show, running a switchboard, running camera.

00:04:49:08 - 00:04:59:16

Isaiah

I mean, I used to sleep in the studio. Yes, I would. I would edit all night, go to sleep in the studio, wake up in the morning, go to McDonald's, which I think is.

00:04:59:18 - 00:05:00:05

Grace

Starbucks.

00:05:00:05 - 00:05:22:07

Isaiah

Now. Yeah, yeah. And then go to class and then come back. But yeah, it was just like the hands on experience was just like, unparalleled. So by the time I got to an actual class, yeah, I could actually, like, rent gear from the, from the place I had already, like, had, you know, hours of real hands on work so that it was kind of like an easy class because of that.

00:05:22:09 - 00:05:25:04

Grace

That's awesome. The McDonald's under the tunnel.

00:05:25:06 - 00:05:25:13

Isaiah

Yeah.

00:05:25:18 - 00:05:38:13

Grace

For anybody who doesn't know there was a McDonald's under the tunnel, That's where I’d go after swim practice. I love that. Okay. So diving into kind of segueing off that into the career. So how did you end up in kind of the post-production aspect of things?

00:05:38:15 - 00:06:01:04

Isaiah

I knew that I did not hate editing where a lot of my fellow students, fellow classmates, if we were doing work projects or anything like that, did not like it. And I actually enjoyed it. And so I from those a time, any time I was on a group project, I was the editor. And so between my junior and senior year, my mom was like, You need an internship, You can't not have an internship.

00:06:01:04 - 00:06:18:16

Isaiah

So she made me talk to the career counselors here at AU and it literally was like, I forget her name is she basically was like, This place looks fun. You should apply here. And I was like, All right. And it ended up being a small post house outside of Georgetown.

00:06:18:18 - 00:06:19:03

Grace

Awesome.

00:06:19:07 - 00:06:39:02

Isaiah

Called GTP. And all I did was shred papers and pick up lunches for the entire summer. That's all I did, like boxes of papers and then go get lunch orders. Occasionally answer a phone. And I didn't hate it. It was kind of a cool environment to be in. And I got to see, like, how spots were made and where they went.

00:06:39:02 - 00:06:54:06

Isaiah

You know, it was all promo work and stuff like that. A lot of political work. And then when I graduated, I needed a job and that was the first place I went back to it. I was like, Hey remember me, I used to work here like a year ago. I need a job. And they hired me. Right on the spot.

00:06:54:08 - 00:07:11:16

Isaiah

And so I just kind of like, came in the door as an E2. Kind of a production assistant and just did a little bit of everything and worked my way up and then one day found myself in the editing chair. Because I had all that experience. Through class and on the side it was like sink or swim, which is a lot of media.

00:07:11:17 - 00:07:23:19

Isaiah

Yeah. You know, if you're ever in this business, a lot of times it's like, Can you do it? We'll find out. Ane they throw you in. And if you don't drown, they keep throwing more things at you. And I didn't drown, so I was able to keep going. That's you. That's how.

00:07:23:21 - 00:07:24:18

Grace

Awesome.

00:07:24:20 - 00:07:25:11

Isaiah

Became an editor.

00:07:25:14 - 00:07:39:23

Grace

Yeah. And that's kind of leads me to my next question, which you might have answered just a little bit. But I love asking this question because a lot of what we try to do on this podcast is kind of bring people from all walks of life and then kind of just to give an insight into kind of what the path was to senior editor.

00:07:39:23 - 00:07:48:20

Grace

Let's say if someone's like, that's my goal. I want to be in the editor's chair. What do you have any advice, any recommendation is based on your experience, on kind of how to get there.

00:07:48:22 - 00:08:05:15

Isaiah

To get to the senior editor position? I think there's so many more avenues now than there were before, and there might even be like different versions of what a senior editor is. You know, like the a lot of the stuff I work for work on is for broadcast TV or the web, right? But then social media is a big thing.

00:08:05:15 - 00:08:24:03

Isaiah

I know there are people who are cutting videos for Mr. Beast that are probably making good money, you know, So like, there's much more avenues now than there were back in the day. But you will probably start off as a as a grunt worker. As someone who is, you know, shredding paper and picking up orders.

00:08:24:05 - 00:08:48:18

Isaiah

You know, and like getting those small details down because once people can trust you. Yeah, I know that you're paying attention and that you can follow steps. You know, you're not just, you know. Yeah. Wishy washy and you can show up. Like showing up is half the battle. You'll get opportunities to do other things. And if you've learned the software, whatever the software is, whatever the tools are if you, if you have it and you know it and you can get into it, more opportunities will get to you.

00:08:48:18 - 00:09:06:05

Isaiah

And so you just got to start chopping away at that block and eventually someone won't show up for work. A client will ask for something different. Then your name will pop up and they'll give you a shot. And then that's your point to just dive right in. And go for it. And if you know, it's like, you know, it's like luck

00:09:06:05 - 00:09:31:10

Isaiah

is just preparation, meeting opportunity. That's all it was. It's just like I had the years in it. The opportunity came. I was ready to go. I didn’t down. I could work my way up. So I worked at GTP for four years, kind of went from a junior editor to where I was, you know, pretty seasoned editor. I had my own clients that were coming to work with me directly, and I was either working one on the producers or one on one with like the client itself.

00:09:31:13 - 00:09:54:03

Isaiah

People that didn't have any kind of media experience. And they were looking to me to kind of help guide them along the way. And then I went to a job fair. Which they sometimes work. Women in Film and Video, WFV. It was one of their job fairs back in the day. And that's where I'm at the company I'm at now, I gave them my resume in like four months later.

00:09:54:03 - 00:10:12:01

Isaiah

They gave me a call and they came on board during a political cycle to cut ads for them. And I've been with them ever since. And so it's just like you kind of have to pick a lane. And be really good at one thing. And then push that. So yeah, I could shoot, you know, I can write now.

00:10:12:01 - 00:10:29:22

Isaiah

You know, I could direct, I could produce you. But like, right now my bread and butter is as editing. And I still think that still applies to a lot of positions in a lot of things. In the industry. So you still got to have that one ace up your sleeve. You know that one thing you can do day in and day out and not get tired of it, you know.

00:10:30:04 - 00:10:41:04

Grace

And that's really cool. So you said you had, you know, clients that come to work with you directly. So it's like once you start networking, even if you're working within a company, there could still be those like individual connections. That's very cool.

00:10:41:05 - 00:10:57:04

Isaiah

Yeah, I mean, it's all about relationships. You know, and like, people are people at the day. And they want to work with people they like. So a lot of times, you know, they don't talk about it in class, but like, there's a lot of psychology in the room and being able to read people's temperament, understand what they're not saying.

00:10:57:06 - 00:11:15:22

Isaiah

Or understanding what they're looking for and then be able to get there. For that or like make them look good to their client at the end of the day. And if you can do that and you can repeat that, they'll keep coming back to you because, you know, just like you want to go to somebody who knows your coffee order, right, when you walk in the door, they're already starting and they putting everything together.

00:11:15:22 - 00:11:25:10

Isaiah

And here's your order. That's a good feeling. Your client wants that with you. And so, like, once you kind of build that rapport, people. It just works out really well.

00:11:25:12 - 00:11:37:11

Grace

I think sometimes the misconception is that there's not a lot of interaction when you're an editor because they think you're just kind of like, in the room. So can you give, you know, shed light on the fact that you do kind of have to have that little back and forth like once a project starts?

00:11:37:17 - 00:12:01:12

Isaiah

Yeah. So the difference would be like, you know, in a perfect scenario, you would think that you're going to get a script and here's the media now make it. And whatever you decide or cut is what's going to end up, you know, being shown. And that is not the case. There are clients, there are producers, and there are people who are paying for this to happen, and they all get a say and they all want to touch it in some form or fashion.

00:12:01:17 - 00:12:20:11

Isaiah

So there's a lot of people management and work that you need to do. It's like you need to be committed to the thing you're working on, but not to. Not so much that you're just going to fight tooth and nail for all your creative decisions. But you got to be you kind of have to kind of be like a referee some time and be like, All right, I hear what you're saying, but this is why this wouldn't work.

00:12:20:13 - 00:12:36:23

Isaiah

But let's see if we can make this work for you. You know, it's you're like problem solving and solutions like that. Before the pandemic, you had a client in the room with me almost every day. You're were working on a lot of stuff and then thanks to zoom and just work from home culture. That's kind of shifted since then.

00:12:37:01 - 00:12:52:20

Isaiah

And there's less of that. It still happens every once in a while, but now it's more like through Zoom calls and through communication with teams, things like that, where you're kind of still having that day to day, but just not sitting behind you watching you Edit. Because they realize, oh, I could do multiple things and still get things done.

00:12:52:22 - 00:13:11:11

Isaiah

People still come in every once in a while and you kind of have to build that rapport and like, you know, welcome people and show them around the office. Like get them settled. Show them where the coffee is, the bathroom is, we sit down, we talk about their project, we go over their media, we go over to the script, we go over what their end goal is, and then we start working toward that direction.

00:13:11:14 - 00:13:36:20

Grace

What's the vision and how can we get there? Yeah, that's awesome. Speaking of the pandemic, I wanted to talk a little bit about the Bloomberg 2020 presidential campaign. Two question two part question there. I guess, one, how is it kind of being an editor in a political campaign environment only because we do talk a lot about DC on this podcast and our students are going out there and a lot of it is political, you know, politics-heavy work, I should say.

00:13:36:22 - 00:13:45:12

Grace

And then two you know, kind of going into the pandemic at that time, what was that like? So I guess two part question, two loaded questions.

00:13:45:12 - 00:14:02:17

Isaiah

Two part question. So being an editor or like I like the media guys, on a team, you're kind of at the end of a long rope, like a lot of decisions are being made and discussed and things are being shot. And by the time it gets to you, they just need it done. So a lot of times.

00:14:02:22 - 00:14:22:11

Isaiah

Yeah, yeah I feel like, you know, I'm the racecar driver. That's driving the getaway car, you know, I'm like, trying to get to the end as fast as I can because it's. It's about output more than it is about anything else. And so, like, a lot of times I'm given, like, not even a script.

00:14:22:11 - 00:14:39:14

Isaiah

I would say like, these are the lines that we want them to say, make it look good. And then you're just kind of working with your producer. Or building a rapport with your producer. They trust you to kind of, grab the media you need and move forward with that. And with Mike Bloomberg, you know, he's a small guy.

00:14:39:15 - 00:14:49:14

Isaiah

You know, kind of low energy. So our goal was our goal was to make him look cool, big, and tough and fun. He's got the answers. So, you know.

00:14:49:14 - 00:14:55:02

Grace

And he came into the election a little later than all the other. Right. And that's like a little different.

00:14:55:02 - 00:15:15:21

Isaiah

He had missed most of the debates and everything. And so we kind of, I called it the Ford truck approach where I was just like, we're just going to hit him with like Ford truck music, Ford truck text. So you get a lot of Big Mike, like, and stuff like that. A lot of hitting and slapping,. Just kind of make him seem bigger than that, and fast cutting.

00:15:15:21 - 00:15:35:10

Isaiah

So like my team kind of crafted that message, which became like his kind of standard throughout all his media stuff like that. And like, I never met the guy. Unfortunately, he never he came by the office. So I didn't see any of the shoots. The one time he was close by, I tried to go, but I was already working on other ads for him.

00:15:35:10 - 00:15:51:13

Isaiah

So they were like, okay, don't worry about it. I got a button and a sign at the end of it. But yeah, so like, stuff like that, it's like you're, you're seeing and watching this person day in, day out for weeks and like, you're probably working six days a week. You know, like ten hour days.

00:15:51:17 - 00:16:09:07

Isaiah

Just kind of cranking as much as you can. I'm talking like three or four spots a week and like, and that's just my room. And then like, you know, we had three editors on site and we had a couple other editors working remotely, and it was just like passing media back and forth and just new stuff's coming out every week.

00:16:09:07 - 00:16:27:04

Isaiah

And then we have a system producer who's got a big calendar on the wall that's kind of tracking all the information of when spots need to go out, which spots to go to, testing and all that stuff. And so it's it does feel like like when you're at it, it's a slog and you're just going as fast as you can and trying not to put the wrong thing in the wrong place.

00:16:27:06 - 00:16:33:02

Grace

And that's crazy too, was you never met him, but I'm sure you felt like you knew him. Going through all this stuff. It’s crazy.

00:16:33:04 - 00:16:37:09

Isaiah

I'm sure if I saw him and like go to high five him he‘’d be like, What are you doing? Oh, yeah, that's right. You don't know who I am.

00:16:37:09 - 00:16:46:19

Grace

You don't know who I am. But I know a lot about you. That's crazy. And then just anything to add, kind of transitioning into a pandemic at the time. Like a global pandemic.

00:16:47:01 - 00:17:10:21

Isaiah

Yeah. So our office sent everybody home, and about five of us stayed behind, we're a company of 50 people. And so, like, because all our media is kept centralized at the office, like, if somebody needed something a file they couldn't get access to, We, you know, someone need to be able to get get there for that. And so it was one of the five that volunteered to stay behind, which was kind of cool to see the city.

00:17:11:02 - 00:17:31:01

Isaiah

So I got the commute in while it like the city got boarded up. The riots there was protests. You know, like it it really became a ghost town at some point. And then it was like there were like three restaurants that were open, the whole thing. And so every week you went to all three to make sure that they were out there so that you could eat and you walk in, you're like, Hey, what's going on?

00:17:31:01 - 00:17:46:12

Isaiah

You know? So like it was like different quiet space that once we kind of got out of things and people started coming back to work, we kind of went to a hybrid form. Then I started working from home because of that. But yeah, it was it was Ghost Town. So, so strange.

00:17:46:12 - 00:18:05:11

Grace

Yeah, that's wild. And then I know you do some, like motion graphics work as well. How and this is kind of another we really pivoted here, but how do you see anything changing within the world of editing and motion graphics with just all the technology that's that's coming up today? Like, do you see it going anywhere? Do you have any predictions?

00:18:05:14 - 00:18:23:22

Isaiah

I mean, when I graduated, I was editing stuff SD Standard DEF like everything. And then HD was the big cool thing. We got to get, you know, one terabyte drive cost $1,000. You know, like it was like a big deal to get that stuff. And now you can get five terabytes.

00:18:24:03 - 00:18:24:17

Grace

For a like, for.

00:18:24:17 - 00:18:43:09

Isaiah

For like 250. And it's like, it's insane. So like technology is always getting better and our equipment, it's always getting cheaper and it's like one of the few industries where that is actually happening. Well, I mean, like the the cell phone you have now, the camera on that was better than the camera. I could rent from AU, like 100%.

00:18:43:10 - 00:19:04:12

Isaiah

And like, that's insane that everybody has one of those. And so, like, it's less more about like the the, the storytelling is change or anything like that. It's more like the tools you can use and the access to what you actually have. It's like insane. And it's it constantly expanding. I mean, you, I mean, you know, things I love TikTok.

00:19:04:14 - 00:19:36:03

Isaiah

Actually, like editing on Tick Tock and like the idea that I could even do this. And it could be this complicated or look this good. And never have to leave my phone is is an insane thought. So like more of that's going to happen whether it's, you know, it's A.I. kind of going in and giving a base layer or something that you can then go in and manipulate or it's doing 3D space where you're working in it with the VR gear and you're you're adding in, you know, 3D space and, you know, I don't know where it could go, but just watching the last jumps to the last two decades, I've

00:19:36:03 - 00:20:03:01

Isaiah

been out of school like it's it's insane to see the growth. And I can only imagine that it's going to keep accelerating. And so like while compositing skills are very good, very key, um, knowing rhythm and pacing is still very important. And having a basic understanding of how to get around a program is still key. Like, thankfully, if you forget something, there's a YouTube video, right?

00:20:03:03 - 00:20:18:06

Isaiah

And it's like literally at your fingertips. And that's pretty common amongst most editors and, you know, graphic designers, so like that. But you know, everything but you if you can look it up, it's like you can get to the answer faster. So like knowing where the answers are, it's just as key.

00:20:18:10 - 00:20:40:00

Grace

That's awesome and very true. Yeah. I kind of want to go into the creative process from here. So how are you kind of approaching storytelling in your projects, whether it's like a political campaign or a promo or commercial or whatever it may be? What are the key points that you think are important for you know, developing a narrative and kind of having that resonate with your audience?

00:20:40:02 - 00:20:57:19

Isaiah

I'm always looking for simplest message and point of view. A lot of times when they interview someone who's going to be in an ad, they have a standard script that they kind of give them, and then they ask them questions about their life or things that they they're doing. A general like, how did this candidate help you achieve this?

00:20:57:19 - 00:21:15:13

Isaiah

Or what were you struggling with? And that and simplicity is the best way to kind of get that match. You know, whatever, you know, you put as much in as you can, you chip away and keep removing stuff and if your story can still be told or the message can still be understood as you keep it moving.

00:21:15:13 - 00:21:36:11

Isaiah

So if you keep going until it's like you're down to the to the, to the bare bones. And that's what people are going to resonate with the most. Because, you know, people are are covered in messaging all day long. And so, like we kind of not dumbed down the message, but simplify the message in that it's easy to absorb and easy to walk away with what you want them to have.

00:21:36:11 - 00:21:54:02

Isaiah

And then like having an end goal is important. Knowing the feeling and emotion, you want people to you know, they want them to donate afterwards. Yeah. Do you want them to to be sad, happy, and then like, work backwards from there. But remember, your message needs to be simple. It can be about three five things. It needs to be about one thing.

00:21:54:05 - 00:22:18:19

Isaiah

My horse was sick on my farm. I was able to get these bills paid and now my horse is better. Like. Like it's simple. And that's the best way I think. And so with storytelling. Like it it's the same thing. And like, whether you're doing a, you know, photo editorial or, you know, doing a podcast thing like that, like simplicity of story is still the same concept applied through all that.

00:22:18:21 - 00:22:33:04

Grace

Okay, that's awesome. Actually, I really like that answer. And then I guess this kind of leads to the next question of any advice, just because we did say just a second ago about how sometimes there is a lot of like features you could use and, you know, Adobe now it's like.

00:22:33:04 - 00:22:33:16

Isaiah

Oh yeah.

00:22:33:19 - 00:22:53:06

Grace

Different things that you could try out and this. Do you have any advice for our students on how you can balance the creative with the technical? So like does that kind of apply to that same answer of like keep it as, as simple as possible? Because I think sometimes we focus a little too much on being fancy or using all of the, you know, all the like tools we can.

00:22:53:06 - 00:23:01:08

Grace

But then also you want to balance it out with a simple message or something. So just any advice there on kind of balancing that creative with the technical?

00:23:01:10 - 00:23:18:02

Isaiah

I think you should try all the plug ins and try all the effects. So so you know what they do. I mean, I think that's whenever I come across something new, I'm like, Oh yeah, I'm going to add that to my Explorer. Yeah, my favorites folder. And I'm always going to sneak it in when I can. Yeah. So like, try it out.

00:23:18:04 - 00:23:39:12

Isaiah

I mean, this these tools are so powerful that you do a little bit of everything. And, you know, do more of what you love because it will, it will become a part of your style, right? You know, if you're the guy that cuts really fast and has big slashes and lens flares and everything feels like it's always in motion when people need that ad or need that kind of content, they're going to come to you for it.

00:23:39:12 - 00:23:56:18

Isaiah

But if you're like, I like long takes, you know, I like tight shots at faces, you know, And I like, you know, using off color and all my color correction. I just lean into it, you know, like pick a lane. Like I think it's good to try everything right and then stick with what you like.

00:23:56:18 - 00:24:00:19

Grace

Do you think you kind of develop a style of editing over time?

00:24:00:21 - 00:24:21:10

Isaiah

Yeah, because you can't remember everything. And so the stuff you remember tends to be the stuff that you like or something that you maybe have seen. Like if you're watching a lot of Bear, you're probably going to start cutting very weird. And not even realize you're doing it because you've been watching this type of editing style.

00:24:21:12 - 00:24:38:21

Isaiah

So like stuff like that kind of seeps into your style to whatever you're absorbing, which is why it's like, you know, you're always supposed to be learning or supposed to be growing and studying because it it doesn't stop here like it. It really doesn’t and it just keeps going. And there's just so much that you can't watch everything right?

00:24:38:23 - 00:24:47:01

Isaiah

And so the stuff that you like and you gravitate toward, the more you spend time with it and absorb it, it's it becomes a part of you. No matter what you do.

00:24:47:02 - 00:25:07:03

Grace

I feel like I haven't really found my style of it yet. As I'm thinking about that I don't like, I like cuts all over the place. And then just one last thing on kind of the editing aspect of things. It's obviously anything in media is so much collaboration and so much teamwork. So any advice there on how to just like foster a good environment, like a collaborative environment, a positive environment?

00:25:07:05 - 00:25:11:07

Grace

So I feel like it's a difficult sometimes and a lot of people have a lot of opinions inside.

00:25:11:07 - 00:25:14:00

Isaiah

Yeah, yeah.

00:25:14:02 - 00:25:35:14

Isaiah

The best thing is like leave ego at the door, you know, if everybody is working toward the same end goal or a good product, like even bad ideas can, you know, can help lead to good things. Like maybe the ideas are being suggested aren't the right but why are they being suggested? What are they actually trying to get at is are they do you need to change the pacing?

00:25:35:14 - 00:25:54:00

Isaiah

And that's not really you need to change music. You need to change pacing of the cut, like try to find the why for people suggestions, but the ego gets in the way that story stuff or people get like, Well, you're not taking my ideas. So I'm just not going to care anymore and kind of check out and now you're trying to accomplish something and your audio guy doesn't care.

00:25:54:05 - 00:26:09:11

Isaiah

Whether it's good or not because he's he's never going to use it. So as long as you like, keep that environment that we're all working together, we're all on the same team. We're all trying to accomplish the same goal like that. And it's not about, you know, me being better than you or you being better than me. We're just working as a team.

00:26:09:15 - 00:26:28:02

Isaiah

As long as you keep that spirit together because it is a team sport. You can't do this by yourself. It's really tough. Didn't that works out great. But I definitely think humility is a big deal. Open communication is a big deal. People can't read what you think. People can't read your mind, right? So you got to be able to express what you're thinking, what your vision is.

00:26:28:02 - 00:26:46:21

Isaiah

And so when you do find people that speak your language. That's always great and you should hold on to those relationships. But there are times that you'll find yourself in rooms where maybe you're not actually the smartest person. It may be just like, you know, swallowing that ego and just listening and absorbing. Is the best way to go about it.

00:26:46:21 - 00:27:02:19

Isaiah

And then there's places where, like, hey, maybe this is my time to kind of like, stand up and, you know, speak out, like, feel comfortable in that space too, to do that. But like, don't do in a way that it's like, I'm here. You should be listening to me, like make it like a part of the team work, you know?

00:27:02:21 - 00:27:27:00

Isaiah

I like my sets to be like if you got a good idea, say it out loud. I overshoot because I'm an editor, and so I'm shooting the edit, but I will do eight takes or something. Even after I get it. I will do a safety take. Because I want to have options in my edit suite, but I like it when it's like someone's like, What if she grabs it with her left hand and then throws the ball across the room and hits him in the face?

00:27:27:02 - 00:27:36:02

Isaiah

Yeah. Let's try. It's digital, right? We not, you know, we're not confined. Yeah. You know, by the physical space anymore. So let's, let's use it.

00:27:36:04 - 00:27:42:12

Grace

Yeah, that was all great. I totally agree with that as well. I feel like I never like to assume I'm the smartest one in the room. I don't know.

00:27:42:14 - 00:27:48:17

Isaiah

Oh, I've messed up if I'm the smartest person in the room. I'm in the wrong room.

00:27:48:19 - 00:28:01:07

Grace

One hundred percent. Okay, I want to get into the comedy. So what brought that on? I mean, was that like something you've always wanted to do or did you have experience prior to kind of going into the sketch comedy world.

00:28:01:10 - 00:28:26:04

Isaiah

What got, I got into comedy kind of in a backwards way. I'd taken most of the film classes here to use. I had taken a couple of screenwriting classes, so I had an understanding of how to write a script and how to write dialog and character and all that. And I was trying to figure out how to make my own cartoon series and like, how do I, how do I build that system or like, build that kind of a production?

00:28:26:06 - 00:28:44:01

Isaiah

And the animators I knew he was like, Well, what you really need using to write a script? And I was like, it's like the weakest of my skills is writing, which is why I'm a visual guy. You know, I could paint a picture, but I ask me to put a sentence together and it's a different story. And so I needed the practice.

00:28:44:03 - 00:29:05:02

Isaiah

And I had told a friend of mine she was like a first time director that I was like, I need to start making my own stuff. And that's step one is writing it. And she was like, Well, I go to this sketch jam that meets every fourth Sunday. You bring a script, actors will perform it on stage, and that way you get your stuff, you see your stuff, performed and hear the words out loud.

00:29:05:04 - 00:29:20:14

Isaiah

And so I went to one meeting and I was like, Oh, this is actually pretty cool. It's like, you know, everybody's very friendly. So it became like my deadline to is like I'd show up with a four page script, comedy script. I don't know if it's really funny, but it was like funny to me at the time and then watch actors perform it.

00:29:20:15 - 00:29:39:12

Isaiah

And that was a really great experience. And then when that group that was running that moved to Chicago, the a few of us that were left over that were attending were like, Let's form a sketch comedy team. And I was like, I still need to write. I still need that because I'm not great. And so I joined the team as a writer and took pictures of the show.

00:29:39:12 - 00:29:56:06

Isaiah

I didn't want to perform. I just wanted to write. And I, you know, and it just blossoming grew into this, you know, bad medicine comedy that is today. But that's just it was never the intention to go into comedy. Like, it's not like I enjoy it. I think it's funny, but it was never like the thing for me, you know.

00:29:56:08 - 00:30:07:19

Grace

How do you approach kind of like in that four weeks before, you know, you're like, I have a deadline? How do you kind of approach that? It's really the same as storytelling. Like what's, what's kind of the approach to the writing process?

00:30:07:21 - 00:30:37:13

Isaiah

My writing process is probably different from a lot of people. I consume a lot of media and so like, I'm always thinking of stuff and you should be writing down funny ideas. But a lot of times I'll go to like, you know, like a random sentence generator or premise generator and just like generate like 15, 20, 30 ideas and then like go through them, pick out my favorites and then try and come up with a premise or an idea around something that kind of fits that.

00:30:38:11 - 00:30:54:03

Isaiah

I kind of like the randomness where it like it takes my it keeps me from having to like, come up with the starting point. I can take something to be like, Ooh, that cup would be really funny if it had like, funny sayings on it. Like, what are the most what are some funny sayings? I could put out a couple like, be on a cup.

00:30:54:10 - 00:31:13:20

Isaiah

And then like, I could branch out from there. So like, I'm taking those as nuggets and planting them and then like, you know, taking the ideas that are the strongest or the easiest to write because they're, they're actually good. And then writing those full out. And sketch comedy, it's short storytelling. You know, there's a beginning, a middle, and there's three beats.

00:31:13:20 - 00:31:44:07

Isaiah

You take a joke or an idea and you escalate it to its peak. Yeah. There's a limited characters using one space dialogue needs to be simple so you can understand it. You know, somebody is going through an emotional change. They start happy and get mad or, you know, they are they start sad and get scared and like, so like there's a there's a structure to it that's very similar to screenwriting, which is, you know, you got tons and tons of tons of pages to do it, but now you've got like four, three to kind of set something up.

00:31:44:12 - 00:32:03:17

Isaiah

Explain what's the what's the end goal is you get to that. So for me, it's kind of like nugget idea. Kind of water it and see if I can make it bigger than that. And then once, once you get going in the groove. Like it it, you can get to the end yourself. I often a lot of times will write the whole sketch in an email.

00:32:04:15 - 00:32:20:03

Isaiah

And just so I'm not worried about formatting and all that, I'm just like, get it on paper, get on paper. And then once it's on paper and I feel good about it after I've read it, then I'll transfer it to a doc, a Google doc or something, and then go in and format it, make sure everything is right.

00:32:20:03 - 00:32:31:19

Isaiah

And I mean, Oh, it's too long. I need to lose a page. Oh, this looks weird. Like, okay, for the most part, it's like, get it down on paper. Flush it out and then, like, format it and then, well, I'll take that to the writers room from there.

00:32:31:19 - 00:32:38:13

Grace

That's awesome. And just on the name Bad Medicine, where did that come from? What was the inspiration behind that?

00:32:38:13 - 00:32:55:00

Isaiah

So we. So Jon Bon Jovi has a song called Bad Medicine. Which we had no idea about when we picked the name. So it's not based off of that. The whole idea is basically laughter's the best medicine, so we're bad medicine.

00:32:55:02 - 00:32:59:15

Grace

Okay, that's awesome. Like, simple, simple. I like it.

00:32:59:17 - 00:33:07:23

Isaiah

So many people are like you guys are Bon Jovi fans, right? I was like no idea. No idea.

00:33:07:23 - 00:33:16:22

Grace

That's awesome. So you guys are traveling, like, all across the country, Kind of major cities and doing these. Do you travel with the group, are you.

00:33:17:00 - 00:33:17:04

Isaiah

Yeah.

00:33:17:18 - 00:33:18:16

Grace

The writer as well.

00:33:18:18 - 00:33:38:12

Isaiah

We do. There's a festival circuit in America. Yeah a lot of major cities have a sketch comedy festival or a comedy festival where they invite out of town acts to come perform and there's like certain numbers of them throughout the year and we kind of tapped into that early on because DC unfortunately, does not have a lot of theatre spaces for indie comedy.

00:33:38:12 - 00:33:58:02

Isaiah

You know, it's a lot it now. DC is kind of like in standup town and a lot of standup lots of bars. You go to standup show every night. And there's a lot of improv shows and that what sketch needs needs a little bit more than both of those combined. And so like those spaces aren't always readily available or they cost a lot of money.

00:33:58:04 - 00:34:16:11

Isaiah

And so to get stage time to get those reps in, it was easier to, Hey, let's play this festival. That's in Seattle. We'll be there in September. We'll go see a bunch of sketch shows that we can and will get to perform. And so like we got to know different festivals that are really good and got to meet the people behind them.

00:34:16:13 - 00:34:33:16

Isaiah

And that kind of motivated us to like, have a deadline, prepare new stuff for it, and kind of rent, squash and repeat. And as we did that, we got better and better and stronger and stronger. They got easier to put shows together. And then the opportunity comes to find a place to call home that's local and produce shows there.

00:34:33:18 - 00:34:51:16

Isaiah

And now that we have the reps in, like it's something that we can kind of flip and change our focus from traveling to doing more local home shows. So was a time where like most of our shows are on the road. And now a majority of our shows are local here in D.C., but we're still doing road shows like maybe we'll be in Seattle.

00:34:51:18 - 00:34:52:08

Isaiah

In September.

00:34:52:08 - 00:34:57:00

Grace

Yeah, well, we got to get info on the next show in D.C. we'd love to come out.

00:34:57:00 - 00:34:59:12

Isaiah

Come out! It's a good time. It's a party.

00:34:59:14 - 00:35:04:23

Grace

We're going. We're going. Yeah. And Veronica is she

00:35:05:01 - 00:35:09:22

Isaiah

She's been to one of my shows, but she got seated in the front.

00:35:10:00 - 00:35:20:06

Grace

I'm so sorry I did not put you there, but it was okay. I feel like you made it up. But two questions here as well in the comedy. So do you have a favorite sketch that you've written?

00:35:20:11 - 00:35:44:09

Isaiah

I have a sketch that is it's about it's called Chef Crazy Joe, and it's the chef who is teaching people how to make hot chocolate. But it's how to make hot chocolate with a taser. And so the whole idea is that you bring an audience member on stage and you make them put an apron on and you have all the ingredients laid out.

00:35:44:17 - 00:36:01:04

Isaiah

And then you go you start to like, Oh, we're going to teach you how to make this the reveal that we're going to make it with. The Taser is the first time we ever did it. I couldn't find one that looked like a taser. So I grabbed like a tool from the closet. Yeah, that kind of looked like a taser, but it really didn't have the taser gun shape.

00:36:01:04 - 00:36:17:16

Isaiah

Yeah, well, the kid had no idea. The person we invite on stage had no idea it was fake. And they had just like immediate fear hit their face. So it was great. Great for like, the audience loved it. But like, I didn't find out until afterwards that they were like, Oh my God, this guy has a real taser on stage.

00:36:17:18 - 00:36:43:06

Isaiah

And so, like, it's the whole bit. And then like, you're watching me, like, wave the taser around.And then I start yelling at this imaginary raccoon becauses that’s Chef Crazy Joe. And then at some point, a real raccoon shows up with the bat and basically beats the crap out of the entire set. Threatens me because it turns out I have stolen the hot cocoa recipe from the racoon.

00:36:43:08 - 00:36:51:04

Isaiah

Yes. And the reason I have a Taser, because you're supposed to tase the raccoon. And that's what it’s for

00:36:51:04 - 00:36:56:08

Grace

And that’s what it’s for Chef Crazy. I love that. And do you bring people from the audience up a lot or is that like.

00:36:56:08 - 00:37:22:04

Isaiah

We try to do like, once or twice a show. It just the energy is electric. It adds a layer. We made them, we made two people wrap before wearing, like, different weird christmas gloves and stuff. Oven mitts. We made people battle with saxophones on stage, like you played a song. And then they had to, like, you know, mime that they were playing a saxophone.

00:37:22:04 - 00:37:31:20

Isaiah

And like, people got really into it and the winner got a chocolate cake. So like, yeah, it's like audience participation is great sketch. Like, you know, adds a layer.

00:37:31:22 - 00:37:50:04

Grace

And then just last question on this. What do you think comedy superpowers like, why do you think so many people are just drawn to like the comedy world? I know like everybody I've talked to in the last years, like I love going to watch comedy. Is there anything that after being around so many like audiences and, you know, crowds, if you could speak to that?

00:37:50:06 - 00:38:12:21

Isaiah

Yeah, comedy is interactive in a lot of ways. You know, the energy you give the comedian, the comedian kind of gives it back to you right as a conversation piece. Even if you're watching people and privacy and you're throwing a word at them stand ups, doing crowd work or sharing stories about their life, even storytelling, I would say, kind of pulls on that, that that give and take kind of relationship.

00:38:12:23 - 00:38:27:17

Isaiah

But also like life is hard, Life is a struggle and be able to sit down and kind of check out for an hour or so and just be like, all right, we're just going to laugh and have a good time, have a drink, you know, And I just giggle at being silly. I mean, that's one of the reasons that we love doing it so much.

00:38:27:17 - 00:38:51:02

Isaiah

It's like we you know, we're bad medicine, but still. And then the day, you know, for us, it is it is is a stress reliever. It's a good time. We get to like lean into that silliness that we may do a little bit at work, but right now I could just full blown, just be like, my wacky self on stage and dancing and hop around and high fived the audience and everybody's in on it with me.

00:38:51:02 - 00:39:03:01

Isaiah

And when you get that uproar of a laugh or you hit that home run and everybody is just like blown away or just in it together, like it's electric, it's insane. Like I could run through a wall after doing that.

00:39:03:02 - 00:39:17:01

Grace

I think it was Tiffany Haddish that said, just seeing people's mouths go up and seeing everyone's teeth is like electric in itself. Because you know that like once you see that people are just so happy and beaming, which is awesome. So you are performing too.

00:39:17:02 - 00:39:20:05

Isaiah

Yes. I’m performing now? But when I started I was like

00:39:20:06 - 00:39:20:16

Grace

Okay.

00:39:20:22 - 00:39:40:09

Isaiah

Do not put me on stage. I am not an actor. I'm the guy behind the camera. I will make your little we'll shoot sketches, videos, and I'll write and I’ll edit. I'll take pictures of the show. Don't put me on stage. And then people slowly figure it out that I could act or at least be entertaining on stage.

00:39:40:11 - 00:39:54:20

Isaiah

And they, like, slowly pushed me on. So now at the point now where it's like I've done it enough times that I'm actually comfortable on stage now. I'm having fun doing it. I still prefer to sit in the back, and be in the tech booth flicking lights and stuff like that, doing the techie stuff.

00:39:54:20 - 00:40:00:10

Isaiah

And that's my passion. But you know, I go on stage and and play a wacky character if you need me too.

00:40:00:10 - 00:40:07:13

Grace

That's awesome. And are you doing photography for anything else or is photography you just kind of came in through shooting these shows and stuff.

00:40:07:15 - 00:40:20:16

Isaiah

Before I got into comedy, I spent my twenties doing photography stuff. I was shooting flash photography, okay, and doing portraits and stuff. Yeah, it was like I got I was working for the yearbook.

00:40:20:17 - 00:40:21:23

Grace

Shooting weddings too.

00:40:22:01 - 00:40:34:03

Isaiah

I was shooting video for weddings. Shooting video for weddings. Then came to college and then got on the news newsletter. The yearbook? Got in the yearbook. So I get access to the camera.

00:40:34:03 - 00:40:35:20

Grace

That's awesome. Good for you.

00:40:36:01 - 00:40:55:08

Isaiah

I was doing yearbook stuff. Yeah, I was doing yearbook stuff, but also, it's like shooting stuff on the side. And then took all the photography classes and the. The development, the darkroom. Yeah. Doing all that. Like it took as many as I could. They would let me. I did all that, and I had a passion for it.

00:40:55:08 - 00:41:16:18

Isaiah

So when I graduated, I went and bought a camera and started shooting more stuff on the side. And there used to be an indie magazine called Laurie and Woman. That was back, back in the day. And I was doing all their flash photographer them and it was like, it's kind of like a lifestyle magazine, but like very to do it your do it yourself kind of style.

00:41:17:11 - 00:41:37:01

Isaiah

I did like the covers, the spread and all that. It was a lot fun. It was, it was, it was a lot of good. And then the pandemic kind of like really put a lot of stopp to the photography stuff. So a lot of my photography clients moved or stopped doing or needing it. I do it every once in a while I still have all the equipment but it's it's not as it's not consistent as it once was.

00:41:37:01 - 00:41:37:11

Grace

Yeah, right.

00:41:37:17 - 00:41:43:03

Grace

That's awesome. Photography is fun. I feel like commercial photography too, like fashion photography and all that is a lot of fun because.

00:41:43:03 - 00:41:52:17

Isaiah

Because you can play music while you work. Whereas you filming stuff and I need quiet on the set, but like I can crank off to the reggae music lights going, but it’s chill.

00:41:52:22 - 00:42:05:22

Grace

I feel like your subject feels more comfortable than like the silence too, like action. Then they’re like okay. It's my turn. That's awesome. Anything exciting you're doing now? Any projects they want to talk about or anything cool going on?

00:42:05:22 - 00:42:25:15

Isaiah

Yeah. So my one of my main mission is to grow the sketch comedy scene in DC. And right now I would say we're either entering or end the golden era of sketch comedy in DC. When we started our troupe, we were like one of five. And we're pushing, getting close to 15 sketch teams in DC.

00:42:25:16 - 00:42:47:12

Isaiah

Different groups of people. People are doing improv form their own team, there are students who form teams. So we're teaching and doing classes at DC Improv. But there's a bigger sketch comedy scene that we're very active in and supporting and like, so my goal is to create more space, you know, no gatekeeping, create more space opportunities for other people and then support them.

00:42:47:14 - 00:43:03:07

Isaiah

And that has really helped that kind of scene grow where people are excited to come here and participate. And we have out of town teams that are traveling here that a good time. We just had DC Sketch Fest. Yeah, back in March, which is amazing. We had 18 teams coming in from out of town.

00:43:03:08 - 00:43:04:06

Grace

Where was that? Where do you guys.

00:43:04:06 - 00:43:23:15

Isaiah

We did shows at the DC AC in Adams Morgan and at the DC Improv and it was a blast, it was, it was four days of sketch comedy. Just, you know, we got some good press coverage about it. And all the shows sold out. We had teams from Seattle, we had teams from New York and Toronto.

00:43:23:17 - 00:43:45:21

Isaiah

So we're just looking to expand it and go even bigger and better and have even more DC teams participate. So like, just as the scene grows and as it gets bigger, I think that's going to open doors for a lot of people and creates new opportunities. And we're kind of in an era where you don't have to be in New York or L.A. to, to kind of like make content, find media and build off of that.

00:43:46:08 - 00:44:02:23

Isaiah

And so I feel like we're on the path for something or someone to kind of hit it off and kind of be it. And yeah, we've got our our standup celebrities and we got a couple people from the improv scene that have hit it big as well. I think it's time for someone from the sketch scene to get up there and kind of put us on the map.

00:44:03:04 - 00:44:20:09

Grace

Me too. I feel like comedy's evolving in itself in its own little realm because I feel like with TikTok and social media and like you just have so many ways to create comedy, it's not so much like standing on a stage with me talking to a crowd anymore, you know, which I love and I appreciate. That's awesome. Did I hear you say you, you give some classes at D.C. Improv?

00:44:20:09 - 00:44:27:00

Isaiah

Yeah, we teach. We teach sketch classes at DC Improv. Yeah. Yeah. We’re the sketch comedy arm of the DC Improv.

00:44:27:02 - 00:44:28:01

Grace

Oh okay. That's awesome.

00:44:28:04 - 00:44:35:09

Isaiah

It came on right before the pandemic started and then taught classes online. Throughout. And then once they reopened, we came back and started doing shows as well.

00:44:35:10 - 00:44:40:12

Grace

So I feel like it's popped up in my email. Because I still get the DC in my email that it's.

00:44:40:12 - 00:44:41:13

Isaiah

We’re trying.

00:44:41:13 - 00:45:06:11

Grace

Sounding really familiar. Yeah, that's awesome. Well, definitely have to make it out to a show for sure. So one last advice I or one last one last question I like to ask our guest is can you just give our students any piece of advice? It could be multiple pieces of advice, but kind of looking at where you started when you were going to school and where you're at now, just an any and it could be like life advice I have here, you know, in post-production or comedy or this.

00:45:06:11 - 00:45:11:13

Grace

But it can also be in like a general sense. Yeah. Anything you have to say to these kids?

00:45:13:01 - 00:45:35:14

Isaiah

Yes, I think I have to. It's something I'm trying to teach myself and try to remember myself. It's like life is what you make of it. Like you can't wait for other people to kind of give you things or doors to open. You kind of have to just build it yourself. And one the process of building it yourself, other things will happen, good things will happen.

00:45:35:14 - 00:45:57:05

Isaiah

You will attract that kind of energy and stuff. Like I didn't get into sketch comedy to start a sketch comedy festival and to have all these new friends as an adult. And kind of have my world grow and spend my nights laughing with some of the funniest people I've ever met. Like that. It's not something that was a goal of mine.

00:45:57:07 - 00:46:17:19

Isaiah

But once I once I started building that world and leaning into it and committing time to it, like the other stuff grew and blossom. And now the tree is bearing fruit. And that idea that it only exists because instead of me being like, Hey, let me into your sketch comedy club, let me be a part of this like, I, I built it.

00:46:18:07 - 00:46:38:20

Isaiah

And now that exists that that's something that’s the shade of the tree I get to live under. And I think that applies to whatever you want to do, whether if you want to get into podcasting, broadcast journalism, even if you want to make your own films, indie films, TV shows, whatever, it's like just go do it, make it yourself, Make those connections, go out the door, network and network.

00:46:38:20 - 00:46:59:17

Isaiah

Connect. Connect with people. Build relationships. Because that's really what it is. That's what it is. It's just connecting with people. Remember their birthdays remember where live like. Like just just let people know that you do care about them, that they're just not not just a stepping. Like it actually means something to you and build your life that you want.

00:46:59:17 - 00:47:25:12

Isaiah

You know, if you want to work from home. 9 to 5, move somewhere. Do what you got to do to make it happen. Like, it's not going to just be given to you. Like you can build it. And like, that reality of like, you think you want it sometimes coming out of education, like you're, you're trained to follow grade one to grade to grade three, and then you do this and then someone tells you do that and like, then you get out and you're kind of like, Oh, what do I what do I do now?

00:47:25:17 - 00:47:33:18

Isaiah

Do I go to grad school? Do I go get married, or should I go join Greenpeace? Like, you know, it's like there's just it's just so open ended.

00:47:33:18 - 00:47:34:23

Grace

You’re speaking to me now.

00:47:34:23 - 00:47:42:22

Isaiah

It's so open ended. And. But it's whatever you make of it. There's no wrong answers. You just build it, right.

00:47:43:02 - 00:47:51:23

Grace

I like that. It plant the tree and then that's the shade that you're standing under. That's like, so perfect. That's awesome. Isaiah, thank you so much for being here.

00:47:51:23 - 00:47:52:02

Isaiah

Thank you so much Grace.

00:47:52:04 - 00:48:05:23

Grace

This was so fun. We'd love to have you back whenever. As double SOC alum over here. Thank you for tuning in to Media in the Mix. If you'd like to donate to SOC, go to giving dot American dot edu and we will see you on the next episode.

Campus Chronicles with Jackson Dietz & Ericka Martinez

Ericka Martinez Jackson Dietz Media in the Mix

Balancing life, jobs, and creative passions as a student is no easy feat, but Jackson Dietz (SOC/BA'25) and Ericka Martinez (SOC/BA'24) show how it’s done with remarkable finesse. Here’s a glimpse into their journeys and how they manage to gain real-world experience as undergraduate students, creating community, and making unforgettable memories.

LISTEN HERE: