The Smarter Artist Show: Episode 18 - Write to Impress Your Collaborator

The Smarter Artist Show: Episode 21 - The $800 Movie

This week Sean, Dave, and Johnny dig into the indie horror moment happening right now in Hollywood, two breakout films, Obsession and Backrooms, both made by filmmakers who came up on YouTube with almost no budget. They trace the path from Curry Barker's $800 film to a theatrical release that's earned around $250 million (at press time), and talk about why horror rewards resourcefulness in a way most genres don't. Sean talks for the first time on air about the horror script he and Dave have been developing, and the conversation he had with a friend that talked him out of a $5 million budget and into a $1 million one. It's the first public mention of a project that's going to keep coming up. Timestamps: 7:00 — Something Cools 12:40 — The topic of the week. 15:30 — Talking about Backrooms 19:00 — Horror movies being held to a different standard 22:45 — Sean's $1 million movie announcement 24:48 — Dave talks about low budget horror and the upcoming Ice cream Man movie trailer. 26:00 — Benson and Moorehead's low budget Lovecraftian movies which led to them working on Marvel shows. 30:00 — constraints in movies versus having too big of a budget. Discussion about Christopher Nolan's work, and Dave's fave movie, The Fountain. 41:36 — More low budget movie success stories: Halloween, Night of the Living Dead, Blair Witch, and Saw. Resources mentioned: Obsession (dir. Curry Barker) that's a bad idea channel — https://www.youtube.com/@thats_a_bad_idea [https://www.youtube.com/@thats_a_bad_idea] Backrooms (dir. Kane Parsons, A24) The Endless, Synchronic, Resolution (dir. Benson and Moorhead) The Ice Cream Man Redband trailer — https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qiS6TWj4nV0 [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qiS6TWj4nV0] Milk and Serial — https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pbzGQ1lszv4 [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pbzGQ1lszv4] Subscribe to the Dispatch: https://smarterartist.net/dispatch [https://smarterartist.net/dispatch] Next week: we're talking book covers

The Smarter Artist Show: Episode 20 - The Thing We Haven't Written Yet

Dave opens by holding up five completely filled journals to the camera, all devoted to a fantasy novel he's been building in his head for at least five years. That kicks off an hour-long conversation about the creative project you haven't written yet: the idea that's too big, too personal, or too risky to touch until you're ready. Sean's version is the very first book he ever wrote in 2007, a 600-page narrative nightmare with, in the words of Cindy's professor friend, "long passages of staggering genius." Both projects are alive, neither is finished… yet. Timestamps 00:00 — Cold open: Dave shows the journals. 03:30 — Something Cool (Sean): *The Next RenAIssance* by Zack Cass, recommended by Joanna Penn. AI in education and medicine, the case for augmentation, and why Sean thinks school would have worked for him in a different era. 11:36 — Sean publicly praises Dave's screenplay draft as the best rough draft he's ever turned in. 14:30 — What the screenplay feedback was actually about: showing vs. telling, and why a narcissist villain should never be too honest too fast. 16:40 — Something Cool (Dave): *Office Space* (1999), rewatched with his son. Beavis and Butt-Head, the Beavis reboot, and how Winger got cancelled by a cartoon. 25:55 — The actual topic: what is the thing you haven't written yet? Dave's project: a fantasy novel five years in journals, mythology without a single borrowed framework, an ensemble cast, and a central story element he won't reveal on air. 40:15 — Sean's project: the first book he ever wrote, started in 2007 during rest time at the preschool. A 600-page novel that tried to be a fictional *A Short History of Nearly Everything*. Books and Resources Mentioned The Next RenAIssance by Zack Cass (Joanna Penn recommendation) A Short History of Nearly Everything by Bill Bryson His Dark Materials by Philip Pullman The Dark Tower series by Stephen King The Smarter Artist Method by Sean Platt (leave a review on Amazon) Sign-Off CTA If this conversation gave you something to think about, you won't want to live without the Dispatch. Head to https://smarterartist.net/dispatch [https://smarterartist.net/dispatch]. Sign up and you'll get a copy of *The Smarter Artist Method* and the workbook. We'll see you in your inbox.

The Smarter Artist Show: Episode 19 - Your Characters Are Assets. Are You Treating Them That Way?

Saul Goodman was supposed to appear in four episodes of Breaking Bad. He was comic relief. Vince Gilligan read the room, changed his mind, and eventually built a six-season prequel around him. Sean, Dave, and Johnny use that as the on-ramp for a longer conversation about what separates a character that can carry IP from one that can't, and whether a creator can engineer that kind of popularity or whether it only exists because an audience decided it does. The guys then talk about characters taking over shows not meant for them, why some asshole characters work and others don't, and much more in this episode of The Smarter Artist Show. Timestamps 01:37 Episode intro: Your characters are assets. Are you treating them that way? 04:20 — Something Cool: Dave on Maximum Pleasure Guaranteed (new Apple TV show, Tatiana Maslany) 09:04 — Sean's Something Cool: building custom apps with Claude, and why off-the-shelf task management never quite works for him. 10:00 — Johnny's Something Cool - he's doing an appearance at Comicapalooza in Houston. 21:34 — Sean on the Sterling & Stone AI hallucination problem (Forbes quoted something wrong; now the AI believes it) 24:00 — The actual topic: characters that become bigger than the story they inhabit 25:40 — Better Call Saul as the case study. Dave's original take: it'll never work 29:20 — Sean talks about Boricio Wolfe. Why it was their best example, and why it couldn't have been engineered? 34:00 — Sean on characters that take over shows they weren't written for. 40:00 — Johnny: what happens when the audience loves a character you don't? "Assholes are fun to write." 41:00 — The likability question. Succession, Meyer Dempsey, and why some audiences reject complicated characters. 47:50 — Dave on what makes an unlikable character work for him, when the reader can understand or identify why they're the way they are. 51:55 — Ending, theme song If this conversation gave you something to think about, you won't want to live without the Dispatch. Head to https://smarterartist.net/dispatch [https://smarterartist.net/dispatch] Sign up and you'll get two things right away: a copy of The Smarter Artist Method, and the workbook to help you get smarter, faster. We'll see you in your inbox.

The Smarter Artist Show: Episode 18 - Write to Impress Your Collaborator

SUMMARY Sean, Dave, and Johnny open with Something Cool, including Sean's announcement that he's finished his first album and wants early listeners before it drops publicly next month. Then they get into the real subject: collaboration. How it starts, how it breaks, how it makes you better when it works, and what happens when you write with someone who can see your blind spots before you can. By the end of the episode, three collaborations are on the table. Sean and Dave on Yesterday's Gone. Sean and Johnny on The Beam, Unicorn Western, and Future of Sex. And the specific mechanics of how each partnership works differently, from character-by-character chapters to skeletal reference beats to the value of a calling out Sean's old bobblehead ticks in the writing. TIMESTAMPS 0:00 Cold open, Piss Daddy, the email, and why YouTube apparently wants them to lean into it 14:04 Something Cool: Johnny's early read of How Music Works by David Byrne 6:00 Dave's Something Cool: the TV show Something Bad Is Going to Happen, and the soulmate vs. soul match debate 14:31 Sean's Something Cool: Ethan's graduation, and the announcement that Sean's first album is done 20:01 How to get early access to Sean's album before it drops (reply to the Dispatch with one sentence) 25:21 The Piss Story, origins of Piss Daddy, and what it revealed about how well Sean actually reads Dave's work 28:14 How Dave and Sean's collaboration started, and what Dave's instincts gave Sean early on 29:57 The Ira Glass gap, pattern recognition, and the bobblehead note that cured Sean of a writing tick forever 33:06 How Sean and Johnny's collaboration process works, and how it's changed over 10+ years 35:18 Unicorn Western: the reference Western method and why they didn't hide the homage 36:05 The Beam's world-building and how Johnny invented Shift by interrogating the premise 43:06 Yesterday's Gone: how Dave and Sean each took characters independently, the serial killer collision, and the Boricio revelation. What a great collaboration actually demands: writing to impress your partner, not just your reader 48:45 The Future of Sex cliffhanger that cut off all possible escape routes, and why neither of them worried about it 50:54 Pattern Black, overbuilding, and when a collaboration spools out too much rope 52:11 Knowing your strengths and weaknesses as collaborators, and the new script Dave is nearly done with 56:35 Outro, Smarter Artist song LINKS MENTIONED How Music Works by David Byrne (book/audiobook): https://www.amazon.com/How-Music-Works-David-Byrne/dp/1938073533 Sean's album (early access): Reply to this week's Dispatch email with one sentence about why you want to hear it. Public release next month. Comic Palooza Houston (Johnny's appearance): https://comicpalooza.com FREE BOOK + DISPATCH If this conversation gave you something to think about, head to https://smarterartist.net/dispatch [https://smarterartist.net/dispatch] Sign up and you'll get a copy of The Smarter Artist Method and the workbook right away. Also: if you've read The Smarter Artist Method [https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0GZ15XBS9/], a review on Amazon goes a long way.

The Smarter Artist Show: Episode 17 — How to Write Fast (With or Without Robots)

Dave spent twelve years writing bits and pieces of stories at a gas station. He never finished one. Sean spent three years nagging him to publish his first book. Now they've written more than 60 novels together. In this episode, Dave and Sean dig into the real reasons writers stall, why AI won't save you if your process is broken, and the one habit Sean says matters more than any tool or technique. WHAT THEY GET INTO The vomit pass. Sean breaks down the system he's used since his blogging days: brain drain first, clarify second, polish third. Never try to write something you're proud of on the first pass. That's what slows you down. AI as brainstorming partner, not ghostwriter. Sean makes the case that using AI to brainstorm, pressure-test outlines, or generate naming options isn't cheating. Dave disagrees. Loudly. The argument is one of the better ones they've had, and Sean eventually lands on the real point: you're cheating yourself when you make obstacles out of things that aren't your superpower. Dave's fantasy novel. He's been world-building in journals for five or six years. He still hasn't named the continents. Sean has opinions about this, especially after Dave rejected the solution in front of him. The consistency principle. Sean writes every single day, not because he loves every session, but because stopping means starting over. Twenty minutes a day beats two hours once a week, every time. The million-word year that wasn't. Sean challenged Dave to write a million words in a year. They wrote 30k. The book: How to Write Fast (With or Without Robots)* is available now at http://smarterartist.net/htwf [http://smarterartist.net/htwf] The Dispatch: Weekly newsletter with a story, a pattern, a reframe, and a shift, every Friday. Free at https://smarterartist.net/dispatch [https://smarterartist.net/dispatch]. Subscribers get a copy of The Smarter Artist Method at signup. TIMESTAMPS 00:00 Into SOMETHING COOL 2:00 — Sean talks "Beef" and Dave talks about his love for Grimace. 8:00 — Dave talks about Apple TV's "Widow Bay" 12:40 — The topic of the show — writing fast, and updating the book "How to Write Fast" with advice on using AI in the planning process. 20:00 — Dave talks about his fantasy series he's been planning for 5-6 years. Dave and Sean then argue over whether it's okay to use AI to name towns and cities in his book. Dave would like to, but feels like it's cheating. Sean has a different opinion. This argument goes on for some time! 37:00 — Sean talks about how he came up as a writer and how he got so fast. He talks about some of the methods that have helped him write millions of words.