Ten years ago today, a new chapter began in my life. I moved to Los Angeles!
In the days leading up to today, I've reflected back on what's happened in my life over the past ten years and needless to say, a lot has happened.
I initially was supposed to arrive in Los Angeles, June 29th 1999. I had flown out to L.A. from Boston but my flight in Boston was delayed causing me to miss a connecting flight in Denver. I ended up spending the night in Denver learning about the wonders of television in the Mountain time zone...I particularly remember seeing "Late Night with Conan O'Brien" at a weird time slot.
I finally arrived at LAX the next day and it was quite a bumpy first few months. I was living out here in bleak apartment in North Hollywood and went to bed at night sleeping on an air mattress. My first job was as a page at CBS making $8 an hour...sometimes getting barely 20 hours of work a week. I was renting a Mazda 323 that had to have been at least 10 years old. But I soldiered through and around Labor Day of that year, things took a big turn...
That was when Bob Boden (whom I had met the summer before while I was out here on an internship) gave me a call and asked if I could take some time off from my page duties to help out as a production assistant for this game show he was developing at dick clark productions.
This led to me calling up a producer he was working with named Jeff Mirkin. Jeff asked me to come in the day after Labor Day to get started on work on this new project. Long story short...I gave it all I got and this led to Bob and Jeff giving me my first big television gig as a writer on the game show "Greed."
In the quick Reader's Digest version of things, after "Greed" got canceled, Jeff brought me over to Pearson which eventually became FremantleMedia and that led me to meeting David Lyle (the then-president of FremantleMedia). It was a great five years and I got to work with titles like "Whammy!," "Match Game," "Password," "Now You See It," "Card Sharks," and the crown jewel of them all..."The Price is Right." Then, about four years ago, David and Bob (who had by then moved to Fox Reality Channel) called me and asked me if I wanted to come over and join their team as an exec at the new channel. And that, my friends, is where I've been ever since!
There are tons of details I've left out between now and then that I'll reminisce about in a series of blogs over the next several days, but boy...it's been quite the journey so far. There have been a lot of people who have taken chances on me over the past decade and to them, I give a BIG thanks.
When I graduated from college ten years ago, I NEVER thought that I would write for a prime-time network game show, bring back one of my all-time favorite game shows from the 80s, create a game for "The Price is Right," meet many of the celebrities and producers that I admired growing up, launch a cable channel, oversee a five-day-a-week reality newsmagazine show, develop and help create a new awards show, act as a network exec on up to five shows at a time, and (probably most important of all) still have time to make all the wonderful friends I've made throughout the years!
I think this Randy Newman song says it all...
When my friends from high school or college ask me how life's been in L.A., I tell them that it's been a blast. At my recent college reunion, many people told me, "You know...YOU'RE the one that actually knew what he was going to do from day one at college and actually did it!"
And you know what? That's actually quite right, but it doesn't always happen that way. I know I'm an extremely lucky person. And because of this, I'm very grateful for all that has happened and I never take anything for granted!
L.A., you've truly has become home for me...To my friends, colleagues, and mentors...thank you for making this first decade in Los Angeles so wonderful. Here's hoping that the next decade brings just as much (if not more) joy and happiness!
