Hello! Long time, no newsletter! When I started The Pop, I told myself this would be a no-pressure project. I’d write when I felt like I had something to say and the time to do so, so I guess good on me for sticking to that!
I’ve been pretty busy since I last sent one of these out. Production started and wrapped on Season 2 of Work in Progress, and so I’ve been in Chicago for the last six months and now I’m gearing up to head back to LA. I’ve been hacking away at a few TV/film projects of my own. Oh, and, by the by… RYAN AND I GOT ENGAGED!!!! I am so beyond thrilled to make it official with the love of my life. If you have any wedding-planning tips and tricks, please send them my way!
I’ll admit, though, that being busy with work and love isn’t the only reason it’s been a while since I last newsletter-ed. I also became exhausted by the entire concept of the internet as a whole.
A couple of months ago, I wrote an essay for a pretty big online magazine. The editors published it with an incendiary, click bait-y headline that entirely shifted the piece from innocuous fluff to something that roused the trolls from the deepest underbelly of the world wide web. I was pretty shaken up by it: the complete lack of control I felt having my own words warped against me, the barrage of hate from faceless accounts. I didn’t feel like sharing anything online anymore, ever again.
Shortly after, I watched Bo Burnham’s latest special Inside. In it, the comedian returns after a years-long hiatus from comedy with a searingly intimate one-man musical meditation on life as a creative at this specific point in history. He opens with the song “Content,” in which he sings:
I'm sorry I was gone
But look, I made you some content
Daddy made you your favorite, open wide
Here comes the content
It's a beautiful day to stay inside
Of all the capitalistic buzzwords that get attached to creators, content is probably the worst of them all. It flattens the stuff we create into pure product, something we churn out to be consumed by an amorphous audience. Content is not necessarily a creation. It’s just all a part of this click bait-y, digital media machine.
When I hear Burnham’s line, “Look, I made you some content,” I can’t help but be reminded of a Sondheim lyric (and given the fact that Burnham is a former musical theatre kid, I also can’t help but think that’s on purpose). The line mirrors one from the musical Sunday in the Park With George: “Look, I made a hat/ Where there never was a hat.” In Sunday, as George contemplates the sacrifices that go into making his art, he also marvels at the fact that he created something where there was once nothing. Look, I made a hat. The creation itself is worthy of wonder. In Burnham’s song, though, it’s all about creating the product for an audience to gobble up. Look, I made you some content.
Throughout Inside, Burnham examines his relationship to his creations and to his audiences, questioning the need we as a society seem to have to share and overshare. “Is it necessary that every single person on this planet expresses every single opinion that they have on every single thing that occurs all at the same time? Is that… is that necessary?” It’s the same question I found myself asking after that damn essay was published. The audience online clearly seemed to need to comment on my work, but also why did I feel the need to express opinions in my writing for such a large audience in the first place? Was it necessary to share with an audience online, and — more importantly — was it worth it?
All this thinking reminded me of something Burnham said at the end of his last special Make Happy, right before he began his hiatus from performing. He talks about how all of life can feel like a performance and offers the advice: “If you can live your life without an audience, you should do it.”
After he said that, Burnham stopped officially performing for a few years, until he came back with Inside. A pessimist might jump to a negative conclusion, he couldn’t take his own advice and stay away from the draw of the spotlight. But Burnham and his work in Inside are far too self-aware for that. The optimist in me notes the fact that yes, Burnham produced this special for public viewing, but there is notably no actual audience present throughout it. He’s naked (sometimes literally) throughout the special, baring his soul regardless of when/how/if an audience sees it. In the end, Burnham seems to come to the conclusion that we humans need to express ourselves somehow; the key is to figure out how to do it without desperately waiting to see how an audience swallows it.
I reached a similar conclusion soon after that damn essay was published. I dug myself out from the trolls’ cave. I wrote some things that I felt like writing and I published them with some outlets that don’t make money by offering writers up like human sacrifice. I’m still gonna write and I’m still gonna share stuff, but because I like to create things and not because I need feedback. I’ll continue to do it simply in order to make a hat where there never was a hat.
stuff i’ve made
An essay for Shondaland (!!): “Why I (an Adult) Love Watching Teen TV”
Teen girls know how to offer up their raw beating hearts, filled with everything they care about, and demand the world pay attention to them and take action. When used correctly, that can be powerful stuff.
An essay for The Dipp: “Who's The Protagonist On 'New Girl'? It's (Not) Jess”
My half-hour pilot OTHER WOMEN was just named a quarterfinalist in the PAGE International Screenwriting Awards. Yay!
Work in Progress Season 2 premieres in August! I co-wrote an episode! Catch up on Season 1 now!!
stuff i’m thinking about
How Britney Spears’ voice was taken away and how she’s fighting to take it back.
How Gossip Girl got updated for a new generation.
The balance between nature and nurture (written by my friend Meryl!).
The need for a living wage for Hollywood support staff.
stuff i’m loving
Being vaccinated against Covid-19. There’s some scary coronavirus news right now, but my anxiety about it is lessened by the fact that I’ve done what I can for myself and the people around me by getting my two Pfizer shots.
The fact that the monkey trainer from Friends used the HBO Max reunion to start beef with David Schwimmer 20+ years later and get interviewed by Entertainment Weekly??? The power of this monkey trainer!!!
Hacks. This show was basically engineered in a lab to appeal directly to me, and guess what! It does!!!!
Listening to romance audiobooks. Some recent faves have been Boyfriend Material, The Kiss Quotient, and The Unhoneymooners.
Season 2 of I Think You Should Leave. I dare you to find a more perfect sketch show.
Ryan and I just finished watching every episode of The Nanny straight through and I don’t think I can recommend anything more wholeheartedly.
Absolutely everything about Olivia Rodrigo. Long may she reign.
Thanks for reading! If you like The Pop, you can click the heart at the top of this post on Substack or share it on social media or forward it to a friend — they can subscribe at thepop.substack.com. You can follow me on Twitter here and Instagram here, and learn more about my work at sarahhallecorey.com. And if you have any thoughts or feelings to share, feel free to reply to this email.