Season 2 Episode 5: Debt Ceiling

Season 2 Episode 4: The American Dream

Season 2 Episode 3: Personal Property

Season 2 Episode 2: Clientele

Season 2 Episode 1: Employment

Season 1 Episode 10: Creative Real Estate

Writer's Note:

The one unifying aspect of this economic crisis is that the desperation is hitting all classes. It is no longer just the one on the low end of the totem pole that is scrambling financially. As the crisis started, I heard many stories of people that couldn't figure out how to pay their rent or their mortgage and found their struggles stalling at the deaf ears of their unsympathetic landlords who in most cases did not need that rent, and in even more cases, were never particularly attentive and responsible landlords to begin with. But as time rolled on, and the once lucrative American real estate market fell in shambles, these same opportunistic landlords found themselves in the same position of their tenants. And well, I thought that was funny. Hence, this scene.

Season 1 Episode 9: Valentine's Day

Writer's Note:

Way way back when I began this project, I wrote about five episodes-- one of which was this one. A portrait of two couples at two different sides of the spectrum during this economic crisis, financially and romantically. We have Connor and Maura Callux, a financially successful couple with the newly added stress of keeping their businesses afloat while also trying to adjust to their separated lives and impending divorce. And we have Hank and Beth, a couple that couldn't be more solid in their relationship but who has financial strains that could easily break them. From the get-go, these were two scenes that I had quite a lot invested in getting just right, as did Michele, Chris Coffey, and Gerry, my very close friends whom turned in ravishing performances here. It was always one of our favorites on the page. Lovely Gerry who plays my boyfriend Hank went out the day of our shoot and bought two dozen roses to decorate Beth's bedroom with, so it would be one less thing for me to worry about (yes, he IS a bit of a prince!) and we ended up with a room that was vibrant in color. On the other hand, the bedroom we used for Maura and Connor was very spare, and our creative DP Chris Shimojima was inspired to shoot the scene half in shadow. Both Michele and Chris, who play the Calluxes, also arrived with wardrobe in shades of black and grey. Then add the bed in, which was white with touches of green and we ended up with this beautiful, retro visual that almost looked like a 60s movie to me. Put this all together, and we have two scenes about two struggling couples that both simply occur on a bed which couldn't look more different from one another. And which also shows the complicated and bittersweet nature of loving someone in good times and bad, which I think is a lovely treat for Valentine's Day.

Season 1 Episode 8: Split Assets

Writer's Note:

So I met the adorable Meredith Zinner at a screenwriting workshop about a year ago. We both shared the same acting coach but never met before. We hit it off right away and when I shared with her that I was shooting a webseries with a bunch of our mutual friends, she mentioned that she'd love to work on it if a role ever came up. (I actually took her seriously.) I immediately went home and created what I hoped would be a juicy character role for her-- Priscilla, an uptight suburbanite with a bad case of perfectionism. Luckily I didn't embarass myself because she said she would do it! Originally I conceived of this character being introduced in a different manner but it wasn't really coming together, and again, it was my mother who chimed in with her wisdom-- why can't she be Andy's ex? (I really need to give her a credit here. Bad daughter, bad daughter.) Anyway, again, this scene sort of wrote itself, since the characters were so well-defined and the conflict -- they used to be well-off, and he presumes she still is-- was built in. I also need to shout out a big thanks to Dore and Brian, my very best friends, who graciously let us take over their gorgeous house for a day.

Season 1 Episode 7: Grand Supreme

Writer's Note:

So, how many creative ways can we allude to a child but not actually show the child? Well, here is solution #2. In Episode 3, the scene between Astrid and the smitten Daddy, Nate, was written to begin after his daughter Poppy has already tucked herself away in Astrid's rehearsal room, so we wouldn't have to go through the trouble of casting a child. Once we saw the location, our DP Chris suggested someone pretend to be "Poppy" within the room, so you'd see her shadow moving around behind the blinds. (He's a clever one.) It worked out beautifully, and we managed to have the illusion of a little girl in the scene. So, when I got to writing my next scene for Astrid, I thought well, where the heck can I put Poppy in this one?! Hmmm... What if she's locked herself in a bathroom and Astrid is trying to get her out? And since Astrid is trying to max out her coaching to pay off her debt, what if she's doublebooked herself at a pageant? A recipe for disaster, as we all know how these moms can get if their child is not getting enough attention.

Season 1 Episode 6: Unemployment Blues

Writer's Note:

Not a huge amount to say about this episode other than I really do hate beer. Who on earth wants to drink that stuff?! Anyway, I like that the whole scene is built around the beer that she doesn't even want to drink. It pretty much epitomizes the two different planes this couple is living in. He doesn't expect much. She expects too much. Part of the story with Hank and Beth was that he is working nights as a security guard to make some cash and she was working days, so he was always coming in when she was waking up for work. Now, you don't know any of this because all of that is actually in a scene we cut. (Yes, I cut myself, gotta be brutal when you're a producer!) But the sentiment of THIS scene-- that Beth is bummed that she's getting gypped on the American Dream at the point when she should be reaping its rewards-- I think can be felt by many in my generation right now.

Season 1 Episode 5: Linguistics

 Writer's Note:

So this was a little writer's trick of mine. During my post-office hours encounter with the Serbian cleaning woman, in which she tearfully showed me the picture on her cell phone which evidently meant a great deal to her, she also read me a note she had written in broken english trying to explain who she was, which for some reason she felt the need to do despite the fact that we barely had any exchange that extended beyond "hi". I couldn't understand much of what she said, but it affected me greatly that she took so much time to share something with me. For the purposes of Downsized, I split that encounter into two different scenes-- this being the second-- and added in a little sexual attraction, because it's fun. By the way, that is Maura from Episode 1 in the picture on Connor's desk, if you didn't notice. Yes, it's all starting to intertwine now...

Season 1 Episode 4: Self-Help

Writer's Note:

A few years ago I wrote a script about a suburban self-help cult. It was not a very good script, but in it, I created a self-help process I called The E Trinity. When I conceived of the character Andy in Downsized, I decided to have him attempt to sell a self-help process that would help people get through the economic crisis called, you guessed it, The E Trinity. However, in the process of writing a scene for Andy, I came upon some struggles and a bad case of writer's block. I finally tried to pair him with Lowell, and proceeded to write several crappy drafts of a scene and finally gave up. I voiced my frustration to my mother (as I always do)-- Mom, I can't find the scene, these two men both are using self-help principles but Lowell's take is completely mutilated and bastardized, and she said-- Why not make them brothers? And I wrote this scene, in about two hours. Thanks for your brilliance Mom. As for the recruitment video, Chris and I decided to shoot it and edit it to look like the hundreds of other self-help videos on the internet which all seem to be someone talking in front of a white background.

Season 1 Episode 3: Pageantry

Writer's Note:

While I never competed in any beauty pageants as a child, I did compete in dance competitions, and the costs for costumes, coaching, entry fees, shoes, classes was exorbitant and hilarious, considering the end result was a $10 plastic trophy. I thought it would be funny to explore this world of excess in a recession, and so I created Astrid, a beauty pageant coach who can't figure out how to pay her bills, and then threw in Nate, a pageant dad with a crush. And the actors did the rest.

Season 1 Episode 2: Broken English

 Writer's Note:

As someone who usually works late, I am often still perched at my cubicle when the cleaning lady arrives, and I usually am one of the few people who engage them, instead of simply ignoring their presence or complaining of their incompetence while they are a foot away. One night a few years back, one cleaning lady with whom I exchanged an exuberant smiling "hi!" daily, approached me. She was quite worked up, and proceeded to show me what appeared to be a picture of a baby on her cell phone and tried to explain to me in very broken english what this particular photo meant to her-- most of which I could not understand, although I did discern that she moved here from Serbia six months prior, leaving her family behind, and this photo was of a new family member back home. Later that night, I couldn't stop thinking about her, and I realized that in her loneliness, my simple gesture of hello each day was the only intimacy she had, and that was why she chose me to share what was apparently a very special moment for her. So I wrote this scene to give her a companion, someone who is going through his own share of loneliness, as he adjusts to the process of divorcing, made more complicated due to the financial crisis. And I also got to explore the idea of this smart woman who has had to downsize herself in many ways to survive in this country-- by wiping off her makeup, pinning up her hair, and changing from her vibrant clothes into the drab cleaning lady uniform.

Season 1 Episode 1: Duane

Writer's Note:

The first episode began as a simple two-person scene between a sales rep, Beth, played by myself, and her boss, Maura, played by Michele Mavissakalian, as Maura lets an obviously qualified and competent Beth go, citing the oft used term "restructuring." It was an efficient scene, but I felt some element was missing. About a week before the final readthrough, the inspiration came. Why not bring into the scene an efficiency expert who tries to sugarcoat bad news by delivering it with a sock puppet? I sent the rewrite to my friend, Duncan Murdoch, who I thought would be hilarious as Lowell Wishingbone, and all the pieces just came together dramatically and satirically.