The writers' assistant job gives most people their first experience inside a writers' room. And that can be an amazing chance to learn.
You get to see how an episode is crafted and how the professionals create a season of television.
I learned more storytelling lessons in the first month of being a writers' assistant than I did my entire time in college.
It's one thing to learn things by the book. It's a whole other thing to experience them and see how they fit into the very practical and commercial medium of TV.
I went through a complete mental adjustment in terms of what it means to write a script.
There are so many reasons to look for a writers' assistant job if you're just starting out. The thing is...
These jobs are hard to come by. They're not posted online. There's only one position per show. And even if you somehow see an open position, it can be really difficult to get the job over those already working on the show.
BUT there are ways to get to these jobs, which I'll get to in this post. But first, I want to go over some little-known aspects of the writers' assistant job itself.
I'll be tackling the following...
What a writers' assistant does
How to be prepared for the job
How to get the writers' assistant job
So, let's start by defining the job itself...
What does a writers' assistant job entail?
A lot of people think this job means being an assistant to a writer. That is not the case. Instead, they are there to help the writers' room function. In fact, on my timecards, my position was often written by its older name, "writers' room assistant."
In a writers' room, there are anywhere from 4-18 writers sitting around a big conference table.
They talk all day about story, character arcs, episode storylines, season story arcs, etc. Meanwhile, the writers' assistant is the one in the writers' room writing all of this down.
They are literally the note takers or stenographers for the writers in the writers' room.
Depending on the showrunner and how meticulous they want you to be about their notes, at the end of the day, the writers' assistant can end up with a Word document that's up to 40 or 50 pages long.
Again, showrunner preference will come into play in terms of what to do with those notes. Some showrunners are fine with you slapping the date on the top and sending it out to all the writers.
However, most will want you to find the important story points, the dialogue that the room gravitated towards, and anything that seemed like there was a general consensus that this is the direction they should be moving, and bring those notes to the top of the document.
That means if there was a general structure for an episode, that should be clear and moved to the front of the document.
In comedy writers' rooms, writers' assistants will also have to be in control of the script and be "on screen." That means plugging into the two big TV monitors in every writers' room and fixing the script in Final Draft as dictated by the showrunner. It's difficult and requires a high-level knowledge of the software.
Which brings me to my next point...
How to prep for being a writers' assistant
Get to know Final Draft very well. There are features like revisions or locked pages that are crucial for a writers' assistant, and a lot of what happens while shooting on the stage is dependent on getting the right pages from you.
So, a lot is riding on your shoulders. Much of this being "on screen" is technically the script coordinators job, but again, on many shows, the script coordinator and writers' assistant split the same duties.
In terms of the note taking, a general sense of episodic story structure and an ability to type fast will help greatly.
In addition, understanding the flow of a writers' room will be hugely beneficial.
You need to know who to listen to, who not to listen to, what to commit to the notes, what might just be a room joke. There's a lot of talk during an 8-16 hour day. And you need to be on and alert for that whole time.
Because so many of these experiences are writers'-room-experience-dependent, it can be difficult to become qualified to be a writers' assistant without being in or near a writers' room.
How to get the job
All this information and more is available in my book, "Breaking into TV Writing" 2024, Turner Publishing
As I mentioned, these jobs aren't posted online. On very rare occasions, they may be posted in writers' assistant and script coordinator Google or Facebook groups.
However, those groups are generally closed and you need to be a writers' assistant to be a part of those groups to begin with. Therefore, ask around.
See if you know anybody who knows anybody who IS in fact in one of these groups. Have them keep an eye out for you.
Even with somebody on the inside, there aren't many jobs posted. Plus, without any experience on your resume, it will be difficult to get a writers' assistant job. Showrunners like for you to have some level of experience in entertainment. These are not entry-level positions.
But all hope is not lost!
There is a position that generally gets promoted into the writers' assistant role. And that is the Writers' PA.
These are PAs who exclusively work in the writers' room. Writers' PAs have regular PA duties - they pick up lunch and coffee for the writers, clean up the office, re-stock the kitchen. It's a lot like being a PA in the production office.
However, you are around the writers' room and you're getting to know the writers, the writers' assistant and the script coordinator.
When I was a few months into my first Writers' PA job, I was encouraged to ask the showrunner if I could sit in the writers' room, which I was allowed to do.
I also always made sure to ask the writers' assistant and script coordinator if I could help with anything. Soon enough, I was helping to proofread the scripts and taking notes in the writers' room when they needed somebody to fill in.
This led to me being offered the writers' assistant role the next season when the script coordinator got staffed and the former writers' assistant took on his role.
This is a fairly common trajectory and shows the importance of getting that Writers' PA job to start making your way up the ladder.
BUT a word of caution... in this era of fewer and shorter seasons of TV, it can be difficult to make the jump as you won't have many seasons in which to be promoted.
Even if you don't get promoted to writers' assistant, if you're a writers' PA and are able to get to know the writers and sit in the writers' room, you're getting most of the benefits of being a writers' assistant anyway:
Learning how a writers' room works
Learning how professionals craft a season of TV
Networking with writers
Being a writers' assistant can be a great way into the writers' room, but it is not the ONLY way in. Keep the benefits in mind and look out for opportunities where you can get the same benefit through other avenues and positions.
