BritaNick (Pizza Movie)
The Writers Panel
Ben Blacker
4.7 • 796 Ratings
🗓️ 14 April 2026
⏱️ 53 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
Writers/directors Brian McElhaney and Nick Kocher (Pizza Movie; Over Your Dead Body) discuss their comedy sketch roots as "BritaNick" and what that represents, writing scripts that wouldn't be made, editing themselves, how to interact with the people paying you to write, why Pizza Movie is the perfect BritaNick movie debut, and more.
Some fun events coming up!
On Sunday, April 19, 2-4pm, is a live Dead Pilots Society featuring scripts by Joel Kim Booster (Fire Island; The Other Two) and an adaptation of the Valley Heat podcast by its creator Christian Duguay (Mad TV). Cast includes Mitra Jouhari (Big Mouth), Poppy Liu (Hacks), and stand-ups Beth Stelling, Matt Braunger, Chris Garcia, Demorge Brown, Kevin Camea, Emily Maya Mills, Mike O’Connell, and more!
Also on Sunday April 19, at 5pm, Ben Blacker is directing a very fun one-person show by actress Katherine Bourne Taylor. Bellingham Bay is for fans of classic WB and CW shows, warm Canadian TV romances, and people who live in their heads.
THE WRITERS PANEL IS A COMPLETELY INDEPENDENT PRODUCTION.
Follow and support the show by subscribing to Ben Blacker's newsletter, Re:Writing, where you'll also get weekly advice from the thousands of writers he's interviewed over the years, as well as access to exclusive live Q&As, meet-ups, and more: benblacker.substack.com
Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
Transcript
Click on a timestamp to play from that location
| 0:00.0 | Hey folks, it's me, Ben Blacker, the creator and host of the writers panel. |
| 0:05.0 | Thanks for listening. |
| 0:06.2 | Thanks for continuing to listen in these dark times. |
| 0:10.7 | It is not great out there. |
| 0:15.8 | You know, I can't really speak to the state of the business. |
| 0:22.3 | I have friends who are working. I have friends who are working. |
| 0:24.1 | I have friends who are selling things. |
| 0:26.0 | I have friends who are at home and trying to figure out what their next move is |
| 0:31.4 | or how to get out of this business with either a paycheck or some dignity. |
| 0:37.4 | And I understand all of it. I'm somewhere in the |
| 0:41.0 | middle. We're writing stuff, we're pitching stuff, some of it for money, some of it for free, |
| 0:51.3 | but with entities or people that we like and admire and are maybe helpful, |
| 0:58.0 | or maybe not, but at least we're working with people we like. But it's really hard. It's |
| 1:04.0 | really hard right now. It's hard to sell anything. It's hard to, it's impossible to get staffed. |
| 1:11.2 | Television is, you know, its own thing. |
| 1:14.7 | As many of you know, I've been interested more in features the last few years. |
| 1:18.7 | I think you can tell that by the guests who've been on the writer's panel in the past six months or so. |
| 1:25.1 | But it's all hard. |
| 1:26.8 | It's all harder than it's ever been, and it's always |
| 1:29.8 | been very difficult. So look, I talked in my intro a few months ago about, you know, just |
| 1:40.7 | making stuff. And I do think that is in some ways a luxury, but I also think, |
| 1:45.4 | like, it's a thing you can do. And it's a thing that I was looking to do this year. And it's, |
... |
Please login to see the full transcript.
Disclaimer: The podcast and artwork embedded on this page are from Ben Blacker, and are the property of its owner and not affiliated with or endorsed by Tapesearch.
Generated transcripts are the property of Ben Blacker and are distributed freely under the Fair Use doctrine. Transcripts generated by Tapesearch are not guaranteed to be accurate.
Copyright © Tapesearch 2026.

