Hey everyone, John Highlaman here and welcome to Hell on Highwater, my podcast from the

recount and I Heart Radio with big ups to the one and only Rizza for our dope theme music.

With the announcement last week of this year's Oscar nominations, arriving in the wake of

the year when Hollywood was clobbered by COVID on almost every conceivable level when the explosion

of streaming raised profound questions about the distribution, delivery and consumption of

film once the plague ends and when issues of diversity and inclusion in the industry have

never been pressed more forcefully or to such apparent effect, we thought it would be

a good time to take a look at the state of the movie business in this moment of structural

flux and foundational upheaval.

And when it comes to the question of Hollywood and change, there are a few people better to

chop that shit up with than our guest today because in truth, few people have affected as

much actual change in Hollywood lately as the dude in question, my pal Franklin Leonard.

The state of filmmaking in 2021 is deeply complicated and an interview long history of gross

failures of gender, racial and disability representation resulting in financial losses in the aggregate

nine figures, the rise of streaming, the difficulty of making well anything during COVID, but I remain

optimistic if only because I believe in artists.

It is what it is.

Franklin Leonard is the founder and CEO of the Blacklist, a company best known for its annual

survey of the most liked screenplays floating around Hollywood that remain unproduced.

When Franklin first came up with the idea for the Blacklist back in 2005, he was more

less than nobody in the motion picture industry, a junior development executive at Leoticaprio's

production company who spent his weekends plowing through keeping piles of crappy screenplays

...