J.J. Abrams: Make room for magic
Masters of Scale
WaitWhat
4.6 • 4.4K Ratings
🗓️ 17 January 2023
⏱️ 43 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
You can’t predict your next a-ha moment. but you can create favorable circumstances for serendipity to happen – for you, and for your team. No one knows this better than J.J. Abrams, director, producer, screenwriter, and co-founder and co-CEO of Bad Robot Productions, which has been behind some of the most successful TV series and films of the last 20 years, from Lost to Star Trek to the Star Wars sequel trilogy. J.J. explains how creativity and collaboration are things you cultivate, not conjure; and that making room for magic isn’t a luxury, it’s an essential part of entrepreneurship. Building the conditions for discovery emboldens and energizes a team, he shows, helping to accelerate the arrival of the next surprise-and-delight solution.
Read a transcript of this interview at: mastersofscale.com
Subscribe to the Masters of Scale weekly newsletter: https://mastersofscale.com/subscribe
See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.
Transcript
Click on a timestamp to play from that location
| 0:00.0 | JustWorks is the human resources platform that knows your employees are more than just employees. |
| 0:07.4 | They're your people. People like the show producer on the East Coast who's constantly juggling, schedules, studio bookings, and last minute edits before an episode drops, and sometimes has a question about payroll that they need an answer to right away. Luckily, they can reach out |
| 0:23.4 | to JustWorks for 24-7 human support and not have to wait for their boss on the West Coast to wake up. |
| 0:29.3 | JustWorks does human resources right so you can do right by your most precious asset, your people. |
| 0:35.7 | To learn more, go to justworks.com. JustWorks for your people. |
| 0:42.0 | It's a foam latex tongue from the exorcist that Dick Smith sent to me when I was, I think, |
| 0:51.1 | 14 or 15 after writing him a note, a fan letter. |
| 0:56.0 | And the note said, |
| 1:01.6 | Dear JJ, here's a used but clean tongue from the exorcist. |
| 1:03.6 | Stick some peanut butter on the end. |
| 1:06.1 | And put your tongue, which I've never done because I just didn't want to. |
| 1:08.4 | So I have it in the same box in which he sent it. |
| 1:14.0 | This unusual anecdote could only belong to my friend J.J. Abrams. |
| 1:19.3 | JJ is famous for many things, including his awesome collection of movie memorabilia. |
| 1:24.7 | So, maybe I shouldn't be surprised that he's the owner of one of Linda Blair's Prop Tongues, |
| 1:27.5 | courtesy of legendary Hollywood makeup artist Dick Smith. |
| 1:33.1 | It's a relic from a pre-CGI era when the tools of movie magic were things you could hold in your hand. |
| 1:34.9 | I love physical objects. |
| 1:38.9 | There was this book that Doug Doris wrote that he and I collaborated on that was called |
| 1:43.0 | S. |
| 1:45.4 | It came in this sleeve, and when you pulled the book out, you saw there was all this |
| 1:49.6 | ephemera within the book, within the pages you could actually take out. |
... |
Please login to see the full transcript.
Disclaimer: The podcast and artwork embedded on this page are from WaitWhat, and are the property of its owner and not affiliated with or endorsed by Tapesearch.
Generated transcripts are the property of WaitWhat and are distributed freely under the Fair Use doctrine. Transcripts generated by Tapesearch are not guaranteed to be accurate.
Copyright © Tapesearch 2026.