Tell me a little bit about your foray into the industry. When did you land your first gig and how long did that take?
My path was a little interesting. I played football in college at the University of North Carolina. I decided to graduate a year early from college and forgo my last two years of eligibility playing the sport. Thankfully that decision was met with a lot of support from my head coach, Mack Brown, who encouraged me to pursue a career out here in Hollywood. I wanted to give screenwriting a chance. He connected me with a few people that gave me some advice that Ive never forgotten.
I couldnt just come out to LA empty-handed. So I taught myself how to write a pilot and a screenplay on YouTube. I wrote a pilot, and I came out to LA and met with a few people that my coach knew. Those five meetings that I had through him basically matriculated into 25 meetings over the course of the week.
One of the meetings that came from that was my last boss; his name is Luke Ryan and he is the CEO of a small production company based in Los Angeles called Chaotic Good Studios. He hired me as his assistant off of the strength of the pilot that Id written, and I started working for him. Through refining my craft and working, I connected with my manager and we decided to start working together in May 2021. In March 2022, I got the Disney job. So its been pretty quick.