Thread by @helenshang

It's the #BadApple Apple Day of Action so here's my Apple Plus story! I was staffed in one of their mini-rooms 2 years ago. The showrunners had written an incredible, daring, TRULY UNIQUE pilot and I loved all the writers. That said, I do NOT feel we were set up to succeed. (1/?)

Firstly, we only had 5 writers total, including the 2 showrunners. And we only had 6 weeks to break the entire first season, plus write 2 more eps and revise the pilot. 6 weeks is not enough time to break ANY season, but this show in particular required A LOT of research. (2/?)

I was researching before the room started, during the room, and AFTER THE ROOM ENDED. Why after the room? Because after the room wrapped was when I had to START writing my ep outline. I only had like a handful of room days to break it so I went off with a rushed break. (3/?)

Naturally, this required me to work on my own -- including (drumroll) I had to jump on Zoom multiple times with the showrunners / other writers to break scenes, get notes, and talk thru notes. THIS SHOULD COUNT AS ROOM TIME. But now we were all breaking story for free. (4/?)

I worked hard for that show b/c I loved the material and the other writers. I believed in my showrunners' vision and REALLY wanted something like this on TV. I chased the carrot with them. At the end...

...the show was not greenlit. It's a shame -- it was really good. (5/?)

CHAPTER TWO! (Yes, there's more.) So many weeks after the room wrapped and I wrote my material freelance while doing free room sessions, I was like hmm, it's taking a LONG time to get paid. When I finally hear from them... (6/?)

...they wanted to pay me at the LOWER STREAMING TIER RATE. I'm like LMAOOO are you fucking serious? So I go online and do more research. I dug up articles of their leadership publicly bragging about their high amount of subscribers... (7/?)

...and also articles where it mentioned that Apple offered free subscriptions to their service w/ purchase of Apple products & then those subscriptions lapsed (which is prob why they wanted to pay me less). But I realized those subscriptions lapsed AFTER I signed my deal... (8/?)

...and AFTER I delivered my draft. So I write a scorched earth email with times stamped and sources cited. They finally relent and pay me at the higher rate. What fucking rigamarole. (9/?)

The mini-room situation has got to be curbed. These short weeks are not enough for us to do the work required, and it just makes us work for free for the promise of catching the carrot. We also need increased transparency in streaming numbers and viewership. 🍎 (END.)