Everybody with Angela Williamson is made possible by Fireheart Pictures and viewers like you.

Thank you.

The following interview was completed before the start of the WGA and Sag-Aftra strikes.

According to Discover magazine, 60% of American households tuned into a Christmas movie during the holiday season, and the leading producer of Christmas movies, the Hallmark Channel, boasted 85 million viewers in 2021.

Tonight, we meet a screenwriter who brings these holiday movies into our homes.

I'm so happy you're joining us.

From Los Angeles.

This is KLCS PBS.

Welcome to everybody.

With Angela Williamson, an innovation, Arts, education and public affairs program.

Everybody with Angela Williamson is made possible by viewers like you.

Thank you.

And now your host, doctor Angela Williamson.

Erin Tran Donahue is our guest.

And I'm so excited to have you here.

You have been such an inspiration to many, and they don't even know it's you.

But you've been inspiring many, but also to what you've been doing just with the writing community.

So you're here to talk about your Christmas stories, but I would love for our audience to get to know you first.

Well, I grew up in Rhode Island, just outside of Providence from Barrington, Rhode Island.

My mother is Vietnamese, and my father is like Boston Irish and the youngest of, seven kids, six of us in seven years.

And so, yeah, I grew up with this really great, wonderful, big family.

And I grew up loving movies, watching movies, TV, loving old Hollywood, reading all the histories, the biographies.

you know, Fred Astaire, Ginger Rogers, all of those old movies are black and white.

My dad was a little strict.

So we we go watch a lot of old movies.

Those are the best, though.

I mean, especially with what you do now.

That was great training for what you're doing today.

So that was where I sort of got my love for storytelling.

And my father was actually a writer.

before he had six kids, he was in the Navy, met my mom in Vietnam during the war, and they got married over there.

But he was a poet, when he was younger.

And so he really encouraged all of us to pursue our dreams and our passions and our artistic pursuits.

And so that was sort of where I grew up.

You know, I grew up reading tons of books, writing stories and everything.

I went to, Brown University and while I was there, studied film or tried to study film, but it was a little bit too theoretical.

So I ended up just doing a lot of creative writing and being a history major.

I went to right after I graduated, I went to Vietnam for the first time with my whole family, and my father's first time back since the war, and met my family over there.

Loved it.

had such an amazing experience.

We're in Hanoi.

My sister and I walked into a bar restaurant, and there was nowhere to sit.

And there were these four other backpackers there.

And one was this dreamy Canadian surfer who was backpacking around Asia, and he was supposed to be my holiday fling, rebound romance.

And, we've been together now for 22 years.

And so next week, actually.

Some long.

That is very long fling.

So, you know, careful who you sit down next to.

in bars and restaurants.

You never know.

so.

Yeah.

So then we, we kept traveling, and I, we ended up living in Japan for a couple of years and teaching English.

We spent some time in Indonesia, just like traveling and surfing.

We went to South Africa to get our offshore yacht master sailing certification because we wanted to sail around the world.

And so it was me and seven guys on a boat for four months, and it was really intense and crazy and sailed through like a hurricane and storms.

And it was amazing and beautiful and then, we ended up we came back to Rhode Island and I was we were supposed to get jobs on yachts and work in, in that industry.

But then my dad was sick and three of my sisters were pregnant.

And so I was like, I just I can't go anywhere right now.

So we decided he got a job on a yacht in the Caribbean because he's Canadian.

He couldn't work in the US.

So I stayed and I sort of bounced around.

I wrote a novel because I was like, oh, if I'm going to tell people I'm a writer, I should probably actually write something.

So I did that, never got to publish, but wrote it.

And then after a year of being separated, I decided that I was ready to stop bouncing around.

And so I proposed to my husband and he said yes, I got him a ring and everything, got down on one knee, and we decided to settle in Rhode Island for a little while.

I just gloss over that.

I I've heard that story before and I think, oh no, I'm not going to let her gloss on that.

You just you decided you're going to get this done.

I had we we'd been together for so long, we knew we were going to get married, but we needed a green card.

So it was like, okay, so we're talking about getting married, but like, we weren't technically engaged.

And I had this idea in my head for a perfect proposal, and I didn't know how to get it into his head without telling him.

And so I was like, wait, but you're a feminist.

What are you think?

Like, why would you ever wait for a man that you want to marry.

If you already have the perfect and so you can execute.

It?

And so I proposed in my perfect proposal and he said yes.

And, and, and.

Yeah, because I don't think I ever need to wait around for a man to make decisions about my life.

And so, so he did that, and we ended up actually moving.

So we did our green card ceremony.

We were married in secret for a year.

We didn't tell anyone besides our family, because I was like, it's just a green card.

It's just a piece of paper.

It's not.

I wanted to have, like, a real wedding.

he was doing a yacht delivery for six weeks, and I decided that I should write a screenplay, which I had never.

I'd always loved that.

But the idea for me, growing up on the East Coast, the idea of moving to Los Angeles and like, being a screenwriter was just like, how do you do that?

Like what?

I'm going to get an agent, like, I it just seemed a very foreign concept to me.

I was going to live in New York.

I was going to be a novelist, you know, like that was sort of where my comfort zone was.

And but I was like, no, I'm just going to do it.

So I wrote, I got some books on how to write a screenplay, and I wrote a screenplay.

And then I entered it into the Nicholl Fellowship, which is run by the Academy Awards.

And it's like one of the biggest sort of amateur screenwriting competitions out there.

And so I entered it.

And then we also decided, that we weren't happy with our life.

So we sold everything we owned, and we got into our 1973 VW van and spent the next year or so driving around the US and Canada.

And so then throughout while we were doing that, my script made it into the semifinals.

And so that opened a lot of doors for me.

It gave me personal validation about my ability to be a screenwriter, and it gave other people, you know, interest in me and working with me.

So, I was connected to my manager.

I had a meeting with him, and he was like, let's work together.

And we he was like, well, if you want to do this, you're gonna have to move to LA.

And I was like, well, I'm parked down the street, so done, like we're here.

So we stayed and that was around, 12 years ago.

And we I was really lucky.

I started selling, and within the year I sold my first project, a feature pitch, a college comedy called Girls Night Out to Lionsgate.

And it was never made, but it got me into the WGA and it got my career started.

And then I sold a pilot to, ABC Studios called Barrington about my experience living with my parents, you know, Vietnamese mom, Boston Irish dad, and, again, didn't get made, but just got me all the experience and, and project sort of just kept leading from one thing to another.

And it was, as you know, as a writer, it's up and down.

So there's long dry spells.

And I just kept at it and I kept working.

My husband, went back to school.

He went to UCLA and got his master's in nursing, and now he is an ICU trauma nurse at UCLA.

And I had my daughter nine years ago.

And so that shifted things a lot.

Motherhood makes a big difference in how you operate as a human, as a writer.

but that opened up a whole new world for me as well, in terms of the stories I could tell or that I wanted to tell.

And so I started writing some stories that were more focused on motherhood or family based films.

And then, a couple years ago, I had reached this point where I hadn't I hadn't sold anything for like two years.

And, our savings were, you know, unfortunately, being a nurse in L.A is apparently not enough to survive, financially.

And the savings were running out, and I was just in a really rough place, and I. I didn't know what to do.

I was, you know, my sisters actually literally had, like, an intervention with me where they're like, you know, maybe you should know, like, we love you and you're great, but like, you're unhappy.

Like, maybe you should think about doing something else.

And I was like, I'm not qualified to do anything else.

I don't know what to do.

Like before.

Before this, I was a bartender, you know, like, I can't bartend in LA.

You don't.

I don't have a headsh and, but but at that time, I had read this article about how there was they had made 100 Christmas movies that year alone, and it's more now.

But this was, you know, a couple years ago between Netflix and Hallmark and Lifetime.

And so I was like, oh, I should write Christmas movies.

This is actually a perfect place to start.

Okay?

Because at this point you're changing your life and then you're thinking, maybe I should write Christmas movies.

So what we want to do is give the audience a little bit of a teaser, okay?

And they'll come back and tell, and then you're going to tell us how you changed that around.

Okay.

But before we go into our break, you mentioned the WGA, and so I want our audience to know what the WGA is.

Okay.

So the WGA is the Writers Guild, and it is, you know, when you are a professional screenwriter, it's the organization that, protects you.

Basically, it, it protects you, it helps support you.

It makes sure that you get paid, that you get paid a certain amount, that you have health insurance.

And it is invaluable for me as a writer, because everyone is always trying to squeeze more out of you.

Free work.

And it's hard to get into the the Writers Guild.

You have to sell certain things to certain companies.

And before you do that, you are unprotected so they can pay you very little.

You don't get health insurance, you don't get, the whole support system.

And so that was a huge step in my career, to be a part of that.

Thank you so much for that explanation, because I think that's really important.

And I think that people should know more about what the Writers Guild of America does.

So thank you for that.

So when we come back, you are going to pick up from this intervention that you had with your sisters.

And then when you started reading about Christmas movies, how that changed to the area that we see today and that you've been able to entertain us.

So hold on and we'll be right back.

Thank you so much.

It was a great, but before we leave, watch the 12 Days of Christmas Eve.

We had a long talk.

He told me that he knew how he was too hard on you, that he always just wanted what was best for you.

So tell me how proud of you he was and how much he loved you.

He loved you.

I loved you.

You didn't love yourself.

I knew it.

I knew you always loved me.

You just never told me foreign.

Oh, I know.

Thank you for watching.

For.

Listen, I just got off the phone with the client.

They're spending Christmas in Fiji, and so she wants the plans.

By Christmas Eve.

That's in three days.

Well, you should be mostly done with it already.

I know Marshall is.

Of course I can have it done in three days.

I'll have the new designs to you by 9 a.m. on Christmas Eve.

Let's hope it's good enough.

By.

I hope you're hungry.

I'm so sorry, but I've got to go.

That was my boss.

They move the deadline up.

It's due in three days.

Oh, wow.

That's really fast.

You're going to be able to finish it in time.

It's going to be tight with the Bake Off in Christmas, but I'll make it.

I always do.

Okay.

Oh, I got you some some chocolate peppermint since.

I was sweet.

Used to be a favorite.

Save it for when you're feeling stressed in a big new.

You're the best.

Welcome back.

That was Sugar and Spice, a holiday movie.

Wow, that was amazing.

Now, with what you told us in the first segment, I can see a little bit of your life in that movie.

So but before we go there, you have to catch us up because you were at a transition in your life.

You hadn't sold anything, you had an intervention with your two sisters, but you started three, three sisters, three sisters, sorry, sisters.

but then at that point you started doing research.

And what did you discover?

So, like I said, they, between lifetime, hallmark and Netflix, at that point, they're making like 100 Christmas movies a year.

And I just thought, wow, this is a really big market, and I should be writing Christmas movies.

And I love Christmas movies, I love Christmas.

And so it just sort of felt natural to me that I would pursue.

And I write romantic comedies normally anyway.

And so I talked to my my reps, my agent, my manager, and was like, I think I want to try to write Christmas movies.

I had written a movie for lifetime a few years ago called Drink Sleigh Love, which was a teen vampire movie, an adaptation of a way novel.

And so I had a relationship with them.

And so I went back and met with them.

And, you know, pitched a couple of ideas and they and one of them was about a woman ending entering a gingerbread baking competition called Sugar and Spice Holiday.

And they were like, yeah, we like this one.

And so I, you know, created the story, created the pitch.

And, we also decided that it was going to be Asian centered because there had never been while there had been Asian leads in Christmas movies, in sort of Christmas cable movies, there hadn't been like a fully Asian centered holiday movie ever.

And so they bought that idea and I wrote it, and it was crazy because it, you know, it got film during Covid and during like full lockdown.

It was 2020 and then and this was so this was like a month or so after the intervention with my sisters.

And so in the following year, actually, I sold not only that one, but then I sold three other projects in that year because that was my thing.

I was like, I knew it was going to happen.

I knew if I just kept working that I had all everything I needed to sort of keep going and to find success again, and that I had built up enough relationships, enough skills, in order to do it.

And so it sort of it was great.

It was a wonderful affirmation of persistence, which as a writer is everything.

You just have to keep going and you just have to work through the rejections, work through the failures, and just keep going and and believe that you are going to be the one that sort of makes it through.

so then, yeah, I sold that one to lifetime.

I sold a Christmas movie to Freeform.

I sold another Christmas movie to lifetime, and then I sold a romantic comedy to Netflix and so that sort of from that, it suddenly became Christmas movies were my thing and people wanted more Christmas movies.

And so, like, I like I once I started once I felt comfortable in that world and showed that I could do this, then it just sort of opened up this whole world.

And so now there's I'm talking to or I have been developing multiple Christmas projects with different networks.

and some of them are family movies, and some of them are romantic comedies.

Some of them are, you know, like dramedies.

It's just it really.

I mean, I write other stuff too.

Yes.

But what I love about the Christmas movies for writers and I tell writers this, they make them every year.

It's hard for a writer, especially when you're writing features.

It's so hit or miss.

And, you know, if they buy this one story off of you, they're not going to make that.

Like, I sold a movie to Netflix that will be that is airing this April.

So it will have already aired.

Yes.

called A Tourist Guide to Love, and it was based off of when I met my husband in Vietnam.

It was filmed in Vietnam.

It was set in Vietnam, and, you know, it was wonderful.

Netflix is not going to buy another movie about Vietnam from me.

Okay, but I wrote a Christmas movie for lifetime.

They will buy another movie Christmas movie for me next year, and the next year and the next year, hopefully.

And so for writers trying to make a living as a business, strategy and especially moms like the, I, founded the Writers Guild mothers group.

And so a lot of moms trying to work out a new schedule, childcare, things like that.

It's a very flexible schedule.

And you make a Christmas movie, usually you can qualify for your health insurance, you know, and it's enough to give you some time and financial security to work on your other projects.

And so for me, it's just been this wonderfully, rewarding career path because also, I love Christmas movies, and everyone I know loves Christmas movies.

My mom loves Christmas movies.

I can watch them with my kid.

And, and not just Christmas movies, but, you know, I, I know that there can be some, condescension about writing Christmas movies or about writing romantic comedies, or about writing hallmark movies or lifetime movies, because it seems like, oh, they're just these fluffy, cheesy movies.

But for me, like, for example, my mother, my father has Parkinson's and dementia, and my mom takes care of him all day.

And at the end of the day, at night, she wants to watch something that is comforting and soothing.

And for her Christmas movies or, you know, hallmark movies or romantic comedies, they provide that to her.

And so I feel like when people don't respect that and they condescend to that audience, for me, it always goes back to the patriarchy and the lack of respect for women's needs and for, for that audience, and that it's somehow less than.

But she wants something that she knows what's going to happen, that if she falls asleep in the middle of, it's okay, you shall wake up in ten minutes and she can go back to it.

That makes her laugh, that makes her smile, that fills her with comfort and joy and love.

And where the main goal is about love, it's about community.

It's about giving.

And so for me, Christmas movies specifically bring that to people, and I want to bring that to people.

And so I want to make the best version.

Yeah, there have been a lot of bad.

There are a lot of bad Christmas movies out.

There because there's so many different networks who have them now.

It's not just the three that you mentioned in.

The beginning, everyone.

I'm pretty sure HGTV made a great movie this year.

Oh yeah, everyone does.

Maybe.

Yeah.

I mean, everyone has Christmas movies.

And for me, the challenge is trying to find some sort of fresh way into that story and something that people to elevate it, to make it the best version of that.

And another thing for me has also been to add diversity to that world that has historically been a very white, white Christmas landscape.

and like I said, Sugar and Spice Holiday was the first Asian centered one.

And since then there have been multiple other ones.

And thankfully, the companies that I've worked with, you know, Lifetime and Hallmark, are very open to more diverse stories being told.

They're actively seeking those stories being told.

And so that has been a huge shift, and I love it.

So I tell, you know, writers, this is a way to to bring your own voice, to bring your own experience to an audience that maybe has not experienced that in a way that is welcoming.

And for me, it's about not just representation, but about normalization.

So Sugar and Spice Holiday is literally I mean, it's it's the formula.

It's the formula of everyone in.

Let's talk about that formula because you've taken that formula and you've added a multicultural, slant to it, which is wonderful because now we're seeing people like us, but also to what you're doing in the realm of, a Christmas spark that's for a mature audience.

Mature people can find love again, too.

And so how did you take that formula and then add your own to it to make it what we're seeing today.

It's all about for me, usually like the characters, you're just going into the characters and trying to figure out who they are and what they're experiences and represent that in an authentic way and a way that honors it.

But that doesn't, like, exotic it or tokenize it.

Like I said, it's normalization.

The the Asian family is decorating their Christmas tree and but maybe they're eating stinky tofu with chopsticks.

That's the best.

You know, like it's, it's and there's the family altar and all of all of those things, those added details.

that give it it makes it more meaningful.

I think it gives it more depth.

And outside of just the regular usual cookie cutter, holiday film.

And anyone can do that.

Anyone can just take whatever their story is, whatever.

Especially if you're from a cultural background or your sexual identity or ethnicity.

It whatever your experience was, it's unique and it's individual, and those stories deserve to be told, and audiences want that as well.

They even, you know, majority white audiences, I think, want to see things outside of their own experience and they want to, feel connected to the world around them.

And this is a way to do that.

It doesn't always have to be something that's, you know, about being Asian or about being black.

It's like because.

It's about.

We don't like even.

Though all of us celebrating the holidays, really.

Important part of my identity, that's not everything of who I am.

And I don't go through every moment of every day being like, oh, well, as an Asian person, as an Asian, like it's just it's as a person, you know, and we celebrate Christmas and I, I wanted to and I wanted people to feel represented.

And it was wonderful.

The feedback that I got after Sugar and Spice Holiday from the Asian community being like, it was so good to see myself on screen, to see my family on screen and screen, and to have it be just this fun Christmas movie.

And so I, I love being able to not only create those experiences for people, but to, educate other writers about the avenue so that they can share their stories so that they can earn their health insurance so that they can share this.

Because people really I mean, Christmas movies, people love Christmas movies.

They love.

Them.

They do too, and I do, and I get it.

And I, you know, my motto in life sort of is, or I think that my purpose is to experience and create joy.

And so, especially with Christmas movies, I feel like I can do that.

And so even if I was going to write, you know, even I won an Oscar, I think I would still write like a Christmas movie every year if I could, because I the audience that you reach, the appreciation that people have for it, the comfort, the enjoyment that people can have of that, you know, like I said, like I my mother has is a huge inspiration to me.

She has lived a very hard life and she always comes out of it with positivity.

She always focuses on like, what are the good things that I have around me?

What can I be grateful for?

And that's what the message of many holiday movies is.

It's about gratitude.

It's about family.

It's about community.

It's about what can I give, how can I receive, how can I give?

And receive love?

How can I connect with people?

And so for me, that is so integral and so central to how I want to live my life, how I want to, write, how I want to connect with audiences and, yeah.

And I just want everyone to have, you know, Merry Christmas or a Happy Hanukkah or like, Kwanzaa, like any whatever your story is, whatever your holiday is or, I mean, I, I'm trying to develop an idea based around the Lunar New Year, you know, like, just I want people to have a chance to celebrate love in all forms.

You know what?

And that's a perfect way to end our conversation.

Wow.

And you already answered what's next for Irene?

Because I think I want to see that movie about the Lunar New Year.

We all people are starting to understand it and celebrate it, and I think that's a great way to unite us.

So thank you so much for what you've done to not only bring us joy during the holiday season, but what you've done in your little bit of activism so that we can see all people celebrate this holiday and there shouldn't be differences.

So I do appreciate that.

And last but not least, thank you for telling us about the Writers Guild of America.

So thank you so much.

Thank you for giving me this opportunity.

My pleasure.

Thank you.

And thank you for joining us on everybody with Angela Williamson.

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