The Thing No One is Talking About

On Hollywood, Sports, Academia, and Money for Writers

We’ve witnessed a year of unexpected cuts to the arts. Look at the universities. Look at the grant programs for creative writers. Look at the down tick in public reading participation across the country. Some say this is what system collapse looks like. I don’t know about that, but I know it ain’t too pretty out there right now.

I’m no political analyst. I don’t know what’s going to happen next in this country. But I have been hearing things from people across the creative writing community. From New York to California. It may well be the worst of times.

This time of year, it’s normal to see a bunch of job creative writing job postings and hear chatter in the instructor class this time of year. But that’s not happening. All is quiet on the academic front.

Suddenly, fewer students seem to be applying to graduate schools across the country.

And many federal grants, like those provided to the venerable Iowa International Writer’s Program and the NEA grant, have simply disappeared after decades of lifting the financial fortunes of writers.

It’s a weird time because from the founding of the first MFA programs in the mid-20^th the literary ecosystem in America has continually expanded.

But that expansion has paused. The question is whether we’ve entered a period permanent or very long-term contraction.

Well, let’s compare it to recent creative recessions.

You may recall the Writer’s Guild of America and SAG-AFTRA strikes of 2023. These necessary labor actions brought filmmaking and tv production to a screeching halt. It was so bad that fewer movies were released in 2024 as a result. And production in Hollywood is currently down to historic lows. When I say production, I’m talking about actors on soundstages, key grips building sets, transpo guys driving cast and crew from place to place. Those are real jobs that don’t exist in Los Angeles anymore.

But anecdotally, I’m hearing that there are green shoots. There’s been an uptick in options (e.g. this is when Hollywood says they might want to turn your book or short story or memoir into a film or show). I’ve seen this personally with my own work. There’s also been a flurry of big deals happening. Skydance (the guys who make those Tom Cruise Mission Impossible films) bought Paramount (the company that brought you Yellowstone and Landman). Now, Skydance-Paramount may gobble up Warner Bros. But that remains to be seen.

Before this turns into a Hollywood business newsletter, I’ll move on. But the point is that Hollywood took a ding, but it’s alive. That’s good for writers.

Consider the music industry. The version of it that I grew up with died with the expansion of the internet. A successful musical act in the 90s could make millions if they had a top 40 hit. On top of that, they could make money from touring plus merchandising. That era is mostly dead. Some artists report making nothing more than gas money from millions of streaming spins on Spotify and YouTube.

While highly successful icons like Taylor Swift and Queen Bey can print money at their huge shows, most of our modern musical artists are making a fraction of what their forebearers made.

Still, NBA YoungBoy visited New Orleans last week. His fans chased him down the street just to get a glimpse of his face. So there’s that. I guess. If anything, it says that the same fervor that my boomer parents’ cohort felt around the Beatles, Elvis, and James Brown still exists. And that’s probably a good thing for people who write.

Lastly, consider sports, which is a form of entertainment, and actually the most positive of these stories. A generation ago, there was worry that free agency would destroy football and baseball, eliminating profits for both players and owners. The NBA seemed to be stalling growth wise. Alternative sports, like skating, bowling, and curling, were just a sideshow. Today, all the major leagues have billion-dollar TV deals and players do quite well. The NFL pulls in as much money as some small nations, players sign eye-watering contracts, and even college footballers are starting to share in the wealth through the rise of NIL contracts, which were illegal just a few years ago. Millions watched the WNBA finals and World Series. And a film about F1, a sport that barely exists in the continental U.S made over $600 million at the box office this summer, which is a win for Hollywood and sports. (And writers.)

All of this tells me that writers must hold two truths in our heads: yes, times are hard, but they’ve never been better. Artists and entertainers who forge ahead despite market forces will be the ones who win in the end. Because the act of creation leads to unexpected places. But you can’t win if you don’t play.