Episode 43: Doug Abeles

Doug Abeles is one of the cockiest comedy writers in the business, or more accurately, whatever the opposite of "cockiest" is. Those of you in your late 20's or later might be inspired to hear that Doug is a successful, Emmy Award winning comedy writer who didn't even start trying to get into the business until his early 30's. And even then, he still had to go through the ups and downs common to the life of pretty much any comedy writer. But he made it through! He made it through the rain! Glory be to persistence!! Doug and I talk about getting your foot in the door by submitting jokes to your favorite shows, moving out to L.A. to work on a show that lets you go after just 5 weeks, and bouncing back from that letdown to find more work. Eventually, Doug landed at Saturday Night Live where he wrote for the Weekend Update segment for 10 years. He shares some great stories about that experience including an extremely unusual "meeting" with Norm Macdonald. Like every episode of Writers' Bloc, this one has it all! Listen on iTunes.