Meet Gabe Meyers of Best Frenemies in Burbank

Today we’d like to introduce you to Gabe Meyers.

Gabe, can you briefly walk us through your story – how you started and how you got to where you are today.
My father loved film noir. When I was a kid, he showed me every one of those richly-shot, dismally dark, black and white classics. The effect was twofold: I knew (even from childhood) that I wanted to work in film and I became an incorrigible pessimist. Both would prove invaluable in my path to becoming a writer/producer.

In the beginning, like most New York City kids who want to get into the arts, I got a BA at a Northeast liberal arts college and, with it, two tons of student debt. Bennington College (in Vermont) was a wonderful place for me. Bennington focuses on giving their students the freedom to map their own educational journey and I was a young, inexperienced but passionate idiot who wanted to learn it all. There, I wrote my first feature screenplay (bad). I wrote my first full-length stage play (also bad). I did some improv (very, VERY bad). For my thesis project, I directed a Sam Sheppard one-act and by working harder than I ever had before in my life, I, for the first time, created something mediocre. Huzzah!

I graduated college in the summer of 2007 ready to go out into the working world, and two months later all the jobs went “bye, bye.” So, I moved back in with my mother. Luckily, I was a pessimist and had assumed something terrible was going to happen anyway. Take that, horrible timing!

So, in-between being rejected for jobs I was staggeringly overqualified for, I made a promise to myself: every day I would write something (even just a little something) and watch a movie I had never seen. In 2008, I watched three-hundred movies and wrote lots and lots of thoroughly mediocre nonsense that I have since avoided reading like the plague. But everything I wrote was getting a little bit better.

A couple of years later, I got my first big break at WNET’s PBS Documentary Series American Masters. They were looking for an office production assistant and I got the job.

In many ways, working at WNET was a dream. The office was in midtown Manhattan, about a mile from where I grew up on the Upper West Side. The American Masters team were all smart, sharp New Yorkers like myself. And I realized I had the temperament of a producer.

Producers are, by nature, worriers. A producer’s job is to foresee everything that can go horrifically wrong and do their best to prepare and avoid. In this task, my pessimism was a benefit. I was a natural at predicting possible pitfalls and correcting ahead of time.

Although there were times when my bluntness didn’t serve me. During my first week at American Masters, the Executive Producer handed me a documentary and asked me to write coverage. Eager to impress and happy to pick something apart to see how to make it work better, I wrote a small novella of feedback. Every note (no matter how small) came with a paragraph breaking down what I thought could be done to improve. I was direct but constructive. I didn’t know this was to be their next broadcast. Nor did I know the Director was (at that very moment) finishing up his final edit. The Executive Producer loved my notes so much, she forwarded them to the Director (leaving my name on them) and insisted these notes be implemented. A week into my first gig and already someone hated my living guts. I was moving so fast!

My experience at American Masters was invaluable. I gained a wealth of knowledge about producing, line producing, rights/clearances, contracts, and programming a documentary series. I learned how to edit. How to produce a shoot. How to draft a contract and a feature budget.

I worked on eight documentaries a year for four years at American Masters, making my way up to Associate Producer, all while learning the craft of producing documentaries. When we won a Primetime Emmy for Outstanding Documentary series, I was acknowledged by the Academy as an integral member of the Emmy-award winning team and received an award certificate. The next logical step would have been for me to start producing freelance.

But while I was learning what I needed to be a producer, I had found myself focusing more and more of my free time on writing for TV. I had written a couple of pilots and gotten into a few second rounds of pilot competitions. I was even starting to think my writing was not terrible. Then, in my last year at WNET, American Masters did a documentary on legendary writer and showrunner Norman Lear and I had the great privilege of meeting Norman. Working up the guts, I pitched a show idea I had to Norman’s team and Norman liked it.

I figured I was in: an uncharacteristically optimistic and, of course, incorrect assumption. But it was enough to get me to take the risk and move out to LA to pursue my dream of writing for TV and film, so ultimately not a bad thing… at least so far… we’ll see…

Turns out there’s more to writing on TV then just showing up with a decent idea and some B+ samples. Who knew?!

While I pitched series to various production companies that didn’t return my phone calls, I also needed to eat and live under a roof, preferably one with walls attached. I started putting my producer/writer/editor experience to work. I wrote a publicity copy. I edited and produced some industrials and a commercial.

As I started to get more and more freelance gigs, I noticed many other young professionals in the same situation: young, experienced, experts in their specific discipline, all working freelance. I wanted to create a company, a banner, under which we could get larger production contracts, produce our own shorts, and (with access to a giant network of film professionals) offer a wide variety of production services, connecting freelancers to gigs.

With this goal in mind, I, along with fellow writer/video editor Griff Maloney and director/producer Boman Modine, started Best Frenemies. Best Frenemies is a production company focused on producing, developing, and doing postproduction on shorts, commercials, music videos, industrials, etc. In our first few months, we’re already working with filmmakers and companies to produce high-quality short narrative and commercial content. We’ve also produced and shot the pilot of our first original web series “Table for One” which you can expect to see later this year.

Has it been a smooth road?
Pitching show ideas to production companies is an unpredictable business. I feel like I’m constantly one email away from getting the development funds I need to make my dreams a reality, or hearing that the company I thought loved my idea is actually passing. It’s a struggle to not become too emotionally invested and go crazy.

My hardest struggle was working through my divorce. It’s hard to write or work when you can’t get out of bed. That said, even out of that horrible experience, I created something I’m proud of. Right after the divorce, I was housesitting for a friend. I was miserable, to say the least. I spent most of that month collapsed on my friend’s couch eating freezer-aisle chimichangas and binging TV series I wasn’t interested in enough to catch the first time around.

Then, in middle of Preacher: Season 1, I had a revelation. My predicament is actually very funny. Not to me, obviously, but what’s funnier than a schlubby, divorced guy, who clearly can’t get past his ex, eating garbage, sad-man food and watching a patently absurd show? I started developing it into a dark comedy with my Best Frenemies cohort Griff Maloney.

Now we’re editing the first episode of our first original web series “Table for One.” The series is a parody youtube-style cooking show which follows an aspiring chef and YouTube personality as he works to get his life back together after a brutal divorce by throwing himself into the romantic cooking show for couples that he and his ex-wife created. Look for it over the holidays on the Best Frenemies website.

So, as you know, we’re impressed with Best Frenemies – tell our readers more, for example, what you’re most proud of as a company and what sets you apart from others.
Best Frenemies isn’t just a production company, it’s a network of young, freelance film professionals. Our network gives us an extensive list of production services we can offer. In house, we have professionals with years of development, pre-production, on-set, and post-production experience. But even when a client is interested in a niche service we don’t directly provide, we can easily find an expert in that field.

Our network is bi-coastal, full of both seasoned and eager film professionals. If you want material edited into a reel, or you want to direct a music video; if you want a pitch deck for a series you’re pitching or you’re looking for a last-minute Steadicam op; if you need a series of training industrials produced from scratch or you need a budget for your fundraising campaign; we can make that happen.

Let’s touch on your thoughts about our city – what do you like the most and least?
LA’s been rough. I’m such a New Yorker. I like walking. I like public transportation. I like restaurants that stay open all night, tall buildings, and big crowds. I’m not ever, ever “chill”. I dislike the heat, natural landscapes, and positivity.

Native Angelenos, please tell me:
1. Why does everyone want me to join them on a five-mile hike up a mountain, but no one will walk five flat blocks from a parking spot?
2. Am I the only one who thinks it’s creepy that Trader Joe’s cashiers all seem to genuinely care how my day’s going?
3. How is it possible that you can have brunch at 10 am? When is breakfast? 4?

I do love the food in LA, though. If I have a free day, you’ll find me restaurant-hopping around K-town or Silver Lake.

Contact Info:

• Website: www.best-frenemies.com
• Phone: 917-453-0842
• Email: info@best-frenemies.com

Image Credit:
Set photos were taken by Santaro Muto and Justine Woodford. Company logos are available for publicity purposes. All other photos are property of Best Frenemies Llc.

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