S2 E10: The Art of Storytelling: Trey Callaway on Family, Film and Finding Your Story

I'll tell you, one of the greatest experiences consistently that I've had in my career is when you walk onto a set or onto a location, an actual physical space.

Yeah.

And you recognize in that moment, whether it's in a, an ancient fortress that you imagined in your head that is now in three dimensional form in front of you, or it's a space station, hospital, whatever it is, when you walk onto a set, you. I at least am overwhelmed by this notion of two things. One, the childlike response internally is, look what I did. Yeah, look what I did.

I know I'm smiling. I'm like gleeful listening because I knew that.

Look what I did. Yeah. But then the second, I think what keeps you from being an ass is the second equally critical thought, which is, look what they did.

Yeah.

And that's why for me, like, there's a meeting in television in particular called the concepts meeting, which usually kicks off, it's usually the first production or pre production meeting that you have on any episode of television.And what that meeting is essentially is the writer sitting down with all of the various crew department heads and walking them through the script and clarifying ideas and speaking from a 30,000 foot view. What this is, what the episode's about, this is what happens, etc. And it's. It happens to be much like walking onto a set.It happens to be my favorite part of the production process or one of my favorites because it's a moment of recognition as you sit at the end of the table or surrounded by these various extremely talented people in their individual disciplines. It's this recognition of A, if I hadn't put these words on paper, none of these people would be sitting here right now.And B, if I didn't have these people sitting here, all I would have is a bunch of words on paper. Yeah.

Hi, I'm Paige Nolan. Welcome to. I'll meet you there. A place where heart centered conversations are everything.Living what matters is the truest thing and sharing the journey is the best. Hi everyone, and welcome back. Today's episode is special to me for a couple of reasons. First and foremost, my guest is a friend.He's a person I admire and he's inspired me in so many different ways. But also secondly, what we talk about is near and dear to my heart and it is certainly at the center of his.It's the joy and importance of storytelling. My guest, Trey Calloway is a storyteller and he is a great one.I met Trey and his wife Nancy 15 years ago through mutual friends and we appreciated each other from the start. We share this love of story and a deep respect for the creative process. Trey and I agree, so story is everything.In this episode, we talk about storytelling through the lens of Trey's professional path. He's an accomplished screenwriter. You'll hear him talk about his experience writing the hit movie I Still Know what yout Did Last Summer.He's a producer. He's worked with some of the biggest names in Hollywood. Harrison Ford, Ron Howard, Tim Burton and many others. He is a showrunner.His latest project, the House of David, has been a big hit series that y' all can check out on Amazon. He is a professor at USC Film School where he has taught a class entitled Pitching 101 for the past 20 years.And most importantly, he is the creator of a beautiful love story, his family life, married to Nancy, and together they have raised three amazing kids, Clementine Crockett and Cosmo. You're going to hear me sing Trey's praises as a parent. His kids were preteens when we met. Mine were toddlers.And Trey's fatherhood served as a guiding light for me and for Boyd.It was and is an example of how to raise teenagers and young adults in Los Angeles in the very grounded, down to earth way that comes naturally to Trey and Nancy. Trey and I talk about the intersection of story, playfulness, curiosity and connection.We talk about the courage it takes to be who you are in a professional path, but also just in life to be sensitive to your own understanding of yourself and to stay true to the creative expression that is yours to share. Lastly, I will say this is an episode for anyone who has ever loved a TV show or a movie or even felt something during a commercial.Trey has such a reverence and a joy for what happens behind the scenes to make it possible for all of us to feel what we feel when we watch a story unfold on a screen. If you share a show with someone you love, share this episode.It's going to make you appreciate the miracle of collaboration, the vision of leadership and the creativity that happens every day in the world of visual storytelling so that we get to take the emotional ride of the stories we watch. Enjoy my conversation with Trey Calloway.

So, Trey, let's start from the beginning. Let's go back to when I think of you. I think of storytelling. I think of music. I think of you as this force of creative energy.And so I'd love to start in Oklahoma and give. Fill us in on Were you always captivated by stories Were you a moviegoer as a kid or a reader?And just that those in those first seeds of you becoming what I would describe now as a pretty talented, seasoned storyteller.

That's sweet. Thank you. I mean it all. It always goes back to Oklahoma.As hard as I've tried, as hard as I try to get away from that place, I keep getting dragged back. No, look, it's an extremely important part of my formative story. I was born in Tulsa, family of four.Both of my parents were extremely creative people.My mother was a writer and worked in advertising or public relations for most of her career until a very late life, abrupt left turn, where she got a couple of master's degrees and became a Presbyterian minister, which is a whole nother story.

I did not know that.

Wow.

A different kind of storytelling. Yes, but. And then my father was also a writer and director, primarily of commercials on a local and regional basis.So that was my introduction to, like, a form of the entertainment business and certainly storytelling. Just in a 32nd, 15 second, 32nd or 60 second form.

Yeah.

And both of my parents had also been in radio. They both met at a college radio station and were both at the same college in Oklahoma. So, anyway, writing and storytelling were hugely important.Important in our family. My mom used to proudly say that she taught me to read from the newspaper when I was three.I don't remember a time when I wasn't reading or trying to communicate on paper ideas, but I really didn't like, to be honest, I thought, although I got involved in school theater and made a lot of Super 8 movies and was in regional plays and stuff as well, I just didn't. I think I assumed that I would just go into the same family business, that I would work in advertising.And I did work in ad agencies when I was younger, interning and then copywriting in a Tulsa agency. And so I think I thought, I guess that's just what I will do. But truthfully, it's not what I wanted to do.What I wanted to do, basically from the summer of 1977 where I went and saw Star wars at the Fox Theater in Tulfa. And I then subsequently spent all of the money that I had earned mowing people's lawns to see it 10 more times.

Wow.

I saw it 11 times.Not just because I was so engaged by the story or felt like I was escaping what was then, for a number of personal reasons, a challenging childhood, I felt I had this epiphany, which doesn't sound like much of an epiphany now. But it certainly was then, which was just this notion of, wait a minute. It's not just that I love this story.It's that creative communities assemble to build these kinds of worlds. Like a small city of. Or small town of 200 plus people got together to make Star Wars.

Yeah.

And that suddenly was on my radar. Oh, wait a minute. I would love to be in that kind of a community.I don't know how I could possibly get there from here, but it was suddenly on my radar.And then the second most important part of that process was Francis Ford Coppola, the Oscar winning director, coming to my hometown, coming to Tulsa to make the movie the Outsiders. And I went so many other kids in Tulsa and auditioned for any kind of role and got cast as a soch.It was a part of the pool of socs that were drawn from that went through stunt training and showed up for rehearsals and all of that stuff and got used for a lot of bizarre sort of social engineering experiments that Coppola was famous for. And. But then ultimately I wound up being brought to a local drive in one night. And next thing I was given a single line and a medium close up.And I got to be in the Outsiders. And I was super excited by that whole process.But I think what was even more important about it to just in terms of my career later was, was when the circus left town, I got to. I had gotten to be in the circus briefly, and then I suddenly went, oh, wait a minute. That was fun.But if I want to stay in the circus, I guess I have to go where the circus is. And that's what finally got me out of Oklahoma and into USC film school. And the rest, as they say, is history.

How was the set? How old were you when you were in the outsiders?

I was 16 years old. And the whole thing has come full circle a couple of times now. I was literally just.I was in Fresno, California two weekends ago for a big celebration.Fresno, California is where the movie the Outsiders started because a Fresno high school librarian shared the book the Outsiders by Essie Hinton with a group of seventh and eighth graders.And they were so blown away by the book that she then encouraged them to send a copy of the book along with letters of encouragement to Coppola telling him why he should make a movie of this.

Yeah.

And he then read the book because of that and then responded to the librarian saying, you're right, the book is great and I am going to make this movie.So I went back to Fresno or I went to Fresno to meet this librarian at the invitation of C. Thomas Howell, who certainly played Ponyboy and was one of the stars of the film. And they're making a documentary about the making of the Outsiders right now as well. And my original wardrobe is on display in the.In the Outsider's House Museum back in Tulsa.

Yeah.

So it's a whole like full circle kind of thing.

Yeah. And so first set. That's the first time you set foot on the set was age 60.

A real set.

A real.

My dad's TV commercials. Yeah. First real set.

And so when you get to film school, is it immediately about screenwriting or do you go into just I want to make a film or I don't even know what that means.

Yeah, it was both of those things. Yeah, I went. I had to get. The joke is my parents wanted me to go to a state school first to get the basics out of the way.

Yeah.

So I went to two. I went to two years at OU Smart. And while I was there I took a filmmaking class. I think it was literally the only filmmaking class they offered and.And learned pretty quickly in that process of making my first 16 millimeter film that like, I hated the production part of it, I hated the editorial part of it, but I really loved coming up with the idea. And so that's what drove me toward applying to the writing division in the film school at sc. And certainly when you.Then the joke was that they didn't accept any transfer credits. It's a mandatory four year curriculum. So I had to start all over again anyway.

Oh my gosh.

Yeah.

As I'm like praising you, I'm like, in your opinions, I'm like, that is so smart. And then you ended up to.

Yeah. And my parents had been pretty clear from the outset about we'll pay for four years of those. Let's. Those last two years of SE were on me.But anyway, yeah, it was definitely all about intensely focused on the writing aspect of the craft. Not that we didn't take all kinds of related courses and have some production courses as well in the process, but it was very writing intensive.

Yeah. And when do you get your first break?

It's the old. I think it was. Had a Hopper or some smart woman who first uttered the quip. It took me five years to become an overnight success.

Yeah.

That tends to be the case in general in Hollywood, but it was certainly the case for me. I graduated from SC Film with some screenwriting awards under my belt. I had only ever written movies and only a couple of them at that Point.But then my career began with just selling movies. Original ideas for movies or scripts that I had completed that nobody ever saw that never got made. But they helped me pay off my student loans. Right.

Yeah.

And. And so I kept doing that. And then basically in the late 90s is when it all happened at once.I wrote, I sold an original pitch for a big science fiction epic at Columbia. And I remember joking at the end of my pitch to a conference room full of executives, oh, by the way, this is also make a killer TV series.And then they all laughed politely. And then they hired me to write the movie. I wrote several drafts.

Yeah.

And then some big sci fi movie opened that the studio released and it did not do well. And so that immediately everyone got afraid.

Yeah.

Yeah. They were not so interested in the big budget sci fi thing that I had given them.But on the strength of that joke that I made, one of the executives called me and said, you made this joke in your first pitch that it would make a killer TV series. I didn't think it was funny. I just sent the latest draft of the feature to the president of then network called upn and.And they want you to adapt it into a TV series. So I got hired by UPN to adapt that movie into a pilot, which is my first pilot.And then meanwhile, because of at least the development process had gone well at the studio on my movie, they called to ask me if I had any interest in coming in with a take on a sequel to I know what you did last summer.

Yeah.

So I said yes. And so I then set up and sold my pitch for I still know what you did last summer. And at the same time. And that got greenlit into production.And then at the exact same time, UPN greenlit my pilot to series. So like, it was a huge, very sudden launch in a big way into my first produced movie and my first produced TV series all at the same time.

Are you married at that point? So it's before marriage. Okay.

We were together, Nancy and I. We were not yet married.

Yeah.

Oh, no. I'm wrong. I'm wrong. I'm totally wrong. God. This is a sign.

So you're allowed to be a Jesus.

We were married, but not for very long.

Yeah. So you just dove into that prospect. You had the capacity to dive into those two things at once?

I don't know if I had the capacity, but I had the blind faith, ambition. Here's the opportunity. Literally banging down the door. So I better run with it.

Yeah.

And that's where it started. And I have not really looked back.

Yeah. When they come to you and say, what's your take on a sequel, for example, do you lead with yes or do you.Are you watching the first one and really digging in and saying, do I have a take on this? You know what I mean? Is it. Is the opportunity coming first or is like the inspiration like, oh, I really could work with a clever way?

Yeah.You're poking at a sort of a critical component of every least working writer's tightrope act, which is that cross between honoring your instincts creatively and you're. That which really speaks to your soul, since it's your veins that are going to get tapped. Honoring that and also paying your bills.There's always that sort of back and forth. I had already seen for. I still know I'd already seen. I know you did last summer. I'd already. I'd enjoyed that ride.So I was already like, okay, that sounds fun. I'd like to try and pick up that torch and carry it. But then it's also the process of. But what do I have to say really?And where can I take it and what do I want to say with it? Yeah, I want it to be a ride as well, but do I of myself, can I put into this, what can I draw from? Yeah, so it's always a back and forth like that.

And do you have a place that you go? Do you have any ritual or. I don't know.And ritual is kind of an intense word because I know you've got a family and you're busy and all that, but is there a moment where you drop in and you can find that point of view and really feel captivated enough by it that it could sustain you for writing a whole script?

It's a weird thing, Paige, because this is where I really owe it to that early advertising experience. Wound up working for an ad agency in LA as another way to pay off my student loans when I first graduated from school. And then I also created.I had a freelance company and I wrote a lot of taglines for movies. For a while I was a go to guy in Hollywood for taglines. Like I wrote the tagline for Home Alone, the family comedy without the family.Or yeah, Home Alone 2. He's up past his bedtime in the city that never sleeps. Like that kind of stuff. And. But the reason I bring.The reason I bring it up is because to make it real for myself, the rich.When you talk about rituals, yeah, I need to kick start or inspire that kid in me who would Wait in line outside the fox Theater for 11 times to see Star wars and would stare at the posters on my way to get into the theater. And that becomes a sort of a weird but critical part of the excitement for me.So anybody that works with me knows that like including my reps, like, I, maybe I'm just a frustrated graphic designer, but when I get a gig.

Yeah.

One of the, or when I go after a gig, one of the first things I need to do to make it real for myself is to create some kind of key art for it. It might be in the old days when we had folders, like, it might just be like the COVID art on a folder.But yeah, now that we do full blown bells and whistles pitches with graphic design and all kinds of stuff, I'll do title treatments, I'll do the image decks, I'll do it's. And for me, I, what I realize is it's like, it's helping me do a couple of things.It's helping me start to visualize in the ultimate visual medium what this is going to look and feel like.

Yeah.

But also like I, by being able to. Magic of a tagline is super, super important, I think, to me as a writer.But I argue in my 20 years of teaching at USC, young writers, I also think I, I know that I often encourage them to boil what their movie is about into a single line.

Yeah.

If you can speak to the underlying theme of a film and the tone of the film, the way that movie or that TV series is designed to make an audience feel that becomes the trunk from which all other branches grow.

Yeah.

It's. I think it was, I think it was Einstein who said if you can't explain it simply enough, you don't understand it well enough. Like that.Yeah, that is, that's key for me in visual terms, but also in tagline terms. So that's ritual. If I have one that is pretty consistent in the things that I work on.

I think that can translate too to other industries.Like when I think of all the people I've worked with in different industries, it's like knowing what, I guess you could say knowing what the why is, that feels kind of life coach to me. But knowing your why, it's a version of that where it's.If you're going into this big project or even in family life when I've worked with parents and I've worked with a lot of moms who are running their families and other things that they're doing with their lives. But to distill it, like, what is it about? What is your Saturday and your Sunday about? Especially in modern day life where it gets so.Because the competing priorities are everywhere and then you just are running around and you wake up five years later and you're like, wait, did I just miss their middle childhood years because I was trying to get them on the travel team?

Yeah. No. It's funny that you bring that up in, in kid terms because I, I think, I would like to think that it's mostly successful.My kids might argue that it's.It was sometimes to a fault, but it was really important to me with our three kids that they all be effective storytellers, no matter what they wanted to do. And quite frankly, I didn't want anyone to be writers. But I would have encouraged them and supported them if they had.But, but the point is, like, it was really important for me that they were effective storytellers. That from an early age. You're crying. I can see that you're crying. Tell me what it is that you want. Let's talk about what you want.Let's try and work together to crystallize what's really going on here.

Yeah.

And. And I think one of the. If I've done anything right, it's probably the hand that I've had in raising these three amazing people.But like, one of the things that I take the most pride in just engaging with them now as 20 something adults is how even though they're radically different people, all three of them, and they do radically different things, they are all incredibly effective storytellers. They waste no time in telling you.

Yeah.

What they want, what they need. This is who I am. This is what I'm after. It's. I love it.

I've told Clemi this, your firstborn, who I'm the closest with of your three children because she babysat for us consistently through her high school years and now she's in her 20s. I told Clemmie that spending time with you and Nancy and your family. Cause we are, I don't think, 11 or 12 years apart.So my children were younger and witnessing up close the way that you all would talk to your family about movies, it's just this one small little slither of that time where our lives, our family lives really coincided. And it was like a four or five year period. And I was telling Clemmie because now we have children who are 19 and 16.It was, I was so impressed and really influenced the way that I watch TV and movies with my kids.And to have that Model of the way that you would ask them what happened or what did you think with such openness as opposed to assuming that the kid is gonna respond to something. And I, when I work with parents, I bring that up a lot because now TV is such a huge part of our lives.And to use that as a way to get into your kids sense of self or to your point, what they want or what they value or what they learned from that without being too much of a professor about it, which I never thought you were. I mean, I thought you made it so fun. So I, I lived that. I have a lived experience of you guys doing that.And you're right, it really does empower young people and it helps them to understand what their motivations are because story is everything.

That's sweet. Yeah, I agree. And it's, and so is sensitivity. I always just felt like it's funny from teaching all these years at usc. Like it's.I teach primarily a class that I created 20 years ago called Pitching 101, which is teaching writers who've been doing this for years that you, in order to have a successful career, you have to do a lot more of this or at least as much talking as you do writing. And that takes a lot of writers out of their comfort zones.But over the year of, over the years of doing that, one of the things I've started to see is that kids can, and I call them kids, students can be, can be better and better, I think in the world that we live in, where we all have had to, through social media, wind up branding ourselves in a certain sense. And we all have to be our own version of an influencer, regardless of reach or audience and that kind of stuff.So I think kids, students have gotten more and more savvy about that side of things, about if you ask a student at USC film school, what's your movie about? They've gotten pretty adept at very succinctly but compellingly giving you the plot.But then more often than not, when I look at them afterward and I say, but what's it really about? Yeah, they'll stare at me like a deer in the headlights.And that's been really important to me not just as a writer or as a professor or as a producer, but certainly as a parent.It was really important for me, for us, for from the youngest age, our kids were able to actively communicate, to be sensitive to what's this really about? What are you really trying to communicate here? What, without being too therapy couch about.

It or testing them too much yeah, yeah, yeah.

It was just about an honest attempt to really connect to what an actress friend of mine once referred to the arguments that she would have with her daughter as a glass of root beer. That the foam was just the fireworks of the argument, but it was the root beer underneath it. That's what the fight was really about.Whether it's a fight, whether it's a moment of upset, whether it's a moment of excitement, whatever it is. Like, we just really tried to be actively encouraging of our kids sensitivities to what they're feeling, what they're trying to express.What's this really about?

Yeah.

And what I hear too, in that what you just shared is the genuine curiosity of it.

That.

That to connect is never apart from curiosity. And I think there's so much in parenting that's. And I will instill this and I will lead you and I will guide you.And especially again, meeting your family when you already had teenagers and I had young children, it's like being influenced and inspired by that level of curiosity that they are whole people and that we are discovering them, I think is something we could all use a little bit more of. And not only in parenting, but like, with each other in the world.

Well, absolutely. And not only that.You know, this, like, the dirty secret of parenting that no one tells you until you're a parent is that we're all making it up as we go.

Right.

It doesn't matter what. It doesn't matter what kind of good, bad or otherwise model we have set for us by our parents.It doesn't matter how many self help books you read about it. Like, at the end of the day, you're having to wing it just like all of your ancestors did when they were parents.And so it's one of those things where by me asking a kid or one of my kids what's this really about or what's going. Let's talk about what's really happening.

Yeah.

It's not just for them to get access to an understanding of their complex feelings. It's also me, because I'm winging it. And I'm trying to have a more clear, substantial, heartfelt understanding of who they are.

Yeah.

And what they're trying to say. It's. Yeah, it's you.

You did a good job, Trey. You're still doing a good job. I'm serious. You and Nancy are great parents.

The thing I like to say about my kids now is, again, I really take this as a great personal accomplishment, is that even if they weren't my kids, even if Clementine and Crockett and Cosmo were not my kids, I would love to hang out with them in a bar.

Totally.

Like, they're just super cool people. So that's my favorite.

Do you find in working with young people you've been a professor I don't know how many years, but it feels like forever.

20.

Okay, so 20 years. Do you find that there's this more concern about getting it right and like.And does that have to do with AI and like, how we have access to so much information? Because sometimes I wonder with social media and everything that they have access to. Your point of. What is this really about? Asking that question?That there's this top layer of being so well informed and having all the tools to express the thing intellectually that I wonder sometimes if we're losing the messy gut feeling, intuitive. This is just what I think. And I don't know if it's right or wrong because we're losing that kind of raw ability to share, potentially. I.This is all coming up because of the word sensitivity, by the way, and your experience with young people. So I think that's where I'm going with this thought based on what we've shared.

Yeah, no, I get it. Look, I. I think I've been teaching for 20 years at USC, but it's essentially an extremely expensive trade school. Right.So this is very much, very much centered on how to build a successful career as an entertainment professional. Right. And so what I notice is not.I suppose you can certainly make the argument that kids have so much information at their fingertips that sometimes they get lost in that sea of information or they don't know what to do. They can't possibly, as human beings process all of it. And therefore, again, it's deer in the headlights. They don't quite which know which way to go.But for me, it's less about that because tools are just tools and that includes AI. And by the way, I've just over this past year in particular, lost a lot of my fear of that particular tool. I happen to think it's.I'm like, I could start actually preaching a gospel about, as an artist about how it's one of the most extraordinary tools, if not the most extraordinary tool of our lifetime for creative people. That aside.

Yeah.

I think.I do think that one of the things that happens that I've seen increasingly with students that have crossed my path is that the stakes are so high, or at least feel so high to them in an industry that has been in a lot of tumult. They. It's never lost on me that much like I did once upon a time.Although as expensive as it seemed to me at the time, it's nothing compared to what it is now.Like, these kids leverage their souls to get into a film school like usc, and then I think, often, understandably, make the mistake of feeling like every single move they make has to be calculated and strategized or they will certainly fail.

Yeah.

And. And that becomes really difficult to overcome as a creative person. Because as a creative person, you are, by definition, a sensitive person.

Yeah.

And most of all, sensitive to your own emotional state. So if you get too much in your head about if I make one wrong step, that's the end of my career.Then you'll never be able to take the kinds of risks that you need to take as an artist to explore what really matters to you most.

Yeah.

It goes back to that. That tightrope we were talking about when you were asking me about.I still know it's like opportunity versus instinct, but you need to err on the side of instinct. First of all, creatively, as an artist, you have to really. It has to be first and foremost about.This is a story that brings me joy or that I think will bring others joy in whatever form that takes, Whether that means scaring the hell out of them or making them fall in love or whatever it is. It's the thing that I can light off of my own candle. It needs to be that first before it's.And I can pay all my bills with it because that way spells doom if you're just focused on that.

And I want to go back also to a point that you said around that same tightrope that. That we referenced earlier. When you get the opportunity to write the TV series from the film script.And I know this has happened multiple times in your career where you're getting the opportunity to do something maybe you haven't done in that way. How do you handle that risk? The. The doubt that you're facing? The gap in skillset. If there is one.And say yes to that, maybe before you're totally ready.

That's such an excellent question. It really is. Like so much blind faith, ambition, and confidence is required of any artist, whether you're a ballerina or you're a screenwriter.At some point, you have to just be willing to just step out into the spotlight one way or another, whatever form it takes, and just do follow your instincts.I've lost track of the thousands of times and the thousands of ways that I have felt the night before, whatever it was I was going to be doing the next day, oh my God, I'm not ready. I'm going to fail. I can't do this. The all the imposter complexes that are triggered, all that stuff.But I also can't count all the times the next day after all of that anxiety that kept me up the night before, I've lost track of all the times the next day I couldn't be more excited by the experience that I just had.So that becomes an empirical body of evidence for me that's like no matter how nervous I am, and I still actually think maybe this is the best answer to your question.I actually think if you don't have butterflies before something's wrong, you're not close, you're not closely plugged in enough to, to what got you started in this in the first place. And that is on some level always having to take a risk. I have a dear friend who is a brilliant business person.He's enjoyed a wonderful career as, as a consultant and, and worked for a number of huge high profile corporate firms. He is all.He also happens to be a really talented photographer and in some ways I think he has a better eye and is more gifted than some actual working professional photographers that I've worked with. He never saw it that way for himself, but I always saw in his work like, wow, you have a really genuine eye.

Yeah.

Long, long story short, he was recently a restaurateur friend of his saw some of his photographs by chance and was really captivated by some of the natural landscape photos in particular.And this restaurateur was about to open a restaurant and had been looking for the right kinds of photographic wall hangings for his restaurant to help build the image and create the environment he wanted to create. And so he asked my friend finally, could I blow up some of these particular photographs and use them to decorate my restaurant?And my friend said yes, of course, without really thinking it through. And then on the night of the opening of the restaurant, my friend had to step out of the restaurant and call me.And at first I thought something was genuinely wrong because he just seemed so urgent and anxious in his call. I said, what's up? And he was like, I don't know how you do this. And I said, do what?And he said, I've just gone to the restaurant opening and my photos are blown up on the wall and just can't stop thinking like everybody's looking at them and what do they think about me and what are they. How are they responding and do they like them? Do they. Are they going to enjoy the restaurant?And I was like, welcome to the world of an artist, my friend.

Totally.

That's exact. That's exactly what we do on a daily basis.Every time pick up an instrument, every time you pick up a pen, whatever it is you're putting yourself out there and taking. Assuming the risk.

Yeah.

The consequences of those creative actions. But for me, like at this point, not only am I used to it, slash, beaten down, but I suppose it. But also I'm just consistently energized by it.And I feel like. That's why I say, I feel like if you don't have butterflies, you need to check yourself.

Yeah.

You're not close enough to what you're doing.

Yes.

How does it feel when you walk into the theater or go to see the premiere of the show or do you even see it in that capacity because you've worked on it so much behind the scenes? Do you see what you produce or what you're a showrunner, so what you create in that way with an audience.

Yeah, I absolutely do. I think for me, when it's most powerful is, Is in a physical space.I'll tell you, one of the greatest experiences consistently that I've had in my career is when you walk onto a set or onto a location, an actual physical space.

Yeah.

And you recognize in that moment, whether it's in a.An ancient fortress that you imagined in your head that is now in three dimensional form in front of you, or it's a space station, hospital, whatever it is, when you walk onto a set, you. I at least am overwhelmed by this notion of two things. One, the childlike response internally is, look what I did. Yeah, look what I did.

I'm smiling, I'm like gleeful listening because I knew that's what I did.

Yeah. But then the second, I think what keeps you from being an ass is the second equally critical thought, which is, look what they did.

Yeah.

And that's why, for me, like, there's a meeting in television in particular called the concepts meeting, which usually kicks off, it's usually the first production or pre production meeting that you have on any episode of television.And what that meeting is essentially is the writer sitting down with all of the various crew department heads and walking them through the script and clarifying ideas and speaking from a 30,000 foot view. What this is, what the episode's about, this is what happens, etc.And it's, it happens to be much like walking onto a set it happens to be my favorite part of the production process or one of my favorites because it's a moment of recognition as you sit at the end of the table or surrounded by these various extremely talented people in their individual disciplines. It's this recognition of A, if I hadn't put these words on paper, none of these people would be sitting here right now.And B, if I didn't have these people sitting here, all I would have is a bunch of words on paper. Yeah. Each one of these people is a storyteller. She tells stories with makeup, he tells stories with special effects.That guy tells stories with transportation, whatever it is. Like they're all there because they are all creative.

Yeah.

And they are a part of that community that I talked about earlier where it first dawned on me in the summer of 1977. Oh, people build worlds together.

Yes.

Like that. That's. That is just my absolute jam is when you walk onto that set and you go, oh my God, it's real.

Yeah.

You started here. It started here and now it's there.

Yeah.

And look at all these incredibly talented people who made it happen.

Yeah.

That is. That's my favorite part of the process.

That's so beautiful. This is why I get so inspired talking to people and why I often start with the early seeds in someone's life.Because I love storytelling, I love movies, but I. It did not. This is a true story. It did not really dawn on me. It did not really.I didn't really have a concept of the miracle of collaboration that is a movie, that is a TV show until I lived in this city. And I've had a lot of mixed emotions about living in la again. Back to Nancy and Trey Calloway.Love, like seeing your family be so normal in la and like you guys sat down for family dinner, you entertained in the backyard. Just very real about the whole thing was grounding for me. And that is how I've raised my teenagers.And that was really important because LA is wacky and weird and beautiful and hardworking and so many wonderful things about it. But it's a true miracle to the things that go into even a commercial. Cuz now Boyd does music for commercials. Like the.

Just really great music.

Thank you. And even like witnessing Boyd's career path where he used to be in sales and distribution and now he's doing music.The level of attention to one note for a 30 second commercial. I always knew I was marrying an artist and all that, but like to see, to witness, to hear him talking to the composers and then the TV producer.So I, I think it's so cool that you captured that or that you were drawn to that so young that you would leave Star wars and be like, wow, everyone worked together. Because I would leave movies and be like, ah, Tom Cruise is hot. I'm gonna go see Top Gun 11 times. That's cool.Let's put Tom Cruise in an airplane and I'll go again. But it really is a miracle.

Yeah.

By the way. And we will keep going to see Tom Cruise in fighter jets.

And by the way. And by the way, that means the storytellers did their job.

Right.

That's what you're, that's what you're supposed, that's how you're supposed to react.

Yeah.

But yeah, I think it's so a word that you used just in passing when you said hard working. I think that's what a lot of people who don't live in Los Angeles who are used to just looking at what the final output is but don't.Aren't really plugged into how the sausage is made. The work is what's key and the work is what I am so inspired by.Just last week I had a beautiful opportunity speaking to music to, to go to Warner Brothers and sit on the historic Eastwood scoring stage. This is arguably the most significant and historic scoring stage left in Hollywood. This is, this is where Casablanca's score was recorded.It's where the Looney Tunes scores for all the cartoons were recorded. Back to the future. Like the list is endless. But I was there for a scoring session for a major Disney animated film that comes out next year.And I was looking through the glass at an entire symphony orchestra of players and behind them an entire band with percussionists and guitars and a separate room of percussionists over here behind glass.And what I was so deeply moved by was just this overpowering notion that every single individual in that monumental historic stage was not there by accident. They were there because they had worked for thousands upon thousands of hours and rehearsed and learned their instrument inside and out.And they were all each individually there because each of them was at the very tip top of their game.

Yeah.

And it was the most well oiled musical machine I've ever seen. And I was so inspired by it because that's the thing that people aren't aware of.If you're not a part of this business, and God bless you, if you're not, you'll live a lot longer than most of us. But, but the truth is like, it takes an enormous amount of work.

Yeah.

To get to this place. This is why I always say too, even the worst movies you've ever seen still constituted an enormous amount of work. A lot of people had to work hard.

Yeah.

To make that bad movie.

Yeah.

But I'm inspired by the work, definitely.

Yeah, absolutely.

And do you feel like when you walk onto a set now that you've been on so many projects, you can tell right away if the collaboration is working, if the vibe is high? Is that a question of the leadership? Is that a question of shared vision? What makes collaboration work at its highest level when it is working?

That's a great question. And certainly as a showrunner, it's. You're right, it is about the leadership. So it's really critical in any business venture.But a television show is basically just a small company of 200 plus employees and the showrunner is the boss of that company. But the showrunner is also the person whose head is most immediately on the chopping block in terms of success or failure.And so I always want to set the right tone. I.And what I want is to establish from day one that even on its worst days, and we've all had them, like, it can be really, it can be a very difficult grind working in Hollywood, but even on its worst days, it beats breathing coal dust. And it is still the greatest job, in my opinion, in the history of jobs.And I want to inspire everybody else to treat whatever it is we're working on through that same lens. Like, how blessed are we to all be here? And I will.Usually it sounds shameless and maybe infantile, but, like, I'll show up in their first meeting with a big basket of candy.

Yeah.

And for me it's because, like, I am always to a fault.Trust me, if you hadn't picked up on this already, like, I am always deeply in touch with my inner 12 year old kid standing in line at the Fox theater. And so I want everyone else to bring their 12 year olds to the table.

Yes. Yeah.

What is it that made you most excited to be in visual effects or most excited? How did you wind up in hair? What was that thing that you saw or that you did that made you so excited?And so I want to cultivate that kind of collaborative energy and spirit because then that's. That becomes like the torch that leads everybody through those dark days when we're working shooting nights and none of us have slept.Yeah, I still, even in those moments though, I'll still look around in the middle of the night like I did earlier this year in Greece, running the Second season of House of David for Amazon. And you'll.I'll look around and go, man, if you would have told me when I was 10 years old playing army in the woods behind my house with all the neighbor kids, that I would one day be on the grounds of an 11th century Greek fortress with 200 men with swords and sandals and 60 horses running through their midst and flaming arrows and drone cameras flying overhead and camera operators dressed like warriors running through the middle of all of it. If you had told me that I was going to get to do that, much less get paid for it, I would have thought you were crazy. But I, like, I.You just have to pick those moments.You have to do this in life in general, obviously, but certainly in Hollywood, you have to make sure that you take those moments to look around and go look at what we're doing.

Yes.

Essentially what we're doing is playing.

Yes.

This is an industry of play, because all human beings need to play. Even if your version of play is just going to the theater on Saturday to see Top Gun, it's play. That's what we do.And it's critically important to our survival.

It makes me think of family life again, because so many of my listeners are running their families.And again, it's that notion of when you are parents, you're constantly reining in and having boundaries and don't jump on the couch and you opened up the can of paint in the dining room. You gotta be in the backyard for that. But there are moments in family life that I would really try to do.And I was, to your word, blessed with the opportunity. I didn't think so at the time. I was so burned out, but I was teaching preschool at the same time I was raising young children.So it was a burnout period.But then at the same time, I also could recognize what a gift it was because I was in that mode of playing professionally, so I knew how to do it and I understood the value of it. And so to have those moments in family life and be like, God, I get to do this.Like, I get to go catch a butterfly right now, or with the teenagers, like, yeah, everyone's off task or they're eating crappy food or whatever, but I get to hang out with these teenagers in this kitchen, eating this gross food and not worry so much all the time about that adult part of it, but, like, this moment is amazing. It's like what you dreamt of.

To me, the perfect example of that is the intersection, the perfect intersection in my life as a parent between Storytelling and play.

Yeah.

That I. To. To my great pleasure. My. My boys still talk about.And I've been there to witness them telling their friends about this, which was that we had the one girl and then we had two boys. And they're each challenging in their own respective ways. The boys, the.Especially when they were in that terrible two some phase, like it was just, it was a non stop challenge to effectively parent and just keep them alive through the average day, not to mention maintain and preserve our sanity. But at a certain point, out of desperation, no doubt, I blurted out these words.I don't even remember what it was I was trying to negotiate with my young sons. They were probably at the time like 8 and 5. But I blurted out these words.If you do X whatever it was I was trying to get them to do, I will go out in the backyard and pick fresh Hot Wheels from the Hot Wheel tree. And they were like the what? And I. And on that right there in that moment, I spun this yarn about a mythical Hot Wheel tree that only dads could see.And one day when your fathers, you'll plant your own Hot Wheel tree and you'll have it there for your sons. But there is a Hot Wheel tree that only I can see.And so if you will cooperate with me and do whatever it is we needed to get done as parents, I will go pick fresh hot Wheels. And instantaneously, I love it. They did exactly what we needed, by the way. Hot Wheels are like the most for boys, in particular for girls.I don't care for kids.Yeah, they're just such an incredibly valuable currency because you can get them at Ralph's, the local grocery store, and they're like 99 cents per car. So I just filled up a bag of them. I had the bag hidden in my closet. And it was the most effective currency for my son's youth.And each time they would do whatever it was I needed them to do. Then I would go to the closet, grab a couple of Hot Wheels, step out through the backyard.I would make sure to grab a couple of leaves off of whatever tree or bush so it felt like they were freshly plucked. And then I would come in and I would just put that in their hand.And then I would catch them later, like walking around the backyard, carefully examining, looking for wherever that mythical tree was. But it's a thing that they still talk about and it's. It is, it's an intersection between storytelling and play. Yeah, that's why they remember it.

Oh, I love that one. I would still be talking about that too. If that had been a moment that's a good moment in their childhood. Tell me what's exciting to you right now.I know House of David, you've traveled the world. You've been in Greece for that. Your kids are now older, totally different stages. So tell me what story you're telling right now with your life.Like this phase of your life.

Okay. Greece is part of it. In that, like in the last four years, I've worked in, I think, 13 different countries.And that, that is a reflection of, again, the tumult of Hollywood and the entertainment industry.But it has had just countless benefits for me on a personal level in terms of being able to find some space and time and distance for myself to process a lot of. A lot of what's happened in our lives over the last decade. So that's great.I think what also excites me, but also makes me anxious and nervous, those butterflies we were talking about is a where the business is at right now and the sense that there is a massive seismic shift happening that impacts all kinds of people in their professional and personal lives in our industry. So I'm having to navigate that, but I'm also.And that makes me nervous, but it also, it excites me with new possibilities, new ways of telling stories, et cetera, et cetera. So I'm in the middle of launching an AI studio. And, and so I'm super excited about that.Having had the experiences I had on House of David, which involved using all kinds of state of the art technology to make a show like that, but also is very educational for me in terms of, oh my gosh, I now see a way forward to make all kinds of different shows. So that, that is. Excites me, makes me nervous, but also excites me.

Yeah.

But also the process of all three of my kids doing what they're supposed to do, which is flourishing. They're all chasing after all kinds of brass rings. Clem is killing it in as the only kid who has any desire to be in this entertainment business.She's killing it working for Matt Damon and Ben Affleck. And Crockett is the Alex P. Keaton of the family, the McKinsey consultant working at the top of the.Working at the great top of the Freedom Tower in New York City, like, living his best life.Cosmo right now, at 21, took a semester off school, will still graduate on time in May, but is right now, as we speak in the General assembly at the United nations with all of the world's most powerful Leaders assembled in. In front of him and in his midst. He's out there determined to try and save the world.All three of them are flourishing and doing exactly what we had hoped and dreamed they would be doing for themselves and in their lives. But that creates the necessity. It also reflects back on me as my progeny.

Yeah.

It's like looking at a mirror or a version of a mirror, and you realize, okay, and they're doing all of those things the way they're supposed to. What's next for me?

Yeah.

What am I doing? What does the rest of my life look like? What are the new brass rings, personally and professionally, that I'm chasing after?What's the new meaning that I'm trying to find for myself?

Yeah.

And we do that as partners in marriage and. Or in business relationships or whatever. But we also have to continue to do it for ourselves.

Yes.

It's a. It's.Although the people we go shoulder to shoulder with in life and share our lives with ultimately bring us all kinds of incredibly deep meaning, it's still. We came into this world alone as infants, and ultimately we're going to exit alone at different times and in different ways.And so you have this obligation, I think, or at least I am now. I feel like I'm being bombarded with this notion that I have an obligation to myself. I have. I have some journeying of my own to do.I have, like I said, some brass rings of my own to chase in a variety of different ways. And so that's. That. That is exciting, but it also keeps me up and at night and gives me butterflies.

Yeah.

Good place to be. If you don't have butterflies. You're not engaged enough.

You're doing something wrong.

You're doing something wrong. One of the ways. I love that you explore that part of your life, and I think it's through music and the way that you've.You always find a way to bring music back into your life and your voice and your singing. And I love on Instagram, all those. When the. When you harmonize and use your voice in different ways.

If.

Yeah, it's like what you're speaking of, finding the different ways to express yourself at different stages of your life in real time. And I do think that each of us are invited into that. It's an opportunity and an obligation, but it's a real opportunity.

Music is the most beautiful, most raw form of human expression and emotion. And I started doing those acapella videos at the height of the pandemic where we were all losing Our minds.We were all losing our minds, and no one knew what to do, and we were all afraid. And when I find myself boxed in, like, that's when I usually get in the car and just sing at the.

Top of my lungs.

But, like, suddenly it was like, you know what? I'll just go do it in the backyard instead. And while I'm at it, I'll sing four or five other tracks of harmony along with it.

Yes.

Because that's how much angst I have. I have to give it voice in multiple directions. But, yeah, that's another gift I got from my parents.They were both extremely musical, and we always had a family band, and it just became a way to express yourself.

So, yeah, it brings us a lot of joy. So I think you're bringing your friends and the people who have discovered you in that way. A lot of joy. So keep being angsty and keep creating.I don't know if I want you to be that angsty.

No.

It's a sensitivity we both share, and we know that about.

I know. This is why I've gravitated toward you since the moment we first met. You never.I'm not a very woo woo person, but I also have enjoyed a high level of kismet in my life, and I rarely woo as the sounds. I rarely meet people by accident. I.

Yes.

It doesn't always reveal itself to me right away, but I always pay close attention to it. So when I meet Paige Nolan, I'm like, oh, yeah, she's my kind of people. A re.There's a reason why I wouldn't have known years ago when we first started hanging out, that I would be squawking on a microphone over the Internet with you. But I'm delighted.

I'll end on this.I wouldn't have known years ago that one of my favorite parenting stories of all time is when you told me that you made Clementine come to the dining room table. The dinner table, I should say. Y' all are casual eaters.So the kitchen table with a printout of the lyrics of this nasty rap song that she was blaring in the house and was not listening to you when you requested for her to turn it down, because you live in every inch of your house the way that we live in every inch of our house. So, again, I've had this inspiration from y'. All. Like, we can live in this size house in la. It's okay. Like, we're gonna use every inch of it.And she had to read these lyrics for you to say this is what I'm listening to. And she couldn't even get through it because it was such a nasty song.But who knew that then when I would have teenagers fast forward and Boyd and I reference your parenting all the time. And I'm like, okay, we gotta get him. Make em sit down on Sunday for dinner. This is what we saw the Callaways do. And it has great outcomes.And so, yes, you come up. And one other way. You come up. Trey also is. I had a moment with you in John Weiser's backyard in the fire pit.When I first moved to la and I did not understand how to embrace my creativity and my just. I love creative writing, but I'm not published or I whatever fill in the blank, like all these external measures of success.So my creative expression. Does that even count if it hasn't been awarded or if I'm not making this amount of money from it?And specifically about writing and backyard la, that's how we all entertained. Beautiful night fire pit. And I'm sitting down, captivated by your storytelling. And you're telling me about USC and teaching.And I said, I really like writing. This is like early on in our friendship and. But I don't know how to consider myself a writer.And you were just so locked in on it and just ask, is writing important to you? Do you write? And I said, yes, I write every day. I write in a journal. I have screenplays in the drawer. I have books in the drawer.He's like, you say you're a writer, and it's just one of those things with creativity and expression. And I think our conversation has really hovered around this theme. It's that important for us. It's that central to who we are as human beings.And to share and express and do that in a group is really one of the ways that we can thrive. So I thank you for all of that.

It is my pleasure. You happen to be one of the most prolific and talented writers I've ever known. And I.But I could sense that before I actually knew it, which is part of why I was saying to you the first part of the risk that you need to assume is just going ahead and planting the flag and calling yourself a writer. So that's that. Get rid of that formality and then concentrate on the work which you have certainly done. But like, to me, it's holy work. It is. It's.This is why when my mother, later in life, became a Presbyterian minister, it didn't surprise me. It was surprising in a lot of respects, but it also didn't surprise me in that this is what storytelling is here for. It's why it's so important.Whatever form it takes, if you're making public sculpture or you're busking in a subway with a guitar or you're writing the next great American novel, like, these are critical parts of the human experience that have to be tendered and protected and promoted and encouraged. And, yeah, listen, I'm. I will keep telling stories as long as anybody will listen to them, yourself included.Thank you for the opportunity and the venue to do and.

You're the best, Trey. Thank you.

I feel the same way about you, sunshine. We did it. We did it.

This conversation with Trey reconnected me with the idea that each of us is a storyteller, and we get to write that story out and play it out on the most exquisite stage of all our lives. I will ask you what Trey is asking himself these days. What are you doing with your life? What new brass rings are you chasing after?What meaning are you trying to find for yourself? These questions are exciting and they're scary. They're worthy of that butterflies in your stomach feeling Trey describes.And so let's approach the questions in the same way Trey approaches his creative process. With the innocence of our younger selves, with the openness that we had when we were 12 years old, discovering so many things for the first time.Let's connect to the freedom we perceived the adults to have when we were kids. We do have the freedom to take risks, to be curious. We do know ourselves better.We have a deeper understanding of what we value, and we can play with that. We can reach for the courage to be authentic. We can show up with a bowl of something sweet and envision the life we want.And we can certainly lead ourselves by the choices we make to experience that life as something real, as something truly joyful. We do that in collaboration. We do that with our friends, with our families, and the people who will come alongside us and create with us.I hope you take a moment today, pause in your life just as it is, and marvel at the love you've created. Use the words that Trey offers us. Look what I did. And then honor the collaboration that has inspired Trey's entire life. Look what we did.And there's more to come. There's more to your story. There is much to be excited about.And if you let it, your enthusiasm and your desire to discover can lead you through the dark days when you're working through the night and haven't slept. Trey, I said it before and I'll say it again, you are the best.I'm so grateful for this hour with you and so thankful to know you and to be a person who is inspired and influenced and moved by your life story, your career story, and mostly by your love story. Keep creating, keep seeking the brass rings and thank you for having the courage to share the journey.Pursuing your creativity and valuing it as you do gives us the inspiration to value our voices and pursue our own creative expression.To find out more about Trey Calloway and enjoy his a cappella singing videos on Instagram and his amazing podcast Be Good Humans, check out the show notes. Okay y', all, that's it for now. I will meet you here again soon. Thanks to each of you for being here and for listening.I'm so grateful we get to share life and in this way.As always, full show notes are available@paigenolan.com podcast there you will find a full summary of the episode, timestamps and key takeaways, and any resources mentioned in our conversation. If you enjoyed this episode, I'd love if you would leave me a rating and a review. You can do that by visiting pagenolan.com Love your reviews.Really do help people to discover the show. And if you know someone specifically who would enjoy this episode, I'm so grateful to have you all share. I'll meet you there with your friends.Lastly, if you have any questions or comments, or if you would like to share any feedback with me, Please email to meetmetheragenolan.com I would love to hear from you. Thank you to the team that makes this show possible.Podcast production and marketing by Northnode Podcast Network Music by Boyd McDonnell Cover photography by Ennis Casey okay y', all, that's it for now. I'll meet you there again.