THE POSITIVE SIDE OF FALL, DREAMS AND DAVID KARABINAS!

Welcome to Potentially Focused and Tuesday, September 3rd! Hope you all had a great Labor Day Weekend! Today we... Help you see the possibilities this fall brings and learn more about the dreams we have every night.

And we’ve got another great interviewee! David Karabinas , the Co-Founder and CEO of Texas Crew Productions.

Under David’s leadership, Texas Crew has grown?into a go-to production company, with a reputation for moving quickly and being fantastic creative partners.?They’ve won an NAACP award for The 44th President: In His Own Words, an Emmy for ESPN’s Brian and the Boz 30 for 30 film, and were Emmy-nominated for Friday Night Tykes, an early project that helped put their company firmly on the map. As if that weren’t enough, they are prolific true-crime producers with more than 50 hours across multiple platforms including Oxygen’s Killer Relationship with Faith Jenkins, Investigation Discovery’s Exposed:?Naked?Crimes, and Hulus’s How I Caught My Killer.?

Their success has not gone unnoticed. In 2022, David oversaw the sale of Texas Crew to Steve Michaels’ Asylum Entertainment Group. A smart strategic move that set up Texas Crew for the future, while ensuring its ability to navigate the challenges all producers are currently facing.

When David is not knee-deep in production, he can often be seen riding around Austin, Texas on his electric bike with his dog, Cowboy. We’ll get into that and much more in just a few short paragraphs.

Potentially Focused is a newsletter for busy people in the TV business (or not) who are curious. Everyone looking for change. Anyone interested in new possibilities and potential. The stories we tell ourselves, the stories we tell others, and what makes us tick. Each edition shares at least one great piece of content on professional development and one centered on personal growth. It's lots of useful information all in one convenient place.

Please like, subscribe, and share with someone who was in one of your recent dreams or someone you've never dreamed of! This newsletter is for all!

Many thanks,

Marco

Here we go....?

FALLING FORWARD

So, here we are on September, 3rd. Labor Day somehow already behind us. Summer may not be technically over, but for me, when we hit the ninth month of the year, there's no denying it.

It's fall.

My favorite season is and has always been the summer. I love the beach and nothing better than swimming in the ocean or a lake, the occasional river or mountain stream, and almost any backyard pool that will have me.

So, when September rolls around, I usually find it just a tad depressing. This year, though, is different.

Deep into a 2024 which has proven to be another difficult year in media for many, I think we all needed the natural break that summer provides. And while I won't be able to splash around the New Jersey shore for too many more weekends, the fall offers out the promise of new directions and new opportunities.

So many of us have been putting in the work. Either trying to land new jobs in TV or figuring out ways to use the skills we learned in the TV industry in new ways. It's a grind, but it's the little work you do day after day that eventually pays off.

I woke up this morning with a sense of possibility.

The fall is the time we harvest. The next few months offer the chance to take that next step in your journey, the step you've earned through the hard work you've done over all these past months.

Does this mean the industry is immediately turning around? Does this mean the good days are here again? Can you sit back and wait for your next opportunity to just drop into your lap?

Of course not. Three times, no!

But, whether it's rededicating yourself to networking and searching out that next TV job or deciding that it's time to move on to something outside TV, this is the time to get serious. If you've been at it for a long time and explored many avenues already, it's time to take all that you've learned and all that you've done and commit to where you want to go next.

Or if you're just starting to figure out where you want to go next, it's time to commit to exploring. To take risks, break out of your ordinary, and open yourself up to new possibilities.

For everyone, this fall is a great opportunity to realize you do have agency. You have power. To get moving, to get unstuck.

But, that only happens if you do two things. Take stock of where you are and decide where you want to be next. And, allow yourself to get past negativity and fear and embrace that change, while hard (sometimes very hard) is possible. Remember that almost everything is temporary, even the challenging times.

The old dream may or may not be dead. But, for sure, there are new dreams out there to capture. Wherever you go, I wish you a good journey and a satisfying arrival at a great new destination.

Speaking of dreams...

RECENT THINGS WE'VE LEARNED ABOUT DREAMING

We all dream. That is a fact. And, yet there's so much we don't know about dreaming.

There's continuing and real debate on what, if anything, they mean.

Luckily, there are researchers hard at work learning more every day about dreaming. This article lays out four recent breakthroughs in our understanding of dreams and dreaming.

Since most of you are busy, to save you some time here's a quick summary:

Get ready to commute while sleeping - Some people, so-called lucid dreamers, can control their dreams and even communicate to the waking world from a dream state. A 2021 study showed that two-way communication between a dreamer and a researcher in the lab was possible. In 2024, another study built on this by training lucid dreamers to control a virtual car from within their dreams.

Sharing our dreams can bond us to others - Sleep and dreams researcher Mark Blagrove from Swansea University thinks dreams were meant to be shared socially and evolved in humans to enhance emotional intelligence and empathy . His 2019 study showed that discussing a dream can lead to increased empathy between the dream sharer and listeners. Blagrove says this could have been valuable to ancestral survival in forming significant connections with others.

Dreams ARE influenced by real life events - This one seems like a no-brainer, but now there is proof. Michael Schredl of the University of Mannheim in Germany is arguably the most prolific dream researcher today. He's kept a dream journal since the early 1980s - over 12,000 of his dreams.

Overall, the patterns support that our dreams are influenced by events and concerns that are happening in our waking lives.

Schredl is one of the first people to look at weather patterns in dreams. He noticed a steady decline over the years of ice, snow, and hail in his dreams. Interestingly, this was similar to the documented declining number of “ice days” (days when the temperature was below 0°C for 24 hours) in Germany since he has been keeping a dream journal.

It's possible to get better at remembering your dreams - Some people are better at remembering their dreams than others, recalling dreams more frequently and in more detail. For a long time, researchers have tried to determine the reasons and mechanisms for this difference. So far, one of the most consistent predictors of more frequent dream recall has been a positive attitude towards dreaming; if you think dreams are important, you’re probably more motivated to try and remember them more often. But, have no fear. Dream recall is a learnable skill . For example, keeping a dream journal can significantly improve dream recall.

And now onto...

POTENTIALLY FOCUSED WITH DAVID KARABINAS

I’d known David Karabinas for a relatively long time before I first worked with him on a project. He’d been pitching me for a few years and we had yet to find something to partner on, but I always looked forward to our conversations and was grateful he continued to keep us in mind. First, because he and his team always brought something my way I hadn’t heard before. As a buyer, this is a rare and treasured thing. And, second, because our meetings were always fantastic conversations.

David is a very grounded person. While he’s extremely passionate about storytelling and his business, he has a healthy understanding that making TV shows, while important, is not life and death. Add to that a clear intelligence, a good dose of humility, and an excellent sense of humor and you can see why people gravitate towards David. He’s something in seemingly short supply, an authentic human being.

But it was the inhuman or should I say the undead who finally brought us together in a partnership. A few years back, AMC+ was launching its first dramatic series based on Anne Rice IP, Anne Rice’s Interview With The Vampire. Our team was doing a companion special looking at the making of the series. The series was a huge priority for the company, and we had to find a production team that could do it quickly and right.

It was the opportunity I’d been looking for to partner with David and his great team and I’m so happy to say we took it and ran with it. Not only did Texas Crew get it done in record time, but they were also a joy to work with on what turned out to be an excellent special which helped successfully launch the first season of AMC+’s great drama. Huge shout out to Executive Producer Jen Patton too!

So, thank you again, David, and welcome!

What's one thing you're currently excited about?

There's a lot of disruption right now in our business, but I am choosing to be an optimist, and I'm going to say that what's exciting me most is the anticipation of what our entire unscripted landscape is going to look like in the next six months. People love watching screens and there needs to be something on the screen for them to watch. It can't all be Tik-Tok videos and other user-generated content. There will always be a place for great professionally produced programs and we just have to figure out the best way to continue producing it and putting it in front of people. We're in a challenging moment but I'm confident we'll get through it and I'm excited to see what it looks like on the other side.

You and your team have always done quality?work and I know from experience what a pleasure it is to work with you. So, for sure some of your success comes from that, but you've also made smart strategic moves. Talk about how you've navigated challenging circumstances over the years.

I appreciate the kind words about our work. Being easy to work with and making great shows is really the best strategy any production company can employ and I like to think we have done that more often than not over the last 13 years. But outside of that, I think the smartest thing we did was stay lean as a company. We made a decision early on that we couldn't have people on our staff who weren't being billed against a project. This was out of necessity because we didn't have investors, none of us were independently wealthy, and we weren't going to take on debt, so we built the company around the model that if we had just one job we'd all have a role in creating it, we'd all be a line in the budget, and the company would be solvent. We also made a conscious effort to diversify our client base so if one client slowed down or flat out stopped commissioning new projects we wouldn't have all our eggs in one basket. I'm really proud of the fact that over the last ten years we've managed to work with most all of the major buyers in some capacity.?

But I think it's also impossible to downplay the amount of luck that is required to succeed in this business. In our case, we were lucky that over the last few years we had become known as good true crime producers when true crime experienced a real boom in popularity. We hadn't set out to specialize in true crime but we kept getting pitched these great projects in that space and before we knew it, most of our development slate was true crime. I wish I could say that was part of a grand plan but it was more of a happy accident.

Agree that luck plays a part, but also I’m reminded of something someone once told me that’s always stuck with me. They said all of us have lucky things happen to us from time to time, but some people are more skilled at realizing it and capitalizing on that moment. Seems to me that’s a skill you have, David.

And now, turning to others…. What would?you say to someone who wanted to start their own production company today?

This may be a surprise, but I actually don't think that it's a bad time to start a production company as long as you are realistic about the finances and you don't bite off more than you can chew. The days of 100 episode orders are mostly behind us and the budgets are getting smaller so I'd be careful about investing in infrastructure and hiring too many too fast. Stay lean. Focus on ideation and instead of investing in your own facilities right off the bat, consider partnering with a company that already has everything and can handle your production services until you really have the business to support it.?

Great points all and it’s refreshing to hear a more optimistic answer to this question than we usually do.

Tell us about being in Texas. With so many of your competitors based in LA or New York, does being in Austin give you some creative advantages or a different perspective?

Perspective is probably where it affected us most. Being in Texas insulated us from some of the competitive instincts that we may have developed had we been in NY or LA and been surrounded by other production companies and more aware of who was selling shows and who wasn't (especially when we weren't). We are kind of in our own bubble just doing our own thing and I've never really felt like I'm in competition with other companies. I think that's why we've always been so open to partnerships and collaborations with outside production companies and producers.?

What is the best lesson a bad boss ever taught you?

I've worked for people who think they can do everyone's jobs better than they can. They only know how to have people work?for?them and not work?with?them. That's not the way to lead people or get them to work together as a team - and our business is definitely a team sport. You don't want to be the smartest person in the room - you want to be in a room surrounded by smart people.?

What's the best thing a mentor ever shared with you??

Don't take it all so seriously. It's just TV. We're not saving the world. Do your best, work hard, but keep it all in perspective.

In an alternate universe where you are happy but aren't doing any of the things you are currently doing professionally, what do you think you'd be doing professionally?

I'm not sure if this is my alternate universe or my retirement plan but I'd work at a bicycle repair shop and have a side gig once a month playing classic rock songs on an acoustic guitar at a coffee shop. I love fixing bikes because it's very black and white - the bike either works or it doesn't. No room for interpretation. No notes. The only problem with the coffee shop side gig is that I can't sing and my guitar skills are pretty mediocre.

In a time when many are looking for new possibilities, any book, podcast or thought leader you find helpful?

Right now I'm reading Richard Haass's The World, which is a primer on why the world looks and operates the way it does today from a geo-political standpoint. It's non-political, really easy to understand, and what I think it illustrates more than anything is that everything about the way the world works is subject to change. Just because things work a certain way now doesn't mean they have always operated this way and certainly doesn't mean that it has to continue to work this way in the future. We can change things - and we have changed things - over and over throughout history. I think that's a helpful reminder these days, especially as our own industry continues to evolve. Nothing is set in stone.

I love that and think we can’t say it enough. It’s not always easy, but we CAN change things.

Thanks so much for sharing your experience and smart POV, David! Wishing you and Texas Crew continued success and give my love to Cowboy!

THAT'S A WRAP!

Today, we started a new chapter on our journey to what's next and learned more about the dreams we have every night.

And thanks to David Karabinas for starting September off for us with some much-needed positivity.

See you for our next edition on Thursday. Have a great 48 hours!

Please let us know what you want more or less of. Please feel free to share information you’d like me to pass along to our readers. Also, always happy to feature guest contributors.

And of course, please like, subscribe, and share.

With deep appreciation,

Marco