Chatting With Showrunner Sera Gamble: What It Takes To Do Her Job
We’re back with another episode of One Moore Hollywood Podcast, this one with special guest Sera Gamble. Showrunner, writer, and producer extraordinaire, Sera Gamble has worked in television since 2007 when she first started as a story editor for Supernatural, the longest-running show on The CW. Since then, she's created several successful TV shows, including You and The Magicians.
In this episode, our hosts, Chris Moore, Katie Marpe, and Dennis De Nobile, chat with Sera Gamble about what a showrunner does, how she got to be one, and what keeps her going.
What's A Showrunner?
According to Sera Gamble, a showrunner is literally the person who runs the show and is in charge of maintaining the creative direction. Three main pillars comprise the inner workings of a TV show: the writer's room, the production, and post. The writers are, of course, responsible for writing, the production is responsible for shooting, and post is responsible for editing and adding special effects after the footage has been shot.
"A showrunner is the boss of the show."
–Sera Gamble
The showrunner is the person who straddles responsibility for all three pillars, the boss amidst many other bosses. Additionally, the showrunner likely created and pitched the show to the studio, meaning their role spans several years rather than just the six months it will take to complete the season.
Many showrunners, like Gamble, start as writers. She worked her way up to showrunner on Supernatural over five years, eventually replacing the showrunner before her who created Supernatural. Year after year, she garnered more responsibility, and when the showrunner was ready to leave, he bequeathed the role to Gamble.
"Someone has to know why the story is being told, what the point is, and where we want to go next. I find that process of discovery really exhilarating. Everyone who contributes is helping it become more of itself."
–Sera Gamble
Because being a showrunner requires balancing moving parts, they have to be good at collaboration and teamwork. They also, Gamble notes, have to know what to fight for and when to dig their heels in. A showrunner must figure out the creative heart, the driving force, and the why of the show they're making.
"I realized to be effective at this job, I have to know what to say no to and what to fight for. I have to figure it out and stick to it."
–Sera Gamble
For Supernatural, the lightbulb moment hit when Gamble and the rest of the writers realized the whole point of the show boiled down to the relationship between the two brothers. The supernatural, urban legend-inspired, monster-fighting elements were important, but only insofar as they supported the story of the two brothers.
Embracing Risk: Why It Matters
The more a project scares her with the scale of its ambition, the more Gamble feels drawn to it.
Carrying this mentality into how she leads her day-to-day life, Gamble says she's survived this long in the business because she approaches each day at work with the intent to make the most of it, assuming her shows will get canceled the next.
"The truth of what's appealing and interesting to me is that I like shows that let you deep into people…the darkness, the stuff that doesn't make sense, the stuff that can't be solved, the stuff that can't be broken down into black and white and good and evil."
–Sera Gamble
Rather than letting the instability of the entertainment industry scare her into doing things by the book, Gamble lets it motivate her to think even bigger, grander, weirder, and deeper. And beyond that, in a world where AI is threatening creative jobs and where so many companies are afraid to gamble on content they don't know for sure an audience wants to see, Gamble thinks it’s a writer's and showrunner's responsibility to advocate for the stories they know need to be told.
“As soon as you’re talking about the history of what people like–really granular data of what people think, based on the history of everything they’ve seen–that doesn’t leave enough room for really dimensional, unusual female characters, and it leaves no room for characters of color, trans characters, and queer characters.”
–Sera Gamble
For Gamble, it is imperative that a showrunner advocates for the stories they want to see told rather than the stories that have just been proven to sell. Because what's the point, she says, of being a human in the writers' room who cares about the future if you're not going to fight for the stories you believe in? "Stories will be boring and bad for people if we don't," Gamble states.
Ultimately, the job of a showrunner is to identify the creative heart of the show–to clear the way for the message at the story's core.
Listen to the entire episode here: Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Amazon Music, or iHeartRadio.
