The Road to Creating a Television Series
And How You Can Help
Earlier this year, I dove into writing my first feature film spec script after several years of ghostwriting scripts. Completing a film story was a personal challenge I wanted to meet because if I spent all my time writing stories for other people, I’d never have the opportunity to do what I’ve always wanted to do, which is to create for a living.
Whether or not the script for The Following ever sells, I worked hard and crafted the story I wanted to create while learning a lot about myself and the writing process at the same time.*
The Invitation to Create a New Series
Earlier this summer, I was contacted by Shawn Lindsey, an entrepreneur and marketing professional, with the offer to join his new production company as a writer for a new independent television series. We talked back and forth, negotiating details, and The Hunger was born.
This was a great opportunity from the get go because Shawn is a great leader who trusts people to do what they do best, which meant I was given an incredible amount of creative freedom to develop a series I believe in.
What Sets The Hunger Apart
The Hunger is a drama set in the midst of a zombie apocalypse. Sure, it’s been done before, and done extremely well, but The Hunger is a zombie apocalypse show as any of my readers would expect from me. It has deep characters with serious flaws, relational dynamics that create some emotionally charged moments that are sure to resonate with viewers, and several mysteries that help to drive the plot forward.
I spent the summer writing the script for the pilot episode, and there were times when I was writing it that I felt like I was writing some of the best writing I’ve ever written.
The Hunger is a show about a family broken by life’s circumstances. It’s about a doctor named Mark Downing who has two daughters. The oldest daughter, Landon, suffers from a disease that threatens to take her life while the youngest daughter, Bailey, disappears in the shadow of her sister’s illness. It’s a story of a man’s desperate attempt to save one daughter and repair the broken relationship he has with the other. All set against the backdrop of a zombie apocalypse.
How You Can Help
The pilot episode of The Hunger has been cast, the director selected, and a crew lined up to begin production, but since this is an independent production, the production company is crowdfunding much of the costs associated with the production of the pilot.
I’m excited about the story we’re about to tell, and I’d like to invite anyone who has enjoyed any of my stories in the past to check out our Indiegogo page and consider helping to make the production a reality.
You can also check out a short video below about the production of The Hunger.
I love writing stories, and this is a big step toward doing it for a living. So if The Hunger sounds like a story you’re interested in seeing as a TV series, please consider supporting it and by doing so, supporting my pursuit of creating more stories that resonate with people.
Visit the Indiegogo page for The Hunger
Also, please check out the official Facebook page for The Hunger for more information about the series and contest information.
*For anyone interested in the progress of The Following, I’ll dive into revisions of the script soon now that the pilot script of The Hunger is finished, but before I start shopping it around, I’m considering writing the novelization of it first, which will give me greater control over the rights of the story if it ever sells. We’ll see what happens.
Tom Farr is a writer, teacher, and storyteller who believes in crafting lies to tell the truth. When he’s not enjoying the good life with his beautiful wife Lindsey and their three much-adored children, he’s striving to create stories that thrill and inspire and preparing for the day Disney calls him to write a Star Wars movie. He’s also a contributing editor for Made Up Words. His work has also appeared on Panel & Frame, Wordhaus, Curiosity Never Killed the Writer, and The Unsplash Book. Check out his fiction writing portfolio on Medium and sign up for his author newsletter.
