Main Responsibilities of an Executive Story Editor in a Television Writers Room
As an Executive Story Editor on *Suits*, Marshall's role involved "creative problem-solving," navigating the writer's room hierarchy to resolve plot inconsistencies and character issues. This entailed brainstorming, drafting and rewriting scripts, and ultimately overseeing on-set production to ensure the showrunner's vision was realized, a "three-tiered job" encompassing creative, writing, and production phases.
Creative Problem-Solving, Television Writing, Teamwork, Executive Production, Scriptwriting
Advizer Information
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Job Title
Company
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Traits
Marshall Knight
Executive Story Editor
Television Writers Room
UCLA
n/a
Arts, Entertainment & Media, Advertising, Communications & Marketing
Creative
Honors Student, Worked 20+ Hours in School, Student Athlete
Video Highlights
1. Marshall's role as an Executive Story Editor involves creative problem-solving, addressing plot inconsistencies or character inconsistencies that the team can't resolve.
2. A significant part of the job is participating in daily brainstorming sessions contributing to the overall season arc and character development.
3. Beyond writing and rewriting scripts, Marshall also acts as a liaison between the writers and the set during production, ensuring the show's vision is realized correctly
Transcript
What are your main responsibilities within your current role?
On Suits LA, my ring partner and I are executive story editors. In the hierarchy of a writer's room, this is in the lower middle third.
We are below the executive producers and mid-level producers. Our role is interesting because we are expected to contribute in the room, but the hierarchy does matter.
Our main job is creative problem-solving. This means laying out the season arc and figuring out the characters. Day to day, our job is to fix problems when the room gets stuck.
For example, if we've written ourselves into a corner or need to make a case make sense on a legal show like Suits, we find a creative solution. Coming up with these solves is job number one.
Practically, we're part of the daily brainstorming. Eventually, we'll write a draft of a script and then work on rewriting it with our showrunner.
Once the script goes to production, we go to set. We act as the eyes and ears of the showrunner and the writers' brain trust. Our role is to ensure the vision is executed properly on set.
After production, we return to the fold and the process begins again. It's essentially a three-tiered job: brainstorming in the room, writing and rewriting scripts, and then serving as a producer on set.
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