It's Not About Who You Know, It's About Who You Are

Last night, I watched Jay Kelly on Netflix, about an aging Hollywood icon/actor who takes an actual trip to Europe to accept an award, but also a virtual trip down memory lane where he comes to terms with all the regrets about the lost or fumbled relationships in his life.

It’s a story as old as time, and in fact, I wrote an essay a while back about similar themes through the lens of one of my favorite stories, The Death of Ivan Ilyich by Leo Tolstoy.

Recently, an episode of Eva Langston's podcast, The Long Road to Publishing, aired in which I talk about my path to publishing. We spent most of the time discussing how I went from writing essays to eventually anticipating the release of my first novel, Gap Year, in February.

But at the very end, she remembered I’d mentioned that I worked in the film industry and asked me several questions about it. I don’t remember all the details of that portion of our conversation, but I did tell her why I’d left the industry. I discussed how I couldn’t envision a future in which I’d find a work/life balance if I’d stayed in the industry. And I pointed out that, as a woman, it is even harder to balance a family, an upward trajectory in a very competitive industry, and any modicum of relaxation.

Today, as I jogged my five miles, I thought about the movie in conjunction with my podcast conversation. And I questioned the real reasons I left the industry— a departure that occurred before I truly got started. In the movie, Jay Kelly is a superstar. Everyone, anywhere he goes, knows who he is. He seems to enjoy this recognition, even as he laments his lost friendships, and mostly, his estrangement from his older daughter and his strained relationship with his younger one. His closest relationship is with his manager, who also earns 15% of Jay’s income.

I am guessing Noah Baumbach, who wrote and directed the film, did so because Jay Kelly’s story, though fabricated, seems authentic. I can only imagine the cost of extreme fame and the potential difficulty of making real connections with other people. And I am guessing Baumbach knows people in Hollywood whose lives mirror Jay Kelly’s.

When I first arrived in Los Angeles, I was young and naive, like many who’d come before me. I loved movies and wanted to tell stories. I didn’t know anyone who had worked in the industry and had zero guidance. In other words, I had no clue. I briefly worked for a company that distributed soft-core porn because that was the first job I could find, and I needed a paycheck. The one positive about that experience was that I met a few people who offered advice, namely that I needed to work for an agent at a reputable agency to really get my foot in the door.

And that was good advice. I met many people and had access to the underbelly of the film industry, which meant it was a crash course in the industry's various facets and an education in what I wanted my next steps to be. I promised my boss a year and wound up staying for a year and a half before I moved on to work on the Warner Bros. lot for a producer.

I’m not sure how many people watched The Studio on Apple TV, but part of the show's hilarity is that, despite being a little over the top, it is accurate. Ass kissing with talent, shit-talking about talent when they’re no longer sitting in front of you, and feeling like you’re making a deal with the devil to get ahead, defined my years working as a creative executive. The whole campaign to make The Kool-Aid movie in that show had me both laughing and shaking my head. It was a perfect depiction of how inane some of my days were.

There were aspects I loved. Sitting down with writers with an idea and receiving a complete script to sink my teeth into was truly satisfying. Strolling the lot and witnessing movie-making at every step never ceased to thrill me. Seeing movie stars casually walk by me on the lot and nodding and saying hello while I pretended my heart wasn’t threatening to leap out of my throat never got old. I’ll never forget the day Clint Eastwood said hello to me as if we were buddies while I resisted the urge to squeal like a fangirl.

But there was something else that overshadowed all of it. I had lost sight of why I’d arrived in Hollywood to begin with. The girl who wanted to move an audience, to make them feel something, to make them lie awake at night thinking about a scene long after the credits rolled, had taken a backseat. Instead, I cared more about moving ahead, at any cost, even if that meant stepping on someone else’s hand to climb the ladder. I cared about meeting the right people, hanging out with the right people, being one of the right people. I saw a future in which I wanted people to know my name or wanted to be near me because of what I could offer them. I guess in a nutshell, I wanted to be famous. I think I thought my parents would be proud, or that I would be proud.

And that leads me to the real reason I left the industry. There were days I no longer recognized myself. And more bluntly, I didn’t like myself. When I looked in the mirror, I didn’t feel proud. I didn’t want to be unkind or care more about what people thought of me, even though they didn’t really know me. I had wanted to tell stories, but not at that price— the cost of losing myself somewhere along the way, of losing the person who yearned for a connection with an audience, wasn’t worth it.

In the end, yes, I left because it didn’t seem possible for me to balance not only work and life, but who I wanted to be and who I feared I was becoming.

So, watching Jay Kelly, though I was as far from being a Hollywood star as I am from being a professional surfer, hit a nerve. I could have stayed. And I could have scrambled to the top any way I knew how, probably at the expense of relationships in my life. Who knows where I’d be now, but despite not having a crystal ball, I don’t think I would have been happy.

Luckily, years later, I found writing. I am sure I won’t be famous, and who knows how many people will even read my words. But though not all days are perfect exercises in balancing everything, I think I do a pretty good job.

I can watch a movie like Jay Kelly and shed a tear for his character because I feel sad for him. And then move on knowing I made the right decision for me.

My debut, Gap Year, releases February 3, 2026. In no way autobiographical, I hope to entertain and connect through my words.