Meet Erica Wachs | Television Writer & Playwright

We had the good fortune of connecting with Erica Wachs and we’ve shared our conversation below.

Hi Erica, why did you decide to pursue a creative path?
I didn’t always think I would be a writer. In high school, writing was something I did while I focused my efforts on cultural diplomacy.

All that changed when I started college, and found myself enrolling in far more English and Creative Writing classes than Global Affairs ones. I had always been a theater kid — participating in my school shows; writing short plays about closeted queer teens (of which I was one) — but it wasn’t until my Intro to Creative Writing Professor, Richard Deming, told me that playwriting was my medium; I had an ear for dialogue. It was so obvious a calling that I almost missed it.

Over the next four years, I immersed myself in the craft of playwriting, enrolling in almost every playwriting class I could take, seeing an average of two productions a week, staging readings and productions of my own work, and earning a Concentration in Creative Writing in addition to my English Major. By senior spring, I also enrolled in a television writing class, with my sights set on LA — at the time I was graduating (2018), we were not only in the Golden Age of TV, but the Golden Age of Playwrights Writing TV With Something to Say, and I desperately wanted to be — and now, count myself incredibly lucky to be — a part of that.

But as for why I pursued this as a career — why does anyone pursue writing? In high school, I wrote to come out. I wrote to grapple with my identity. I wrote to escape into a world where I had a say. In college, I wrote to make that say mean something — inspired by Paula Vogel’s “Indecent”; Branden Jacob-Jenkins’s “An Octoroon,” Guillermo Calderón’s “Kiss” — to find a way in which my voice could join other voices of political and social relevance and meaning while still cultivating exciting theater. Now, in my fifth scripted drama room, I would probably add that I write to entertain, which I think is so important in the art that we create. I write because, when I feel so moved by the world around me, my natural response — my only response — is to write about it.

Can you open up a bit about your work and career? We’re big fans and we’d love for our community to learn more about your work.
My collegiate writing was inspired by my parent’s divorce, and my mom’s subsequent remarriage to a Muslim man. Having been raised as a Conservative Jew until that point, my stepdad prompted me reconcile my dad’s family’s sense of religion with my own. What was Judaism without Zionism? How did one religion that didn’t eat pork come to hate another religion that also didn’t eat pork? Why wasn’t my step-father allowed on the bimah at my bat-mitzvah?

Or at least that was the story I got good at telling my professors, peers, and myself. The writing I did in college – all of it earnest, most of it Jewish – was to avoid writing (and living) the story I wanted to tell: I knew I was a lesbian, and yet feared coming out. This is probably best encapsulated by my collegiate love of Gertrude Stein, which culminated in an independent student where I read most of her oeuvre, researched archival letters between herself and a Vichy government official, and a staged reading of a play I wrote, all in the name of exploring Stein’s relationship to Judaism. In reality, I wanted to know more about her life partner, Alice B. Toklas, her queerness, but wouldn’t allow myself to look at the love letters they bequeathed to the Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library.

In the years since graduating, I have come out, a process six years in the making. When I first started coming out, it felt as if my queerness superseded any other facet of my identity. Now, however, I’ve come to realize how both of these parts of me are informed/reflected by the Main Line, the affluent suburb where I grew up. As such, I’ve recently become captivated by writing about place and class, specifically aiming to answer the questions: “Can you ever escape the place you came from? Would you want to?”

Though the shows I’ve been lucky enough to be a part have not been explicitly about lesbian Jews, I have been lucky to bring pieces of my writing with me to every room, as I’ve learned and grown and honed my formal storytelling techniques. In fact, being in these rooms has allowed me to look beyond identity as a form of writing to see how writers at the top of their game are able to inhabit multiple voices convincingly without sharing the identity of the character.

As pretty much anyone can tell you in this business, getting into a room — even at an assistant capacity — is a Herculean task. I am incredibly lucky to have the unwavering support of my parents, who put the foundation in place that allowed me to pursue this career. And I am also particularly lucky to have spent my first room sharing an office with Michelle Denise Jackson, a brilliant writer who championed my promotion to writers’ assistant when she herself was promoted to staff writer midway through the room. I credit so much of my career to her belief in me and my abilities.

Any places to eat or things to do that you can share with our readers? If they have a friend visiting town, what are some spots they could take them to?
In September of 2022, my best friend from college visited me in LA from Amman, Jordan, so much of this itinerary is ripped straight from her visit!

Food is first; food is a must. My favorites are Pine + Crane in Silverlake (the Dan Dan Noodles) and L’antica Pizzeria da Michele in Hollywood. I don’t typically write in coffee shops, but if I do, they would be Bricks & Scones in Larchmont or Miss Melbourne in West Hollywood.

No tour of my Los Angeles would be complete without visiting a collection of independent bookstores — we’re really blessed to have so many! — with Vroman’s (how many times have I made the schlep from West Hollywood to Pasadena for Vroman’s), Book Soup, Skylight and Chevalier’s being my regular haunts. If lucky enough, we would be able to catch my dear friend Bee Sacks giving a reading of one of their acclaimed novels at a book launch event, as I did this past August for their new novel THE LOVER.

LA theater gets a bad rap, sometimes, and it shouldn’t. When Farah was here, we saw “The Prom” at the Ahmanson; I’ve loved so many LA theatrical offerings, from Pasadena Playhouse’s Sondheim series last year to Skylight Theatre’s “America Adjacent” to the Geffen’s “Mindplay” and “Witch.” (Pro tip: the Geffen hosts an annual prop sale, where they are practically paying YOU to take old props off their hands. I got my cherished copy of “Howard’s End” for $1 from the Geffen’s production of The Inheritance.)

Whenever my fiancée and I have spare time (which is rare), we will head to Fryman for a hike. No other trail gives you access to breathtaking views of nature and the illustrious homes of the hills!

It’s touristy, but I love a studio tour. Farah capped off her visit with the WB Studio Tour, before we visited my friends at John Wells Productions to show her where I worked when I was in the room for MAID (Netflix). While production company tours aren’t open to the public, I would encourage anyone to take advantage of the various screenings and Q&As that happen in LA, especially around awards season.

Who else deserves some credit and recognition?
I have had various writing groups throughout the years, but two figures have remained pretty permanent throughout my writing journey: Zoe Kempf-Harris, a brilliant writer and PhD candidate at the University of Virginia, and writer and actress Vimbai Ushe. Our text conversations are mostly comprised of drafts, self-doubts, encouragement, questions, suggestions, notes, and favorite lines, and I wouldn’t have it any other way.

So much of the artistic permission I’ve been able to give myself since moving to Los Angeles has come from being a co-producer of See What Sticks, a monthly organization that allows artists across any discipline to workshop up to 10 minutes of any material across any discipline. Through See What Sticks, I have developed my voice as a non-fiction writer, while continuing to hone my television writing/playwriting skills.

Paula Vogel’s work left an indelible mark on me when I was in high school, and continues to inspire me today. I still write in the journal I asked her to sign when I was 19 — “Joy in your writing!”

My dear friend Bee Sacks, an acclaimed novelist in their own right, has consistently championed my growth as a writer, thinker, and person.

And finally, my professors David Kastan & Richard Deming, for everything.

Website: https://www.eriwachs.com/

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/ericawachs/

Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/erica-faye-wachs/

Twitter: https://twitter.com/erica_wachs

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/ericafwachs

Image Credits
Nina Goodheart Jasper Lewis Greg Feiner Emily Bice