#david schulner

(link to full article here (Deadline) 

Here is Schulner’s essay:

I am a writer of fiction. But if I may say, the world needs a lot less fiction right now, and a lot more facts. The only reason I’m writing about Covid-19 and the effects it had on my show, New Amsterdam, is because Deadline Hollywood asked me to. Again, there are way more important articles to read right now, so please, if you need to learn about social distancing, the symptoms of Covid-19, or where to buy milk, go read those articles now. They could, without exaggeration, save your life. This article will not.

If I sound self-effacing let me assure you, I’m not. I truly believe that right now, at this moment in time, the only thing I have to contribute to society is the money I have made writing fiction, not the fiction itself. I know people say entertainment is needed in times like these, that people need to escape, but I’ve never been one of those people. When I was thirteen Arthur Miller was my idol. I wanted to hold a “mirror up to nature” as Shakespeare dictated. Yes, I know, I sound insufferable. But, it’s only because I really am!

Though, sometimes, when we get it right, the fiction we write actually does what Hamlet instructed. This was the case of an episode of New Amsterdam called “Pandemic” written by David Foster (a Harvard trained M.D.) and directed by Nick Gomez. David wrote the episode in 2019 about a flu pandemic overtaking our fictional hospital in New York. During a bad year, influenza can kill up to 80,000 Americans. We wanted to get this message out. And the best way to do that was to scare you so bad you’d be washing your hands during the commercial breaks. We showed what happens when our hospital has to erect tents in the parking lot because every bed is taken. When the doctors and nurses and medical techs have been working back to back shifts because their replacements are sick. When panic sets in. When people are quarantined. When people die.

Sometimes, what the mirror reflects back is too horrifying to look at.

This is why NBC recently decided not air “Pandemic”. David even renamed it, “Our Doors Are Always Open”, as a salve. But, let’s call it what it is. We shot a fictional pandemic episode right before a real pandemic hit. People are dying in real life. Do we really want to watch fake people die too? Some would say yes. It’s not for nothing Contagion and Outbreak are at the top of the iTunes chart. The reason we engage with fiction is to watch our heroes battle the monsters we can’t and to learn from their struggle. There’s hope in that. Hope is the reason fiction exists. And yet…

New York State now accounts for seven percent of the world’s infections. And by the time you read this, it will most likely be more. The images we put on screen, of New Yorkers fleeing parks, autopsies in makeshift labs, are hard to watch. Some would say exploitative. Some would say in bad taste. Now they won’t say anything. Because the mirror has been taken down. For better and for worse.

David Schulner, New Amsterdam