Well I just remembered (read: mourned) that one of my absolute favorite TV shows, FX's "The Americans", wrapped earlier this year-ending its six-season run. And that also reminded me: I am no longer under a lid to talk about how I was contacted by a PA at this TV show. I got to make a (tiny) humble, but fun contribution to the show as Season 5 aired-and as Season 6 writing was apparently underway.
First, a little background if you're unfamiliar with "The Americans" TV series. It is a Cold War spy-drama set in the late 1970s through the 80s, in which two Soviet KGB Intel Officers pose as an American married couple living in a Virginia suburb outside Washington DC. The couple are raising their two American-born kids, and they balance their family life with their spying duties (which get pretty intense, dark, and downright insane). They have interesting contacts and "friendships" (like a major character / neighbor who is on a spy-hunting FBI task force) that keep things hopping, too. I am not doing justice to just how addictive, and how insane, the plotlines could get!
So the husband KGB spy, Phillip, has been attending EST courses since Season 3. Phillip had been experiencing doubt from the terrible things he's been doing while undercover in America, juxtaposed to his wife Elizabeth (who is a lethal partisan spy with terrifying Soviet zeal). This leads Phillip to explore one of the most "American institutions" of the mid-to-late 1970s: human potential movements, specifically EST.
So that's the show in a very incomplete nutshell and, if you haven't seen it, you really should watch it. It's so good (really good IMHO), well-written, and it pulls you in. Now, read-on for the tea on how I made my very minor contribution to Season 6... ☺️
I always thought it was really on-the-nose that a spy, who must at all times be Inauthentic (a major EST term/concept), ends up in a seminar that is all about teaching you to "own your bullshit" learn to be Authentic. The EST scenes were always so realistic, I'd bet good money some of the writers and producers may be EST or Landmark Graduates themselves. Anyway, as the show moves through each seasons, and further into the 1980s, they needed to "keep up" with where EST would be-for accuracy. And by 1985 EST would start to change and would end up "The Forum" (and later "The Landmark Forum" in the 90s). So by Season 5, the writers and PAs apparently began researching and putting out calls for input about the post-EST Forum...
...and that's where yours-truly comes in. My original (and apparently somewhat popular) old write-up (revisiting my own attendance of The Landmark Forum) resulted in one of the show's Production Assistants and writers contacting me in 2017! He reached out for a brief Q&A on my 1994 Landmark Forum experience, and over a few emails and a brief Q&A in a phone call I could get a sense that Season 5 stuff was probably being verified a bit (it was actually getting ready to air, as they were speaking with me). It also seemed like they were wanting more info about how EST transitioned into The Forum, probably in case any Season 6 material would cover it. They asked fantastic questions, and really seemed to be after unbiased outside view. Amazing that my silly near 10-year old write-up on The Forum managed to get out there like it has.
The FX folks couldn't say what content, if any, of our discussions (or my blog write-up) might ever make it into the show. As near as I can tell, the only mention of The Forum gets mentioned in Episode 6 of Season 6 ("Rififi"). I didn't see any other mentionings, or direct-apperances, of Philip attending sessions. Still, to even contemplate that I helped inform the writers about the 80s "Forum" and what it may have been like, was a pretty fun exercise.
Apparently my blog SEO was decent enough, that his all even happened. I can imagine some writers and production people googling "Landmark Forum" and "EST" together and boom more traffic to my write-up. And I remain a tiny bit proud that my old write-up was interesting enough to get that kind of interest and request, in the first place. It still gets the lion's share of feedback, over my other blog posts. Gets the most traffice, too.
Anyway, my involvement with "The Americans'" final season was minor to say the least, basically tertiary. But the PA did write down my mailing address and send me a little bit of swag from the show (photo at the end). As a fan already of the series, that was super nice of them! It's still surreal what I got contacted from someone working on "The Americans" series, a show I was already watching and impressed with.
It's fun to think that my write-up perhaps ultimately led to some of what we saw depicted in those brief Landmark scenes in the Season 6. I also have to think the PA I spoke with (and perhaps even producers) went to Landmark Worldwide as well, and probably other attendees like myself. Those PAs and writers really do their homework.
So that's my bit of tea to spill, about how my Landmark Forum write-up led to some interesting contact from FX a year-and-a-half ago! And, now that "The Americans" is over, I'm left wishing they kept going longer. But all good things must come to an end, and it's best to go out when you're still getting Emmy nominations I guess. I like to think Phillip and Elizabeth are back in post-soviet Russia, while their kids Paige and Henry are still over here all grown-up and spying for Putin and his Oligarch government.
Now wait...that would make a topical revival plot, to bring back The Americans!! 🤔 ☺️
