Brian Koppelman
Screenwriter, Director & Showrunner. On 3 shows, 3 appearances. The Shows tab opens the full record on each.
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Together with writing partner David Levien, he wrote feature films including Rounders and Ocean's Thirteen and co-created the Showtime drama series Billions. They also developed the series Super Pumped: The Battle for Uber, alongside Koppelman's work hosting the podcast The Moment.
3shows
3appearances
41statements
2resolved
1supported
0contradicted
50%fully supported
Everything Brian Koppelman said on any show that made the record, most notable first. Each card names its show and opens the statement there.
Koppelman: Uncredited writers should write spec scripts to maintain creative leverage
“If someone's willing to pay you guys who have no credits, 5000 dollars now, write the thing, and you'll have a much better chance of success. And we've taken that lesson to heart still to this day to write unencumbered. We like to go in a room and let our idea…”
Koppelman: Achieving creative control requires taking responsibility for failure
“If you don't have control, you don't take the blame. So if you're comfortable, if you can find a way to be comfortable with failure, which as a writer you have to, or comfortable in your mistakes, then you can be comfortable in wanting to be the final voice on…”
Koppelman: Talent agents rarely do anything tangibly positive for a career
“It's been rare over the course of my career that I can tangibly point to things that agents have done that were really incredibly, just clearly positive.”
Koppelman: No founder who creates an entire sector is psychologically balanced
“No one who wills an entire sector into being is in a balanced place.”
Koppelman: The Wolf of Wall Street does not glorify Jordan Belfort
“Over time, you're gonna understand that Wolf of Wall Street's not glorifying Jordan Belfort.
Like, you just are.
In the moment, people might be taken with Leonardo DiCaprio, right?
In the moment, people might think that this guy is a master of the universe.
Bu…”
Koppelman: Drastic life changes for creative goals are often self-sabotage
“I think sometimes sort of taking huge drastic action that's external to the actual project or external to the actual mission is dramatic, and it feels great in the moment, but it turns out to be another way of self-sabotage, right? I must quit my job in order …”
Koppelman: Film writing demands more original storytelling than television writers' rooms
“Being a movie writer, you really have to survive by your wits. There's nothing holding you in place. There's nothing there's sort of no safety harness. You're just floating out there trying to come up with the next good idea, trying to get hired, trying to sel…”
Koppelman: Giuliani and Christie exploited public office for personal political ambition
“Because the other thing we realized was a lot of these prosecutors, we looked around at people like Giuliani and Chris Christie, and we saw that There were people using these positions of the public interest for their own personal good. So yes, they would do t…”
Koppelman: Super Pumped relied strictly on Mike Isaac's book, not Gurley
“Well, we didn't talk to the people in the show for the show, meaning I told Bill because I'm responsible person in that way. I said to Bill, Mike Isaac sent me his book. We're gonna go tell this story. Anything I may have heard from any conversation that I had…”
Koppelman: Mike Isaac brought off-the-record Uber sources into the writers' room
“And then he was reading every script and giving us notes, and what was great in the room is we'd be in the room and we'd go, what do we really think happened in that room? What's your sourcing? And he would go, and he wouldn't reveal his sources, but he would …”
Koppelman: Writing morning pages daily makes producing creative work easier
“Doesn't happen immediately, but after, after a month of doing this every day, even three weeks, you will find that not only is it easier to produce work, but you're just slightly lighter in the way you move through the world.”
Koppelman: Over half who completed The Artist's Way published previously blocked work
“I would say I've bought Cameron's book for a hundred people, Maybe 20 of those people actually took the time to do the book. Of those, more than half ended up publishing work that they'd been unable to produce before that.”
Koppelman: Calculating the odds of creative success discourages taking action
“One, you have to calculate less. You have to calculate less. If you, the more you try to game this stuff out, the more it becomes clear the odds are against you, and you can't win.”
Koppelman: Movies and television are rapidly merging on streaming platforms
“Movies exist on streaming platforms now, so I think these things are all becoming one thing pretty quickly.”
Koppelman: US Attorneys hold king-like power through immense prosecutorial discretion
“These United States attorneys who were like kings because they have this tremendous amount of discretion as far as what they're going to prosecute, when and how.”
Koppelman: Creative work does not require abandoning your other identities
“One mistake I see people make when they decide they have to do some kind of artistic work is they think it means they have to grab that identity so hard that it has to shut out the rest of their identity. But what I found was you don't have to do that.”
Koppelman: The expected value of unwritten creative ideas is zero
“The expected value of not doing the work is zero. Like there's no question about the EV of just thinking I'd like to write and not writing.”
Koppelman considers 'Solitary Man' to be the best film he ever made
“Solitary Man, which was a commercial failure. I mean, it made its money back, but it was not a big commercial success, but I know it's the best movie we ever made.”
Koppelman: Morning pages eliminate writer's block by creating momentum
“I meditate every morning, and I do morning pages every morning. So morning pages, like out of Julia Cameron's book, The Artist's Way, I do three longhand pages, a real brain dump, where I just Let the pen move for three pages, no matter what. And it has this i…”
Koppelman instructed his kids to burn his journals upon his death
“No, you burn, I, my, there, my kids have instructions to burn upon my desk.”
Koppelman: Every Hollywood agency initially rejected the 'Rounders' screenplay
“We were rejected by every single agency in Hollywood.”
Koppelman: Showrunners must manage studio relations like founders manage VCs
“I'll tell you, it's so analogous to the way a founder and Will work with the investors, right? The VC, the board. It, it's up to you to manage that relationship. It's up to you to set the terms.”
Koppelman: Speak to powerful executives without awe, condescension, or fear
“The main thing is, is don't treat them as the, most of the time, Don't treat them with a sense of awe, and that they're, like, their station makes them better than you, but also don't try to condescend to them as though you're the smartest person in the world,…”
Koppelman: Delivering overlong cuts invites executive interference
“What happens when you give the 67 minute thing is you're inviting a bunch of people to tell you how to get the thing to 57 or 58 minutes. And suddenly they're giving you their opinion on it. Also, by you not having to have rigorously With discipline, make thos…”
One line per show, most statements first. The link opens Brian's full record on that show: the calibration, argument clarity, speaking style and every statement made there.
| Show | Role there | Eps | Statements | Record | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
 a16zLEDGER | Screenwriter, Director & Showrunner | 1 | 21 | 100% 1/1 | full record on the a16z Podcast → |
 KNOWLEDGE PROJECTLEDGER | Screenwriter, Director & Showrunner | 1 | 11 | — | full record on the Knowledge Project → |
 ACQUIREDLEDGER | Screenwriter, Director & Showrunner | 1 | 9 | 0% 0/1 | full record on Acquired → |