Alright – so today we’ve got the honor of introducing you to Chloe Hawker. We think you’ll enjoy our conversation, we’ve shared it below.
Chloe, appreciate you making time for us and sharing your wisdom with the community. So many of us go through similar pain points throughout our journeys and so hearing about how others overcame obstacles can be helpful. One of those struggles is keeping creativity alive despite all the stresses, challenges and problems we might be dealing with. How do you keep your creativity alive?
I’ve always been a really creative person–I’ve been a writer and an actor as long as I can remember and have dabbled in knitting, pottery, music, swing dancing, and lots of other forms–but I don’t think I fully recognized how important creativity was to me until the pandemic. Like a lot of people, I was living at home with my parents, working remotely, and thinking a lot about what really mattered to me. To get through that time, I went back to something I had discovered I loved in law school: comedy writing. I started taking writing class after writing class, channeling the anxiety and difficulty of that time into getting better at making people laugh. Classes gave me structure, feedback, and external accountability to keep coming back to my creative practices, even in the midst of really tough life circumstances. This is still how I keep my creativity alive: I work with other creative people and use that accountability to help me keep going. I write sketch shows with my friends, I take TV and novel writing classes, and I try to write a few new ideas every single day, even if they don’t go anywhere. For me, creativity ultimately comes from doing the work: if I sit down and just start writing, eventually, the words will come.
Thanks, so before we move on maybe you can share a bit more about yourself?
I’ve been writing fiction and doing theater since I was a kid, but I ended up where I am through kind of an unusual route. I went to law school and, while I was there, I got involved with the campus comedy show, a full-length production that parodies something in pop culture with law-related humor, because I really missed being involved in theater. I ended up as both a writer and an actor, and it was a formative experience for me. After taking some comedy writing classes, I moved to NYC during the pandemic so I could get involved in the comedy writing scene here.
In the face of constant cultural pressure to specialize and niche farther and farther down, I strive to be a multi-hyphenate. I’m a lawyer in my day job, and I’m a writer and performer who loves lots of different forms and media: I write and perform sketch and character comedy, TV pilots, novels, poetry, and short humor. For me, comedy and storytelling are a way to create hope and wonder: I always gravitate toward stories that show the decency in people and how awe-inspiring the universe is. I also just love surprising people and making them look at something in a different way.
Right now, I’m writing and performing in a variety of sketch shows at the People’s Improv Theater. I’m also working on revisions to a contemporary fantasy novel and a workplace sitcom pilot that takes place in a New York church. I’m really excited to see where both of them lead me.
There is so much advice out there about all the different skills and qualities folks need to develop in order to succeed in today’s highly competitive environment and often it can feel overwhelming. So, if we had to break it down to just the three that matter most, which three skills or qualities would you focus on?
I’m convinced that one of the most important skills as a writer, and probably in most things, is persistence. I think it’s easy when you’re a teenager or in your early twenties to think “success” will happen immediately, but the reality is that success is at least partly a numbers game: you just have to keep working, even when you’re dealing with rejection and disappointment. I like to remember that Stephen King used to nail rejection letters to his wall until the letters got too heavy and the nail wouldn’t hold them up: every time I get rejected, I’m just channeling Stephen King. As a lot of great writers on creativity like to point out, the best batters in history only hit the ball about a third of the time, and it’s the same in writing, or any kind of creation. Maximize your number of at-bats.
Relatedly, a second skill that’s been huge for me is taking feedback well. I’ve worked with a lot of people who don’t know how to take feedback, whether that’s notes on something they’ve written on a director asking them to try something a different way. As a person who wants to make art that other people will enjoy and not just for myself, I’ve worked really hard to learn how to balance humility in taking critical feedback from others and discernment in knowing when that feedback is right. Sometimes you have to go with your gut, but you also have to be courteous to people who are taking the time and energy to give you feedback and you have to be honest with yourself when something isn’t working. Unless someone really didn’t pay attention, there’s often something true behind even the least helpful feedback (though the person who gave it may not know what it is!). And if multiple people give you the same piece of feedback, odds are high they’re right.
The last skill, which is really related to the first skill, is having a growth mindset: I both believe that I can always improve my skills and I’m always working to improve them. In comedy, like in a lot of disciplines, it becomes easy to coast: you see a lot of writers and performers sticking to whatever’s worked for them before (regardless of whether it actually worked that well), and you can get stuck that way. I don’t want to get stuck. When I read the stories of people who have written or performed in things I love, quite a lot of them focus on the fact that no matter how good you are now, you can always be better. I think some people find that frustrating (endless work!) or take it as a reason to be a perfectionist, but I see it as a hopeful thing: who knows where I might get to if I keep putting in the work and trying new things? So I would advise anybody pursuing a creative practice, or really any aspiration, to try to learn as much as possible: talk to people more experienced with you, collaborate with people who intimidate you, take classes, take creative risks. The magic is that there’s no way of knowing where that’ll take you.
What was the most impactful thing your parents did for you?
The most impactful thing my parents have done for me is to be in all-in supportive of whatever is important to me and whatever I decide to do–a lot of creative people (and people in general) aren’t that lucky, and I’m really grateful. My mom is a thriller writer (she writes as L.S. Hawker), and when I was young, I brought her a story of mine to read. She asked me if I wanted her to read it as an editor or as my mom, and I told her I wanted her to read it as an editor. Since then, she has championed my work while also not hesitating to give me the feedback that I need–she’s one of the reasons I’ve learned to take feedback pretty well! My dad isn’t a writer, but he also has been a huge cheerleader of everything I do. He’ll ask me the tough questions about what my next steps are and what I’m doing to move my creative aspirations forward, and he’s always ready to celebrate any time something exciting happens. They’ve been instrumental in helping me have the confidence to keep going and keep creating new things. Plus they’re pretty great joke brainstorming partners.
Contact Info:
- Website: https://www.chloehawker.com
- Instagram: @chloechawker
- Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/chloehawker/
Image Credits
Pretty Funny Comedy, Steph Jacobson
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