How-To H'wood: Firing & Being Fired
The art of the ax swing, in today's advice no one tells you

Welcome to my latest Field Guides to Modern Hollywood, how-to advice no one tells you. In part one, I explained how to climb the greasy pole to success. Today: How to gently push someone off the ladder — or survive being pushed.
If Hollywood has one hobgoblin, it is the specter of firing. In a town of status-obsessed workaholics, the thought of being fired is so horrific that it’s something we never talk about — or prepare for. Firing retains its totemic status as this evil that lurks among us. Let its name never be mentioned lest we conjure its presence.
Those who are touched by this evil are cast out of society, not to be spoken to for fear that what felled them will rub off and send the reaper your way. As the poet Auden wrote, not of firing but it might as well have been:
The unmentionable odour of death
Offends the September night.
Firing is part of our life here in this business, where the climb to the top generally looks much more like a game of Chutes and Ladders than it does the Santa Monica Canyon stairs.
Yet nobody talks about how to deal with it! Until now. I’m tempting fate with today’s how-to guide, but sadly, firing is a huge part of life here now.
Let’s dispense quickly with how to fire someone. For most managers, this is, unsurprisingly, the worst part of the job. But just because it’s unpleasant doesn’t mean it has to be ugly. You can do it without losing your soul.
One showrunner who has had to let people go remembers, “When you are firing someone, explain that it is better for everyone to find a place where they can really excel and this is not that place for them because of mutual disconnections. They are now free and able to find that perfect place. I’ve made dinner plans with people after firing them.”
For the person being fired, it doesn’t have to be the end of the world. If you build a life prepared for the Grim Reaper’s appearance, the ax falling can be as much a liberation as a horror. It’s a truism, but if you are dismissed from your job, it was the wrong job for you. Life in the wrong job is never going to be happy. But there’s a huge world out there with billions of people who find fulfillment without working for your former employer. This is your chance to join them.
More to the point, if you are prepared for a life beyond your current place of employment, you will enter that new world with joy and become an object of envy to the community around you, not the morose cautionary tale, brooding at some table in Brentwood waiting for former colleagues to say hello. In every way, you might look back at this turn as the best day of your life.
But that requires being prepared. Here then is my guide to surviving it — and what to know about the other side.
I. Resist Outrage — and Get a Recommendation
One veteran industry friend reflects on firing: “It’s so tricky. Most people who are fired are given the boot with zero warning and escorted out of the building. There is no good way to be fired.
“If it’s amiable and they simply have to cut the workforce and layoffs have happened, the best thing to do obviously is be pleasant and get a good referral. But being fired is awful and usually painful — usually a shock. People generally feel wronged.”
II. Refuse Feeling Ashamed
This is a subjective business, dependent on taste, subject to lots of turnover and these days immense amount of turmoil. If you live here long enough, you’ll likely get fired at some point. In fact, if one has been around for a long time and never been fired, that itself gets a little suspect. If you rise high enough, sooner or later being ousted is the inevitable final step.
As for me, I’ve been fired four times in my life.