Pop-Culturalist.com

Dara Resnik is a multifaceted talent who works behind the scenes bringing some of our favorite TV shows to life, including Castle, Jane the Virgin, Daredevil, and Shooter. Her latest project, Home Before Dark, finds Dara serving as cocreator, showrunner, and executive producer. We caught up with Dara recently for an in-depth conversation about getting her start in the industry and how Home Before Dark has impacted her relationship with her daughter. She also shared an exciting new series she’s working on!

PC: How did you discover your passion for the arts and storytelling?
Dara: I grew up in New York City. My parents took me to see Cats when I was six years old. It was my first Broadway play and I loved it. Then we saw Les Mis and Anything Goes. I could literally name every Broadway play we saw in the order that we saw it. [laughs] We’d also go to museums on the weekend. I took art classes at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, and I was always a really artsy kid. I thought that I wanted to be an actor because that was the thing that you saw. So I studied at the Neighborhood Playhouse School of Theatre for a few years in high school. I realized that I wasn’t particularly talented. [laughs]

I ended up going to college and got a degree in economics. I’m actually right- and left-brain balanced. While I was there, I realized there was a business side to Hollywood. I thought, “Well, I have these nice Jewish parents who are nervous about this artistic gene.” I was like, “Maybe I could do the business side.” So after college, I applied to the Peter Stark Producing Program at USC. I was like, “It’s business plus art. It checks all the boxes.” While I was there, I started reading scripts. So many of them were bad. So many of these people who are represented are not particularly good writers. I knew that I could be at least as good as the scripts I was reading.

So I ended up writing out of practicality. Ultimately, showrunning brings all these things together. In between college and grad school, I wrote for Entertainment Weekly. Writing was always one of those things that kept tapping me on the shoulder. I journaled my whole life. I wrote stories. I was never that kid that was like, “I’m going to be a writer when I grow up.” Unlike acting, it never quite occurred to me until it was born out of necessity.

PC: Who or what has had the biggest influence on your career?
Dara: My parents always tell me if I ever win an award, I have to thank them first. My dad’s a first-generation American. He’s always had this incredible work ethic. My mom has always been my biggest cheerleader. She said to me recently, “I always knew you would be successful. I just didn’t know that you’d make any money at it.” [laughs] But they’ve always genuinely supported and believed in whatever it was I wanted to do. They’ve been my greatest inspiration and support.

PC: That’s the perfect segue. Every person has their own definition of success. How do you define success? Is there a moment that stands out in your career?
Dara: Oh geez. I teach at USC on the side. One of the things that I tell the students all the time is we have this definition of success in a capitalistic culture that includes a full bank account, accolade, and fame. I went to Dalton in New York. You’d see all these families with all this money and fame. You realize that they’re not happier than the people that you know who are living in a one-bedroom apartment in Brooklyn. To me, success is a balanced life.

My most successful moments are the days where I get to work with creative people all day and play in my imaginary worlds, and then I get to go home to a happy kid, to my friends, and a bottle of wine. I’ve built this amazing community. There’s this Jewish community called IKAR out here and they’ve become my biggest support system in LA. I savor the days where all of those things can coexist. That’s success to me.

PC: Your most recent project, Home Before Dark, is airing on Apple TV+, and you’ve said in previous interviews that you took a lot from that experience. What was the biggest lesson you learned as a creative and as a person?
Dara: That’s a great question. It was really confirmed that what’s just as important as the work is how happy and collaborative people are together, both in the writers’ room and on set. That is something that’s really important to pay attention to because that’s what makes the best work. People who are unhappy don’t do great work. People who are nervous about losing their jobs don’t do great work. The best work is when everybody feels relaxed, happy, vulnerable, and able to share their most visceral moments so that you can use those and create those real moments for the audience in turn.

PC: An important theme within the series is having open and honest conversations with your children. Have you noticed your own relationship change with your daughter during this process?
Dara: Oh my god. Yes! Matt and Hilde Lysiak have had a huge influence on me in that way. They’re who the show is based on. They’re peers. When you sit down and talk to them, they finish each other’s stories. They deeply respect each other. Each sees the other as a whole person. He’s not just a parent. She’s not just a kid. It’s deeply influenced how I have handled my kid since then.

One of the reasons that I ended up being so attracted to Home Before Dark to start with was that I had recently gotten a divorce. The mantra of my divorce, which came from my sister who was a grade school teacher, is there are no secrets in a house with children.

Children are natural investigators. It’s why they ask all those “why” questions. They’re just trying to get to the bottom of it. I was already aware that I couldn’t keep secrets from her. I was going to have to be honest with her about all kinds of deeply difficult emotional moments in our lives, particularly surrounding the divorce of her parents. But it has made it so much easier, frankly, especially when you have to have conversations about the pandemic, the protests, and the president. There are things that I feel like I talk to my eight-year-old about that a lot of people don’t even talk to their friends about.

PC: It was also recently announced that your new series, The Horror of Dolores Roach, has moved into development. What can you tell us about the series?
Dara: I’m so excited about that project. It was created by a playwright named Aaron Mark, who I’m deeply in love with. He just got married in my backyard in a tiny, socially distant ceremony. He and Daphne Rubin-Vega did this one-woman play at the LAB Theater Company in New York called Empanada Loca, which was so successful that Gimlet made a podcast of it. Through some friends, I listened to the podcast and was deeply obsessed.

They had been looking for a showrunner, and I walked into the room to meet him. He had flown into LA from New York last summer and I went to meet him. It was platonic love at first sight. We both just got each other immediately. I guided him through the writing of the pilot because this was his first pilot writing experience. The partnership has been incredibly organic. It’s a story about survival.

I think that what’s happening with Dolores Roach is deeply informed by the pandemic, the protests, and everything that’s going on in the world. As a woman of color who’s been cast aside her entire life, she refuses to go away and refuses to die. So me, Aaron, and Daphne Rubin-Vega have been toiling away on these first few scripts. We’re hopeful that once things are up and running again, we get our pickup.

Pop Culturalist Speed Round

PC: Guilty pleasure TV show?
Dara: Dawson’s Creek

PC: Guilty pleasure movie?
Dara: My daughter and I have been watching A League of Their Own on repeat.

PC: Favorite book?
Dara: That’s a really good question. I have so many favorite books. I’ve read The Great Gatsby five times. I’ve read Age of Innocence a bunch. Also Pride and Prejudice.

PC: Favorite play or musical?
Dara: Les Mis. I mean, what am I: a monster? I have to say Les Mis because again, it’s like a comfort food, one. But I love musicals. There are very few musicals I’m not deeply in love with. I recently rediscovered Hairspray and Kinky Boots.

PC: A band or artist that fans would be surprised to learn is on your playlist?
Dara: Missy Elliott

PC: Who would play you in the story of your life?
Dara: I don’t know personality-wise if this works, but I used to get mistaken for Sara Gilbert a lot. So people literally, when I was younger, would ask me for my autograph, thinking that I was her, so I’m going to go with Sara Gilbert.

To keep up with Dara, follow her on Twitter. Binge-watch Season 1 of Home Before Dark on Apple TV+.