Daily Inspiration: Meet Dan Ramm

Today we’d like to introduce you to Dan Ramm

Hi Dan, can you start by introducing yourself? We’d love to learn more about how you got to where you are today?
Frankly my career is a combination of hard work, luck, and failure. Let me explain.
A chance meeting with the actor Joe Mantegna in 1999 changed my life. At the time I was in the home improvement business, and I had received a call from his wife Arlene, to look at an issue at their home and give them an estimate for repairs. Once at the house, I saw a large photo of Joe on the wall and realized I was in “that actor’s” home. I had always been a fan of his work starting with Searching for Bobby Fischer and of course Godfather III, among many others, but Ratpack was far and away my favorite. Over the next year, Joe and I formed a bit of a friendship, somewhat based on our mutual love for Frank Sinatra, Dean Martin, and of course Sammy Davis Jr. Joe had completed the film The Ratpack not long before our chance meeting. Secretly I wondered what he would think of a screenplay I’d written years before we met on the life of Sammy Davis Jr. Something I wrote to see if I could.

Over the next two years Joe would call me for repairs on one of his properties, or even just hang out with him at a celebrity golf event, sometimes even finagling a spot for me on his team. On a drive back from the golf course in early 2000, I mentioned to Joe that I was selling my company. I had spent most of my life working very hard at something I didn’t love, and I had decided that the time had come for me to reinvent myself. He was curious about my ambitions and, although at the time I didn’t know what I wanted to do, I knew I wanted something different. I explained that the sale of my company included a proviso that I stay on with the new owners for one year as an advisor and to help the transition.

In early 2001 Joe and I were talking, and he asked me about the sale of company. He knew that year was nearly up and wondered what I would do next. I still didn’t know. That’s when he said to me, “Well, look, I have a pilot for a series I’m doing and if it goes, why don’t you come work for me?” I couldn’t believe what I was hearing. He went on to explain that he’d never really done television, but he wanted to be home more. He too was looking for a change. This was an opportunity that I never could have imagined, and I said yes instantly. I didn’t even ask about salary; I didn’t care. This was the opportunity that I had hoped would someday present itself.

During the next couple years, I learned a lot by just watching how television filming was done and read as many scripts as I could get my hands on. There was a steady stream of scripts being submitting to him, so there was no shortage of material for me to read. I learned what made a story work and what didn’t. Joe’s original series was short lived, but Joe wanted me to stay on, figuring it was only a matter of time before he’d be on another series of some kind.

After about three years of working with him, I got the courage to show Joe my Sammy Davis Jr. script. I could see the look in his eyes when I handed him the script. It was sort of an “Oh boy, here we go” kind of look. But after a few weeks he said to me, “Hey, that script is pretty good. Is writing something you want to do?” The question surprised me. Not only was it a question no one had ever asked me, it was one I’d never even asked myself. I timidly said, “Yes, I think so.” Another few weeks went by, and he gave me the script back with all of his notes in red referencing what was good and bad about the story and writing. And that was our relationship from then on. He always encouraged me and was never light in his criticism of my work. That was probably the best help of all. He would often say, “Anything creative is loaded with criticism and opinions. You have to really believe in what you write and yourself.”

The more I wrote the more I learned about writing and the more confident I became. I often had opinions about scripts submitted to him, things I thought could be improved and so forth, and many times my comments were validated by him and others. Joe continued to nurture that creative spirit inside me, pushing me to be better. In the following two decades I wrote three different TV series—two of which I created or co-created—did some guest writing on Criminal Minds and sold three Television pilots.

I’m sure it wasn’t obstacle-free, but would you say the journey has been fairly smooth so far?
I can say for sure that it most certainly was unpredictable. Starting out in a career that had nothing to do with show business and doing it for so long and then transitioning into a field that I could only dream about was certainly a step way outside my comfort zone. Show business can be a cruel business in a way, there’s always ups and downs there’s always a lot of rejection and a lot of criticism. But one thing Joe told me early on is that you have to believe in yourself, if you don’t really believe in yourself how do you expect anyone else to believe in you. And that’s really stuck with me.

The first day working for Joe Mantegna I almost quit. It was a Monday, and I showed up to the lot on time and made my way down to his trailer where he was waiting for his next scene. I asked him what he wanted me to do for him today? His response seemed simple enough, he wanted me to invite some friends of his to a screening of a film he’d directed. He handed me a list and I made my way back to the office. When I looked at the list closely, I saw names like Billy crystal, Andy Garcia, Sid Caesar, etc. Obviously only ever seeing them on television or in film it was all I could do to actually call them and speak to them over the telephone.

Mind you this was not their agents phone number or their publicist phone number, this was their home phone number. A friend of mine later told me that I was experiencing something called impostors syndrome. A very common condition where you feel like you don’t belong somewhere because you have little or no experience in what you’re doing. My father had given me a piece of advice as a little kid that I use to this day. He said, “how do you eat an elephant? One bite at a time.” Meaning don’t let the entire situation overwhelm you, just look at what’s next. So I decided that I would work the rest of the week and then over the weekend I would decide whether or not I wanted to continue to work for Joe. Needless to say, by the time Friday came I was convinced that I was in the right place.

As you know, we’re big fans of you and your work. For our readers who might not be as familiar what can you tell them about what you do?
Primarily I’m a writer. I’ve written for Criminal Minds, co-created and wrote a show called Hollywood Weapons Fact or Fiction, a sort of Mythbusters type show about Hollywood that lasted 6 seasons, I currently write a show call Gun Stories; a documentary style show about the history of firearms, in it’s 15th season. I created and wrote a show called Booger Bottom USA; about a family of hunters in Georgia, and a few shorts that aired on PBS. In the last decade I’ve done more in the way of producing. I was one of the producers of an Emmy Winning documentary about the Palm Springs Air Museum in 2022, and was nominated for an Emmy in 2023 for another documentary.

I really think I’m most proud of my new novel Long Branch. In television writing you have to funnel all your ideas and creativity through several filters. How expensive would this be to produce? What location would we use for filming? Are there too many characters? And so on. That’s not even taking into consideration the networks input, which they always have. Will the network let me do this? Is it too violent or too sexy for primetime? Then of course each script you write for a show passes through many hands higher on the food chain that you. Being free from all that was very exciting. With a novel I could paint whatever world I wanted with the goal of telling the story I wanted to tell. It would be a chance to really stretch as a writer and an artist.

Long Branch is about out of work actor Mason Powell who travels back to his hometown of Long Branch Georgia to make some quick money and then return to Los Angeles. But in Long Branch Mason stumbles into a mysterious crime that happened 20 years ago. The more he digs, the more he finds that he may have played a small part in the crime. Worst of all, someone is determined to keep the past buried by any means possible.

If you had to, what characteristic of yours would you give the most credit to?
Being a Kansas City native I think I learned from a young age what I like to call “midwest values.” Be on time, do what you say your going to do, be polite to everyone, give a firm handshake and look the other person in the eye. And maybe the most important, be trustworthy. I come back to KC often as I have a lot of family there, and I’m always pleasantly reminded of the cultural difference between Los Angeles and KC.

I’m proud of being from Kansas City and always look forward to coming there to visit family, go to a Chiefs game, or fulfill my BBQ cravings!

Pricing:

• $17.99 Paperback
• $7.99 Kindle Version
• $17.46 Audibles

Contact Info:

• Website: https://www.DanRammBooks.com
• Instagram: @DanRammAuthor
• Twitter: @DanRammAuthor