Broti Gupta’s résumé will make you jealous (especially if you’re an aspiring writer). Before penning episodes of Netflix comedy “Friends from College” and inclusive family sitcom “Speechless,” she contributed to McSweeney’s and The New Yorker’s humor section, Shouts & Murmurs. Did we mention she started publishing those pieces when she was still in college?
Originally a pre-med student, Gupta discovered comedy during a summer of soul-searching. “I realized that I always loved comedy,” she told Brown Girl Magazine. “I loved ‘SNL,’ I loved reading humor. My best friend and I would shoot dumb little ‘high school-based sketches’ on my iPhone until we were way too old to be doing that,” she remembered.
Once she decided to pursue comedy, Gupta made TV writing her endgame and used humor pieces as a way to get there. “I knew that, obviously, writing for TV, you have to be able to write jokes and to practice writing jokes,” she revealed in an interview. “I would write humor pieces and send [them] to College Humor or Funny or Die. Building up from that is when I started writing more legit humor pieces for places like McSweeney’s or Shouts.”
Meanwhile, Gupta kept refining her screenwriting and eventually became a staff writer on “Friends from College,” a hangout comedy about a group of late-30-something friends who met at Harvard, and “Speechless,” a sitcom following a working class family whose eldest child has cerebral palsy and is in a wheelchair. She wrote the first two episodes of the latter’s third season, which is currently airing. Gupta’s also an occasional stand-up comedian.
One of the major influences on her style is Nora Ephron, writer and director of films such as “When Harry Met Sally…” and “You’ve Got Mail.” “She’s so conversational, she’s so casual, she’s so accessible,” Gupta described, “and that’s the best kind of writing.”
But Ephron isn’t the only woman Gupta considers a role model. “The people who have mentored me are all women. They’re largely all women,” she said. “I have two managers: one is a woman, one is a fan of women. They’re both so wonderful. The industry people I’ve met have all been so supportive of women, but they’re mostly young people.”
However, Gupta recognizes that her positive experiences in Hollywood are because of the trailblazers — including “a lot of brown women” — who came before her. “I haven’t really had to deal with that much sexism or racism, but that’s completely because of the way these people have paved for me, because they have had to deal with it,” Gupta explained. “I think I’m very lucky because I’m a young person to this industry, and I’m in TV, which I think is probably very different from movies. Most people I’ve worked with have been extremely socially aware and have understood their place in how we have to further this industry, how we need to shape it to feature stories from women [and] people of color,” she said.
As for Gupta herself, she believes she does her best work when she taps into her own truth, especially her experiences as an Indian-American woman. “I used to worry about how a white audience would perceive my writing, or whether I was being ‘too Indian’ about anything,” she admitted. “A huge awakening was realizing that if I catered my writing to those things, it wouldn’t be written authentically.”
Season 2 of “Friends from College” is expected to bow on Netflix later this year. “Speechless'” third season airs Fridays on ABC.
Previously on Writer to Watch….
Sierra Teller Ornelas of “Superstore”
“Sierra Burgess Is a Loser” Scribe Lindsey Beer
“Atlanta” Emmy Nominee Stefani Robinson
