Trentovation

Response to TV Show Viewers: Post 41

In November 2013, I agreed to renovate the project house in Summerville, South Carolina with film crews on site. It would be for an untitled TV “series,” a vaguely defined concept where over the course of four episodes, I’d show viewers, aspiring home rehabbers and curious enthusiasts, how I resurrected a seemingly irredeemable house, or as my circle of peeps called it a “pig’s ear.”

Unlike many of my other jacked up messes, this home had not been condemned, nor was it abandoned and unwanted. However, it’d been placed back onto the market after failing inspections required by the lenders of other buyers, creating a win-win scenario that has been key to most of my projects—eager seller(s) and chomping-at-the-bit prospective buyer named Trent Fasnacht.  

Yet this is where my story detours, creating another lesson others can learn from. When verbal planning and prepping were scrapped and then altered, this should have been my off ramp back to normal, my walking away from discussions that had been presented as a golden opportunity.

However, my position was weak, my leverage flimsy. I’d been getting ready for over three months, without anything in writing, which as I’ve explained previously, was my first major misstep. Readiness, which included telling people this prep was all part of an opportunity to renovate my house with TV producers, painted me into a corner. The only way I saw out of that spot, was to be on television, ideally HGTV, somehow, some way. That meant taking whatever producers were willing to give me in mid-March 2014. And take whatever, is easy to imagine as less-than-ideal, far from admirable.

The series that had grown to a likely six episodes, three months rehabbing the entire house and positioning me to have a finished home to sell at the beginning of the busy spring buying season, real estate in one of the best school districts in Berchador, was suddenly scaled down to one—a pilot. A big maybe-for-more. I was disappointed, but still grateful. The film and construction crews would spend two weeks setting me up for the rest of the project.

My team of tradespeople had never laughed at me in person or over the phone, but they’d stopped waiting for me toward the end of January. And I was now telling myself this had been for the best. since due to the tight schedule, the producers preferred to bring on a general contractor to build the side porch and carport as I’d designed. And I wouldn’t have to work on the roof either since they’d subcontract its replacement as well. More good fortune as consolation.   

I really wanted to also demo the inside down to the studs, what was typical in the initial phase of any renovation. But because viewers would expect a payoff at the end, I agreed to us painting the exterior instead, from chocolate brown to something brighter.

It wasn’t what was laid out back in the fall, but it was still more than I could have imagined before any of this had started. I remained faithful that things would work out, and when my wife voiced her concerns, I reassured her that no matter what, we’d be alright. More than confident, I remained hopeful that I could take the project from however they left me and it.

Diann trusted me and I needed the producers to come through.  

*

It may soon read as if I’m whining and making excuses for not being great at my TV gig and capitalizing more on this opened door. And I have no issue preemptively apologizing for that. Yet, in order to explain how we started with the outside of the house, and answering some other questions, I’m aware that I have some explaining that could be interpreted as overly justifying or even something less venerable.

Here goes.

Once the film crew mobilized on my Summerville site and the Charleston peninsula, reality sank in how fun and interesting this would be with the challenge of having cameras on me steadily.

However, a new layer of haziness began to lift with it becoming clear that producers were taking on things differently than had been laid out for this one-episode long shot, or more importantly, what I’d been anticipating. The teams and crews on site seemed unaware or prepared for the agreement to include the carport, side porch, and roof as part of this pilot filming.

I’d changed, adjusted, and reworked my approach and expectations a lot. So, this latest situation was more than a hiccup for me. This was a giant crater in my newest revised plans.

In order for producers to stay tucked within their two-week window, they were driving everything, and this was far from all bad. They oversaw the schedule, budget, and lunch for me and producers. On some mornings, they even had donuts and coffee waiting when I arrived on site. And who doesn’t appreciate that sort of thoughtfulness? The production side was micro managed pretty thoroughly. Not to the minute, but strictly, impressively really, to each hour of every day excluding the one weekend, day one through ten.    

They also had an associate producer assigned to tell me what I should be wearing throughout each day. Although it was a fun distraction, this seemed unnecessary to me. In the Rehab Addict DVDs I’d been sent, Nicole Curtis worked in jeans or shorts and t-shirts, typical on sites like ours. But at show’s end, she was always dolled up, more like a realtor than a hands-on renovator, with fancier hair, makeup, and dressier clothes.

But the biggest issue that really threw me off more than I enjoy admitting, was that even though it was my house, for some show/series that had been described to me by others as mine, I was out of the loop, on the outside of any circle of collaboration. This meant that along with work on the production side, what I knewnothing about, I was also excluded from the planning, scheduling, and coordinating of the construction team and their scopes and activities, where my background was rooted and what had gotten me to that moment. And these were hearty punches to my gut, insulting and hurtful.

And with the revamped scope, this lack of inclusion was even more impactful since the people I’d spoken with on the phone the most, were not in the mix on site, but rather were off and hundreds of miles away working on other projects. What I’d been told was “a big deal,” was seeming less significant as this filming progressed.  

The reroof, side porch, and carport were all critical to my redesign, as well as interwoven with the logical sequencing and my perceived, altered progression of my rehab. I was expected to talk on camera about the project, but I was now uncomfortably nervous realizing I didn’t really understand what we were doing since it was so different than what I’d agreed to the week prior. I was confused, leading to obvious uncertainty I once again felt embarrassed over.  

Instead of a genuine effort to make a pilot that might be a chance at my own show or series pickup, it felt as if producers were trying to complete some sort of charity assignment to appease me and satisfy folks in Manhattan. Their focus was beyond brighter siding, and in lieu of the big three things I’d been regrouping over, causing me to wonder if network decision makers had redirected them to do other, alternative exterior improvements.

I needed to make up for the time I’d lost waiting—meat and potatoes, nuts and bolts, the early phase necessities. Yet producers were showering me with sizzle—a decadent arbor, French doors I wouldn’t need until the finish phase, landscaping and masonry that should come at the end, a new, super fancy garage door that would need to be protected from there on, etc.

Rather than an authentic home improvement show to teach and inspire viewers, producers were treating me like I was the winner of a once-in-a-lifetime experience to be a TV home renovator—they called me “the talent” and my clothes were “wardrobe.”

I’m not sure how else to describe it. It just seemed off, with me in this sea of smiling faces working hard at something so different than what I’d been prepped for.

Although I appreciated the kindness, generosity, and hospitality, starting the project on the exterior sent my mind racing over how this beginning at the end would impact my actual real-life plans and approach to continue on with the project afterwards.

I was up for facing this latest unexpected challenge. But to me this starting-on-the-outside-first approach was unnecessarily frustrating. Resurrecting an old, rotten, multiple addition house is hard enough without making unforced errors that just add to the difficulty. It was clear that a lot of time and money and effort was about to be wasted. Compounding this was the lost chance to recoup even more down the road by having the roof done now, as well as the carport and side porch as covered areas to work under and out of. Instead of me teaching people how to take on a challenging house, I was the main face on this featurette on how not to do it.

This approach was all made even more surprising with these being Rehab Addict people. They’d worked for years with Nicole Curtis. I’d just expected them to know all this even better than I did.

Starting with the initial redesigning of the house back in November, and then all the other misdirecting that had happened since, I’d reorganized so many times in the last three-plus months that I had lost track of revisions. My attitude of thankfulness was becoming cluttered with the reality of all the scopes that were being made harder and the beautiful new work that would have to be torn out and redone. To be honest, my fun and exciting experience was something of a heartbreak and I couldn’t understand why, other than my lack of experience and my over eagerness to start as usual—as soon as I left the closing table.

*

I hope this is coming out fair to all involved. To be crystal clear, the team of producers and contractors filming and working on the house could not have been nicer to my family and I. Given the three-month history creating these jumbled up circumstances, they did the best they could. However, I was out of sync on too much and it did feel as if they were patronizing me, just on the edge of being tolerable. Again, not their fault. There are reasons for this that all go back to me, things I did wrong that I knew of, but also mistakes lost in the fog.

It was absolutely thrilling to be the focus of all the attention, and I sincerely appreciated the effort being put forth on my behalf. But being honest with myself as I write, I was angry for botching this opportunity, for being so wide open to network and the production company just because they produced Rehab Addict. I shouldn’t have told Diann or anyone else what might be happening until I had written, signed off on agreements as a basis for my planning before starting.

But the thing is, I was afraid to push for anything binding, fearful that if I tried to lock down specifics, that my chance to see what it was like on the other side of the camera would disappear like a fleck of sawdust in the wind. I suppose that I’m now conceding that my faith had borders I was unwilling to recognize.