Even before Dawson’s Creek, they were obsessed with TV, especially with Yvette Lee Bowser’s iconic ‘90s sitcom, Living Single. An oft-told story is that the sisters read an article in Essence about the show that introduced them to its storied creator; Yvette became someone for them to aspire to, a fellow Black woman who created something they loved. And so the distance between what they saw on their TV screen and what they saw for themselves shortened.
“[Yvette] is one of my best friends now, which is crazy,” JaNeika says. While in grad school at Syracuse, JaNeika designed an independent study titled, “African-American Female Influence in Television,” for which she reached out to Winifred Hervey, Ava DuVernay (back when she was an entertainment publicist), and, of course, Yvette. After about six months of trying, she nabbed a phone call with the showrunner — they ended up talking for three hours. “I feel like sometimes we look at the people we admire like they’re so far away,” JaSheika says, as they reminisce about the joint screaming that occurred after JaNeika got off the phone. “But the reality is they were just in our space as well.”
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The title of JaNeika and JaSheika’s new book, Living Double, is a play on Yvette’s influential work. It chronicles their journey from Tampa, Florida, teenagers to TV producers who’ve worked on shows such as Desperate Housewives, Revenge, Empire, and now, Gossip Girl. Part memoir and part career guide, Living Double is about recognizing the foundations being set for your future. It’s a road map for people who may not see themselves yet in their career dreams, but who want to. It’s one of the ways they’re passing along what they learned from reading about Yvette in Essence all those years ago. “Especially in these hard times, we’ve had a traumatic year,” JaNeika says. “We’re still going through some kind of weird, shaky ground transition. But we want people to know now more than ever is the time to keep on dreaming. There is power in declaring your dreams.”
That statement makes JaSheika recall a Megan Thee Stallion video she watched recently, of her audition tape for VH1’s Love & Hip-Hop. “She literally is on this audition tape talking about how she is Megan Thee Stallion, she’s gonna be the hottest name in the game, everybody is going to know who she is,” JaSheika says. “And I’m like, there you go, that’s your example of declaration.”
As they continue to work on the new Gossip Girl with their coworkers over Zoom, JaNeika and JaSheika are invested in “keeping the vibes high” and helping to create a writer’s room that’s supportive and open. (“A good idea is a good idea,” JaSheika says.) So far, they’ve gotten lucky and ended up in rooms that are similar to Gossip Girl's environment, less “hierarchical and mean-spirited” than some Hollywood horror stories assert. Living Double addresses that, too.
“You’re artists, you’re hungry, you come out here and you finally get an opportunity and you’re kind of sh*tted on,” JaSheika says. JaNeika cuts in, “The industry likes to haze us.” JaSheika concedes, “That’s a better way to put it.” They don’t believe in carrying on that tradition. “We come from the idea that in order to get the best work out of people, they've gotta come from a place of joy as opposed to a place of fear and scarcity,” JaNeika says. That idea is an apt way to describe JaNeika and JaSheika’s joy in their own art, and their commitment to setting up things for the next generation of Black women who want to work in TV. “We want to help create that access for people who don’t normally feel they can take up a space in this world.”
Another of JaSheika’s favorite stories is how the two decided to give themselves 10 years to become professional writers — 10 years to really really make it. “Now had we known better,” she laughs, “we would have said two.”
Living Double, released in December 2020, is available for purchase here.
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