The wait is (nearly) over. Two-time Emmy-winner Severance is returning to our TV screens on January 17, 2025 – just over 1,000 days since the season 1 finale aired; yes, we did the math! Starring Adam Scott, the sci-fi thriller centers around the mysterious Lumon Industries and the… intriguing procedure that its employees undergo (no spoilers!).
At Vancouver Film School, we love to see our alumni get hired onto these big, award-winning industry projects. That’s why today, we’re turning the spotlight on Mohamad el Masri, a Film Production alum who proves that the path to becoming a writer is rarely a straight line.
A successful screenwriter in L.A., Mohamad has written for October Faction, Here and Now, and Soulmates. He was even recognized on Tracking Board’s 2016 ‘Young & Hungry’ list as one of Hollywood’s top 100 new writers. This list highlights the most promising up-and-coming creatives who are driven to succeed in the entertainment industry.
VFS alum Mohamad el Masri is a Writer and Co-Executive Producer on season 2 of Severance. But before Mohamad became a screenwriter, he worked multiple production jobs. Although these jobs weren’t writing positions, they gave him valuable experience in other areas of film production. With persistence, he was finally able to pen his way into the writer’s room.
We were fortunate enough to speak with Mohamad and gain insight into his career as a writer and what inspires his work:
Looking at your past work, there seems to be a recurring dark/sci-fi theme. Do you specifically seek out these types of projects?
There’s very often no choice in the matter. Rare opportunities come along in an extremely competitive landscape, and I do my best to present my work and myself in a manner that results in being hired. The choice of tone or genre is rarely in my control, so my hope is to work with kind people, whose creative work and intent I admire and respect, and vise versa. I’ve worked very hard at not making a fool of myself by underestimating others, which has served me well.
How did you land your role on Severance?
The opportunity on Severance came after 21 years of countless, debilitating failures. But, I’m always on time and never miss a deadline.
How does it feel to have worked on an Emmy-winning series? Has it impacted your career at all?
I’m grateful to have worked on Severance and am proud of its success and recognition, but the work of being a writer continues apace, as it did before.
With a reported cost of $20 million per episode, season 2 of Severance is sure to be unforgettable.What inspires you as an artist?
What inspires me as an artist is blinding rage at the absolutely horrid state of the human condition.
How has your experience at VFS helped you achieve such an incredible career?
VFS showed me that there are no such things as geniuses, savants, or auteurs. No one is inevitable. There is only relentless work, deliberate choices, generous collaboration, endless curiosity, failing and learning—and the primacy of dignity and being kind. Everything else is noise.
Do you find other ways of channeling your creativity outside of the writer’s room?
I jog fifteen kilometers a day in an impossible attempt to escape the scourge of existence, read many books to numb the pain, stress eat to feel again, kvetch with my friends about the dying of the light whilst waiting for the coming of the asteroid, and watch unhealthy amounts of sports talk media and football. Existentially speaking, the latter two are admittedly preposterous, but I find the bright primary colours of professional sports indelibly soothing—so I partake voluminously, with vigor and joy. These are the most creative things I do outside of writing.
We enjoyed Mohamad’s commentary about the state of the world today (especially using words like “kvetch”) and his ability to take each obstacle as an opportunity to learn, never taking his writing career for granted. We encourage all aspiring creatives to view challenges as opportunities and push yourself to learn from anything and everything. As with television – you never know what’s going to happen in the next episode.