What's My Job?: Mike Long on "Good Day New York"

Question: What does Mike Long do?

Good Day New York has a recurring segment where a special guest is brought out and the hosts try to guess his or her profession. Last week, someone with a job close to our hearts was tapped to try to stump them—and he did a great job!

When asked if he's a ventriloquist, Mike answered, “No, I’m not, I’m not… Well, I guess metaphorically I am.”

When asked for a clue, he replied coyly, “No one ever says to me, ‘Don’t put words in my mouth!’”

Have you already figured out his job? It took the hosts nearly seven minutes to guess!

Check out the full video below, and then keep reading for a Q&A with Mike.



GG: Was it fun to be on the show? How did it feel to not be “behind the scenes” for a change?
ML: It was exciting and so much fun! I do television once in a while, usually commenting on speeches. It's fun but often sterile, staring alone into a studio camera with the interviewer thousands of miles away. This time it was all about me. Speechwriters don’t get that a lot! The day before the segment, the producer and I planned the bit, so I wrote some potential back-and-forth, we talked about the most well-known events I’d written for so they could pull photos, and I prepared a long list of clues. If you look closely, you can see my notes on the table in front of me.

What kind of feedback or attention have you got since being on the show? 
It’s exploded in my own little circle of social media, which has been great. Plus, within one hour, it generated an intriguing new assignment for me. It also drove up subscriptions to my newsletter (sign up here!), and it put in jeopardy Colbert’s chances of actually getting to his new gig, as I am now on the hunt. (This is extreme sarcasm.)

Are you planning more TV appearances in the future? 
Well, planning them is one thing; getting them is another. But yeah, I'd love to do more, and the odds seem to be on my side. Long ago I did standup, I’m comfortable on camera, and producers seem to find me quick with a funny remark. I’m already working on another gig that I hope will come together before summer. Cross your fingers for me!

Spoiler alert: Mike Long is a speechwriter, author, educator, and award-winning screenwriter and playwright. Find him online here.

Writer Poll: Is Ghostwriting Hazardous to the Health of Your Voice?

All ghostwriters are writers—whether they're writing in collaboration or on their own. So what happens when a ghost is too good at inhabiting the writing mind of another person or persona? Is it possible to get so immersed in another voice that you lose track of your own?

Annie Davies' recent Salon piece, “My Dirty Secret Writing Life,” says yes. In it, she expresses regret that she spent so many years ghostwriting a young-adult book series based on a popular TV show. Ultimately, she decided that “none of the ghostwriting gigs mattered very much, not in the long run.” And when she finally stopped writing for the series and turned to her own bylined projects, she found that she’d become disconnected from her own voice.

We polled our writers to see whether that resonated with them—had ghostwriting ever been hazardous to the health of their voice?

Davies' article really hit a nerved in our writer community. Most responses scolded her for her unacknowledged privilege, including some variation of “first-world problems.”

One of our ghosts, Sandra Rea, responded with “DUH…she lost herself. That’s what writers do.” She went on to pose some questions in a hypothetical conversation wtih Davies: “What does being a 'real' writer mean to you? What do you think you were doing all those years? If you were busy as a ghost—and paid well too—doesn't that legitimize you as an actual, flesh-and-blood writer?”

Some writers said that they found ghostwriting to be beneficial for their other projects. Holly Robinson said, “I enjoy the challenge of capturing a new voice on the page and have discovered that, although most of my clients are people whose lives are quite different from mine, many of our central conflicts and experiences share a common thread. Plus, ghostwriting has given me lots of good fodder for my fiction writing!” Alan Perlman felt similarly, saying, “As an academically trained linguist, I'm unusually objective about language, and as a student of stylistics, I like the challenge of replicating another person's voice. Praise from the client, audience reaction to a speech, and money—these serve my superficial ego needs.”

Other ghosts felt that, though they had at times felt conflicted about their own voice, at the end of the day, it all comes down to the paycheck. A writer who preferred to remain anonymous said, “Anything hazardous [to my voice] has been helped by the check I get that covers my rent and life.” Blogger and ghostwriter Claire Shefchik agreed: “When I'm ghostwriting and start worrying about ‘the health of my voice,’ these three little words usually help: I'm getting paid.”

The consensus from our writers is clear. Davies should be happy that she's been able to do what so many people can’t: make a living off of her writing, bylined or not.