Reaser’s show gets ‘Huge’ response
SALEM – Andy Reaser’s new television show, “Huge,” is getting a huge response, making the top spot of lists of summer shows.
The 35-year-old with Salem ties is co-writer of the hottest new teen television hit on ABC Family, and sometimes, such as for the July 26 episode, “Movie Night,” sole writer of individual segments. “Huge” airs locally on Monday nights at 9 p.m.
Andy Reaser is writer of the ABC Family series, "Huge."
Reaser started with “Huge” in February of this year when writing began. It was a script he had written about his local high school band several years ago, he said, that landed him the job.
Reaser grew up in the world of high school bands and music. He is the son of former Salem High School Band Director Dennis Reaser, who now lives in North Carolina, and the brother of Salem piano teacher Sarah Reaser O’Brien.
Fans of “Huge” consider it a cross between “Glee” and fat camp. ABC Family describes it as: “Funny, heartbreaking and provocative, ‘Huge’ follows the lives of seven teens and the staff at a weight-loss camp, as they look beneath the surface to discover their true selves and the truth about each other.” The television series is based on author Sasha Paley’s book of the same name.
At Northside High School where he graduated in 1993, Reaser was involved in school plays including “Our Town” and “You Can’t Take it with You.”
He was also an active member of the band, starting in seventh grade. “First I played the trumpet, then the baritone,” he recalled in a telephone interview last week from his home in California. Once he joined the Northside High School marching band, he said he switched to the sousaphone and never looked back.
He earned a degree in English from George Mason University, and then a Master of Arts in creative writing from Hollins University, where he met his wife, Jennifer Dickenson. Both graduated in 1999.
Dickenson is also a writer, who currently is working as a casting director and has worked for both MTV’s “The Real World” and the current season of “Project Runway,” he said.
After they married in 2001, the couple headed out to Hollywood to pursue their respective writing careers. Reaser landed a job on the set of the movie, “Stuart Little.”
“The little plane that he flew in the movie, it was my job to go and pick it up,” Reaser explained. He also helped people move in and out of their offices throughout the production.
On the set of the former TV show “Charmed,” Reaser was a production assistant starting in June 2001. He said he was encouraged to sit with the writers in their office and learn the show and the process for writing it. He started during the second season and he just followed along and took notes. By the third season he was co-writing and in the fifth and final season he was a full-time staff writer.
At the end of the series about the sisters who were witches, he worked for ABC Family writing a few episodes for “Wildfire” and “The Middleman.” In July 2008 his first solo-written episode of “The Middleman” aired on ABC Family.
The cast and crew of “Huge” just finished filming the 10 episodes of Season One. The writing process is a complicated one, Reaser said. Four or five writers sit in a room and discuss a general idea of the how the show will work, Reaser explained. They each have an episode they will write, but they collaborate to have an idea of the plot and characters and how to tie together their separate episodes. After they have all written their pieces, they will come together again to tie up loose ends and fill in the gaps, he said.
Once the show is written, his schedule permitting, Reaser said he is able to view most of the filming. The show’s producers like to have the writers around during this time in case any questions arise during specific scenes, he added.
“It was totally cool,” he says. “It’s really amazing when you see it all come together.”
From beginning to end, Reaser explains that the process is “really fast and really rewarding.”
– By Margaret Christ, Salem Times-Register intern
Wonderfully written article. Keep up the good work. There are many interesting Salem-connected folks we’d like to read about.
Wonderfully informative article. I really enjoyed reading it. Makes me wish I had been nicer to him when we were growing up.