Khoury News

From HBO to “Hello, World”: Why and how I pivoted from entertainment to tech

After several years as a writer's assistant for HBO's "Real Time," Will Beeker decided it was time for a career change. Now, months away from earning his CS master's, things have turned out exactly how he'd hoped.

January 22, 2026

by Will Beeker

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About 10 years ago, I took my first job in Hollywood. At that time, if you had asked me where I saw myself in a decade, I might’ve said in the writer’s room of the latest prestige drama series, or collecting my Oscar for Best Original Screenplay. Pursuing a master’s degree wouldn’t have cracked the top 10. 

But here I am, an Align master’s student studying computer science at Khoury College and preparing my transition into the tech field. So, why such an abrupt career change? 

I had always loved writing and reading, and I developed an interest in filmmaking in high school. I went to film school, then moved to Los Angeles from the Midwest, working assistant jobs in entertainment with the goal of becoming a screenwriter. I worked at a small talent management company, then a bigger one that represented the likes of Adam Sandler and Brad Pitt. Seeing celebrities walk in and out of our offices was a treat — it seemed to be proof I was getting closer to my dream. 

But something was missing.  

I didn’t realize exactly what it was until I started working as a writer’s assistant on the HBO series Real Time with Bill Maher. I researched and fact-checked for the show and started engaging the left hemisphere of my brain in a way I hadn’t done since high school.  

I was doing political, historical, and scientific research — topics I knew very little about — on tight deadlines. In a matter of a few hours, I’d have to get myself up to speed on a new topic so I could provide an intelligent answer to a question from the show’s host or writing staff. I was like ChatGPT set to deep research mode but without the hallucinations. OK, with fewer hallucinations.

Working with statistics and doing that kind of in-depth research satisfied a part of my brain that had gone unfed during my creative pursuits. This opened my mind to a career change, but it wasn’t until my wife was accepted into a PhD program at Harvard and we moved across the country that transitioning to another line of work started to seem possible, and even necessary.  

But what exactly could I do, given my background? 

I had been into computers for a long time. One of the first things I did after getting my first full-time job was use the money to build a gaming PC. I watched over my wife’s shoulder as she analyzed data in R Studio and asked her to show me how it worked, thinking I could apply it to the statistical research we did on Real Time. Once she introduced me to Python, I felt like a whole new future opened for me. 

I delved into YouTube tutorials, Stack Overflow posts, and any guidance I could find online. I wanted to learn everything I could about programming, and there was enough content on the internet to keep me busy forever. I wanted to dive headfirst into a topic without any risk of hitting the bottom, and computer science was a vast ocean for me to explore. 

But the flip side of having so much information at your fingertips is how overwhelming it is trying to sift through it all. There also seemed to be a way of talking about coding that was taken for granted, a language I hadn’t had access to. It became clear something was lacking in my self-teaching.

Eventually, I found Khoury College’s Align program. It seemed perfectly designed for someone like me.  

But surely, they were exaggerating. Surely not anyone with any background could get in. When they meant transitioning to tech, they meant transitioning from electrical engineering or biology, not late-night comedy. Then I saw testimonies from alumni with backgrounds in music composition and graphic design, people without much technical background at all, and they had come out of the program fully prepared to enter the world of computer science. Now, more than halfway through the program, I feel confident that I, too, will be fully prepared when I graduate.

Celebrity sightings are less common in Boston, but I’m thrilled with where I’ve ended up. Every day that I learn something new, it reaffirms that I’ve made the right decision.  

Just don’t ask me where I see myself 10 years from now.