Tag: ken plume

FROM THE VAULT: Bob Balaban Interview

Conducted ~11/2002

Over the course of his 40 year career, Bob Balaban has worn numerous hats. He’s been a writer, a director, and a producer, but he’s most well known as an actor, appearing in Catch-22, Midnight Cowboy, 2010, Close Encounters of the Third Kind, many Christopher Guest films, Seinfeld – just to name only a few.

It was in Close Encounters that he played the role of the translator, David Laughlin, and it was the on-set relationship with Francios Truffaut during the film that formed the backbone of his wonderful – and highly recommended – memoir of this period, Spielberg, Truffaut and Me: An Actor’s Diary, which provided a good enough excuse to do this interview.

The real reason, though, is that Balaban’s one of those actors you always see on the screen, and his is a career I thought would be fascinating to find out about. I certainly enjoyed finding out more about him, and I hope you do, as well.

Here’s my interview with Bob Balaban…

KEN PLUME: Am I correct in understanding that you’re from a Hollywood dynasty?

BOB BALABAN: A very quiet Hollywood dynasty. My dad was born in Chicago in 1908… his parents came from Russia. They settled in Chicago, where they lived in a little tiny grocery store with eight or nine children – in the backroom all together – and my grandmother got the idea to go into the movie business. She basically went to a nickelodeon one day with two of the older brothers – Barney and John, I believe – and realized that there was this thing called the movie business, where, when the product got stale, you didn’t throw it away like an old bunch of lettuce – you merely sent it back to the movie company and they sent you back another movie. So immediately, this appealed to her. Also, it was a business that was never done on credit, while their little struggling grocery business was a lot of people writing down chits and then never paying it back, because my grandfather was a very sweet person and hated to collect from other poor people. So the movie business was the perfect thing for them, and about a couple years later they had built several theaters. By the ’20s in Chicago, they had the largest chain of theaters in the Mid-west and eventually merged with Paramount. My Uncle Barney, my father’s oldest brother, became Chairman of the Board and President of Paramount in the ’30s and remained for many years. Sam Katz, who was the partner in Balaban and Katz – who was at that point married to my aunt – went off to run MGM and become head of production for many years, including the musical years with all those great things they did in Arthur Freed’s musical unit.

PLUME: How much of that legacy was surrounding you during your childhood years?

BALABAN: Nothing. I was basically unaware of it. First of all, if your relatives are doing something when you’re born, you kind of assume – I did, anyway – that it was unusual. I didn’t pay too much attention to it. Later on, I’m now completely fascinated in everything they did, and it’s just so historically interesting to me, I wish I knew more about it. I’m always trying to read about it and talk to older relatives, very old relatives at this point, obviously, and I’m really, really interested in it. But as a kid, I wasn’t aware of it particularly, other than the fact that I could go to movies for free.

PLUME: Were your childhood years spent in the Hollywood area?

BALABAN: No, no, no….

PLUME: Or were you part of the Chicago contingent?

BALABAN: You have to remember – the theaters were in Chicago, my parents always stayed in Chicago… as did most of the relatives. Barney eventually moved to New York, because Paramount Pictures was run out of New York – even though the studio was in Los Angeles, the ownership was always in New York.

PLUME: The actual corporate offices…

BALABAN: Yeah, they always were. Even when Gulf and Western took over, there were big offices on 1500 Columbus Circle. But you have to remember, the Paramount building was 1501 Broadway – it’s still there. It’s a great old building, and Barney, I’m sure, used to fly to California frequently, and certainly was on the phone, I’m sure, all the time, but didn’t spend much time in Los Angeles.

PLUME: But the main home base for the family was still in Chicago.

BALABAN: Yeah, a lot of Chicago relatives.

PLUME: How long did the family own this theater chain?

BALABAN: Oh, I guess 30 years or something – 40 years? Longer.

PLUME: Was your father involved in that business at all?

BALABAN: My dad was the baby. When he was born they were already successful. They sent him to business school – he probably would have loved to have been a poet or a writer or something, and he was very creative. This never went away for him. When he got older, they helped set him up in business in a chain of art houses in Chicago. He built a wonderful, landmark theater in Chicago called the Esquire Theater, and owned the Chicago and the Carnegie, and some other wonderful theaters where I loved going when I was a teenager, and eventually became a pioneer in cable television and owned and operated a series of stations around the country… also some radio stations and other things. He was the baby, he was more into some of the new technology, and was very forward thinking, all the time. Great man… he died last year at the age of 92.

PLUME: Am I correct that he was also a pioneer in the idea of pay-per-view?

BALABAN: Yes, he was. As early as the late ’50s, as I remember it, he was working with an inventor to try to figure out some kind of way that you could get first run movies and other special events into your home, on your television set, by paying per view. At one point he came home with a box that you put quarters into, that would enable a signal to be transmitted, release the signal, and you could see all these amazing things for 50 cents or a dollar, whatever it turned out to be. This obviously was not the wave of the future, technologically, but it obviously was – he had grasped immediately the concept of how much …

PLUME: Convenience entertainment?

BALABAN: Convenience entertainment, not leaving the house. I mean, the whole idea of movies was it was special to go to see – you went to a movie theater to see something that was magical and amazing, in a very special location. But obviously as television began, it so undercut movies that he was trying to think of a way to combine seeing these special things, and the fact that people were just captivated by the magic box.

PLUME: So, monetarily, the best of both worlds.

BALABAN: Yeah. And it still proves to be.

PLUME: How would you describe your childhood?

BALABAN: A lot of puppets. I was very much in my room with my marionette stage, you know, creating these incredibly boring things that I felt were so fascinating, and forcing my relatives to come, and charging money for them to see my little productions.

PLUME: What were the standard thematics behind the productions that you would mount?

BALABAN: Oh, I never thought about it thematically too much… I’d be embarrassed to talk about it. But I’m kidding – ultimately it was thematically about lost people. I was probably writing sort of existential, Sartre-like puppet shows long before I had ever read No Exit. That’s what my puppet shows were like – you can imagine. We had people on clouds, floating about, not knowing where they were or what life really was, and people, characters, who would populate a play and then turned out not to be real.

PLUME: So definitely not the standard Punch and Judy that other kids would be doing…

BALABAN: No. If anyone would have been paying serious attention to my puppet shows, I would have been sent to therapy very young.

PLUME: Were they issues you were working out, or …

BALABAN: There was no working out. I’m from the Midwest, and I loved my family. I had a very good time as a child, but I was also – I have a theory about Jews growing up in the Midwest, that there is an ultimately sort of wonderful avoidance of a lot of things, and a great acceptance of whatever is happening. Which, if it’s okay and it’s nothing too terrible, you were kind of left to grow up on your own. My family was loving… they were very supportive and very affectionate, and basically I could do what I wanted, and basically it wasn’t anything dangerous, thank God.

PLUME: So do you think it was more a matter of living in the now, as opposed to forward thinking?

BALABAN: Yes, I would say it was very much that. You know, “They’re okay, the kids, let them be – they’ll be fine.” And more or less, we were.

Continued below…

June 30, 2013
FROM THE VAULT: Dave Goelz Interview

Conducted ~1/1999

After my interview with Muppeteer Jerry Nelson, Jerry was kind enough to provide access for to the set of Muppets From Space, and vouched for me to his fellow Muppeteers.

What followed was over a month of me just hanging around the set in the increasingly cold January of 1999, part of which was spent chatting with and ultimately interviewing Muppeteers. Also, getting my hair cut by the production’s hairdresser… just because. Well, my hair was getting too long. She cut it with a razor. I felt like a movie star.

Anyway.

One of the Muppeteers I met was Dave Goelz. Goelz, if you’re not familiar, is the Muppeteer responsible for Gonzo, Dr. Bunsen Honeydew, Boober Fraggle, Zoot, Beauregard, Uncle Travelling Matt, and many, many more.

And he’s a pretty nice guy, to boot. Below, you’ll find our conversation…

KEN PLUME: First of all, tell me a little bit about your background…

DAVE GOELZ: I have always enjoyed puppets, but at two times during my childhood puppetry became a hobby. When I was five I became a huge fan of Howdy Doody, and when I saw a Howdy dummy at the local toy store, I got very excited. My folks said that if I saved half the money, they would match my funds and I could get the dummy, which I believe cost either $3.95 or $7.95. I saved every penny of my 25 cents per week allowance, and in no time my parents were surprised that I was ready to make the purchase. The next Christmas my parents gave me a Howdy Doody marionette. During this period I was also interested in the original Time for Beany puppet show, starring Stan Freberg and Bob Clampett. I had Beany and Dishonest John hand puppets made by Ideal Toys, but was disappointed by the official rubbery Cecil the Seasick Sea Serpent puppet. My mother made a beautiful Cecil for me completely from scratch. She was a big influence; she showed that you could make whatever you needed.

When I was thirteen, I became interested in marionettes. In junior high school I had become fascinated by the theater, with its curtains and colored lighting. My father built a marionette stage for me, and I equipped it with three strings of our Christmas lights; one whole string in blue, one in red, and the other in yellow. That way we could plug in different strings to make a range of colors. My friend Eddie Paul and I wrote scripts and put on marionette shows for our family and friends. I had a little printing press and we made tickets for the shows, for which we charged ten cents. We made well over a dollar in less than a month. Easy money.

After high school I studied to be an industrial designer, and entered the profession. After a couple of years I started watching Sesame Street on Saturday mornings and just got hooked. I had been a Muppet fan for many years, but now I started getting fascinated with the design process that went into what I was seeing on the screen. Who were these people who created the puppets, costumes and performances that were so evocative? I got very curious.

One day, I read in a newspaper and read that Frank Oz was to appear nearby at a puppetry festival, so I took a day of vacation time and went to see him. I was just blown away by the two shows Frank did at Mills College in Oakland. During the first show, I was like an assassin. I was in a window above and to the side of the stage with a telephoto lens and a couple of rolls of film. It was fascinating to see Frank working. During the second show – they had to give two shows since so many people came – I sat out in the audience. I could feel the love for those characters all around me. After the show, I got up to go back home and back to my job of designing these boxes for scientific instruments. As I trudged to the car amidst a buzzing crowd, I had a strong feeling that I should be doing puppetry, but I had no idea how I could make a living at it. I didn’t think there was any potential at all, so I was just sad. Within about a month of that day I was asked to make a business trip, which was a very rare event. Not only that, it took me to Pennsylvania. At the end of my work, I took a week of vacation time and went to New York and visited Sesame Street. How odd that my whole career grew out of six days of vacation time. I went to Sesame Street every day and just watched them work.

PLUME: Was the set more open then as opposed to now?

GOELZ: At that time Sesame Street was shot at Teletape Studios at 81st & Broadway. I had pre-arranged with Frank Oz to visit the set. This was the fall of 1972. I watched them shoot for the entire week and they were all very kind to me. I had brought some puppets with me that I had made, and the Muppet people there said, “You should show these to Bonnie Erickson, head of the Muppet Workshop,” .

So I phoned Bonnie and went across town to visit her. When I showed her my puppets, she said, “Oh, that’s great! You can build puppets. You should meet Jim, but he’s in France right now.” About a month after that, I was sitting at my desk in California and the phone rang and this voice said, “Hi there. This is Jim Henson.” I went, “WHAA?!?” He sounded like Ernie! I jumped up and looked over the partitions around the lab. Everyone was just working normally, and I had Jim Henson on the phone! I couldn’t believe it. He suggested that we meet in Los Angeles the following week when he was scheduled to appear on a Perry Como special. So we met in Los Angeles, and I showed him my portfolio. It was an industrial design portfolio that covered my career. It went something like this: John Deere tractor, American Airlines interior, Hewlett Packard laser interferometer — puppet. I told him my objective was to illustrate how my background was perfect for becoming a puppet designer. In fact, it was.

We agreed to stay in touch. I planned to borrow some video equipment and start performing in my own videotapes. In about a month or two I got another call from Jim saying, “I’m coming to San Francisco – would you like to get together?” So I booked a hotel for him in Los Gatos. I took him out to dinner and when I picked him up he was waiting outside; a tall, gaunt figure standing in the rain. He looked frail and vulnerable. Later I would learn just how strong he really was. After dinner I showed him the tapes that I had just completed. This was around February of 1973, and he was contemplating doing a Broadway stage play that utilized many forms of puppetry. He asked me if I would be interested in being involved both as a designer and a performer. We stayed in touch and by June we worked out a deal where I came to work for six months on the designing and building phase of that project. During my stint, Muppets got a series pilot with ABC, so we put the stage play aside and worked on the pilot. Jim asked me to perform three characters in the show, so I stayed an extra couple of weeks for the shoot. Jim invited me to join the company, but I didn’t feel at home in New York, so I went back to California.

I had been on a leave of absence from my electronics job, and during the extra two weeks that I stayed in New York, I was replaced. I realized this was a good thing, because I had been afraid that I’d go back to work, get comfortable and secure and never pursue this work that I was passionate about. After a few weeks I started my own business doing industrial advertising and videotape work using puppets. Soon I had a couple of clients and was doing good business. After about 8 months, Jim made me an offer that I couldn’t really refuse. Jim proposed that I keep my main industrial client, come to the Muppet Workshop as a designer/builder, and perform occasionally in specials. It gave me the Muppet work that I was passionate about, and included several escapes to California each year. This was an example of Jim’s business genius. He knew I didn’t like New York, so he conceived of a deal whereby I would get to leave frequently to service my client. How could I say no? So I did it.

Continued below…

June 30, 2013
FROM THE VAULT: Stan Lee Interview

Conducted ~6/2000 & ~4/2002

I’m a comic fan. Despite what I think of the emaciated, dying industry as it exists today, I’ll forever hold fond memories of my comic book reading childhood.

And if you’re a child of comic books and Saturday morning TV (like myself), then Stan Lee is instantly recognizable as the creator (with artists such as Jack Kirby, Steve Ditko, & Don Heck) of Spider-Man, the Incredible Hulk, the Fantastic Four, Iron Man, the Avengers, Daredevil, X-Men, and many, many more.

If that list reads like a story out of a Hollywood trade magazine, it’s because all of those properties have gotten – or are about to get – the big screen treatment.

As with many of my interviews, I got a hankering to chat with one of my childhood idols, and went out and did it. When chatting with Stan, you’re instantly aware that his mutant power is sheer, unbridled enthusiasm. He has been, and remains, a dynamo of boosterism.

And a fun guy.

Also, despite his claims that he has a bad memory, many a gem will slip from that forgotten treasure trove if the circumstances are right.

What follows are two of the interviews I’ve done with Stan, the first of which was while he was having huge success with the internet media start-up Stan Lee Media – which would end the year under a dark legal cloud (through no fault of Lee’s) that would decimate the company.

The second interview followed about 2 years later, and was mainly me taking a promotional opportunity just to chat with him again.

And on a quick tangent, here’s a bit of fun I was able to arrange to celebrate Halloween last year, after joking about it with him in one of my interviews – Stan Lee reading Edgar Allen Poe’s The Raven…

And now, without further ado, delightful discourse with the dandily dignified (and definitely dear) Stan Lee…

KEN PLUME: If you were to sum it up, what was your introduction into the comics industry?

LEE: Well, I applied for a job in a publishing company… I didn’t even know they published comics. I was fresh out of high school, and I wanted to get into the publishing business, if I could. There was an ad in the paper that said, “Assistant Wanted in a Publishing House.” When I found out that they wanted me to assist in comics, I figured, “Well, I’ll stay here for a little while and get some experience, and then I’ll get out into the real world.” In those days, it just didn’t seem like comics was the kind of field that anybody would want to make a career in. They were the absolute bottom of the cultural totem pole. Nobody had any respect for comic books in those days.

PLUME: So this is, what, the early 40’s?

LEE: It was either 1939 or ’40 when I started… I can never figure out which year it was.

PLUME: You described it as a temporary job…

LEE: I thought it was at the time…

PLUME: So what exactly were your aspirations at the time?

LEE: I just wanted to know, “What do you do in a publishing company?” How do you write… How do you publish? I was an assistant. There were two people there named Joe Simon and Jack Kirby – Joe was sort-of the editor/artist/writer, and Jack was the artist/writer. Joe was the senior member. They were turning out most of the artwork. Then there was the publisher, Martin Goodman… And that was about the only staff that I was involved with. After a while, Joe Simon and Jack Kirby left. I was about 17 years old, and Martin Goodman said to me, “Do you think you can hold down the job of editor until I can find a real person?” When you’re 17, what do you know? I said, “Sure! I can do it!” I think he forgot about me, because I stayed there ever since.

PLUME: And it was Timely Comics at the time, wasn’t it?

LEE: Yeah, it was Timely Comics.

PLUME: What did the position of editor entail at Timely?

LEE: I was responsible for all the stories, either writing them myself or buying them from other people. In comics – in those days, anyway, and always when I was there – being the editor meant being the art director too, because you can’t just edit the stories without making sure the artwork is done the right way so it enhances the stories… And the stories have to enhance the artwork. They have to go hand in hand. So I was really the editor, the art director, and the head writer.

PLUME: So you were a jack of all trades?

LEE: Yeah.

PLUME: The 40’s and 50’s have always struck me as a very nebulous time at Timely… What exactly were the events that led up to the boom of the early 60’s?

LEE: Well, what happened was that – until the early 60’s – I did everything the publisher wanted, and his way of publishing was to follow the trends. Whatever was selling at the moment – he would publish books in that genre. For instance, when it looked as though Westerns were hot… we added a lot of Western titles. When Romance stories were doing well… we published a lot of Romance books. Then we did a lot of War magazines. Then Horror. Then Crime. Then the Animated-type of characters… The Terrytoons-type of things. We did Teenage titles. We never were leaders in the field – we always followed the trends. In those days – until the early ’60’s – comic books were very cyclical. There were trends… One year, Romance books would be hot… One year it would be Horror stories…whatever… and we just went along. We were like a production house – we just kept producing whatever was hot at the moment.

All during that time, I kept wanting to quit, because I felt, “There’s no future in this.” I’d say to my wife, “I’m going to give it another few weeks and then I’m getting out of there.” Then I’d get a raise, or we’d add some new magazines, and I’d get a little bit interested in them and I’d figure, “Well, I’ll stay a little bit longer.” Somehow, the years just kept falling away and, before I knew it, I’d been there for 20 years.

It was now 1960. By now, I really wanted to leave, because one edict that my publisher had was that the stories had to be geared towards young readers – or unintelligent older readers. We weren’t supposed to use words of more than two syllables, and we had to have simple plots – no continuing stories, because he felt our readers weren’t smart enough to remember from month to month where they had left off. It was really boring.

In either ’60 or ’61 I said to my wife, Joanie, “This time, I’m really going to leave.” She said, “Well, if you’re determined to leave, why don’t you first do a book or two the way you wanted to, no matter what the publisher says? The worst that can happen is that he’ll fire you. You won’t care, because you want to leave, but at least you’ll get it out of your system.”

It happened that – at that time- my publisher had been playing golf with Jack Liebowitz, who was one of the bosses at DC comics – which in those days was called National Comics. Jack Liebowitz had told him that he had a magazine called The Justice League, which was selling very well, and it was a group of super-heroes. So Martin came to me and he said, “Hey Stan… Why don’t you do a group of super-heroes?” Again, this business of following the trend.

I figured, “All right, but this time I’m going to do it my way.” Instead of the typical heroes that have secret identities and nobody knows who they are, I did The Fantastic Four – where everybody knew who they were. And instead of the girlfriend who doesn’t know that the hero is so-and-so, I had the girl in the series actually be engaged to the hero, and she was a heroine – she was part of the team. Instead of the typical junior sidekick, I had a teenager who was also the brother of the heroine – and the hero would soon marry the heroine, so they would be brothers-in-law. The fourth member of the team was a monstrous-looking guy, called The Thing, which was not a typical super-hero type in those days. I also tried to give them fairly realistic dialogue, and I didn’t have them wear colorful costumes. I always felt that if I had super-power, I wouldn’t immediately run out to the store and buy a costume. Somehow or other, the book caught on. We had never gotten fan mail up until that point… Sometimes we might get a letter from a reader that would say, “I bought one of your books and there’s a staple missing. I want my dime back.” And that was it. We’d put that up on the bulletin board and say, “Look! A fan letter!” Suddenly, with The Fantastic Four, we really started getting mail… “We like this… We don’t like that…. We want to see more of this.” That was exciting! So I didn’t quit. Then we did The Hulk, and that did pretty well…. And then the rest is history.

Continued below…

June 30, 2013
FROM THE VAULT: Sir Ian McKellen Interview

Conducted ~6/2000

I must admit, I don’t recall exactly what my rationale was for chasing down this interview, other than just respecting Sir Ian as an incredible actor who was just beginning to really get noticed by Hollywood. The first X-Men was just about to open, and the first installment of The Lord Of The Rings, The Fellowship Of The Ring, was still in the future.

Regardless of what the circumstances were, this is one of the interviews I’m most proud of. Sir Ian was wonderful, speaking n full candor, and I thought our conversation hit a wonderful groove. I also managed to do the interview before such in-depth pieces like this became a bit of a rarity for him.

I hope you enjoy it…

KEN PLUME: Tell me about your formative years… What drew you to acting?

SIR IAN McKELLEN: Before I ever acted as an amateur – which I did a great deal at school and at university – I used to go to the theater with my parents in the north of England, where I was born and brought up… Theater of all sorts. A weekly repertory theater played every week at the Bolton Hippodrome, visiting opera and ballet companies at the Theatre Royal, vaudeville theater at the Grand. For Shakespeare and the classics, sometimes my parents took us to the big city of Manchester close by to see famous actors in all sorts of plays. I was also taken by the school each year for a week’s camping in Stratford-on-Avon to see the Shakespeare season there. That’s how I first enjoyed acting – mainly through the theater, as we didn’t go to the cinema much. It was because I enjoyed watching other people act that I thought, “I’d like to have a go at that myself.” There was no early intention of being a professional. I went to study English at Cambridge, and there did a great deal of acting with friends who were determined to become professionals: Trevor Nunn – who now runs the National Theater, Sir Derek Jacobi, Sir David Frost, Peter Cook, and others. I caught the bug there… It was then that I realized, “Well, if they’re going to be able to do it in the professional theatre, then perhaps I can myself.” When I left Cambridge, I applied to regional repertory theaters in the UK and got accepted by one of them… And here I am, still at it.

PLUME: This would b e around the late 50’s, early 60’s, right?

McKELLEN: I started in 1961.

PLUME: What was it about acting that enamored you of the process?

McKELLEN: When I started to do it, I discovered I could do it. I think it’s as simple as that. I didn’t have any other specialties that I was good at. Growing up and finding tan enjoyable activity which the grown-ups admired – or don’t object to – for a nice well-behaved boy was fulfilling. It gave me an identity that otherwise I didn’t particularly feel I had.

PLUME: Did your heart stray in any other directions?

McKELLEN: Before acting, I wanted to become a journalist. I also toyed with the idea of being a chef – but that’s only when people asked me what I wanted to be. In fact, I always used to say I wanted to be an actor, but I didn’t ever believe that I was good enough to be come one. It was only at Cambridge, when I was surrounded by others who wanted to become professionals – and when I got a few good reviews in the national press of my acting – that I thought, “Oh well, maybe it’s okay.” But what did I really enjoy about it? It probably has something to do with my sense of being gay… It’s very difficult to talk about this or analyze it. If you were growing up gay in the 1950’s in the north of England, you had a secret which was difficult to share…

PLUME: If not impossible…

McKELLEN: Well, it used to feel like it was impossible. Yet, when you were on stage, you could be absolutely open about your emotions and indulge them and express yourself in a way that – in real life – I wasn’t doing. I think that was part of the appeal. Certainly I felt, when I decided to become a professional, that, “Oh good… I’m going to be able to meet some real-life queers.” Because I’d heard that the theater was full of them… and so it has proved.

PLUME: How would you describe the atmosphere at Cambridge? Was it conducive to the fostering of an artistic bent?

McKELLEN: There’s still no drama faculty at Cambridge – nor at Oxford – but a great deal of acting went on at the time. Undergraduate groups of actors run by the undergraduates and advised by theater-mad dons – one of them, John Barton, left Cambridge while I was there to become a senior director at the Royal Shakespeare Company. So we had connections with the professional theater, and during each vacation we were recording the whole of the Shakespeare’s works, playing supporting parts to professional actors who were brought down for a weekend in Cambridge to record a play at a time. Some of our productions used to play in London on professional stages. The line between being an amateur actor and a professional was nicely blurred. I was told by my tutor that if I went on acting, my academic studies were going to suffer – and they did – but we were all young gentleman and we were thought to be responsible enough to do whatever we wanted to do, and what I wanted to do was indulge myself in the theater, and I was allowed to get on with it pretty well.

PLUME: How difficult was the transition out of Cambridge and into the “professional world”?

McKELLEN: Well, it seemed easy, because I was very keen and very enthusiastic and in love with the theater and the idea of theater -and professional theater people seemed to be the most fascinating in the world, and there’s no where else I wanted to be. It didn’t feel, by that time, like strange territory. It was just constantly fascinating. I just looked around for the people who were the best at it and tried to contact them and work with them. None of this was fueled by a desire to be a star, or famous, or rich, or be in movies or even in television… It was theater that I was interested in. Appearing in front of a live audience, and the problems, technicalities, and joys of that. It was also rooted in – and this is why Cambridge was crucial to me – a respect for the word and the text of a play… Which, of course, overlaps into your studies. You study Shakespeare, you study plays, and so – for me – there’s never been much of a division between people who write about the plays as academic texts and study them for examinations, and actors like me who analyze them for performance. We seem to be in the same business, really.

PLUME: So you’re saying that the study and need for understanding is the same, but the decides to take it a step further and get up on the stage and perform it…

McKELLEN: Yes, that’s right.

PLUME: What were the opportunities afforded or the challenges inherent for a young actor starting out in the professional world at that time?

McKELLEN: That sounds suspiciously like “What advice would you give a young actor…” I think the point to be understood is that we’re all different. I’ve never been a fan of theories of acting. I didn’t go to drama school, so I was never put through a training that was limited by someone saying, “This is the way you should act.” We all act differently. Acting is a very personal process. It has to do with expressing your own personality, and discovering the character you’re playing through your own experience -so we’re all different. We all do it in different ways. My experience is my experience, and it isn’t necessarily relevant to anybody else. I certainly don’t disparage someone whose attitude towards their work is utterly different from mine – that’s up to them. I think the only judgement I would make is “Are they doing it well?” and “Are they doing it seriously?”

PLUME: How subjective is the critique “Are they doing it well?”

McKELLEN: Well, then you have to say, “This is the script as written. This is the style in which it’s written. Is this actor adopting the right style and playing his/her part appropriately within the story that’s being told. That’s how I would make a judgement. It wouldn’t be of any interest to me, necessarily, to know how he/she had achieved it, or what their experience was before the moment I actually saw them on stage.

Continued below…

June 30, 2013
FROM THE VAULT: Jerry Nelson Interview

Conducted ~12/1998

While trying to come up with the best term that describes Jerry Nelson, one’s mind turns inevitably to the words multi-talented and multi-faceted. Both contain the prefix “multi,” meaning many, and they illustrate the numerous talents – and characters – contained within him. From his humble roots in Oklahoma to his literal hand in creating cultural icons (The Count von Count, Floyd Pepper, Gobo Fraggle, Robin, Emmet Otter, Lew Zealand, Crazy Harry, Herry Monster… The list goes on and on…), Jerry has accomplished much in his long and distinguished career. Although you don’t ever see him, you know and appreciate it when he’s there.

I’ve long been a fan of the Muppets, and being the inquisitive person I am, I researched exactly who the people were that worked to bring the Muppets to life – those wild men and women known collectively as Muppeteers.

Through the still-newish medium of the internet, I had begun a correspondence with longtime Muppeteer Jerry Nelson, and when the back-to-back filming of Elmo In Grouchland and Muppets From Space brought him to my backyard, I arranged to have a lengthy sit-down interview with him.

It was also through Jerry that I was able to hang around the set for months on end (effectively sacrificing my college career – an anecdote for another time) and befriend many a Muppeteer.

Jerry has become a good friend over the years (we also share a birthday, which led to me helping pull off a big surprise party for his 65th – gulp! – 10 years ago), and his life’s work has contributed nothing but joy to both children and adults for generations. I hope you’ll understand why doing this interview was so important to me, and I hope you get a kick out of it as well…

KEN PLUME: Tell me a little bit about your background…

JERRY NELSON: I was born in Oklahoma in 1934. I lived there with my mom until I was about 6, then we moved to Washington, D. C. and I grew up in that area.

PLUME: Was it a job related move?

NELSON: Yeah, as a kid it was my job to go to school. It was during the war. My mom and dad were divorced, and she took a job with the Navy Department, so we moved there for that. I spent summers with my grandparents in Tulsa, and the rest of the time I lived in D.C.

PLUME: So you were 6 when you moved to Washington…

NELSON: Well, I was probably 7 or 8. I know I was already in school. I remember about three schools in Oklahoma. One would have been a kindergarten, one would have been a first grade, and the other one would probably have also been first grade or the beginning of second grade. I know when I started school in Washington I was in the second grade. The reason I remember one of the places in Oklahoma was because is was a one-room schoolhouse. I was in a class room with all age kids and the teacher would move around, kind of like an arena. That was a good learning experience early on.

PLUME: Going to Washington schools must have been quite a shock after that…

NELSON: Yeah, going to Washington was a big change in my life. It was a big school. The first school I went to in Washington, I had to wait after school because my cousin went to the high school next door, and I used to wait in the playground so we could go home together. We had to go by public transit that involved a streetcar and a transfer to a bus. It was fairly complicated travel for a second grader.

During those days we’d listen to radio. That’s probably where I became fascinated by voices and accents. I would hear names and think, “Oh, that’s the same guy that does this other voice on that other show.” That was probably where I became interested in the fact that you could regulate your voice and do different characters.

PLUME: How clichÃ© was it that families would gather around the radio and listen, whereas today you have every member of the family going to their rooms to watch their own TVs…

NELSON: Radio was more of a family thing, although in my family when we watched TV we would do that together as well. I suppose today everyone has their own TV or computer or whatever they’re interested in and it certainly seems more fragmented. Society is more fragmented. People, rather than staying with their nuclear family, tend to adopt families who are more in tune with them.

One of the major things that Jim saw with puppets, and Bill Baird also, was that they weren’t just a children’s entertainment, that they could also entertain and educate adults as well. Jim was the one who really connected in this struggle with The Muppet Show, but it took the success of a children’s show to enable that. People who had never seen The Muppet Show used to ask me, “What is that?” and I used to say it was an entertainment program for children of all ages. That’s the way I always thought of it, because there were different levels that appeal to different intellects, different age groups. The jokes were there for very young minds, but the jokes were also there for the older audience. That’s the interesting thing about Sesame Street. Young children would watch it over and over again and they’d watch the same show at the end of the week. When they first started, at the end of the week, they’d run the full week’s programs and children would watch them all over again. Nowadays, kids will do that with videos so that they know it by heart. They have minds that are busy looking at other things. They’ll watch the storyline, then they’ll watch a character, then they’ll watch the background. Eventually life comes along to distract us.

PLUME: Sesame Street is on what, its third generation now?

NELSON: At least. That was the interesting part. When kids were 6 or 7, they’d go, “Aw, I don’t watch that stuff anymore. I’m too old for that. That’s a children’s show.” Then somewhere in their teens they’d start watching it again, and then in college they’d start watching it again. It has a perennial quality to it.

PLUME: Nothing is really too dated, either.

NELSON: No, not really. You can look at some of the haircuts, maybe that would date it, but not the themes or the humor.

PLUME: What were your interests in school?

NELSON: By the time I got to high school, I was interested in country music and at some point in school, I don’t know how it happened, I got involved in a school play. It was fascinating and a lot of fun. As a youngster, my mom had put me in some group that traveled and did shows for Jaycees and Lions Clubs called Juvenile Review that a guy had put together. We did shows like Tom Sawyer and Hellzapoppin, Jr., which was basically tried-and-true vaudeville routines. We also sang on the radio in the Washington area. After that, I didn’t do much until the play in high school, and I thought, “I find this interesting.” I stayed with the idea of being an actor after that. For a while I thought radio and television were good. Throughout high school my musical tastes developed… I still like country, but now I like jazz and classical music as well. I realize music has shades for various moods and you’re not restricted. I stopped playing guitar when I was focused on jazz and thought, “Well, I can’t play jazz.” At some point, maybe in the 60’s movement came about, I started playing again because I thought, “Oh, I can play that.” In terms of acting, that was put on hold when I went into the Army. I was in the Army for two years and went to Japan.

PLUME: Was this right after high school?

NELSON: About a year afterwards. This was at the tail end of the Korean conflict, so I got the GI Bill and was able to go to school. I went to school for about a year and a half and thought, “Well, I’m not really doing anything here. If it’s acting I want to do, I should be in New York studying acting.” I felt like the thing to do was forget about school and pursue acting.

PLUME: When year was this around?

NELSON: I got back from the military in ’56 and went to school from ’56-’57, moved to New York in ’58, and stayed there for a couple of years.

Continued below…

June 30, 2013
FROM THE VAULT: Penn Jillette Interview

Conducted ~9/2003

Without a doubt, Penn Jillette was an interview that had me worrying.

I’m always trepidatious going into an interview with someone who’s fiercely intelligent and highly opinionated – as any right-thinking, overly self-conscious person would be.

Despite my reservations about making an utter fool of myself, what usually (thankfully) happens is a kind of verbal high wire act, where the conversation feels like its dancing along on the thinnest of threads, propelled by an intellectual energy and give-and-take that can be quite exhilarating. And no, I’m not being hyperbolic.

Anyway, the interview with Penn was done with no real agenda in mind other than to just try and get some background and insight into a man and a mind I’ve always found fascinating.

And I made it out alive.

I’ve long wanted to have another conversation with Penn – and numerous attempts to chat with Teller over the years have been scuttled by scheduling snafus – but I’m happy if this piece is the only one I’ll ever have.

Below, you’ll find my original intro to the piece, followed by my conversation with Penn Jillette…

Does anyone really not know who Penn Jillette is?

Anyone?

Well, if you’re culturally impaired, I’ll give you a bit of a hint – he’s the louder, larger half of the comedy and magic tour de force, Penn & Teller.

In other words, he’s not the small, silent guy.

If you’re still in the dark, you can visit the official Penn & Teller website. Also be sure to watch their Showtime original series, Bulls***!, the second season of which should be ramping up soon.

KEN PLUME: Going back a bit – as far as your evolution as a performer – my understanding is that you started out by doing Renaissance Festivals…

PENN JILLETTE: We did a few of those, yeah.

PLUME: How would you describe the evolution of how you existed within each of those acts – because in your early years, you had a different partner, right?

JILLETTE: Kinda-sorta-ish. When I was in high school and junior high, I was juggling with Michael Moschen – who is a MacArthur Genius Grant juggler, and has PBS specials and stuff like that. A very serious juggler. And Michael and I, and his brother Colin, juggled through junior high and high school, and right upon graduating… well, kinda graduating… After getting out of high school…

PLUME: A clever play on words, there…

JILLETTE: After that, I went to Ringling Brothers Barnum & Bailey Greatest Show on Earth Clown College, and then came back and started juggling with Michael, and we were club-passers. Serious club-passers. No talking, no jokes – just really jock juggling stuff. We were first in the world to pass nine clubs. Now people are doing eleven – but at the time in the early 70’s, that was a big deal. And I met Teller during that time. I had just decided to do stuff in showbusiness… I would do anything. And one of the anythings on that list was a Renaissance Festival – which I absolutely made no concessions for at all. I just did my street show as written, and they pretended it was Renaissance. Which, you know, Renaissance is just Hippie – it’s got nothing to do with that actual time period. It’s just a Hippie festival, now. Another excuse to do macrame and drink beer. None of which I do. Teller and I worked Renaissance Festivals and street performing – actually more real, no kidding around, Philadelphia street performing than we did Renaissance Festivals. And during that time of us working together – which was not long, a few months – we wrote a show, which was going to be Teller and another gentleman by the name of Weir Chirsamer and me. We were going to do a show called The Asparagus Valley Cultural Society. Teller and I wrote most of that show, and Weir helped when he came in at the last minute. Then the three of us did that show first at Princeton in ’74, I guess…. Yeah, that seems about right. I should know this. And then we just fought the world to be able to do The Asparagus Valley Cultural Society show. We did that from the early 70’s until ’81, and during that time got to be the longest running show in San Francisco, in a little theater there called the Phoenix Theater – which I believe now is a Korean restaurant.

PLUME: What was the format of the show?

JILLETTE: It was very much what you would think of as Penn & Teller now – just younger. Teller and I have had kind of an odd movement in our career, in that we’ve gotten more aggressive and nuttier as we’ve gotten older. Most people kind of roll off, but the earlier stuff… it might have been artistically wacky, but it didn’t have the same skepticism and blasphemy that we have now.

PLUME: Is that a confidence issue or a success issue?

JILLETTE: Part of it was that the third member of the group at Asparagus was Christian. So in order to speak for the group, you can’t be a skeptic or pro-science – you had to be a Christian. So that changed the tone of it somewhat. It wasn’t success, because Teller and I, by the time Asparagus Valley got together – within a year, we had achieved all our goals. I mean, our goal was to earn our living doing exactly what we wanted. Which is many people’s goal. But we didn’t have any of these Madonna/Howard Stern/”king of the world” type ambitions. We knew that we were kind of odd and creeps, and we wanted to do odd, creepy stuff for people who wanted to see that. I’m a big fan of huge populations of people, so you’d think with 300 million people in the country, you don’t even have to please 1% to be phenomenally successful. Elvis and Colonel Parker were bothered that there were some aboriginal indians that did not know the name “Elvis.”

PLUME: That’s what led to the “Great Album Airdrop” of ’67…

JILLETTE: Yeah! But that has really never been very much to me. I remember that there was a woman that I dated very early on in the 70’s when we were doing early stuff, and I overheard from somebody – and this is friend of a friend of a friend stuff, but since it’s about me, it doesn’t really matter much, the exact sources – but I heard back that they asker her if we had changed when we were getting more successful, and her answer was, “No, they didn’t change at all. Not because they stayed humble, but rather because working in a s***hole on the street, they felt what they were doing was the most important stuff in the world.” Teller always has the gift of… well, I guess he’s worked hard for it, really… of confidence. He really can believe that what he’s doing is important and good if it’s important and good, kind of regardless of the venue. And Teller and I have never been venue-oriented. When we first went on Broadway – our first run on Broadway… even, I guess, a little off-Broadway, since it was so f***ing successful… we would have all these journalists saying, “Is this really a dream come true, that you’ve worked for all your life?” And it was so difficult to answer, because we didn’t want to appear to lack gratitude. We didn’t want to appear to not think we were lucky, or to be in any way unpleasant, but the truth was it never crossed our minds to have that goal. We never had what I call a “venue-driven” goal. I mean, I just can’t imagine saying, “I want to be on Broadway.” What does that mean? It’s a little like saying, “I want to work in a blue building.”

PLUME: Is there any venue that you wouldn’t perform in, or that disappointed you in any way?

JILLETTE: Well, you know, we wouldn’t play Sun City when we were asked. And we were the only ones who were asked to play Sun City. No one in the video that said, “We ain’t gonna play Sun City” was asked! And actually, we didn’t say “no” when we were asked, we just told our agents – they probably didn’t pass this off… We told the agents to send out to Sun City that we had a very simple rider – that Penn and Teller each got $500 a week, each of our crew got $500 a week, we got airfare, we had decaffeinated tea and decaffeinated Diet Coke backstage, and equal rights for all people in the country we were performing in. And we said, “Just send that to them, because maybe it will blow by them.” We thought that maybe if we ended Apartheid, you’d be able to say, in five years when you saw us on Letterman, “That bit kind of sucked, but hey – they ended Apartheid.”

PLUME: And it’s great for the bio…

JILLETTE: Exactly! But there have obviously been venues and shows that we weren’t crazy about, but the question kind of implies a categorical thing, and I don’t think there really is one.

Continued below…

June 29, 2013
FROM THE VAULT: Rick Moranis Interview

Conducted ~10/2005

In early 2000, I did a massive in-depth interview with Dave Thomas, of SCTVand Bob & Doug McKenzie fame (which you can read HERE). During that conversation, I mentioned to Dave that I had attempted to arrange an interview with Rick Moranis earlier in the year, and encountered one of the most intimidating yet courteous declines I’d ever had when Rick answered my query with a phone call in which I essentially had to pitch him why the interview was necessary. I also had to explain the internet and the emerging field of online journalism.

Yes, I was utterly intimidated.

Nothing in Rick’s performances would have prepared me for the deep (deep!) voiced, utterly serious, level-headed, and most of all inquisitive person that rang me up that day, who finished our brief chat with a polite decline of the interview, as he felt he had nothing to talk about or promote.

Now, I’ve never wanted to do an interview just to pimp a product. I’ve always tried (when not doing favors or assignments) to chat with people I genuinely have an interest in conversing with, as I don’t believe in prepared, iron-clad questions. I want to have a conversation with someone. I think that’s far more interesting to them, to me, and to whoever might be reading the interview in the future. So I knew that Rick’s belief that he had nothing to offer in an interview was wrongheaded. Convincing him, however, would be an uphill battle.

It was during that aforementioned interview with Dave Thomas that I tried again, asking Dave if he would make my case to Rick.

Rick wouldn’t budge.

A couple of years later, I tried again, and contacted Rick’s agent about setting up an interview.

I got my second phone call from Rick, in which he again declined to be interviewed – very nicely – but for pretty much the same reasons.

I had to admire a man that, when most people would simply let a request go unanswered or have their representative deliver the news, actually picked up a phone and said, “I’m really sorry, but I just don’t feel like doing this.”

Towards the end of 2005, though, there were rumblings that Rick was going to be releasing a country music album through an independent online label. Sensing that this might finally provide the ostensible rationale for Rick to finally do an interview, I contacted the label to see if he might be interested in having a chat to promote the album.

And he was interested.

And I was delighted.

Even though the interview was set up to discuss the album, I’ve never let something like that hinder me. I always do an interview with the idea that, once I’m on the phone, a natural conversation has the potential to go anywhere.

And my conversation with Rick did touch on many things.

Since then, I’ve kept in touch with Rick, and still find him to be nice, warm, intelligent, and utterly intimidating. Just less so than before.

Anyway, here’s my interview with Rick, which you’ll find below the original introduction…

I’d be surprised to encounter anyone who’s turned on a TV or watched a film in the past 20 years, but didn’t know actor/writer/comedian Rick Moranis. Unless you’ve been living in a cave, you’ll know Rick from SCTV (where he co-created the legendary McKenzie Brothers with Dave Thomas), Ghostbusters, Honey I Shrunk The Kids, and many more flicks through the years (including a guilty fave of mine, My Blue Heaven).

I got a chance to chat with Rick about his career, including his Grammy nominated album, The Agoraphobic Cowboy.

Before you go thinking it’s some comedy album – it’s not. Yes, many of the songs are funny and the wordplay definitely comes from a brilliant comic mind, but it’s more in the vein of Randy Newman or Harry Nilsson – and trust me, that’s strong praise. With a country flair and a solid backing band, Moranis has recorded an album that never becomes kitsch or a novelty, but stands on its own two feet as a legitimately enjoyable listen. For more information, check out his official website at www.RickMoranis.com.

KEN PLUME: Anybody who goes to your website can read the background on why you decided to do the album. You’ve spent the past 15 years raising your kids and have managed to take work when you wanted to take work. What made the timing right to do a project like this?

RICK MORANIS: I don’t know that I would even guess whether the timing was right or not. I didn’t go into it thinking like that. I just decided to do it because I’d written the songs and got the kind of feedback on it that led me to meet and play the stuff for some musicians, particularly Tony Sherr, who wanted to record it, so I did it. I wasn’t even thinking about the endgame on it, so I didn’t have any kind of career plan in mind. But then again I never approach career like that. I just took opportunities as they came up and decided whether to do things based on the merits of the individual project.

PLUME: Would you say there was a certain amount of serendipity in how this project came together?

MORANIS: I think my whole career has been serendipitous.

PLUME: Have you at any point ever had a plan or direction for yourself?

MORANIS: I don’t think I’ve ever had a plan or direction for myself. I’ve actually made decisions based more on what I didn’t want to do than what I wanted to do.

PLUME: What would be one of the first decisions you made based on something you didn’t want to do?

MORANIS: Based on something I didn’t want to do? I was offered… when was that? Hang on, hang on… I can’t remember exactly when it was, after which radio job, but after a radio job, a deejay job at a Toronto radio station that I left. And again, I can’t remember which one it was so I’m not sure whether I was terminated or I quit, but I was offered another job that paid well and was in Toronto and was a morning show and high profile, and I decided to not do it. Because I knew that it was time to move on.

PLUME: What would be the reason you were terminated?

MORANIS: When I was at CFTR doing the all-night show at the tender age of 19, there was a management change. And what’s often the case with radio is, when a management change comes in, they change personnel. That’s not limited to radio, of course. There’s many companies that change personnel when managers change.

PLUME: What was the initial appeal of radio for you?

MORANIS: Well, I got a job spinning records for deejays when I was in high school, so the appeal was the fact that it was paying $3.00 an hour and it was an unusual and very exciting and fun job.

PLUME: When you became professional, you would change your playlist according to what the station was playing at the time. But what would you say your musical tastes as a teenager were at that period, when you went into radio? Your own personal musical taste?

MORANIS: At that time my personal musical taste was a variety of contemporary music. Obviously the dominance of what was called rock at that time, having been exposed to all the music of the 60’s from the British Invasion, Motown and the California sound of the Beach Boys. That led to discovering some of the more interesting bands that were coming out of England and the States that were doing what became known as album-oriented rock. The AOR format. Be it Led Zeppelin or Genesis or American bands like Spirit, or the early Steve Miller Band. Jethro Tull. I guess that’s back in the British category, Jethro Tull, right?

PLUME: Right.

MORANIS: But I also had been exposed to middle-of-the-road music as a young kid because my mother always had a middle-of-the-road radio station on in the house. So I was aware of Nat King Cole and Tony Bennett. I recognized a lot of the standards. Some showtunes. I also had an uncle who listened to a lot of classical and opera when I was a little kid, and whenever I visited their house, he had records on of various symphonies and also some Broadway musicals. So I had a lot of exposure. But being a teenager who had an electric guitar and had a pretty lousy rock band I could call my own, I was for the most part into rock and roll.

Continued below…

June 29, 2013
FROM THE VAULT: Dave Thomas Interview

Conducted ~1/2000

Dave Thomas has a reputation for being a guy quick to temper who doesn’t suffer fools gladly, going all the way back to his Second City days and the landmark comedy show that grew out of them, SCTV.

As is my wont, though, I didn’t care about whatever reputation he may or may not have – I viewed him as a comedy icon and someone who would probably be fascinating to chat with.

And, after you read the interview below, I hope you’ll agree.

He’s also known as one half of that most-Canadian of duos, Bob & Doug McKenzie, alongside Rick Moranis (you can read my in-depth interview with Rick Moranis HERE).

I’ve since stayed in touch with Dave, and my own personal opinion of him hasn’t changed in the time I’ve known him – he may seem gruff and succinct, but he’s smart, funny, and a genuinely good guy. He’s got an amazing comedy mind, and he’s also one of those writers who has a knack for mentoring the next generation.

Oh, and if you ever talk to him, ask him about his car.

KEN PLUME: Tell me a about your background, growing up in Canada.

DAVE THOMAS: Well, I didn’t grow up just in Canada. I was born in Canada near Niagara Falls in a place called St. Catherines. Then I lived in Toronto till I was six. Then we moved to Durham, North Carolina. We were there in the early 60’s. My Dad was doing a Ph.D. in Philosophy at Duke, and ended up becoming a philosopher, lecturer, teaching college, and ultimately a medical ethicist. Then we went to Britain. Both my parents were British. We had relatives in Scotland and Wales and my father ‘s parents lived in Birmingham, England and we spent time with them all. After that, we came back to Canada when I was twelve, so I was gone for awhile.

PLUME: Sounds like you had quite a global childhood.

THOMAS: Yeah, it was interesting. We went to Britain every summer, pretty much, when I was a kid visiting relatives. My brother and I got pretty good at the British dialect, and it was primarily so that they wouldn’t think we were Americans or Canadian and therefore rich.

PLUME: Wouldn’t want that misunderstanding.

THOMAS: Then they (slipping in to cockney accent) “wont you ta pay feh every’ting, see? An that’s not nice.” My parents – my father particularly – were kind of comedy aficionados, so at that time I was exposed to a really wide swath of comedy, from Peter Sellers and the Goons – which came out of my parent’s British background – to Andy Griffith when we were in Durham, North Carolina. This was before he did The Andy Griffith Show, and in fact before he did No Time For Sergeants, when he used to do comedy radio stuff and comedy records. Also Jonathan Winters and Tom Lehrer, who was actually kind of an academic’s comedian.

PLUME: So you had a rather eclectic and widespread comedy background.

THOMAS: Absolutely. No question about it.

PLUME: Was there any disappointment in going back to Canada?

THOMAS: No, actually. It was just all part of life. I think kids are very accepting. “What? We’re moving here now? Oh, okay.” I don’t think they turn into moaners and complainers until they’re teenagers.

PLUME: Did it have any impact on your teenage years?

THOMAS: No, I was settled by that time. I found myself sort of restless and wishing we would move again when I was a teenager, but I was kind of settled in Canada by that point. Canada is sort of like a looking glass into the United States. It’s like a balcony seat in a theater. Marty Short’s father was Irish, and he used to describe the US as “The Excited States” – that there was always stuff going on there and everything seemed bigger and people reacted in a bigger way to things. Canada, by comparison, is much more conservative and reserved. Anyway, when I got to college, I ran into Martin Short and Eugene Levy and Ivan Reitman -we all went to McMaster University. There was no theater or film course at this school, so we just started our own theater and film stuff, because it was what we were all interested in. We were all general arts students. The McMaster Student Council funded some things, and we talked them into funding films, theater groups, and plays – in some cases out own plays. So we just spent our undergrad years putting on shows. It was a lot of fun. Then, right after college, Marty and Eugene got roles in the Toronto production of Godspell and I took a job as a copywriter for McCann/Erickson. I wrote ad copy for about six months, and then I did some low-level promotional campaign for Coca-Cola. The campaign hit big, and I ended up being the head writer for Coca-Cola Canada out of McCann in Toronto, and then they sent me to New York to work with this guy named Bill Backer, who was creative director for McCann worldwide at that time. Around this time they were opening a Second City Theater in Toronto.

PLUME: The initial troupe was in Chicago, right?

THOMAS: Yeah, that’s right. They started out in Chicago in about ’58 or ’59. That was the Elaine May, Mike Nichols, Paul Sills crowd. A decade-and-a-half later, they opened up a branch in Toronto. I wasn’t in the first cast that they put together, and it’s a good thing, too, because they ended up closing that theater because they couldn’t get a liquor license, but it was a great cast. Joe Flaherty, Dan Aykroyd, Gilda Radner and John Candy were all in it. All very funny people, and I went and saw that show and thought, “This is what I really want to do!”

PLUME: But you were firmly entrenched as an ad guy.

THOMAS: Yeah, making a lot more money with McCann/Erickson than the Second City Stage salary which was $145 a week. By comparison, I was making about $50,000 at McCann/Erickson as a successful copywriter. In fact, my creative director said, “In another three years, you’ll be a creative director,” This compliment was in fact the straw that broke the camel’s back, because then I realized that was as far as I want to go in advertising, and that would be well before I was 30, so I realized I’ve gotta get outta here. Anyway, I saw this Second City Show, and I saw these very funny
people, and thought, “I’ve got to be part of that.” So when they closed the show on Adelaide Street and opened six months later at the Old Firehall, I auditioned and got in.

PLUME: What year was this?

THOMAS: This was 1974. It was just before Lorne Michaels started his recruitment program for Saturday Night Live.

PLUME: How did you miss out on that?

THOMAS: Very simple, really. Danny had been doing this improvising stuff for quite some time, and he’s a very unique talent, so he got scooped from the Toronto company, and Gilda (Radner) got scooped from the Toronto company, and then Lorne went to Chicago and grabbed Belushi. Lorne knew Chevy from other shows as a writer. And candidly, I think he just didn’t think I was as funny as those guys. Anyway, at that time, I was a relatively new addition to the Second City Stage cast and happy to have the job there.

PLUME: Was there any disappointment amongst those who were left behind?

THOMAS: Some. I remember some good-natured bitching. But, for the most part we were all happy to have jobs. I think. I know I wasn’t disappointed.

PLUME: But they didn’t know how big SNL was going to be anyway.

THOMAS: Yeah, nobody knew. It was just some new show that some Canadian producer was putting together in New York. We had no idea it was going to be big. Within six months of SNL starting, the guys who ran the Second City theater in Toronto decided to start up SCTV. So, for me, getting into the cast of SCTV was just a miracle of good timing. First I’m in the right time and the right place to get the stage show, and then just as that’s getting kind of ripe, they start a TV show. Again, in the right place at the right time.

Continued below…

June 29, 2013
FROM THE VAULT: Terry Gilliam Interview

Conducted ~10/2000 & ~8/2005

Terry Gilliam was the first member of Monty Python I ever had the pleasure to interview. As you can imagine, it was quite a momentous event for a comedy fan such as myself. I confess to being a bit nervous, but I needn’t have worried – of all the Pythons I’ve had the chance to chat with, Terry G was easily the most open and candid, with no subject taboo.

This first interview was conducted a month out from the start of principal photography on The Man Who Killed Don Quixote, and while he had his usual pre-shoot jitters, this was a very confident Gilliam, still riding high on the financial and critical success of 12 Monkeys and Fear And Loathing In Las Vegas. Unfortunately, as we all were able to view in the documentary Lost In La Mancha, the production of Quixote unraveled quickly, leaving Gilliam emotionally drained.

Over the next few years, audiences would be hard-pressed to even find theaters playing Brothers Grimm (marked by battles with the Brothers Weinstein) and the gothic Tideland (both are worth a second look on DVD. And, as we all know, tragedy marked the production of his latest film, The Imaginarium Of Doctor Parnassus, further fueling the ludicrous chants of the so-called “Gilliam Curse”.

Immediately following this 2000 interview is my second in-depth conversation with Terry, which took place as Brothers Grimm was being unceremoniously dumped in theaters in the Fall of 2005 as part of the slate of final Weinstein films pushed out when they departed Miramax. I think both pieces, read consecutively, provide an interesting study of Gilliam as a filmmaker and man who, above all, keeps on pushing forward.

Parnassus, though, feels like a Gilliam film from his classic period – like Time Bandits and Brazil – and will hopefully mark a new era of productivity from a remarkably gifted filmmaker. Heck, even Quixote is back on the docket.

A quick aside before we dive into the interview itself. In 2006, THINKfilm was doing a rather horrendous job of marketing Tideland, and I worked with Terry on guerilla marketing techniques. After a failed attempt to get him booked as a guest on The Daily Show, I suggested instead that he crash the line of guests waiting to see the show. At first a bit reluctant, Terry eventually embraced the idea – and enthusiastically made the sign you’ll see in the video below, shot by Terry’s daughter (and now producer) Amy Gilliam and edited rather slapdashedly by myself. I still think it’s a nice bit of absurd fun – and proves just how beloved Terry is by audiences, if not executives.

And now, here’s the original interview…

KEN PLUME: If you could, give me a little background on yourself – pre-industry…

TERRY GILLIAM: I was born in 1940 in Minnesota – in Minneapolis – and grew up in the country… dirt roads, swamps, lakes, woods… Huckleberry Finn / Tom Sawyer existence. When I was 12, we moved out to Los Angeles, to the San Fernando Valley – to a place called Panorama City. At that time, there was a panorama – now you can’t see it for the smog. I went to school out there, and went to college at Occidental College – where I graduated as a political science major. After college, I took off for New York and got a job with Harvey Kurtzman at Help! magazine. I was the assistant editor. Basically, three people did the magazine – it was Harvey, myself, and a production man. One of the things we did there were fumetti, which were a series of photographs done like cartoon strips. I think it was the beginning of my filmmaking, in a sense, because we had actors, we had sets, we had locations, we had costumes, we had lighting – all the things that go into making a film, except nothing moved. I was always in charge of putting those things together. Help! magazine was an amazing place at the time, because Harvey Kurtzman was one of the great idols of my generation of cartoonists. So it being, at the time, the only real national comic magazine – Mad being, up to that point, infantile – all the people like Robert Crumb, Gilbert Shelton (“Fabulous Furry Freak Brothers”) – all the guys that became the great underground comic artists in the late ’60s were applying their stuff to the magazine. So I got to be friends with all these people. Out of that, came a meeting with John Cleese – who was over with a group called Cambridge Circus, which was the Cambridge University Footlights revue, who had come to New York – and I got him to appear in one of these fumetti. We became friends, and years later that produced a certain team effort.

PLUME: A little cult show not known outside many circles…

GILLIAM: Exactly. The magazine eventually folded and I went off and hitchhiked – this was in 1964 or 1965 – and I hitchhiked around Europe and fell in love with Europe. I came back to the States and stayed there for another year and a half working in LA in advertising, because as a freelance cartoonist and illustrator. I was only making enough money to get me one meal a day – so I got a job in advertising at an agency. The guy who got me the job was Joel Siegel, who is ABC Good Morning America‘s movie critic. For one of the jobs there, Joel and I did the movie campaigns for Universal Studios – which, again, these circles keep completing as life goes on. After 11 months, I quit.

PLUME: What kind of a transition was it, going from sort of outside, avant-garde on Help! magazine to as mainstream as you can get in an advertising agency?

GILLIAM: Help! was free and New York was very interesting because I got to meet a lot of really interesting people and work with them – Gloria Steinem, Esquire Magazine, Paul Krasner had The Realist…there was The Outsiders Newsletter, … all that was going on. In LA – Carson Roberts was the name of the agency, and I think Carson Roberts are responsible for the phrase “Have A Nice Day”… the creative director who hired me had formerly worked with Stan Freberg – Freberg had done some of the great puppet shows and comedy albums of that era. So it was an interesting time. I got hired as an art director and copywriter, so I was able to do all aspects of a campaign. It was a pretty free and easy place, and I very quickly didn’t like it – but it was a job. I would arrive late in the morning and go into my office, lock the door, and hide there until lunchtime, and then go take a very long lunch – then come back, lock myself in my office, and leave very early.

PLUME: What aspects of the job did you not like?

GILLIAM: Office life. Brazil is very much a result of my time in the agency. I was frustrated by having to deal with the client. One campaign I did – which was for Anderson Split Pea Soup, whose selling point was that, unlike Campbell’s, you didn’t have to add water – I wrote and designed the whole campaign with radio ads and everything. They did a test of the whole business, but it didn’t increase sales. It was only later that they discovered that one reason it didn’t do well was that the soup wasn’t available in the shops. So that kind of ridiculous stupidity got to me.

Continued below…

June 29, 2013
FROM THE VAULT: Joss Whedon Interview

Conducted ~6/2003

I was a late-to-the-party fan of Buffy The Vampire Slayer, having not begun watching the series until the musical episode. With the availability of DVDs and its recent premiere in syndication, though, I was able to catch up ludicrously fast, quickly falling in love with the show and its troubled spin-off, Angel.

As is my wont, I decided to do an in-depth interview with Buffy‘s mastermind, and found him to be a fascinating guy.

You can see for yourself in the interview below, which follows the original introduction for the piece.

If you’ve been living in a cave (and you know who you are), then you’ll be completely in the dark as to who Joss Whedon is.

Otherwise, you’ll know him as the creator/producer/poobah behind one of the largest “cult classics” to grace TV screens – Buffy: The Vampire Slayer.

Add to that the Buffy spin-off Angel and the cancelled-but-not-forgotten sci-fi series Firefly, and you’ve got a bit of a cottage industry. For the longest time, though, Whedon (whose father and grandfather were both highly-respected TV writers) was best known as one of the most sought-after script doctors in Hollywood. If a script needed a fix, you called Joss Whedon – on everything from Toy Story to X-Men.

While Buffy may be over (Fox Home Video just released Season 4 on DVD, if you’re having withdrawal symptoms), Angel continues to thrive, and plans are currently afoot for a Firefly feature film.

We recently had the chance to talk rather extensively with Joss about… well… a little of everything…

KEN PLUME: In the past, you’ve described yourself as a bit of a TV snob, as a child.

JOSS WHEDON: That’s true.

PLUME: Was that a reaction against your family’s legacy, or just the environment you were in?

WHEDON: It was more the environment I was in. When my parents divorced, I lived with my mother. My mother had been with a TV writer for 30 years, with a comedy writer, and although my parents were good friends after they divorced and got along, she wasn’t exactly watching either sitcoms or football after my father left. She really was more into the Masterpiece Theater of it, and I kind of just followed in her footsteps – except for the part where she watched the news, which I didn’t. It was depressing. It was really my mother’s influence… a lot of stuff I do trace back to her. I also thought that, quite frankly, I loved when my father was working on The Electric Company when I younger … I liked the shows he did, but I never thought they were as funny as he was. In my mind, I thought that he was running them, because he’d run The Electric Company. I don’t think he was, but it felt like Alice, Benson, and even Golden Girls – which I think was hilarious and was a classic – this is the wittiest man I’d ever met, and all of his friends were extraordinary, and the sitcoms were never quite the same as my father.

PLUME: Did you blame the sitcoms as a form, for somehow watering down your father?

WHEDON: I think to an extent, yeah. And also just classic teenage rebellion. Rebellion and snobbery were both involved. But also that thing of, “I know what my father’s capable of, and I don’t think Alice is up to his level.” So there was a little bit of that, too.

PLUME: What direction did you start to go in? Did you see a direction for yourself going in a certain path?

WHEDON: Oh yes… I was going to be a brilliant, independent filmmaker who then went on to make giant, major box office summer movies.

PLUME: So, Spielberg…

WHEDON: Spielberg by way of George Romero or Wes Anderson, or a strange combination of the two …

PLUME: Commercial success with artistic integrity intact…

WHEDON: Exactly!

PLUME: So, obviously, you had these dreams of Hollywood which were completely unrealistic…

WHEDON: Well, you know, you don’t know – it could still happen. I did manage to keep my artistic integrity – I just happened to have to go to television to do it.

PLUME: Oh, bitter irony.

WHEDON: Not bitter at all, but definitely irony. The first thing I did when I came out to Los Angeles, on my way to Santa Cruz, where my brother was – where we were going to be independent filmmakers together with no money and no idea how to make a film. Then I ran out of money. Luckily, I was at my father’s house. So, after some great expunging, “I could make some money if I wrote a TV script,” thing sort of occurred to me.

PLUME: Was it a difficult wall to break down?

WHEDON: You know, I literally had left college going, “I’m not going to be a television writer.” And my friend would go, “Three-G TV!” Third generation. He’d taunt me all the time. “It’s not going to happen!” A lot of things happened when I got to LA, one of which is my father and I got a lot closer, I spent time with him – which I hadn’t really done as a kid. Which is really nice. I tried to write a TV series, and then I discovered first of all that I love writing more than anything on this earth, and that you could write exactly as well as you want to.

PLUME: What it something you had explored at Wesleyan?

WHEDON: I had written the little movies that I’d made, but production was the big part of Wesleyan back then.

PLUME: Was it more theory, or film study?

WHEDON: It was really film theory. Watching films over and over again and dissecting them, really understanding what they were trying to do, and all that good stuff. The best film theory study available. But, really, sort of crap production – as my movies evident.

PLUME: Well, you see the balance the other way in a lot of film schools, which is, “Studying the classics is all well and good, but we’re trying to push you out into production.” Do you think there’s a loss of a sense of place and understanding of the form they’re working in?

WHEDON: It’s very important to understand how to shoot a movie, if that’s what you want to do. But it’s more important at that age to be studying the meaning thing, to be studying what builds up the great movies. Where the simplicity is, where the complexity is. Anybody can tell you where to point a camera – and quite frankly, nobody can tell you how. You can either do that or you can’t. Learning what a gaffer is, or how to load your own film is great – I actually had to load my own film during my thesis film once, because my crew was too stoned. They just said, “We’re really too stoned to change it.”

PLUME: Damn those non-union crews…

WHEDON: Yeah, we were top notch. You get so many people out here with incredible technical expertise who have nothing to say, or no idea of the importance of having something to say, or the importance of understanding what they’re saying.

PLUME: Do you think, to some extent, those are the kind of filmmakers that the Hollywood executive tends to like – because they’re malleable?

WHEDON: Yeah. Well, you want somebody who can make it pretty and make it work and give the executive what the executive thinks they want, and bring something to the party. Not just translate the words. If you’re the writer, what you’re looking for is somebody who can convey the actual meaning of the script… and quite frankly, people who are just schooled in production don’t really have that. There’s a lot of people out there who make a pretty frame, that has nothing to do with what is said.

PLUME: Form over function.

WHEDON: But you know, there’s advantages to both – don’t get me wrong. There’s a lot of people teaching theory who are filling people’s heads with completely idiotic agendas and not really getting down to the basics of “This is exactly what he was doing, exactly what you think, what you feel.” It hasn’t been accomplished. You need to be looking at that stuff.

PLUME: What kind of agenda irritates you the most?

WHEDON: Any agenda. Any agenda beyond what the film itself is trying to say. My biggest concentration was gender studies and feminism. That was sort of my unofficial minor. That was what all my film work was about, but at the same time, somebody bringing the knee-jerk feminist agenda to a text can be the most aggravating thing in the world. Especially if you’re a feminist, because you’re like, “You’re the person that everybody makes fun of. You’re the reason why we’ve got no cred.”

PLUME: Planting subtext for subtext’s sake…

WHEDON: Yeah, planting subtext based on everybody brings their own experience to a film – that’s why films are popular, and that’s fine. As long as they’re working from the film outwards, towards themselves. What people with an agenda do – whether it be, like, Cartesian physics or some thing I can’t begin to understand, or feminism, or anything – they try and shove it in. “Look at this this way.” Okay, let’s look at the film as it exists, what it is, what it’s trying to do. We can judge it. But you’re talking to somebody who was raised to be a radical feminist, who thought that liberals were wishy-washy and who loves Seven Brides for Seven Brothers. So you know, this conflicts around always. Take the film at its own value, and then go to the other place.

PLUME: Was that part of your motivation for taking gender studies for a minor?

WHEDON: It’s not that I took it for a minor, it’s just like I pursued it in everything I did. It’s always what interested me. But, when you’re dealing with feminism you’re dealing with a lot of people who understand feminism better than they understand film, and again you pose something and that doesn’t just go … the point is, you can have an agenda as long as you let the film come to you and take that out of you. I know a guy who could not get through a paper without talking through Freudian theories of infantile sexuality. And his lecture on the Wild Bunch, in terms of Freudian theories of infantile sexuality, was actually fascinating. Because he loved the Wild Bunch, he understood the movie, and then he let it speak to him. He didn’t try and like shove in a theory.

PLUME: Meeting his mother would be interesting…

WHEDON: Yes…

PLUME: Going back a little bit, was it your choice to go overseas to Winchester – to what, I guess, was essentially high school?

WHEDON: Yes. My mother suggested it, because she was on sabbatical, and enjoyed England, and didn’t trust the schools in California where my father was. So I was to go for half a year, because she was taking a half a year sabbatical. I bizarrely managed to get into the single best school in the country, through no merit of my own. I really don’t know how that happened. I was lazy, I was terrible, but through osmosis, I was learning more than I ever had before. It was so extraordinary. My family went back to America, and the school asked me to stay along, and I did.

PLUME: So you got to be the standard there, as the token lazy American.

WHEDON: I was the token lazy American, except when it came to English class, where I was relentless and unstoppable.

PLUME: How palpable was the cultural difference, going to that school, compared to the American schools you’d gone to previously?

WHEDON: Well, let’s see. I went from Riverdale, a fairly progressive private school that my mother taught at, where I’d gone for 10 and a half years, since first grade – because it went all the way through, K-12. I went from that, having never been out of the country, to a 600 year-old all male boarding school where I actually listened to a lecture on why co-education will never work. The cultural difference couldn’t have been huger. The only thing that was the same was that, like at Riverdale, I had no money and was surrounded by very rich people.

PLUME: That lecture had to appeal to the radical feminist in you…

WHEDON: Yeah. Well, you know, there’s plenty of arguments that co-education is actually bad for girls in the present state of the country. But that was not his argument. Put it this way – at the end of it, I was like, “Sir, don’t you think if God had wanted man to fly he would have given us wings?” It was very, very strange.

PLUME: So, technically, you were never in a traditional public school…

WHEDON: No, I never was.

PLUME: Did you ever feel, personally, that you missed out on anything? Or do you feel that the course you took was actually a benefit?

WHEDON: Well, you know, Riverdale was a good school. Winchester was a great school. An incredible school.

PLUME: What aspects of it made it incredible?

WHEDON: It was literally rated the best education you could get in the country. I wish that I could have made some moves on a girl at some point in my high school career, but that probably wasn’t going to happen at Riverdale, either. Which is one of the reasons why I stayed at Winchester. Socially, every boy that comes out of Winchester was completely pathetic. Intellectually, it was a staggering gift to be able to be around that much intelligence.

Continued below…

June 29, 2013
FROM THE VAULT: Neil Gaiman Interview

Conducted ~2/2005

I originally conducted separate interviews with both Neil Gaiman and Dave McKean in the lead-up to the theatrical release of the film MirrorMask. Both Neil and Dave were a delight to chat with, and I only wish more time had been alotted to do both gentleman justice. Who knows? Maybe that will be rectified at some point in the future.

After interviewing Dave, I then had a sit-down (by phone, anyway) with Neil. Below, you’ll find my original intro for the piece, followed by the interview itself.

15 year-old Helena longs for a normal life. Maybe that’s because she was raised in a family of circus performers. When her mother falls seriously ill after an argument, Helena blames herself – right up until the night before her mother’s operation, when Helena falls asleep and enters a dreamworld full of masked denizens and bizarre creatures ruled by two opposing queens. The White Queen has fallen gravely ill, and it is up to Helena to navigate the strange world she finds herself in and retrieve the one object that can cure the queen’s malady – the MirrorMask. But is she dreaming, or is something far more sinister afoot?

That, in a nutshell, is the story of MirrorMask, a fantasy adventure directed by Dave McKean, written by Neil Gaiman, and produced by The Jim Henson Company (quite the power trio, eh?). The film recently had its premiere (to critical and audience acclaim) during the Sundance Film Festival, and will a screen near you in the coming year (you can view the trailer at the official site).

I spoke with Dave McKean here, and now here’s writer, storyteller, dreamweaver, and Douglas Adams fan, Neil Gaiman …

KEN PLUME: So, from what I hear, Dave thinks you’re a bit of an a**…

GAIMAN: (laughing) Well, you know, it’s true! He won’t work with me! And I say, “Dave, work with me. I’ll give you money.” But no…

PLUME: So, from your perspective, going into these 10 intense days of writing the MirrorMask script at Jim Henson’s home, did you know it was going to be as rocky between you and Dave, initially, as it turned out?

GAIMAN: Well, the nice thing about it is it was never really rocky personally. We’d been friends too long and we’d worked too well together for it to have ever been personal. But it was odd. Because we’d worked together so incredibly well for so long, neither of us had ever noticed that we’d never actually come up with something in the same place… Or known that we had completely disparate ways of working.

PLUME: Was there a sense of disappointment that there was that kind of gulf…

GAIMAN: No… In fact, we were talking about this the other day, that now that we know that’s part of the process – what it really was, was a sense of shock. You have to understand, you’re talking about two people who had worked together for 17 years at that point, and never had an argument.

PLUME: Must have been quite a wake-up call…

GAIMAN: After 17 years, you’re finally having your first arguments about something because you have completely different ways of working. And now, we were talking about the fact that probably what will happen is the next time we go off to do a big fantasy movie or whatever – whether it be to the Henson’s house or a Caribbean island – we now know that we do argue. And neither of us ever really argued… We had a very, very simple rule, which was whoever cared most about something, won. In fact, when it got to one point – there was one argument that we had where we really couldn’t figure out who cared most, so we tossed a coin.

PLUME: Who won?

GAIMAN: Dave won. And then having said, “Okay, fine. You got it Let’s carry on…” Dave then decided he needed now to spend 5 hours convincing me that he had been right – and then at the end, he decided to do it my way.

PLUME: So, in other words, the coin toss is out next time…

GAIMAN: I don’t think we’ll do the coin toss next time. But the point is that now that we know that this happens, neither of us is afraid of it. Neither of us would think twice about the fact that we’ll probably wind up, next time, arguing. And that’s fine, because we both argue because we care.

PLUME: Was there any point that you didn’t think the process was going to work and you’d resolve the differences, or did you always believe you’d be able to work through it?

GAIMAN: I don’t know… It’s very hard, because you’re talking about the events of 3 years ago – literally 3 years ago. We sat down on the 2nd of February, and we finished on the 12th of February 2002.

PLUME: But as Dave said, there were certainly times that he would go upstairs and play the piano, you’d go downstairs to write, and you’d just not talk to each other for a bit.

GAIMAN: Well, it really wasn’t not talking to each other in the sense that “I don’t want to talk to you” – it was very much two different working methods. Part of it also had to do with the fact that Dave was not a writer – in the same way that I am not an artist. When Dave would do a cover painting for Hellblazer, when he did the first Hellblazer paintings, the first thing he would do was draw the entire cover and the color it in, and he would do the whole thing in colored pencils, and then when he was completely satisfied with it, he’d paint it. So Dave’s rough would be the thing. These days, 17 years later, you’ll say, “Dave, do a book cover. What’s it gonna look like?” And he’ll squiggle in the bottom corner and go, “This is going to be a cat, and then I’m going to have a load of stuff floating around here. It’ll be really cool.” And you go, “Oh, okay.” And then he goes of and sort of makes it all up while he does it, and that’s how Dave does covers now. That’s pretty much the way – when I started as a writer, I would outline everything, and I’d knew I had the entire story and everything worked out before I began to write. But over the years, now I find that incredibly dull. I’d much rather know some of the high points, but discover all the rest of it on the way…

PLUME: Doing it much more intuitively…

GAIMAN: Yeah, and make it up as I go along. Just figure out enough so you know who the characters are, you know what’s happening, and you know where it’s going, and then go write it. Find out the cool stuff. And Dave just thought this was ridiculous. He thought that we should actually outline everything that happens first, and then start writing it. Eventually I just said, “Look – you can stay upstairs if you’d like and you can outline stuff, but I want to get these characters out and find out how they talk. I want to know what they sound like. I want to know who they are – and the only way I’m going to do that is by writing them.” So that was the point where Dave stayed upstairs and played his piano, and I went downstairs and just started writing. And then we went out to dinner and I showed Dave what I’d written, and he quite liked it. And that was actually when everything started to fix.

PLUME: In any way do you think that the approach Dave was championing was a way for him to feel he was actively participating in the script process?

GAIMAN: I don’t think so, because Dave was an active participant all the way through…

PLUME: But do you think he had the perception that, by stepping away while you wrote downstairs, he was no longer actively participating? It seems like wanting to outline it and have everything down was a way to be more concretely there…

GAIMAN: No, I don’t think so – I think that was just how Dave had always written things. Dave is visual. I’m about words, and Dave is about what he can see, and Dave wasn’t comfortable with feeling he had a story until he had a hundred 3×5 file cards filled in – each with a drawing or an event or a little thing on it, and it went in exactly the right order and they were all there, and he could look down and see them and move them around.

PLUME: I asked Dave the same question, but what do you feel was the turning point when everything clicked and started to come together?

GAIMAN: There was maybe only 3 bad days at the beginning when things were tough, and then I started writing. Once I started writing, and Dave started actually sort of enjoying what was being written – even though he thought I was mad for not having 3×5 index cards – things started improving. And then we were probably a week in, and Terry Gilliam came over for lunch. He was standing there with his back to the gas fire down in the basement just warming up – because it was *really* cold – and he looked and he saw this big piece of paper. Dave and I had gone out and we’d bought this giant pad, and I’d drawn a line down the middle, and we just sort of covered the pad with each of the events and each of the people, and everything that happened. And it was really Gilliam just looking down at our giant sheet of paper with this line and saying, “That looks like a movie.” And it was wonderful… It was magic. It was like Jesus popping into your Sunday School and going, “All right, you’ve definitely got the 10 Commandments down, now.” It was great – that feeling that, if Terry Gilliam says that it’s a movie, then it’s a movie, and we’re dong all right. And suddenly the incredible sort of lack of confidence that was plaguing us up to that point just went away, and we carried on and had fun.

PLUME: There certainly was a restrictive budget to consider when actually writing the script. How much of what you conceived actually made it to the screen?

GAIMAN: I’d say *exactly* 73% – possibly 74%. I don’t know!

PLUME: You kept a running figure… That’s good…

GAIMAN: (laughing) It’s very weird, because you’re not looking at something… Because we built it knowing what the budget was, there wasn’t ever a place where we had to compromise because we didn’t have the money. I’d decide to do a scene in a school or whatever, and Dave would just say, “No, you can’t do that. We won’t be able to afford it.” And he’d come back with a counter-offer. So I could have a school scene or a hospital scene – well, I’ll take the hospital scene, then. So that was right back then and there in the plotting and original first draft of the script stage.

PLUME: Having seen the film now, how much of what Dave was able to bring to the screen differed from what was in your mind on the page?

GAIMAN: In 17 years I’ve been writing things that Dave has drawn – I’ve done comics and I’ve done children’s books – all I’ve ever learned from this is that it doesn’t matter what I have in my head when I begin… What Dave will give me will be stranger and more magical, and sort of beyond what I’d ever expected. So there’s a level on which I’m cheerfully writing monkey birds and giant floating stone giants and feral sphinxes with human faces, and griffins and things – and what Dave delivered was not just stranger than I’d imagined, but I think stranger than I could have imagined. But that, for me, is the joy of it. It’s the joy of sitting there at a kitchen table and writing a scene where our heroine gets pushed into a room filled with a bunch of music boxes which then open to reveal dolls who transform her, bit by bit, into a sort of evil, dark princess version of herself, whilst singing The Carpenters’ “Close to You.” And suddenly you’re looking at it on stage, and it’s stranger than I could ever have imagined. So there’s never any feeling in there of disappointment, of going, “Gosh, I imagined this as looking so cool, and what Dave gave me is so much less than that.” It’s always, “Oh my god. This is so much weirder than I’d ever dreamed of.”

PLUME: Have you been surprised by the reactions it’s gotten so far in the screenings you’ve attended?

GAIMAN: There’s one moment in the thing where the audience applauds, and that took us completely by surprise. One line of dialogue in a scene that we wound up having to fight for a number of times. It was the one scene that didn’t work in the script as far as everyone was concerned, but we knew that it could work, but it just was odd. It was a scene that after it was shot and then cut together, it didn’t quite work. It was the one scene we had to move it around a little bit in the plot. I saw a video of it in October and it still didn’t work, and then I figured out some lines of dialogue that would get us from the scene before into that scene. We had, in many ways, the coolest scene in the thing – but in other ways just the best thing about it is it’s the scene that the entire end of the movie hinges on. If we cut it out like everybody wanted, it wouldn’t have worked – and we also wouldn’t have gotten our one great moment where people don’t just laugh, they actually applaud… Which none of us expected, and we only learned during the Sundance screening.

PLUME: In what ways would you approach working on another project with Dave differently? What knowledge would you apply from this experience to the next?

GAIMAN: I think the thing that I got, and I don’t know about Dave, but I think the thing that I got from this was just not worrying about the arguments. It wasn’t that either of us were scared of arguing, and it wasn’t that either of us hadn’t been through creative relationships where you do butt heads and fight over stuff, but it was simply the fact that in 17 years we’d never had any sort of disagreements. So it was, “Oh! This is strange. I didn’t know we did this.” So I probably expect that more, actually, going into it now, and not worry about it and not be scared of it, and just go, “Okay, well, it’s just part of the process.” The main thing is we both care intensely… So caring is good.

PLUME: Have you had any initial discussions as to what the form of a follow-up might take?

GAIMAN: Nope. The only thing we’ve discussed is that we’d like more money.

PLUME: And a little time to sleep…

GAIMAN: Oh, it’s the same thing, frankly. Dave, bless him, made a film that looks like it was made with $40 million for $4 million. But where it came out of is Dave sleeping and Dave getting to see his family, and all of those kind of things. So if we did it again… There is nowhere, making this film, where we had enough money to throw money at a problem to make it go away.

PLUME: So you just threw Dave…

GAIMAN: (laughing) Yeah, we just threw Dave at the problem! And Dave threw himself at the problem, and he would make things go away. But it was really frustrating for me, knowing that if something went wrong with the computers… Something went wrong at one point and it turned out the electrics in the building they were in just were not in good enough shape to handle the amount of computing and air-conditioning load they were putting on them. And there was nothing that could be done about that. In a normal Hollywood situation, you’d take a few thousand dollars and you’d throw it at that problem, and you’d either get new offices or new electrics, but Dave couldn’t do it. What I’d love to do, having made a film that looks like it was made for $40 million with $4 million, what would be really cool is getting to make something that looks like it was made for $200 million with $20 million. That would be really fun. Just enough to make Dave happy.

PLUME: I have to ask, being impressed with your film about John Bolton…

GAIMAN: Oh, thank you!

PLUME: What is your next directing gig shaping up to be…

GAIMAN: I hope Death: The High Cost of Living…

PLUME: Is that finally looking like it will happen?

GAIMAN: Well, it certainly looks like it. I just handed in the third draft of the script to New Line… except that I just realized – Coming in on the plane yesterday, I just realized something that I need to fix and change. The problem with adapting your own stuff is that it’s much, much harder to… You’re really attached to the way you did it the first time, and then slowly you realize, “No, that’s actually wrong. I need to make this character the same as that character, and throw out that scene, and do a new thing,” and “Oh damn, I’m going to lose that….” And then there’s sometimes even a small feeling of disappointment going, “Oh, the fans would have been looking forward to seeing that scene happen, and now I’m not going to make that scene happen.” So it’s just trying to figure it out for myself…

PLUME: Do you think you’ve found the middle-ground?

GAIMAN: I think I certainly have, but I think I may want to do one more draft before we actually get down to shooting. But certainly everything looks fairly like it’s happening, and so that’s happening from a directing point of view. Then on a film point of view, the next thing that’s happening is I have to fly out to Hollywood in a couple of weeks for meetings with Robert Zemeckis and Roger Avary about the Beowulf film. That’s the motion capture movie that we’re making.

PLUME: You’re sure he’s not just going to do an Old English Polar Express 2…

GAIMAN: No, no… And what’s fun about Beowulf is, having made Polar Express, Bob is now going, “Okay, we have this technology. We made it look like this in Polar Express, but now we’ve learned” – kind of like MirrorMask, they’ve learned all the things they did wrong, and he also wants to try and do it as an adult film, using that technology.

PLUME: How comprehensive an adaptation is this going to be?

GAIMAN: It’s pretty comprehensive. I mean, we go all the way from the beginning of Beowulf through to the final act with him as a 75 year-old king battling this dragon. So it’s the whole thing. We wrote it as a live action script, which Zemeckis fell in love with, and of course now we’re going to have to go back and figure out how we turn it into a motion capture script, because things that would have been difficult, and expensive – like the dragon – are now going to be very cheap. But things that would have been cheap and easy – like two people standing around, talking to each other – are now going to be an awful lot harder to pull off convincingly, so we’re going to have to figure that one out.

PLUME: And when are audiences going to finally see your inevitable collaboration with Terry Gilliam?

GAIMAN: I don’t know. I read an interview with Gilliam recently where he mentioned that he’d pretty much given up on Good Omens, but he mentioned that he and Johnny Depp might be interested in giving it one last try. But I haven’t heard that from him – I just read it in an online interview, so god knows if it’s actually true. You know, I love Gilliam. I think Terry is a genius, and I would work with him like a shot on anything he wanted to work on.

PLUME: It seems like there’s almost too much momentum on something happening between you two that something eventually has to happen…

GAIMAN: I very much hope it does. Really, I just love getting to work with geniuses, because they make you look good.

PLUME: It’s interesting how similar Dave’s experiences bringing MirrorMask to fruition are to the process behind Terry’s early films, like Jabberwocky and Time Bandits…

GAIMAN: Absolutely. And Time Bandits was always the thing that we held on to when we were making this film. You had to have something in mind as the kind of thing that you’d like this to be kind of like. We knew that we were doing something in a particular genre – it’s the genre that Wizard of Oz is in, and the genre that Labyrinth is in, and it’s also the genre of Time Bandits… Although Time Bandits stars a boy rather than a girl.

PLUME: Do you think there’s a hesitancy, or fear, from Hollywood to actually do a dark fairy tale in the vein of pictures like Oz and Time Bandits – the sort of Grimm route of showing the darkness and the light?

GAIMAN: I don’t think it’s Hollywood, but I think there is a sort of idea of what a family film should be and what middle America likes – and to be honest, I have no idea if it’s true or not. I do know that there are definitely mothers out there who feel that it is their job to protect their children from anything that might make their children think – or scare them, or stir them, or make them happy or sad, or whatever. And then there are definitely people out there who feel that children happen to be people, and people really like art that makes them think and makes them work, and makes them feel. And I do fall into the latter category.

PLUME: I was speaking with John Lloyd the other day, the creator of a wonderful UK program called QI that we’re going to be doing a feature about – have you heard of the show?

GAIMAN: With Stephen Fry…

PLUME: Yeah. A really great show, that manages to be both educational and truly funny in the same breath. But we were talking about the natural inquisitiveness of children and how they learn, but we got to talking about when babies begin to walk, the natural instinct for a parent is to reach out and keep them from falling if they begin to see their child go over. Come to find out, this is actually not a terribly good thing to do, since children naturally have what is called the “Parachute Reflex”, which is that, if they begin to fall, they will automatically fall to their hands and knees, cushioning the fall. If, however, the parent lunges for the child to protect it, it distracts the child and they don’t go into the reflex and instead just fall. So it’s a matter of…

GAIMAN: Letting them fall. Letting them learn. Absolutely! It’s like people say to me, “How do you make sure the right children don’t read Sandman,” or whatever. And I think that kids are really, really good at figuring out for themselves what their limits are. Kids self-censor. You’ll never find a kid – until they sort of hit mid-teens and there’s peer pressure and weirdness – you won’t find a kid going and turning on something they don’t want to see, or that they think will be too scary for them or too weird. Kids are very, very good at self-censoring.

PLUME: Or, if they have a question, asking the question…

GAIMAN: Yeah, exactly. They ask. And it’s lovely.

PLUME: What one project currently on the periphery would you love to see come to fruition?

GAIMAN: On the periphery… God, there are so many of them floating around. There are things I’m looking forward to. I’m looking forward to seeing what Henry Selick’s Coraline actually looks like when he’s finished it. I think that will be enormously fun. I’m so looking forward to actually getting Death rolling, because I think it will be fun. Most of all, I guess I’m looking forward to… I think the next thing Dave and I are going to do is an adult project, and we know what that is and it will be fun doing it – if there aren’t a lot of surprises. But I’m really looking forward to heading off with Dave when, again, all we have is a budget and the idea that whatever we want to do is going to be better and cooler than MirrorMask was, and to see what we come up with.

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June 29, 2013
FROM THE VAULT: Dave McKean Interview

Conducted ~2/2005

I originally conducted separate interviews with both Neil Gaiman and Dave McKean in the lead-up to the theatrical release of the film MirrorMask. Both Neil and Dave were a delight to chat with, and I only wish more time had been alotted to do both gentleman justice. Who knows? Maybe that will be rectified at some point in the future.

First up on the schedule was my conversation with Mr. McKean, Below, you’ll find my original intro for the piece, followed by the interview itself.

15 year-old Helena longs for a normal life. Maybe that’s because she was raised in a family of circus performers. When her mother falls seriously ill after an argument, Helena blames herself – right up until the night before her mother’s operation, when Helena falls asleep and enters a dreamworld full of masked denizens and bizarre creatures ruled by two opposing queens. The White Queen has fallen gravely ill, and it is up to Helena to navigate the strange world she finds herself in and retrieve the one object that can cure the queen’s malady – the MirrorMask. But is she dreaming, or is something far more sinister afoot?

That, in a nutshell, is the story of MirrorMask, a fantasy adventure directed by Dave McKean, written by Neil Gaiman, and produced by The Jim Henson Company (quite the power trio, eh?). The film recently had its premiere (to critical and audience acclaim) during the Sundance Film Festival, and will a screen near you in the coming year (you can view the trailer at the official site).

Here’s my conversation with director, artist, and all around swell guy Dave McKean…

KEN PLUME: What was the initial mandate for the project, that was presented to you , and your initial reaction to it?

McKEAN: The initial proposition was from Lisa Henson at Hensons. They just had this little opportunity to make another fantasy film in the tradition of their father’s films – Jim Henson’s films Labyrinth and Dark Crystal. They were pretty expensive when they were made and they were not so successful when they first came out, but over the years they’ve done great, and somebody noticed this. But the proposition came with a much smaller budget, and the offer of sort of creative control. And it seemed like an interesting opportunity, but then when Neil and I actually sort of sat down and started thinking about it, we just had lots of ideas and lots of possibilities – and it grew and actually became something very interesting.

PLUME: Did you have any reservations about the mandate?

McKEAN: Well, yes… the two main things were the budget – which was very low, so it was a bit alarming committing to doing something, especially since it was a film that was going to include a ton of CG and animation.

PLUME: The budget was what, $4 million?

McKEAN: Yes, $4 million – so committing to that without ever having done it before… I’ve never done anything like that before… So that was a bit worrisome. And then the idea was to make a family film – it was always to make a family film. I mean, even though I think that’s a great thing to try and do – I’ve got two kids, and I’ve sat through enough films that I would call children’s films rather than family films to know that it’s great when you find a family film. If we all go along to a Pixar film – which is a real family film – everybody has a great time. They’re wonderful films.

PLUME: In other words, an inclusive film…

McKEAN: A completely inclusive film. It doesn’t talk down to anybody, and it doesn’t talk over anybody’s heads… Just something that would appeal to anybody. But that was tricky again, because Neil and I are both more known for doing more adult material, and certainly darker and stranger material…

PLUME: Because it’s your preference, or that’s just the material you found your self doing more often?

McKEAN: It’s not my preference at all. I’m happy doing whatever really occurs to me – some of it is very adult, and some of it… We’ve done some children’s books together… and so some of them are for children. Personally, I like to spread. I like being able to do anything. I think that’s healthy, doing anything and everything, rather than just getting completely obsessed with one particular genre or particular kind of work.

PLUME: Do you feel that you’ve in any way been pigeonholed into being perceived as an adult artist?

McKEAN: No, not really, because I tend to be known for different things. I mean, there are a lot of comics or sci-fi fans out there who sort of think of me doing that kind of work, but there are just as many people who like the CD covers I’ve done, or the children’s books I’ve done. So different people like different things, and then some people like everything. I mean, very few like everything… and that was another thing about this film, and it’s been highlighted when we finally get to show it to people – we realized it’s going to be a minority of people who like it and get it, but I really couldn’t pinpoint that minority. It’s certainly not an age group… It’s not a particular kind of person, or male or female. It’s just a bunch of people, and some of them are seven years old and some of them are 70, and they get it. And it’s always going to be a minority – but that’s okay. It’s absolutely fine with us.

PLUME: When you sat down with Neil to begin brainstorming exactly what the project would be, what are the elements you agreed on right off the bat, and what were the fundamental differences? I had heard you had a few fundamental disagreements…

McKEAN: We did have a bit of a strange, rocky start to working on it together. We’d never actually worked on the same thing in the same room together before, in terms of actually working out what it was going to be or writing it. So that was a bit strange, having worked together for 17 years, to find out that we’re completely incompatible. But there were a few things. I’m not a big fan of genre fiction, generally… I’m not a big fan of fantasy films and horror films…

PLUME: Well, you picked a fine project to work on…

McKEAN: But the thing is, some of my favorite films are fantasy films, and horror and science fiction films, and the difference is when those films are about real people and real situations and real things, then that’s when I’m completely fascinated by them.

PLUME: So you don’t like the fantastic just for fantastic’s sake…

McKEAN: No. Because it just has no interest to me, and doesn’t impact my life at all. I don’t care what a Hobbit thinks, because I’m never going to meet one. But I do care what a 17 year-old girl thinks, because I’m going to get one very soon, because mine’s 11! You know what I mean? If you’ve got a story that involves ghosts or something… A story about ghosts that is about people that need to believe in ghosts or think that they see ghosts is fascinating to me, but a film that actually comes down firmly on the side of “Yes, there are ghosts, and they’re going to help you work out all your problems” – Well, forget it. I’ve lost it already. So that’s my particular preference. I’m sure when you talk to Neil you’ll get a different feeling about it. But we both had these sort of ground rules, and they were good to establish at the beginning.

PLUME: How would the conflict manifest itself while you were working out that story? What points would you stick on and which would he stick on, and how would you resolve it?

McKEAN: Well, the conflict manifested itself as a lot of staring at each other over plates of pasta, and then I would go off in a huff upstairs and play the piano, and Neil would go off on a huff downstairs and sit by the radio and just write stuff, because that was the way he got through it. But we kind of worked this through in the first few days, and then when it became obvious that if we carried on being this way we were actually going to get nowhere, we just decided to work separately for a bit, and Neil just wrote and I just came up with images and ideas and things upstairs, and then slowly we – we read them to each other – and slowly it all began to make shape.

PLUME: Is there a demarcation point where you can say it transitioned from being rocky to, “Yes, this is coming together…” ?

McKEAN: Yes. The point was when we decided – I think it was Neil’s idea, actually – to get one big, huge piece of paper and draw a line down the middle of it, which represented time, and then put all of these little notes on to the piece of paper… So that both of us could understand the overall shape and look of it, and see how the rhythms of it were. And I think that was a nice thing to do. Then Terry Gilliam came round to the house for lunch, because he lived close by – we were staying at Jim Henson’s old house in London – and we were due to go out, but he came down and just looked over what we were doing and remarked that it looked like a film. As soon as he said that, we kind of felt that we must be on the right track.

PLUME: So it was a mini-epiphany…

McKEAN: Oh, absolutely. Yes. A blessing… A blessing from a mighty Python.

PLUME: As working environment, how was it to work in Henson’s house? It was, what, a 10-day period?

McKEAN: That’s right. It was 2 weeks, and in that time we sort of brought all the ideas and images together that we were going to use – having thought about it separately before that – and then worked it all through and wrote a first draft.

PLUME: Was the house a conducive place to work in?

McKEAN: It was a very strange place to work in. There are some people who like to be surrounded by other people’s work, and there are people who like to be surrounded by their own work, and Jim was definitely of the latter category. There were Miss Piggys hanging off the ceiling and Kermits on the wall, and it was an odd one. But it was wonderful for that, and it was in a great place right by a park, so we could walk around the park and just talk about what we were going to do that day. Looking back on it, it was a great 10 days, and I’d very much like to do it again.

PLUME: With Neil or with another collaborator?

McKEAN: I think for next time I’d like to do an adult film. I don’t want to get pigeonholed just doing just family films and fantasy films… I don’t really want to get pigeonholed just doing anything in particular. But I’d like to do an adult film, and I’d like to do a film that gets down to the real language of film – so a rather more experimental film. But then I think after that I’d love to do this again. I think this was a great template for making a film – just starting with a huge, blank sheet of paper… Not based on a book, not based on anything you’ve done before… And just blue sky thinking different ideas. And I think next time, having done it once and learned so much and seeing pretty clearly what we did wrong – I’m sure we’ll make a whole bunch of mistakes next time as well, but it gives you a much higher platform to jump from next time, and I think we could make a much wilder and bigger and better film.

PLUME: Seventeen years on and after this experience, do you view Neil, as a collaborator, in a different light now?

McKEAN: It’s strange… In some ways, I feel like we’ve almost come back to square one, because we started as completely different people – both involved in our own worlds doing different things. We met on a magazine that didn’t happen. Neil was very separate from me – he was writing several stories for other illustrators to do. I was writing and drawing my own stories, and we got together simply because we liked each other and fancied trying it. And since then we’ve done lots of different things, and gone through a period of feeling like maybe we have strict identities and roles with each other – I’m the illustrator and Neil’s the writer, or whatever. And it feels now a much more liquid, easy, improvisational way of working, and I kind of like that. I’m happy for it to be more of a challenging relationship with each other.

PLUME: In some ways, do you think you now have a different respect for each other’s abilities?

McKEAN: Yeah… But again, you’d have to talk to Neil. I certainly recognize my failings as a writer much more clearly now… Because I love writing, and I don’t do it very much, but I do love writing. And I recognize Neil’s strength as somebody who’s always on the story, whether something works and if it’s being understood, and that’s great. I don’t know. It’s been a very long, strange process, and in amongst all that, we learned a lot about each other, I think.

PLUME: So you have a script in hand now, and a set budget…

McKEAN: Yes…

PLUME: What were the issues that leapt to mind when you looked at the script with the understanding that now you had to realize it?

McKEAN: Well, it’s actually wonderful. I think it would have been the kiss of death to say, “Right, you can have complete creative control *and* $200 million.” Because I think we just would have stared at the white piece of paper, and we’d still be there now staring at the white piece of paper. It’s very good to have a box to fight against, and to know where your limitations are, because it immediately implies a certain kind of thing… a certain kind of shape… a certain approach to things. And I knew straightaway that we would not be able to do photo-real animation, so that ruled out a whole load of stuff, because it’s too expensive and too time-consuming – and actually, at the end of the day, it’s not very interesting to me. So I’d much rather do something that looks illustrative and looks like something you’ve not seen before. Then, as were writing it, there are certain things that I know are expensive that are maybe not obviously expensive. Shooting a lot of live action with a lot of extras and all this kind of stuff may seem pretty easy to do, but that’s where the money goes. Whereas creating a city crumpling up into a piece of paper or a tower landing with one huge, giant claw – it sounds absurd and huge and crazy, but in fact that’s not so expensive… That’s pretty simple to do. So it wasn’t always obvious, and it’s good, I think, that we both sat in the room together so that – Neil was writing the screenplay, certainly, but I was there to say, “No, we just can’t afford a classroom full of children. It sounds crazy, but we’re just not going to be able to run with that.”

PLUME: Well, certainly one of your strengths as an artist is your improvisatory nature, in puling disparate elements together into something unique…

McKEAN: Yeah. Absolutely. I’ve always liked making things that don’t deny the medium that they’re made in. If it’s collage, I’m happy for it to look like that. If it’s a film made with computers, I don’t mind that it looks like a film made with computers – so long as it still has a feeling or a mood or an atmosphere that is relevant…

PLUME: But you’re not afraid to mix mediums, either…

McKEAN: Nope. I really don’t care about any of that stuff. I’m really not a purist in any sense whatsoever. I’m happy just to mix and match and take what I need. I’m a complete magpie. So long as it works for the piece and you’re telling the story in the most concise way, and in a way that really connects with the emotions of the story.

PLUME: What would you say was your greatest joy in the process of realizing the film?

McKEAN: Finishing it.

PLUME: Is it well and truly finished now?

McKEAN: It is… Well, I can’t quite bring myself to say that it’s completely finished – there are 3 or 4 little stupid things in it – but having now seen it a couple of times in front of an audience, I’m desperate to just tweak. But it’s basically finished, and the high spots are all the way through. I mean, sitting in the room and sorting it all out at the beginning was great, doing the storyboards and imaging what this would be like moving was great, working with the actors for the first time – because I’d never worked with actors before – was almost always wonderful, and our young girl, who’s at the center of the story, was fantastic.

PLUME: Was there any learning curve for you, in dealing with the actors?

McKEAN: Oh, it wasn’t a learning curve – it was a vertical slope! It was great. And working with a crew… And one of our actresses is Gina McKee, who’s a hugely experience actress – so I learned a lot from her, just because she knows film inside and out, upside and backwards. Then sitting down with the animators – a very young team of guys and girls fresh out of art school, first job for them. It was lovely working with them – what they brought to it and their techniques, and the stuff they’d learned, and how it exploded the project. I always had a sort of basic level way of doing things – in case things went wrong, I knew we could do that – but it was great working with them and elaborating on that and making it more interesting and more elaborated. That was all great. It was a very long post-production process – it was about 17 months… And a lot of that, I have to be honest, I was completely miserable. It just went on and on and on and on. Yet in amongst that, there were some great moments – when you first see some of these characters walk around…Doing the motion capture and 5 minutes later our characters are walking around. And seeing the shots finished for the first time, and laying music against things for the first time – all of those are wonderful.

PLUME: Where did the miserableness… miserablosity?… come from? Was it a matter of how long it was taking?

McKEAN: It was how long it was taking… It was the fact that I was constantly doing 16-18 hour days to composite everything and work with the animators. I’d work with the animators during the day from 11 to 6, then I’d have something to eat, then I’d go back in the studio and work till 4 and 5 in the morning composting it. I’m happy doing that for 3 or 4 weeks, maybe, but not 17 months. It just went on and on…

PLUME: So just the sheer exhaustion…

McKEAN: It was just that, and at times I just completely believed we would never finish it, and I lost track with really being able to see it properly, what we were doing. The computers gave us every single technical problem you can imagine – and just living with not knowing if I would get in this morning and the computers had just crashed, utterly, and the whole film had been gashed. You just never knew. I think that was the most wearing thing – not knowing tomorrow whether it would all end with a complete shutdown and failure.

PLUME: So how many mornings did you curse Neil and his easy end of the deal?

McKEAN: Well, I never completely cursed Neil, although I did have a little Action Man doll of him – with a leather jacket and sunglasses on – that I poked with a stick occasionally. But no, he would call in to see how I was and I could barely raise a syllable. “Is it really that bad?” “Yes. It’s really that bad.”

PLUME: Is there anything in the process that you look back on and see a way you could have streamlined it? Or was it just such a process of discovery that it had to go the way it did?

McKEAN: Well, no, it did have to go the way it did. There was no way of doing 4 years of film school quickly before making it – there was no way of gaining that experience without going through it. We didn’t have money to throw at problems to make them go away – we just had to deal with the circumstances we had. Now, if we did exactly the same film for exactly the same budget, it would go a lot smoother because I know all the stuff that we could cut out of it. I would know what the implications of all my decisions would be. You know, we had to decide about things every day – you have to make 20 to 30 decisions about the film every day, and I had no idea whether I was making the right decision because I’d never done it before, whereas now it would be easier. Of course, a whole bunch of new technical problems and mistakes would come up, but the old ones hopefully would not be there.

PLUME: But at least you would have the boilerplate to work off of…

McKEAN: Yes, and the final knowledge that it does end. I mean, there really were times when I was ringing my wife at home in complete despair saying, “I think we should just admit it to ourselves that we’re never going to finish it, and we should just pack up our few remaining marbles and go home.”

PLUME: Who was your cheerleader throughout the process? Was there anyone pushing you on, or was it a matter of pulling yourself up?

McKEAN: No, certainly Neil was always a cheerleader, because it was much easier for him – being completely away from all this process and not seeing the pain – to call up sort of bright-eyed and bushy-tailed and be a cheerleader. Lisa Henson was a cheerleader, and the folks at Henson. So that was great. And my wife was a great cheerleader. To be honest, everybody at the studio was great, because they didn’t have the responsibility of it, and so the young guys and girls in the studio, for most of the time, were wonderful, and I sort of drew strength from them.

PLUME: So the film has screened and you know the process…

McKEAN: Yes…

PLUME: Do you feel more comfortable moving on to another project, and do you know at this point what that will be?

McKEAN: No, I’m happy to move on to the next project. I’m very much looking forward to going back to my studio on my own and doing some drawings on my own, without 50 people sitting around me watching what I’m doing every day. So I’m doing some more books. I’m doing some books based on the MirrorMask film – there will be 3 books based on the film – and then I’m doing another children’s book with Neil, and then a book on my own. So I’m looking forward to doing that. We’re planning at least two more films, and I want to sort of get on and start planning those out, and we’ll try to do Signal to Noise, which is the next one, probably towards the end of the year. And I’m designing a Broadway musical for Elton John, so that’s in the works. So there’s a bunch of things to be getting on with, and I’m happy doing a diversity.

PLUME: And the response sop far to MirrorMask has been positive…

McKEAN: Yeah… I’m very surprised. I went to Sundance absolutely in dread, mortal fear, of being booed out of town. Fortunately, some people seemed to have liked it. I really, honestly don’t expect a majority of people to click with it, but we’ve been lucky, I think, that we’ve got some nice people to see it.

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June 29, 2013
An Evening With John Hodgman & Ken Plume VI

I’m Ken Plume, and soon you’ll be listening to “A Bit Of A Chat” with me, Ken Plume.

In this episode, I have another of my periodic chats with deranged millionaire, minor television celebrity, PC, and literary trivialist John Hodgman, about jet ski comedy, boating, deep frying, presentational casual, guns, and smooth plugs.

Be sure to watch JOHN HODGMAN: RAGNAROK on NetFlix. Now.

Hope you enjoy…

Download “An Evening With John Hodgman & Ken Plume VI“:

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(PREVIOUSLY: An Evening With John Hodgman & Ken Plume I, An Evening With John Hodgman & Ken Plume II, An Evening With John Hodgman & Ken Plume III, An Evening With John Hodgman & Ken Plume IV, & An Evening With John Hodgman & Ken Plume V)

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June 27, 2013
A Bit Of A Chat with Ken Plume & Graham Linehan 5

I’m Ken Plume, and soon you’ll be listening to “A Bit Of A Chat” with me, Ken Plume.

In this episode, I have another chat with writer/director/raconteur Graham Linehan, about Count Arthur Strong, The IT Crowd, sincerity, dream apps, collaboration, and Doctors.

COUNT ARTHUR STRONG premieres on BBC2 July 8th.

Hope you enjoy…

Download “A Bit of a Chat with Ken Plume & Graham Linehan 5“:

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June 26, 2013
A Bit Of A Chat with Ken Plume & Sylvester McCoy 3

I’m Ken Plume, and soon you’ll be listening to “A Bit Of A Chat” with me, Ken Plume.

In this episode, I have another chat with Time Lord emeritus Sylvester McCoy about banksters, Hobbits, Doctors, wizards, and Roadshows.

Hope you enjoy…

Download “A Bit of a Chat with Ken Plume & Sylvester McCoy 3“:

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BONUS: *See* Sylvester & I talk about Doctor Who 50th Anniversary plans…

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June 19, 2013
A Bit Of A Chat with Ken Plume & Joseph Scrimshaw 2

I’m Ken Plume, and soon you’ll be listening to “A Bit Of A Chat” with me, Ken Plume.

In this episode, I have another chat with writer/performer Joseph Scrimshaw, about GIF v JIF, gorillas v monkeys, grumpy cats, tender hug levels, and Paul F. Tompkins Meets Frankenstein.

Visit Joseph’s site at www.josephscrimshaw.com.

Hope you enjoy…

Download “A Bit of a Chat with Ken Plume & Joseph Scrimshaw 2“:

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June 17, 2013
A Bit Of A Chat with Ken Plume & Benari Poulten 3

I’m Ken Plume, and soon you’ll be listening to “A Bit Of A Chat” with me, Ken Plume.

In this episode, I have another chat with writer, comedian, and US soldier Benari Poulten, about adult skate, Settlers of Catan, food flair, Desaad, Joh Yowza, teapot tempest, and ambient drugs.

Hope you enjoy…

Download “A Bit of a Chat with Ken Plume & Benari Poulten 3“:

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June 14, 2013
A Bit Of A Chat with Ken Plume & Molly Oldfield

I’m Ken Plume, and soon you’ll be listening to “A Bit Of A Chat” with me, Ken Plume.

In this episode, I chat with author and QI elf Molly Oldfield about secret museums, cuneiform for kids, Bletchley teacups, and bombed statues.

You should also check out her wondrous book, THE SECRET MUSEUM.

Hope you enjoy…

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June 13, 2013
A Bit Of A Chat with Ken Plume & Paul Feig 3

I’m Ken Plume, and soon you’ll be listening to “A Bit Of A Chat” with me, Ken Plume.

In this episode, I have another chat with writer/director Paul Feig, about The Heat, bespoke suits, passion pits, movie jail, and legitimacy.

Hope you enjoy…

Download “A Bit of a Chat with Ken Plume & Paul Feig 3“:

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June 10, 2013
A Bit Of A Chat with Ken Plume & Rebecca Watson 7

I’m Ken Plume, and soon you’ll be listening to “A Bit Of A Chat” with me, Ken Plume.

In this episode, I have another chat with author, presenter, and skeptic extraordinaire Rebecca Watson, about forever Swatch, Kenny Paris, butter beer, Book It Becca, Cosombies, and Poochie.

And be sure to visit Skepchick.

Hope you enjoy…

Download “A Bit of a Chat with Ken Plume & Rebecca Watson 7“:

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June 7, 2013
Whotininnies 23: The Game Of The Doctor

Join Ken Plume and Glen Oliver as they take you on a journey beyond geekiness and nerdiness – Well, they pretty much just nerd out geekily and have a bit of a chat about Doctor Who and all things sci-fi.

Whotininnies 23: The Game Of The Doctor
Ken and Glen are all mushy ligaments and neener neener. SPOILER WARNINGS all around. As always, our theme is courtesy of Chameleon Circuit.

Hope you enjoy…

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(Artwork by Molly Lewis)

June 5, 2013
A Bit Of A Chat with Ken Plume & Taran Killam

I’m Ken Plume, and soon you’ll be listening to “A Bit Of A Chat” with me, Ken Plume.

In this episode, Ken Plume chats with actor Taran Killam about SNL, Heat, improv, family, not walking, 19th century Mokiki, and happenstance.

Hope you enjoy…

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May 29, 2013
A Bit Of A Chat with Ken Plume & Hal Lublin

I’m Ken Plume, and soon you’ll be listening to “A Bit Of A Chat” with me, Ken Plume.

In this episode, Ken Plume chats with actor Hal Lublin about Thrilling Adventure, Topper Penny, Captain Lou, Slapback McGee, Terry Gosling, and Charo.

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May 24, 2013
A Bit Of A Chat with Ken Plume & Jackson Publick 2

I’m Ken Plume, and soon you’ll be listening to “A Bit Of A Chat” with me, Ken Plume.

In this episode, Ken Plume has another chat with Venture Bros. creator Jackson Publick, about muumuus, shirts, George Lucas, interns, arcs, and founding fathers.

Hope you enjoy…

Download “A Bit of a Chat with Ken Plume & Jackson Publick 2“:

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May 24, 2013
A Bit Of A Chat with Ken Plume & Rhys Thomas 3

I’m Ken Plume, and soon you’ll be listening to “A Bit Of A Chat” with me, Ken Plume.

In this episode, I have another chat with hyphenate Rhys Thomas, about Doctor Who, Tom Baker, Swiss Toni, and Queen. WARNING: Game Of Thrones Spoilers.

Hope you enjoy…

Download “A Bit of a Chat with Ken Plume & Rhys Thomas 3“:

[audio:http://traffic.libsyn.com/bitofachat/bit_of_a_chat-rhys_thomas_3.mp3]

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May 24, 2013