by Nathan Stout (of AccordingToWhim.com)
Episode 5: Litigateable ————————————————-
Air Date: September 2005
Production Start Date: March 2004
Production End Date: July 2005
Revisions?: None.
Sketch 1: “Smilodon” The dinos are back again with a bit to say from the Dino Fact Finder book.
Sketch 2: “Paid Advertisement 1” Nathan and Chris try to generate revenue for the show.
Sketch 3: “I Wasn’t Expecting That: Gun” Nathan is forced to take money.
Sketch 4: “I Wasn’t Expecting That: Box” Chris gets a gift from Miguel.
Sketch 5: “I Wasn’t Expecting That: Peanuts” Chris gets a surprise with a can of ‘nuts’.
Sketch 6: “I Wasn’t Expecting That: Creditor” Chris gets a very different kind of creditor call.
Sketch 7: “Paid Advertisement 2” Nathan and Chris try to generate revenue for the show.
Sketch 8: “Dock Fire
Sketch 9: “10 Sketches In One Minute” Like it says…
Sketch 10: “Ending World 1.1” A sort of music video set to a lighting storm in North Fort Worth.
Sketch 11: “I Am Rage” Chris is mad.
Sketch 12: “Paid Advertisement 3” Nathan and Chris try to generate revenue for the show.
Sketch 13: “Manpons” The tampon that’s ‘cool’ for guys to buy.
Sketch 14: “Dylan And Cody Try To Get On The Show”
Sketch 15: “Blooper Reel 1”
Sketch 16: “Paid Advertisement 4” Nathan gives up on the idea.
Nathan’s Notes:
1.) The opening of this episode is sort of a throw away. I had no real plans and just thought it would be fun to do some more dino stuff. The book they are looking at is called the Dinosaur Fact Finder. I got this book several years ago at a Half Price somewhere. I’m not sure but I think Chris got it out and looked for the ‘joke’ names. There are a couple of other shot things like this we shot with the dinos that might show up one day in another episode.
2.) This was supposed to be the opening for this episode. The idea was that Chris decided to get us some investors in the form of paid advertisers to help with show expenses. The people he lined up were kind of dubious. This is another one of the sketches that I thought might get us kicked off the air.
3.) The idea for a series of sketches (like the subtle sketches) grew on me and I wanted a series called “I Wasn’t Expecting That” where the punch line was: “I wasn’t expecting that”. I got the idea after watching some old episodes of You Can’t Do That On Television. I liked the simple format and the fact that they often repeated sketches over the course of the series with slight different dialogue and/or actors, but basically the same jokes. My first original idea never made it on screen. It was a person going door to door trying to preach to people. He is well dressed and respectable looking. His speech uses the phrases: ‘our Lord’, ‘being devout to Him’ and so on. It turns out in the last bit that he is a ‘Satan’s Witness’ then the person at the door turns and looks at the camera and states: “I wasn’t expecting that”. The first in this series is where a burglar breaks into a house. The joke of the person using a clapper to turn on the lights came out of the need to have the burglar caught unawares.
4.) The next “I Wasn’t Expecting That” sketch took a little more time than the rest. I hoped to make the decapitated head gag work, but it looks kinda crappy. With the ‘faked’ table top, angle of shoot, and cut to the next shot in fluid motion it works out pretty well.
5.) The can of nuts “I Wasn’t Expecting That” sketch was really quick and easy to shoot. You will notice Chris playing with some magic The Gathering cards too. Also, I always like making fun of Chris’ expression at the end of this sketch. It is this sort of ‘this sketch is a piece of crap’ look. I never let it go by without mentioning it to him.
6.) The final “I Wasn’t Expecting That” sketch was shot right after the burglar sketch. I am actually talking to Chris in this sketch then using GoldWave I dropped the bass and made it sound like a phone call. We also used the clapper gag here too.
7.) “Dock Fire” took several months to finish. I could not find any burning sort of footage until one lucky day the fire department came and burned down an old house a few blocks over. I then added the fire sounds and there you go. I do feel the shot was too dark when filming Chris though.
8.) “Ten Sketches In One Minute” took over a year to finish. We decided to collect little tiny funny bits over an extended period of time. I finally decided (in July) to find some stuff to finish this. My and the wife went swimming and I took the camera along and finished the final pieces to this puzzle. Just a some notes of interest; the Taco Bueno cup was real, the bag I have for the Paul Bunyan grocery store is one of those city lawn bags, the house we drive by singing Bob Shack is a little shack with the word Bob in big letters (that was from our Mexia trip as is the rust remover bit).
9.) “Ending World 1.1” was my final attempt to get this episode done and in the can. A few years ago I emailed and got permission from Kurt Harland (lead singer of Information Society) to use his music from the album ‘Don’t Be Afraid’. Now, jump to early 2004. While I was working overnights I shot this lightning storm. I put the music from the album over the storm and got this promo bit that has some advertising for the show on it.
10.) “I Am Rage” was shot on the night we shot the office sketches. Chris’ rage dissipates as soon as he discovers he is not really trapped. This is the same fence that I am hanging off of in the “Worker 625” sketch.
11.) “Manpons” was this great idea I came up with while thinking of commercial ideas. I made a dummy label in Photoshop and taped it to a box for the prop. I used my Yamaha keyboard’s demo song for the soundtrack and several title screen and sound effects to finish the commercial. The bits of footage of me acting like a dork were shot while I was shooting the “Castle Silliness” sketch.
12.) I worked with Dylan and Cody at the Target in Burleson. I got both of them together for this impromptu sketch. With the help of ‘Lewis Cannon’s’ clothes and some groovy glasses Dylan tries to get in on the show. I remember it was late spring and the inchworms were really bad. They were hanging everywhere at my house. You couldn’t move without being covered in worms and webs. One worm got on the fake pizza box (which was a real pizza box inside out) and Dylan adlibs a few worm related comments into the sketch. Dylan had a sunroof in his car so shooting them talking in it was easy. The opening and closing segments were shot months later that tied Chris and myself into the overall sketch. Chris did this 2001 Hal impersonation while I am checking my email. I sort of adlibbed it all and it worked out alright.
13.) The bloopers in this segment were culled from over a year of shooting. There are more bloopers but these were probably the funniest.
14.) In the closing segment the paid advertiser sketches are wrapped up with me giving up and just borrowing the money from my mom.