A Day in Paradise

I’ve blogged about Shadow Falls a before, it’s an audio-drama which centers around an epic power struggle between good and evil which takes place in the mysterious town of Shadow Falls. Shadow Falls was created by Mark Yoshimoto Nemcoff and a large crew of actors and producers. The show has ramped up, and we’re now gearing up for the 6th and last episode of the first season.

Alongside the drama, Mark is doing a “companion” podcast where he talks about various issues (think directors commentary on a DVD). In the first episode he solicited interview requests, so I decided to put together a couple questions and Mark responded immediately.

Thanks Mark for taking the time, and for being the first interview in my 5-question-interview section So without further ado, on with the interview.

What were some of the inspirations for ths show?

Twin Peaks, Lost, X-Files… What inspired me was that I felt we could create a completely compelling and addictive audio experience based upon serial storytelling if we focused on some kind of search for the truth as the thematic throughlne. If it was this really complex mystery that had the ability to be very unpredictable, yet be grounded in the concepts of something as simple as the battle of good and evil, I thought we could really have something special in a medium (podcasting) that has so much untapped potential, especially as a platform for storytelling.

And without a doubt, one of the most powerful influences on me, as a kid, was the old CBS Radio Mystery Theatre with E.G. Marshall. I used to listen to that glued to the radio. I also have all the old BBC Radio episodes of “Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy”, which wasn’t so much an influence for Shadow Falls other than to me it represents almost pitch perfect casting. Writing the words is just part of the battle.

As an writer, how difficult was it for you to switch into writing for audio, and how did your experience with PCH and being involved with Podshow help?

The writing on PCH takes up a totally different amalgam of writing tools in that it’s very much like writing for a TV sketch show. The bits, the fake commercials and even the rants are like the bastard child cross between crazy monologues and some kind of slam poetry. Writing for PCH is a visceral release that makes me able to live my life without having to pay to go to therapy. The only rule on PCH is to make it funny and push the boundaries of the first amendment as far as possible. It’s performance art.

But for Shadow Falls, my background writing for TV and Film made me think it would be cake. Boy, was I wrong. Originally, my mindset would be to create the show like the way you’d do a TV drama, albeit with a much shorter script. But once you realize that the crutch of any sort of visual cue or reveal is taken away from you it makes you think twice about how you do everything. The rule in film is always “Get in late, get out early” of each scene but with audio dramas there are certain aspects of the story (especially one involving clues and slow reveals) that require you to rework a scene to accomodate the proper amount of exposition. So sometimes your initial pacing that you have in mind at the outset won’t work for certain things. For example, one of the things I learned in TV (taught to me by Aaron Sorkin, no less) was that “Dialogue is just the noise your characters make flapping their lips in between making decisions.” keep it moving to keep your audience moving… but Aaron has the luxury of Director Tommy Schlamme’s signature long tracking shots to help. In audio drama, sometimes you have to stop a bit to smell the daisies, especially when your audience can’t see those daisies for themselves.

When I was writing Shadow Falls I had to get back into the mindset of a novelist in terms of detail, the mindset of TV writer for the structure with episodes and the mindset of a classical composer in terms of the pacing of the story arc of the first season.

And luckily, I had some great collaborators in James Napoli and Matt Johnson from the New Frequency Radio Theatre company who came in and polished up the scripts to make sure they would really work in an audio-only medium. Those guys saved my ass.

And of course, being with Podshow helped immensely because they are the ones footing the bill for Shadow Falls since it wasn’t a cheap show to produce, luckily I have really great co-executive producers in Adam Curry and Ron Bloom who understand the commitment to pushing the boundaries of this medium.

It’s funny that you mentioned comic books in your last SF companion show, often when I’m listening to Shadow Falls I visualize it in a comic strip format. Are there any plans put this story into any other media formats (satilite radio, film, book, comic, graphic novel, etc)?

Now that would be pretty cool. Let’s say we’ve had some discussions at Podshow where other ways to present Shadow Falls has come up. If any artists out there have any thoughts, I’d love to hear or see them. I think Shadow Falls would be awesome as a comic/graphic novel.

The music of Shadow Falls is fantastic! Is there a story behind your collaboration with Munk to write the theme music?

I’m super proud of the music. Some people know that I used to be composer for TV back before I became a writer so I had a very, very specific idea what the score for Shadow Falls was going to sound like. I auditioned a couple of other composers and tried to explain my ideas but, of course, as some musicians are want to do, they didn’t listen to my ideas and gave me demos ignoring what I’d told them and those demos sucked badly. Finally, when it came down to it, at nearly the last minute, I decided that the only way I was going to get the music I wanted was to do it myself. So I called my good buddy Munk whom I’ve known for 20 years since our days plaing in bands together back at Berklee College of Music and we talked and I knew he was doing a lot of heavy duty, very dark score music for a couple of pretty big videogames, including one about Dungeons and Dragons. We talked a lot about the music and the opening theme came about as the kind of thing where he said: “How about this?” and then I added something and he added something and then boom, I knew we had it. The underscore during the show is a cross between stuff I’ve written and stuff he’s written, often even layered together so it’s a very collaborative process. In the end the music and all the sound design for Shadow Falls, no lie, is exactly 100 percent what I’d heard in my head when I first thought of the show.

I loved the “shadow falls makeover” you did to the fan contributed audio comment in the Shadow Falls Companion. Do you have any comments for anyone interested in starting with audio dramas?

Yeah, learn audio production. LOL… The post production work on Shadow Falls takes about 50 hours per episode.

These are my comments:

• Learn story structure and know it inside and out. At the risk of sounding like a cliche, if you haven’t read it, go to Amazon and get a copy of “Story” by Robert McKee. Build your pacing around structure, not only of your individual episodes but of your entire series arc.

• Be very patient. Writing just the first 6 episodes (the first season) took 6 weeks but only because I put myself on a TV show like schedule for getting them done and we had a project schedule to keep to in terms of casting and production. If you have the luxury of time, use it but not at the expense of staying motivated.
• Find a great cast. Like I said before, a portion of the battle is creating the script. The other is getting those words you’ve sweated over to come to life.
• Have a vision. Know what you want your show to sound like even if you’re just basing it another show as your template. Have a vision and stick with it.
• And lastly, have fun. So much of working in showbiz really sucks, so when you get the chance to work on your own project, make sure you’re enjoying it or else you’ll go crazy.

This entry was posted on Saturday, September 23rd, 2006 at 9:37 pm and is filed under 5-question-interview, Podcasting, Like-So-Totally-Awesome, Sci-fi. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.