EP. 357.5 — Last Looks: Eye of the Beholder (w/ Mikhael Tara Garver)

[00:00:00] Paul Scheer: Will living in a bell tower make you insane? The truth about Drop Dead Fred. And what happened in the Disney World Star Wars Hotel. All this and more coming up on today’s Last Looks. Hit the theme.

[00:00:19] Music: [Intro Song]

[00:00:19] Paul Scheer: Hello, all my ghost daughters. It’s me, your wig dealer, Paul Scheer, and welcome to How Did This Get Made Last Looks. That’s right. Where you, the listener, get to voice your issues on Eye of the Beholder, a movie, the Discord user. Mick G 3D thinks should have had the tagline “Eye of the Beholder. A Snow Globes impede thriller.” All right. I like that. That’s good. Thank you Mick G 3D for that alt tagline. Remember, if you have an alt movie tagline or uh, maybe, uh, a new title, submit it to us on our discord and we may just read it on the show like I just did. Now coming up on today’s episode, we’ll be hearing all your corrections and omissions on eye of the beholder.

[00:00:58] Then Jason and I will talk about large scale, immersive experiences with special guest, Mikhael Tara Garver. Now, Michael is an expert on the immersive world. She worked on the Star Wars hotel and Sleep No More. We’re going to talk to her all about her fandom and the future of immersive entertainment. I was thrilled to have her on this show.

[00:01:18] I can’t wait for you to listen to it. If you like all this kind of, uh, new immersive theater that’s going on. It’s a great listen. Plus as always, I will reveal the movie for next week’s episode and people, do you live in Philly? Do you live in the suburbs of Philly? Well, come out and see How Did This Get Made on November 16th.

[00:01:36] It’s a Saturday night. You gotta come check us out, Philly. Plus, if you can’t come to Philly, well, watch us at home. That’s right. On December 12th, we will be talking about a great holiday film with our good friend, Jessica St. Clair. So, head on over. To hdtgm. com, get your tickets for either for both. It’s going to be a blast.

[00:01:57] The movies are now announced and I got to tell you, we got some bangers. So get yourself a ticket virtually or in real life. We will see you soon, Philadelphia. Plus. Here’s the thing I want to tell you about. This is actually really fun. Um, Jason and I are gonna be traveling around the country, Boston, LA, New York, and DC doing improv shows with a cast that is absolutely amazing.

[00:02:21] Darcy Carden, Chloe Trost, Lisa Gilroy, Rob Hubel, Seth Morris, Carl Tartt, Phil Augusta Jackson, Chad Carter, Owen Burke, and more. We’re going to be on the road. So come check us out, uh, LA on November 12th, and then we’re going to be in Boston on the 20th and we’re going to be in DC on the 22nd. Tickets are also available at HDTGM.com

[00:02:45] And we would love to see you there. Tickets are almost sold out for both shows. So get them now and, uh, after the show, I’ll sign books. That’s right. If you’ve not gotten a copy of Joyful Recollections of Trauma, uh, I will sign them in New York, Philly, wherever you are, I’m going to sign those books, bring them to the theater or buy them at the door.

[00:03:02] We will have them there. Uh, and I will make time to make sure that everyone gets what they want. Um, also if you’re away from home, you can order a personalized book and I will get it to you by the holidays. Just go to the link on my website, uh, or just go to Chevalier’s. It’s a bookstore here in Los Angeles and I will personalize it to whatever you need.

[00:03:20] Okay, so now that that’s done, I know you’re coming out on the road. I know that there’s plenty of chances for you to see us virtually or there. So go to HDTGM. com. I know that that’s done. So now let’s talk about Eye of the Beholder. Okay. We had questions, right? And we might’ve even missed a few things. So here’s your chance to set us straight.

[00:03:37] Fact check us if you will. It is now time for Corrections and Omissions.

[00:03:41] Music: [Corrections and Omissions Song]

[00:03:44] Paul Scheer: Thank you Chris Purcell for that theme song. Let’s go to Mitch Kappa. AKA Chunk style.

[00:03:49] “It was funny how Jason brought up how hot Ewan McGregor is because there were two different instances in the movie where people describe him as being very plain and unremarkable. Like they just kind of forgot to change the script after he was cast. Also, there was no mention of the section of the movie when he was living in a bell tower. Obviously he was already mentally unwell before that point, but it seems like a level of torture that would be outlawed by the Geneva convention because it would make anyone insane.”

[00:04:18] You know, you bring up a good point and I think I wrote it off in my head that he wasn’t actually living there. He was kind of like hanging out there a lot, but you’re right. That would drive any human insane. I mean, he’s become like the hunchback of, uh, Notre Dame, even in the first scene when he’s, uh, getting the incriminating pictures on the boss. It looks like he’s living in that place too. Maybe he just likes to take naps.

[00:04:39] I don’t know, but he really does settle in. Really well. And I think we described it in the episode, but the character was supposed to be an older, uh, overweight gentleman. And so I think that, yeah, they never changed it. They never changed it. And I guess they made him look, I mean, they dressed him a little bit less cool and hip.

[00:04:58] I don’t know. It was the nineties. So at that point, I can’t tell you the styles Dove writes,

[00:05:02] “Let’s Talk more about how insane it was that Ewan’s character had a surveillance microphone set up that when we first see it, we’re meant to assume it’s a rifle. And then it’s revealed just to be a super sensitive microphone. But then later it is actually a rifle with a barrel located right next to the sensitive microphones, which means you in would have probably made himself deaf by firing it if he wasn’t already deaf from living in that bell tower.”

[00:05:28] People you’re calling out all the right stuff. I think it was a gun. But yeah, that doesn’t, I don’t know, now I’m confused. You’re right. He would go, he would blow at his own eardrums. Why would he need a rifle? Someone caught him, but he wasn’t a sniper. He wasn’t a killer. Dove, why does he have a gun? Why does he have a gun at all? Um, Joe Tangelo writes,

[00:05:50] “The wildest scene that you didn’t talk about is when Ewan McGregor confronts the blind guy to warn him about Ashley Judd. Instead of just discreetly warning him that she’s a serial killer and that he’s witnessed her kill multiple people, he runs at him, punches him in the face, knocks him to the ground, starts kicking him and screams, open your eyes, you stupid blind bastard! She’s gonna kill you! And then he runs away.”

[00:06:13] Oh, my God, Joe, I totally forgot about that scene until you just said it. You’re right. I mean, that whole section of the movie is like where the movie cratered for me a little bit. And I just felt like I was, I was watching, but I wasn’t really invested at that point and you’re right. Like, well, he did it there. I mean, look, he tried to save that blind man by blowing out the tire in the car and then killed the, look, he is mentally unwell.

[00:06:35] We have to just put that there. I mean, he should be using one of our great sponsors, which I won’t mention because if they’re not paying for this episode, I’m not going to mention them. Loves Tarps writes,

[00:06:44] “This is Ewan’s second worst haircut in a film that came out in 1999.”

[00:06:50] I assume you were, of course, uh, alluding to the Phantom Menace when he was rocking that rat tail. Oh man, George Lucas, you got it. You figured out what the kids wanted to see. Jedis with rat tails. Why? We didn’t need that. We didn’t need, we didn’t want that. I mean Boba Fett has like a little rat tail, but that feels like he killed somebody and then took their rat tail. I, I, I don’t like, did Boba Fett kill a Jedi?

[00:07:17] Is that a Jedi rat tail? Ooh, Star Wars fanfic. Let’s get started. Um, all right. And then LovesTarps writes,

[00:07:24] “You didn’t talk about how Ewan was also wearing a jacket that made him look like Santa Claus, uh, to go with the Merry Christmas daddy stuff.”

[00:07:31] Well, okay, look. Okay. I get it. That jacket does look a little puffy. I’m looking at a picture of it right now and it does have a, a fur lining. I, I think that that was, I don’t know. I don’t think he’s trying to dress like Santa. I don’t think so. In a movie with bad hair, they probably also had just some bad, uh, production design cobbled with, uh, bad wardrobe. Uh, Dr. Guts 1003 writes,

[00:07:52] “Maybe Paul was aware of this and just didn’t mention it when discussing the scene, but in the closing moments when Ashley Judd tells Ewan, I wish you love. That is a reference to the title of the song that both her and Ewan’s hallucination daughter sings throughout the movie.”

[00:08:09] Dr. Guts, I was not aware, and no one was, because clearly no one picked up on it, so what are we saying? Is that a real song, or are they joined in a Drop Dead Fred world of imaginary friends who all sing, which would prove my point that they all live together in, uh, heaven space.

[00:08:30] Oh, I don’t know, Dr. Guts, I did not know that, but now you’ve opened up a real can of worms about invisible friends. Oh, that’s a whole Team Fred, Team Sanity all over again, but this one proves my point. Anyway, Sean McBee writes,

[00:08:41] “The snowglobe transition from New York to San Francisco was particularly galling as he’s walking away from the bar in New York. The bartender holds up the snow globe saying, Hey, you forgot this. But as we push in, we see it’s San Francisco. That’s right. It’s a San Francisco snow globe, which then transitions us to that city. Does that mean that he bought the San Francisco snow globe in New York?”

[00:09:02] Um, here’s what I’m gonna say, Sean, and I don’t want to defend this movie, but I’ll tell you this. I believe that the entire movie was built on snow globe transitions because in the deleted scene, there’s another transition with the snow globe. I have a feeling they cut that out and every snow globe was the next location, right? So we were to assume like if he’s in Atlanta, he’s holding up an Atlanta snow globe, but when we see the snow globe, it’s going to London or wherever he’s going.

[00:09:31] So that I think was the, that was like our, our transition point. It didn’t work because you can’t just do that once. Uh, there’s no pattern there. Uh, you know, once is odd. Twice is a coincidence. Third time, it’s a pattern. I think this movie did it once, but there were two times on deleted scenes. All right.

[00:09:48] So many great corrections and omissions this week, but there can only be one that is the best. Oh my gosh. This is going to be really hard here because some of you came after me. Um, and I gotta say the person who really brought this whole thing together. You’re really, uh, you know, made me look at this in a totally different way.

[00:10:05] Yes. I gotta say Mitch Kappa. You brought up the, that he was living in a bell tower. I get that, but it was really that Dr. Guts made me rethink, or makes you all rethink, your Team Fred positions, because I believe that Fred hangs out with a group of, uh, imaginary friends. And this would assume that same logic.

[00:10:29] Okay. So, uh, Dr. Guts, you are right. Or you are the winner because you prove me right. And now you get this amazing song from Caleb Yellow. Hit it, Caleb.

[00:10:40] Music: [Winner’s Song]

[00:10:43] Paul Scheer: All right. Remember, if you want to submit a theme song to us, email your theme to HowDidThisGetMade@Earwolf.com . Please keep them short 15 to 20 seconds. And if you want to chime in with your own thoughts about the latest episode, hit up the discord at Discord.gg/HDTGM, or call us at 619-PAUL-ASK. Coming up after the break, Jason and I will chat with Mihkael Tara Garver about immersive entertainment. So stick around.

[00:11:22] All right, people, you know, every Monday we are releasing old How Did This Get Made episodes back into our feed. This week’s Matinee Monday was The Adventures of Pluto Nash with Jessica St. Clair and Lennon Parham. So keep on checking out our replays of classic episodes every Monday. And without any further ado, Now it is time for Just Chat with Jason and our guest, Mikhael Tara Garver.

[00:11:43] John Cohen, play us in

[00:11:52] Music: [Just Chat Intro]

[00:11:58] Paul Scheer: So Michael, I want to have you kind of tell us about what you do, because in trying to put it together, even in describing it to other people, I was having a hard time and I didn’t want to like say too much, too little, give you too much credit, take away too much credit.

[00:12:13] So I wanted you to kind of let us know, because I am so excited for this conversation, but I want you to set the table for us. In what you do.

[00:12:21] Mikhael Tara Garver: Okay. Um, the first thing that I do is I usually explain what I do because, you know, like it’s a weird, unique space that in a weird way I started doing 25 years ago before we had words like immersive or fandom or, uh, collective experiences.

[00:12:39] We just did it. And about 25 years ago, I was just in Chicago, um, making theater and art and trying to figure out how to make a business out of it. And so I started making these immersive experiences, uh, as part of an art form, as part of, like, how to bring comedy. I was really obsessed with live music. How do we make that even into more of an experience of live music?

[00:12:59] So anyway, cut to, um, I make large scale immersive experiences everywhere that I can. connect digital and physical. So most recently I was the Director of Immersive Experience for the Star Wars Galactic Starcruiser, which we should, uh, absolutely talk about.

[00:13:14] Paul Scheer: Amazing.

[00:13:15] Jason Mantzoukas: Yes. Would love, would love to hear everything.

[00:13:17] Mikhael Tara Garver: Some of my fandom, uh, fandom paraphernalia is in the back right there.

[00:13:23] Jason Mantzoukas: Is that a lightsaber hilt?

[00:13:25] Mikhael Tara Garver: That is a lightsaber hilt. I was gifted by the ship as the General Organa.

[00:13:31] Jason Mantzoukas: Whoa, do you know what color your kyber crystal is?

[00:13:34] Mikhael Tara Garver: I’m purple.

[00:13:35] Jason Mantzoukas: Okay. Okay mace windu.

[00:13:37] Paul Scheer: Yeah, I love it

[00:13:39] Mikhael Tara Garver: So I’ve done everything from that to I made a project years ago in boston called Fornicated which started with text and led to live rock shows and we could do it with a different band every night and it was about kind of the fandom of rock show music and then I get hired by the UN to make the museum of international drug policy.

[00:13:59] Jason Mantzoukas: So that’s an immersive drug policy experience?

[00:14:02] Mikhael Tara Garver: Correct.

[00:14:04] Jason Mantzoukas: So you’re really digging in on mandatory minimums?

[00:14:09] Mikhael Tara Garver: What that is, is like, how do you have many people with many languages and many different points of view in one space and give them ways to communicate with each other? So, uh, for Disney, I was a consultant for Imagineering. And I.

[00:14:24] Jason Mantzoukas: Oh, yeah, sure.

[00:14:24] Mikhael Tara Garver: Traveled and did international projects for them of like how to make collective experiences And then I think a lot about fandom like your fandom I think is like podcasts have some of the strongest and coolest fandom.

[00:14:38] Jason Mantzoukas: The worst.

[00:14:40] Paul Scheer: It’s balcony monsters.

[00:14:41] Mikhael Tara Garver: I know right and then but like how that happens It’s because we’re you’re in our ears and in our brains.

[00:14:47] Paul Scheer: Yeah.

[00:14:47] Mikhael Tara Garver: So I think a lot about that, make experiences now. I run Culture House Immersive which is um an entertainment studio, black, brown, female owned, um, which is to build this entertainment kind of as a leading way to lead entertainment and to give creators more of a stake in the ownership.

[00:15:05] Paul Scheer: You know, it’s so interesting because I have been excited about immersive entertainment for a long time. I think it’s a, it’s a wonderful evolution of things that we see and we want to interact with, but also it gives you a reason to get out of the house. Right. I think for a lot of people, it’s like, oh, like you can’t experience this anywhere else. And, you know, I think the first time my mind was blown was by like Sleep No More and going to this thing that had no, it did have a beginning, middle and end, but your beginning, middle and end could be completely different.

[00:15:37] I went there three times and enjoyed it in three completely different ways. And that was really like mind blowing to me to be in this place that you. The want was to get lost, to find your way to find that.

[00:15:52] Jason Mantzoukas: To be experiencing something and be able to make active choices inside of receiving a, a narrative, a receiving a story or something like that, to be able to feel as though you have choices, you have agency inside of the event is kind of amazing. And it, it really gets at play, it really gets at that idea of play.

[00:16:17] Mikhael Tara Garver: Well, and the, the permission. So I was one of the original directors on Sleep No More in Boston and some of the permission of, you know, as adults, I know, like, it’s weird to play. It’s weird to feel permission to play if there aren’t children around.

[00:16:31] Paul Scheer: Right.

[00:16:31] Mikhael Tara Garver: And so like. And also, we all play differently, and so a lot of the work I focus on is like, also how do we create work where people who are not comfortable with others can have a way to slowly transition into play, because that’s some of the hard stuff with theme parks, right? Like, like, it’s for the front row, not necessarily the eighth row.

[00:16:51] Paul Scheer: This is, I guess the question I wasn’t going to think to ask right away, but how do you deal with that? People in the sense that, right? Like, you, you know, you, you see it a lot of times. Um, you know, when you’re on stage, you can experience it. People come to shows with different energies. I’ve been to many, uh, a Halloween themed event and, you know, right.

[00:17:15] And I think part of it is like bringing you in, but then where is that line drawn? And how do you teach the people in the immersive space to draw that line? Because it is still like in, it’s a sacred space. You’re not going into these, you know, these people are actors or performers. Like, is that something that you think a lot about and trying to like, Also draw the line, bring them in, but also keep them out to a certain degree.

[00:17:39] Mikhael Tara Garver: I don’t think about keeping them out. I think about creating, but I understand exactly what you’re saying. I think about like, there’s this craft that actually hasn’t been mined very much. Right. It’s the craft I’m slightly obsessed with, which is how do we create pathways for people to enter where we give them, I call it directed freedom, so they have ways to put their energy forward, and you have to train performers in that.

[00:18:04] I think narrative helps a lot, so we build large scale multi narrative, right? That’s the thing I’ve been doing. When you go to a haunted house, right? There’s one path, you’re going on a path, and, and, Like, the only real response you have the agency to make is no, or like, push someone, right? You don’t have many options.

[00:18:27] You can kind of move forward through the thing. And so, as human beings, without those ways of participating differently, I think we’re setting ourselves up for a lot of challenges, right? At the same time, when you go to an experience that’s like, free for all, then the same thing happened. So I spend most of my time thinking about that, but Star Cruiser is the highest and best example of like getting to build that where I just came back from.

[00:18:52] I mean, I can speak about it, but our fandom are all people who are not fans of Star Wars. They’re fans of that experience because they could participate differently.

[00:19:00] Paul Scheer: Well, this is so exciting because that was the kind of the promise of the premise of The new Star Wars world and then this hotel is going to be attached to that world.

[00:19:09] And, and I think in the beginning there was going to be some more interactive games, but I remember that I was at Disneyland when they were trying to play with the immersive in the frontier, uh, land. Like they had like a dad, like they had a day where they would like, they actually were. Just trying to see if you can engage in a theme park differently.

[00:19:28] And from what I heard, and I tried to get on that, that, uh, cruiser, I tried to get in that hotel in those final days when the reservations were, were going before it closed. I’m so upset that it’s closed because it also seems so kind of amazing. Uh, like talk to us about like how you even approached that, like, because it’s like very corporate and I also think of immersive as being very.

[00:19:49] Uh, I hate this term, but punk rock, right? Like, I mean, I think it’s like a little bit more like it’s not following those rules.

[00:19:55] Mikhael Tara Garver: So I got a phone call just to give you context. People have been working on this ship, which is a hotel and experience. It’s like all the things, all the technology for about six years.

[00:20:04] And I got a phone call nine months before it opened and they were like, Hey, could you be here in three weeks? Um, And I was not a Star Wars fan, so I think that should be the context here.

[00:20:18] Paul Scheer: Yeah, yeah, yeah.

[00:20:18] Mikhael Tara Garver: Um, and, but I’m usually like a fan of fandom, so when I get hired to do a job, I like immerse myself and then I make sure there’s a lot of experts around me.

[00:20:27] Like, there’s a t shirt behind me that says, Bleep Bloop Star Wars, because I would be in a scene writing a scene, I’d be like, what’s the bleep bloop over there? And someone who’s smarter than me would say it. The thing about building that was it had every single tool you could ever imagine, everything from holograms to, uh, ability to have your phone, have communication from characters that was triggered off of actual conversations you were having, so you were fully in it.

[00:20:57] But the power of it, the power that has been responded was the design of how we built the story and the performers. And so we integrated that with all the technology and you became necessary. You and not like in a like you’re necessary. And then it’s a it’s 15 minutes later and the asteroids are gonna come no matter what.

[00:21:18] Literally, the thing you did in the front of the bridge of the ship. If you hit an asteroid, And I was in my room in the, in the, in my cabin on the side, that asteroid in, in real time went by the ship and I saw it.

[00:21:33] Jason Mantzoukas: Wow.

[00:21:33] Paul Scheer: Whoa.

[00:21:34] Mikhael Tara Garver: Now, I didn’t know that.

[00:21:35] Jason Mantzoukas: Now, you wouldn’t know how or why, but nonetheless, everybody is participating in the same narrative.

[00:21:42] Mikhael Tara Garver: Everybody is connected. And when you start to make a world that way, right? Like, we feel it. Like, I always say what people want when they hire me is like that feeling. They want to feel like really present where they are and connected to something larger. That’s it.

[00:21:58] Jason Mantzoukas: Yeah.

[00:21:59] Mikhael Tara Garver: And there’s a craft of that, right? So like, or if you went upstairs and you saw Chewbacca come out the, Uh, The, uh, launch pad, someone else downstairs helped him get on the ship through the engineering room at the exact same time.

[00:22:16] Paul Scheer: Wow.

[00:22:18] Mikhael Tara Garver: So it’s all that, and it’s 46 hours of that.

[00:22:22] Jason Mantzoukas: And is there a forward moving narrative that starts at a specific time and ends at a specific time?

[00:22:29] And everybody’s similar, I guess, to Sleep No More. Everybody can kind of, you know, at their own choosing with their own agency, choose to opt in or out of all of these events, or is it just happening more passively to them?

[00:22:43] Mikhael Tara Garver: So you’re implicated in it from the beginning. This is one of the big things I think about, which is like why I do work in rock concerts, right?

[00:22:50] We know how to behave there. We know how to show up. And then if another thing happens around us and invites us from that, known behavior will do it. So we were all, you’re all passengers on a cruise. You board the cruise, you just happen to be taking a cruise into space and a spaceship, you take off, you see your launch pad from Orlando up into the ship, and you watch yourself take off and go to this ship.

[00:23:14] And when you enter, you’re a passenger on a luxury cruise line, and you’re told, look, it’s a dangerous time in the galaxy, but don’t worry, we’ll take care of you. And then the First Order enters the ship during the muster, which is what launches a cruise.

[00:23:29] Paul Scheer: Right.

[00:23:29] Mikhael Tara Garver: And you are implicated because you know even if you disagree even if you work for the First Order or you work for the resistance or you work for this like that do the heist which is reclaiming a stone for the Ryloth people. You are implicated because you’re trying to save the ship the ship.

[00:23:51] And all of these questions of like, how do we care about each other and still disagree become a part of it. And so like, at dinner, you watch stormtroopers walk by and you’re under occupation. And so you have a choice when the Beyonce of the galaxy sings to like, to care. I mean, you’re right. It’s, it’s very different than Sleep No More in that narrative is its core.

[00:24:13] Jason Mantzoukas: Got it. Yes.

[00:24:14] Mikhael Tara Garver: And many narratives are its core, but you’re not, you could engage in that just because you’re having a drink at the bar and you see something happen.

[00:24:22] Paul Scheer: I did an event like this in L. A. one time with some friends and you had like missions that you had to do. And if you did it or if you didn’t do it, it really affected the end of the show.

[00:24:30] I saw it again. I saw it twice. Whenever I see something like this, I want to see it twice because I want to see where just as a fan of it, where where the railings are and how much it can change. Is there a world in which people didn’t want to go to sleep in this Star Wars cruiser? Like, I mean, they’re like, is there, is there 24 hour content or 40, you know, like, or the entire time or do things shut down?

[00:24:51] Mikhael Tara Garver: Nothing shut down, but like on a cruise, we went to bed, right. And I mean, that’s the crazy part. They went into their cabin and they went to bed and my job was building, I think, unfortunately, tell narratives in spreadsheets. So there’s like 600 stories that are happening that all could go in different directions.

[00:25:11] And so I knew when I had physical performers to create those stories. And then, you know, so at night, on the first night, the droid gets captured, and so if you walked upstairs at four in the morning, you would still see the droid captured to the thing, and then being part, and like that happening, right?

[00:25:31] That is still happening. And so, we have things that you launch in story that it makes sense that it’s happening overnight, so you can see the seeds of that. Throughout and like if you go to the bridge at 9 a. m It’s a very different thing than when you go to the bridge at 9 p. m But it’s still there and we’re still in space in real time where we said we would be.

[00:25:52] Jason Mantzoukas: How cool. I love it.

[00:25:55] Paul Scheer: Well now my question is this you have like 100 rooms in there right this is 100 different uh, families, right. Going into this thing. I’m mad that this thing, I feel like it didn’t get its proper due, right? It was open from March 1st to like September 30th, uh, 2022 to 2023. And like my thought was like, well, you should don’t open it up like three times a year and just do this event. Yeah. Three times a year and then get people in, you know, or what do you think in looking at such a large scale thing under such a big banner? Like, what were the lessons that you learned about that, that you’re bringing into what you’re doing now at Culture House too.

[00:26:30] Mikhael Tara Garver: Well, like to go back to the corporate question, I’ll just say that, right.

[00:26:34] Which is like, Disney has a structure. It’s worked really well for them. They open theme parks, lots of people come, it takes a certain type of operations. This project was successful, like when they announced it was selling out or they were closing it, it sold out in four hours. Like.

[00:26:49] Paul Scheer: Yeah.

[00:26:49] Mikhael Tara Garver: I mean, it’s bananas and it is things like I can’t say, but it is. It was very highly successful for guests.

[00:26:59] Paul Scheer: That’s what I’ve heard. I’ve only heard A plus like thumbs up.

[00:27:03] Mikhael Tara Garver: When I tell you there’s a fandom for this that just Yeah. Sold out the fan convening that they organized twice over and then had a waiting list the size of the list to go to this Con that is just the ship is called the Halcyon called the Halcyon. That’s it.

[00:27:20] Jason Mantzoukas: Wow.

[00:27:21] Mikhael Tara Garver: Exactly. And so. I think that all corporations, Disney included, are trying to figure out how to participate with their fandoms differently. Like, they’re not set up to participate with their fandoms in this way, in a way where it’s generative, in a way where And so I think there’s that. I think that how I build the work, I think about how we’re building it at Culture House is like, you need many different ways to experience a big investment.

[00:27:45] So you need a half day, you need a one day, you need a two day, so that there’s different ways to come on. And that also might have changed the narrative that was marketed, which is that it was a hotel, and it was well beyond that. And the, and like, I believe we don’t need every experience to be $5, 000.

[00:28:08] That was, that was not.

[00:28:10] Jason Mantzoukas: That’s a tough barrier to entry for, for this experience is cost.

[00:28:15] Mikhael Tara Garver: Totally. Exactly. And also it’s less than people pay for a cruise at Disney, but it, but if it’s a new experience, it’s really hard to, you know, so.

[00:28:25] Paul Scheer: Well, you’re also doing something that’s kind of crazy, right? Which is, um, you’re going to the number one vacation destination and you’re saying, Hey, don’t for, yeah, I know that there’s like a tram where you go into the Galaxy’s Edge and, but you’re basically saying don’t go there and you have to almost carve out like two days where you’re not doing, I mean, it’s a tricky mindset for people who have, yeah.

[00:28:49] Jason Mantzoukas: Yeah, because like we’re talking about Sleep No More or some of these other things, these are the event you go to. This is your hotel and it’s a very hard thing to switch your brain into being like, no, no, the, the, I’m going to the hotel to stay in the hotel to be part of a story. You know, and this gets into a real blurring of the lines that I feel like is really a part of what you have been, it sounds like baked into from the beginning, which is like the, the audience as, not just receivers of an event, but the participants of.

[00:29:22] Paul Scheer: Yeah.

[00:29:23] Mikhael Tara Garver: What does it mean? And that for me, so I’m an athro person, like I’m not a participator. I’m shy actually, and kind of awkward when I go into a room. And like, I want us also, I think the other reason that this was unique was that we were designing it. It was designed that you could literally, like, there are some amazing stories of people who sat quietly in the atrium watching everything and then a performer would come sit next to them and then like, sit next to them four different times and then the fifth time that person would look at them and be like, I’m scared, like grown men.

[00:29:58] Jason Mantzoukas: Wow.

[00:29:59] Mikhael Tara Garver: They would share something because the relationship had been developed, right? Which is what I believed could happen. But if someone had gone right up to them and been like, how do you feel? What can we do? They would have been like, they would have shut down.

[00:30:10] Jason Mantzoukas: Sure.

[00:30:11] Mikhael Tara Garver: Right. So I do think the lines there are muddy. Are complicated, but there’s a craft and that’s the part that like, I call it immersive involvement now. I didn’t have words before. Now, it’s what I call it.

[00:30:23] Jason Mantzoukas: How interesting.

[00:30:24] Mikhael Tara Garver: Yeah, I think I think more of the work, you know, I’ve used it to help design everything from an event and how to think about how to welcome people in when they’re not. Priya Parker. If you’ve ever read her book, the Art of Gathering, she’s incredible.

[00:30:39] It’s so good. But like that thinking about how all of us who don’t really know how to human well together need help.

[00:30:47] Paul Scheer: Yeah.

[00:30:48] Mikhael Tara Garver: And so if that can be done in entertainment, I think the thing with Star Cruiser was it was doing something actually, you’re kind of right, like punk rock and revolutionary inside a container that was hard for Disney to know how to talk about that, right?

[00:31:03] Jason Mantzoukas: There was something about, and I can’t remember when he started it, and I’m sure you’ll know, do you know Charlie Todd’s Improv Everywhere? Um, that he has done for many years. There was something about that was like, I feel like one of the first times that I felt like I understood or saw someone take the audience out of the seats and make them the participants and the receivers of a show that was still happening, but now it was happening on the streets of New York.

[00:31:29] Now it was happening. It was taking the show out of the confines of the space and making the participants, not just passive receivers, but they have agency. They can operate inside of the thing, even if there is this macro umbrella. And that is, you know, particularly exciting. You know, it feels again like we’re talking about.

[00:31:51] It feels like we’re all doing a play. We’re all putting on a show. We all get to do it. You know.

[00:31:57] Mikhael Tara Garver: We all matter, right? Yeah, that’s the other piece.

[00:32:00] Jason Mantzoukas: But that’s a that’s a dangerous lesson to teach the audience that they matter. Boy, do I not like that.

[00:32:05] Mikhael Tara Garver: It is if you don’t have boundaries, it’s 100 percent dangerous.

[00:32:09] Paul Scheer: I think that that’s kind of like what we Jason and I started off uh, at the Upright Citizens Brigade, which started in Chicago. And they did a whole show where they took the audience out into the street and worked around the street. And there were all these like big things that became like, you know, they, I think they saw a suicide.

[00:32:25] And then Adam McKay tells a story about how they set up a fake, like a Pepsi executive at Navy pier and did like a Q and A with the audience and stuff, you know, so it’s like, it is an interesting way to engage with people. And I guess the question is, is you’ve come from, you know, these seminal things, these giant, like the, if you don’t know anything about immersive theater, you’ve heard of Sleep No More, I would imagine, but you definitely probably have heard of the Star Wars hotel.

[00:32:47] What’s next and where, and you are now at this, this company Culture House developing more of these, or where is it going? Like, what is, what’s the future hold?

[00:32:56] Jason Mantzoukas: What’s exciting to you now about this space?

[00:32:59] Mikhael Tara Garver: Well, so pre COVID even, this is the largest growing entertainment space ever. It’s growing at like 30 percent financially.

[00:33:07] So like, when you think about the fact that I’m here in L. A. and I have friends in television and film who are like, this whole industry is changing. I think I should have more agency. I think I should have more ownership. Part of this also for me is really a cultural thing of how do we start and launch usualizing this immersive entertainment platform or this way of making things and let it so that people can own their content and then they can make it into a TV series, they can make it into a film, but they hold on to more of the content from the outset.

[00:33:39] So, we’re launching. We just, uh, we raised some money for an incubator. We’re incubating 20 plus immersive experiences, everything from, and when we do it, we develop out the universe. So we have a project, Layla and the Starship Afrotopia, and it was originally an animated series, outlined, received from a woman named Jumai Youssef.

[00:33:59] And I looked at it and I was like, well, what if we made the whole universe and there’s a band, Ain’t Afraid, that is connected to the story? And what if you could go to their concert on Afrotopia, the spaceship, and what if that’s the way you engaged with it? And then we start releasing the animated pieces.

[00:34:18] And what does that do about Jumai’s ownership of the universe? That content and that world and the merchandise and all of those things. So we’re looking at it that way. We have another project, um, called Fair, F A I R E, that is, uh, a renaissance festival, but also we’re filming a series backstage where, like, this came from my Disney time, like, The absurdity of like backstage in those things, right?

[00:34:45] But also you could end up following kind of the story of like Bob the actor, or you could go with Bob the blacksmith, right? Who’s now.

[00:34:54] Jason Mantzoukas: Yeah, you know, you can choose to be behind the scenes or participate. Oh, that’s cool. That’s great.

[00:35:00] Mikhael Tara Garver: So thinking about what I like to think about is the ways we already know how to participate and then kind of expand that. Yeah. Right?

[00:35:08] Paul Scheer: Right.

[00:35:08] Mikhael Tara Garver: And, and think about how then that lets us tell stories in different ways, many stories, um, and, from there, like, we get excited about how that expands to other media, podcasts, all those things.

[00:35:22] Jason Mantzoukas: Sure. When we do the How Did This Get Made convention, and it’s a week long, weekend long convention that you’ve built a 48 hour, insane, immersive experience.

[00:35:32] That includes all of the movies that we’ve done in the past and, and all of our fans get to experience it. That’s going to be where it really takes it to the next level.

[00:35:40] Mikhael Tara Garver: Look, I’m signed up. Like I cannot wait to make all like, that’s the thing, right? Is you can do many things all at once.

[00:35:49] Jason Mantzoukas: But I still want to be a Jedi if that’s cool.

[00:35:51] Mikhael Tara Garver: That’s totally cool. And also, you know, you look at things like the sphere or you look at things like Taylor Swift and bracelets. It’s like, it’s happening. Everywhere. It’s all part of that same desire and need for coming together. So the How Did This Get Made Immersive Experiences on its way.

[00:36:07] Paul Scheer: All right. That’s it. The drop dead Fred room. The job that Fred is part of is gonna be really controversial. This is so amazing. Now, for people who are fans of this or intrigued by you, where can they follow you or find out more? You know, what can they do?

[00:36:22] Mikhael Tara Garver: Yeah, they can, uh, follow us at Culture House Media, and then I am on Instagram and I am @MTGexperience.

[00:36:30] Paul Scheer: Okay.

[00:36:31] Mikhael Tara Garver: Those are my initials.

[00:36:32] Paul Scheer: Thank you so much. Uh, and please come back when you have, uh, something cool to tell us about. Cause we’d love to hear what’s, uh, what’s up next.

[00:36:40] Mikhael Tara Garver: I would love that. Thank you guys so much.

[00:36:41] Paul Scheer: Thank you.

[00:36:42] Jason Mantzoukas: Thank you, Mikhael.

[00:36:43] Paul Scheer: Thank you, Mikhael, for chatting with us, but now it is finally time to announce our next movie.

[00:36:49] Okay. We are going to go from New York city snow globes to New York city monster probes. Yes, that’s right. Next episode, we will be watching the 1982 campy monster movie. Q: The Winged Serpent starring David Carradine, Michael Moriarty, Candy Clark, and Richard Roundtree. Oh, I cannot wait. Here is a breakdown of the plot.

[00:37:11] “A petty swindler accidentally intrudes on a New York police department murder case involving a winged deity monster.”

[00:37:18] That’s right. A swindler intrudes on an NYPD murder case with a monster. Oh, I can’t wait. Rotten Tomatoes gives this film a 72 percent score on the tomato meter. And Janet Maslin from the New York times writes “The only movie in which you may ever see a nod bloody skeleton wearing a gold charm bracelet.”

[00:37:39] Well, look, if you’re going to be eaten, uh, uh, wing deity, you’re not gonna eat that bracelet. It’s bad for your belly. Um, all right. Listen to the trailer for Q: The Winged Serpent.

[00:37:50] Trailer Audio: Q is coming.

[00:37:54] Q is coming.

[00:37:59] Its name is Quetzalcoatl. Just call it Q. That’s all you’ll have time to say before it tears you apart.

[00:38:08] Q is coming.

[00:38:09] Paul Scheer: Q The Winged Serpent is available to stream on Peacock, Amazon prime video, to be Crackle Plex, AMC plus, and Shutter. And I encourage you to check out Hoopla Canopy and libby, which are digital media services offered by your local public library that allow you to consume movies, TV, music, audio books, eBooks, and comics for free.

[00:38:30] All right. Remember people, How Did This Get Made and Dinosaur Improv are on the road in November. It’s November 15th through the 22nd. Go to HDTGM. com for more information and tickets. That’s right. We’ll be announcing the movies there. And if you want a personalized copy of my book, uh, head on over to HDTGM. com and I’ll put a little link right there on the front page. All right. That’s it. Um, people, if you listen on Apple podcasts or Spotify, please rate and review us. Please also make sure you’re following us and have automatic downloads turned on. It helps the show and we appreciate it. You can visit us on social media @HDTGM.

[00:39:04] And I want to shout out the Action Jackson 5 for making our opening theme song and a big thank you to our producers, Scott Sonne and Molly Reynolds, and our movie picking producer, Avaryll Halley, our associate producer, Jess Cisneros, and our engineer, Casey Holford. We’ll see you next week for Q the Winged Serpent.