Hollywood is supposed to have all these geniuses in it but you wouldnt know by most of the crap that comes out in the movies and television. There is a tiny corner of Los Angeles with brilliant people doing nutty works and thats at Channel 101.
Channel 101 was created by Dan Harmon and Rob Schrab, the very funny guys who wrote and produced the FOX pilot Heat Vision and Jack. The concept behind Channel 101 is that every month short films are screened in LA and the audience votes on their favorites and the creators with the most votes are then allowed to do the next installment.
Ive been a fan of Rob Schrabs since the first Scud: The Disposable Assassin trade paperback was released and I am pleased as punch to know that hes still creating nutty and accomplished works like Twiggers Holiday and Ringwald and Molly.
Check out the official site for Channel 101
Daniel Robert Epstein: What are you up to?
Rob Schrab: Were doing a film that has this guy whos paralyzed so hes got a wheelchair that he wanted to fly into the sunset. So I was doing some special effects.
DRE: What do you do the special effects on?
RS: Final Cut Pro.
DRE: Wow.
RS: Yeah, its pretty awesome. Its a great program and I do everything on it. A lot of people use After Effect but this is just easier for me.
DRE: How did you learn how to do the effects?
RS: I took a class to learn how to use Final Cut Pro and then just through our little community people said This is a good way to do lasers with greenscreens. Then it was just experimenting with it.
DRE: Did Channel 101 come out of the Other Network at all?
RS: No were completely different separate things. We knew of them and they knew of us. We actually screened a pilot that we produced a couple years ago with them and then we started doing our own thing and then kind of did this cross promotion thing. Which kind of worked, but not so much. We developed it on our own. Even before 101 we would have like these little events. Dan and I are really into making these little DVD movies but we only do them if theres a deadline because were really lazy. So we just say hey everybody a month from now make the next Batman movie, dont spend any money and well all watch it or everybody do a kid show and well watch it. We started doing these themes with the month deadline and people really started getting into it.
Then we started to be a lot pickier about submissions and people were just getting pissed off like, I worked a whole month on this you fucking asshole! That was just a drag. So we said, Hey, instead of us being the bad guys, lets make the audience the bad guys and let the audience vote for it. If it sucks, it wont be just us saying it. Thats pretty much how 101 came about.
DRE: You like to do these things that seem like very low tech, but they have all these crazy effects in them like Twigger's Holiday and Ringwald and Molly.
RS: I like to layer everything and the more I do it the more I layer stuff. It is pretty addictive to be coming up with the effects and building props and stuff. Its a real freeing experience because Dan and I were like working in the business for seven years and we only got one thing shot. We were constantly writing scripts and they were constantly being put on shelves collecting dust. We were just getting frustrated because we came out here to be creative, not to fill shelves with paper. We wanted to make stuff. So we started shooting stuff. Then for the last two and a half years weve just been shooting stuff, a short a month.
Its a great discipline and its the best school in the world. You get immediate recognition or rejection because you got 300 people watching it and they dont respond to it. Its like an open mike for directors. Dan and I are super creative people and you would think Hollywood would be the creative capital of the world but it isnt. Everywhere you go youve got these uncreative people saying No, thats not going to work. While youre like No it will work, youve just got to let me do it.
DRE: It seems like certain people, like Ben Stiller and Oliver Stone, recognized that you guys were smart.
RS: No not really.
DRE: Not really?
RS:I got some work based off of 101 on Drew Careys Greenscreen show. Im being shopped around finally, as a director by my agency based on my work with 101.
DRE: How much do you have the making of a Ringwald and Molly or a Twigger's down to a science?
RS: I try to strike a balance because there is a deadline and you dont want to overextend yourself, because you do have to make a living too. Although there is the danger of just becoming so obsessed with your show that you just let the bills go away, which I have done before. But yeah I got it down that so I can crank those out in a week.
DRE: How did you come up with Twigger?
RS: I wanted to do something that wasnt sci-fi or horror based even though theres sci-fi and horror in it. But I wanted to do something that had everything like making the special effects and the props but not doing that genre. So I wrote everything around that. Ive always wanted to do kind of like a live action Calvin and Hobbes, Pee-Wee Herman kind of stuff. The first episode went over really, really huge. The second one was even bigger and then it turned into this epic thing.
DRE: Is that one of the things you want to turn into a feature?
RS: Yeah, Ive been approached with it. Right now Im in the process of developing a script and its just trying to nail down what would be the best way to approach it.
DRE: Whats Monster House?
RS: Monster House is a script that Dan and I wrote back in 1998. Several times it was almost made into a film and then recently [Robert] Zemeckis came up with the idea to do it with motion capture like Polar Express. He is like obsessed with this new technology and was just going through all the properties that he liked. Monster House is going to be the second mo-cap animated thing that hes done and thats coming out in summer 2006.
DRE: Is Gil Kenan still directing it?
RS: Oh yeah.
DRE: How do you know Gil?
RS: I dont. They hired him. The live action is already shot and now theyre going to be like animating for the rest of the year.
DRE: What was the feature length Heat Vision and Jack script about?
RS: Well there was a bunch of them. We wrote one. Then [South Park writer] Pam Brady wrote one and then a couple of other people wrote one. The problem was we wrote the original on spec and Ben flipped over it. He wanted to make it so it was just one of those things that got really big, really fast and then went away because it didnt get picked up.
I remember saying in a meeting, If we dont get picked up, lets make it into a feature. Of course we didnt get picked up and a couple of months later we found out that the rights to Heat Vision and Jack were kind of handed over to one of the Zucker brothers and that we were under contract and they had to use us even though they didnt want to use us. It got kind of messy. We ended up writing a script for somebody who wasnt involved with this thing from the beginning like we were. We were executive producers on the show and now we were being told by somebody we didnt even know what works and what doesnt. It was really annoying and finally we just had to walk away because they werent going to make the movie that it should have been. Just recently, Ben was asked if he would you be interested in directing it and he said Only if Rob and Dan write it. Now were working on a deal again, so this is like round two with Heat Vision and Jack.
DRE: Sounds more like round ten.
RS: Yeah, exactly. But Ive got bigger fish to fry so Im not going to hold my breath.
DRE: How much of this Hollywood stuff started because of Scud: The Disposable Assassin?
RS: I would say all of it. It began when we came out here to work on the Scud feature script which was optioned by Oliver Stone for three years. We got a decent chunk of change you know, relatively at the time. We were basically told No, youre a comic book writer, youre not a screenwriter. So in an effort to prove them wrong we wrote a spec script called Big Ant Movie which was about giant ants taking over Los Angeles. One of the executives at Oliver Stones wanted to see it and a good friend of ours gave it to her. She put it in her briefcase and as she was taking meetings all over town and one was with Robert Zemeckis. Robert Zemeckis pretty much said Do you have any writers that can do anything with big insects. She goes, Ive got a script right here. She pulled it out, gave it to him and a week later we were meeting with Robert Zemeckis. Shortly after that we got a two picture deal and one of those pictures is Monster House.
DRE: Then we met with Ben Stiller and he said, Do you have any TV ideas? We said Oh well kick around something and Heat Vision and Jack came out of that.
DRE: Do you feel theres a real overall philosophy to your work?
RS: Its really just entertaining yourself. Thats the biggest thing. Our best advice to people is to just make yourself laugh. If youre writing a comedy script you should be like laughing the entire time. Its hard but youve got to work with your gut and your heart and some people cant do that.
DRE: On Zoolander you did the brainwashing sequence, right?
RS: Yeah I got that from working on Heat Vision. When we were shooting Zoolander I was just kind of hanging out, Ben was like, Look Im really far behind. If I give you a crew would you shoot second unit for me? So I shot second unit like on Zoolander for about a week. I was also picking up shots that Ben didnt have time to do because it was just such a grueling shoot.
DRE: That movies really popular with people of a certain age you know.
RS: Yeah, its a great movie.
DRE: Its a huge movie. Robot Bastard is coming out on DVD.
RS: Yeah, its got animated menus and I have a Ringwald and Molly DVD and a Twiggers Holiday DVD. Robot Bastard has a ton of extras like behind the scenes, the making of, the making of props and how to do stuff. At one point Robot Bastard was going to be made into like a TV show for MTV. But that of course fell through. So Im going to do like a radio play for the pilot that I wrote for MTV. So thats going to be on there.
DRE: Anything new happening with Scud?
RS: Im still shopping around Scud. I was very close to having a series last year. We were casting and everything and of course everything shifted and the new guy didnt get it. I have like a ton of animation tests and I have got like a script that Im shopping around. Were trying to get into Adult Swim as well.
by Daniel Robert Epstein
SG Username: AndersWolleck
Channel 101 was created by Dan Harmon and Rob Schrab, the very funny guys who wrote and produced the FOX pilot Heat Vision and Jack. The concept behind Channel 101 is that every month short films are screened in LA and the audience votes on their favorites and the creators with the most votes are then allowed to do the next installment.
Ive been a fan of Rob Schrabs since the first Scud: The Disposable Assassin trade paperback was released and I am pleased as punch to know that hes still creating nutty and accomplished works like Twiggers Holiday and Ringwald and Molly.
Check out the official site for Channel 101
Daniel Robert Epstein: What are you up to?
Rob Schrab: Were doing a film that has this guy whos paralyzed so hes got a wheelchair that he wanted to fly into the sunset. So I was doing some special effects.
DRE: What do you do the special effects on?
RS: Final Cut Pro.
DRE: Wow.
RS: Yeah, its pretty awesome. Its a great program and I do everything on it. A lot of people use After Effect but this is just easier for me.
DRE: How did you learn how to do the effects?
RS: I took a class to learn how to use Final Cut Pro and then just through our little community people said This is a good way to do lasers with greenscreens. Then it was just experimenting with it.
DRE: Did Channel 101 come out of the Other Network at all?
RS: No were completely different separate things. We knew of them and they knew of us. We actually screened a pilot that we produced a couple years ago with them and then we started doing our own thing and then kind of did this cross promotion thing. Which kind of worked, but not so much. We developed it on our own. Even before 101 we would have like these little events. Dan and I are really into making these little DVD movies but we only do them if theres a deadline because were really lazy. So we just say hey everybody a month from now make the next Batman movie, dont spend any money and well all watch it or everybody do a kid show and well watch it. We started doing these themes with the month deadline and people really started getting into it.
Then we started to be a lot pickier about submissions and people were just getting pissed off like, I worked a whole month on this you fucking asshole! That was just a drag. So we said, Hey, instead of us being the bad guys, lets make the audience the bad guys and let the audience vote for it. If it sucks, it wont be just us saying it. Thats pretty much how 101 came about.
DRE: You like to do these things that seem like very low tech, but they have all these crazy effects in them like Twigger's Holiday and Ringwald and Molly.
RS: I like to layer everything and the more I do it the more I layer stuff. It is pretty addictive to be coming up with the effects and building props and stuff. Its a real freeing experience because Dan and I were like working in the business for seven years and we only got one thing shot. We were constantly writing scripts and they were constantly being put on shelves collecting dust. We were just getting frustrated because we came out here to be creative, not to fill shelves with paper. We wanted to make stuff. So we started shooting stuff. Then for the last two and a half years weve just been shooting stuff, a short a month.
Its a great discipline and its the best school in the world. You get immediate recognition or rejection because you got 300 people watching it and they dont respond to it. Its like an open mike for directors. Dan and I are super creative people and you would think Hollywood would be the creative capital of the world but it isnt. Everywhere you go youve got these uncreative people saying No, thats not going to work. While youre like No it will work, youve just got to let me do it.
DRE: It seems like certain people, like Ben Stiller and Oliver Stone, recognized that you guys were smart.
RS: No not really.
DRE: Not really?
RS:I got some work based off of 101 on Drew Careys Greenscreen show. Im being shopped around finally, as a director by my agency based on my work with 101.
DRE: How much do you have the making of a Ringwald and Molly or a Twigger's down to a science?
RS: I try to strike a balance because there is a deadline and you dont want to overextend yourself, because you do have to make a living too. Although there is the danger of just becoming so obsessed with your show that you just let the bills go away, which I have done before. But yeah I got it down that so I can crank those out in a week.
DRE: How did you come up with Twigger?
RS: I wanted to do something that wasnt sci-fi or horror based even though theres sci-fi and horror in it. But I wanted to do something that had everything like making the special effects and the props but not doing that genre. So I wrote everything around that. Ive always wanted to do kind of like a live action Calvin and Hobbes, Pee-Wee Herman kind of stuff. The first episode went over really, really huge. The second one was even bigger and then it turned into this epic thing.
DRE: Is that one of the things you want to turn into a feature?
RS: Yeah, Ive been approached with it. Right now Im in the process of developing a script and its just trying to nail down what would be the best way to approach it.
DRE: Whats Monster House?
RS: Monster House is a script that Dan and I wrote back in 1998. Several times it was almost made into a film and then recently [Robert] Zemeckis came up with the idea to do it with motion capture like Polar Express. He is like obsessed with this new technology and was just going through all the properties that he liked. Monster House is going to be the second mo-cap animated thing that hes done and thats coming out in summer 2006.
DRE: Is Gil Kenan still directing it?
RS: Oh yeah.
DRE: How do you know Gil?
RS: I dont. They hired him. The live action is already shot and now theyre going to be like animating for the rest of the year.
DRE: What was the feature length Heat Vision and Jack script about?
RS: Well there was a bunch of them. We wrote one. Then [South Park writer] Pam Brady wrote one and then a couple of other people wrote one. The problem was we wrote the original on spec and Ben flipped over it. He wanted to make it so it was just one of those things that got really big, really fast and then went away because it didnt get picked up.
I remember saying in a meeting, If we dont get picked up, lets make it into a feature. Of course we didnt get picked up and a couple of months later we found out that the rights to Heat Vision and Jack were kind of handed over to one of the Zucker brothers and that we were under contract and they had to use us even though they didnt want to use us. It got kind of messy. We ended up writing a script for somebody who wasnt involved with this thing from the beginning like we were. We were executive producers on the show and now we were being told by somebody we didnt even know what works and what doesnt. It was really annoying and finally we just had to walk away because they werent going to make the movie that it should have been. Just recently, Ben was asked if he would you be interested in directing it and he said Only if Rob and Dan write it. Now were working on a deal again, so this is like round two with Heat Vision and Jack.
DRE: Sounds more like round ten.
RS: Yeah, exactly. But Ive got bigger fish to fry so Im not going to hold my breath.
DRE: How much of this Hollywood stuff started because of Scud: The Disposable Assassin?
RS: I would say all of it. It began when we came out here to work on the Scud feature script which was optioned by Oliver Stone for three years. We got a decent chunk of change you know, relatively at the time. We were basically told No, youre a comic book writer, youre not a screenwriter. So in an effort to prove them wrong we wrote a spec script called Big Ant Movie which was about giant ants taking over Los Angeles. One of the executives at Oliver Stones wanted to see it and a good friend of ours gave it to her. She put it in her briefcase and as she was taking meetings all over town and one was with Robert Zemeckis. Robert Zemeckis pretty much said Do you have any writers that can do anything with big insects. She goes, Ive got a script right here. She pulled it out, gave it to him and a week later we were meeting with Robert Zemeckis. Shortly after that we got a two picture deal and one of those pictures is Monster House.
DRE: Then we met with Ben Stiller and he said, Do you have any TV ideas? We said Oh well kick around something and Heat Vision and Jack came out of that.
DRE: Do you feel theres a real overall philosophy to your work?
RS: Its really just entertaining yourself. Thats the biggest thing. Our best advice to people is to just make yourself laugh. If youre writing a comedy script you should be like laughing the entire time. Its hard but youve got to work with your gut and your heart and some people cant do that.
DRE: On Zoolander you did the brainwashing sequence, right?
RS: Yeah I got that from working on Heat Vision. When we were shooting Zoolander I was just kind of hanging out, Ben was like, Look Im really far behind. If I give you a crew would you shoot second unit for me? So I shot second unit like on Zoolander for about a week. I was also picking up shots that Ben didnt have time to do because it was just such a grueling shoot.
DRE: That movies really popular with people of a certain age you know.
RS: Yeah, its a great movie.
DRE: Its a huge movie. Robot Bastard is coming out on DVD.
RS: Yeah, its got animated menus and I have a Ringwald and Molly DVD and a Twiggers Holiday DVD. Robot Bastard has a ton of extras like behind the scenes, the making of, the making of props and how to do stuff. At one point Robot Bastard was going to be made into like a TV show for MTV. But that of course fell through. So Im going to do like a radio play for the pilot that I wrote for MTV. So thats going to be on there.
DRE: Anything new happening with Scud?
RS: Im still shopping around Scud. I was very close to having a series last year. We were casting and everything and of course everything shifted and the new guy didnt get it. I have like a ton of animation tests and I have got like a script that Im shopping around. Were trying to get into Adult Swim as well.
by Daniel Robert Epstein
SG Username: AndersWolleck
VIEW 10 of 10 COMMENTS
ought:
Scud saved my formative years and properly taught me on the ways of battling ben franklin
teejwi:
Rob rocks. Saw him here in Milwaukee a bunch of times at open mike nights before he hit it big. Cool guy to have a beer with.