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AUGUST 1998

Brent Haynes, a young programming poobah at The Comedy Network, asks my friend Kellie Benz if we’d be interested in creating a new half-hour comedy series.

We’d never teamed up before but Kellie and I share a lot in common. We were born in the same year. We grew up in podunk BC towns. And we’ve both received death threats. Kellie’s sacrilegious short film pissed off some hardcore far-right Christian groups who religiously tune into the Comedy Network. And I angered ex-schoolmates with a Vancouver Sun article that made fun of my high school reunion.

SEPTEMBER 1998

Kellie and I bang our heads together for ideas. I suggest THE WACKY WACKY KEN HEGAN SHOW, a nutty sitcom about a vegetarian writer who hates vegetables. He has kooky uncles and neighbours. And maybe hilarity ensues. Kellie thinks my idea sucks the high hard one.

OCTOBER 1998

We toss around more ideas but they’re all lame, expensive, or destined to attract lawsuits.

NOVEMBER 1998 - PITCHING

Inspiration strikes us: SKULLDUGGERY, an adventure series parody with a cliffhanger at each commercial break and the end of every show. After two weeks of frenetic emailing, we craft a one-page outline and a series ‘bible’ that includes character descriptions and each episode’s storyline.

Our pitch to Brent: “SKULLDUGGERY is about Carl and Marlon Carlson, bickering fraternal twins and the World’s Greatest Cat Burglars. When an evil crime lord kidnaps their beloved Sadie Winters, Carl and Marlon are forced to pull off the crime spree of the century.”

Brent flips for the idea and we’re in development. Kellie will write and direct episodes 1, 3, and 5 while I get 2, 4, and 6. I agree to write one script per month for $500. My rent is $560. My Dad taught math but I didn’t go to Dad’s school.

JANUARY 1999 - WRITING

Another credit card arrives. I now have six and they’re all cranked to the limits. Depressed and out of shape, I find 385 pennies then walk to the community centre for a workout. They make me roll the pennies.

FEBRUARY 1999

My agent calls. She’s leaving her agency and can’t take me with her.

MARCH 1999

Writing at night, I take a day job sorting mail at UBC. Turns out I’m super talented at sorting mail. I’m so fast, my supervisor calls me Flash. By my second coffee break, the mailroom manager offers me a permanent job. Uh-oh. I tell him I have a series in development at The Comedy Network. A co-sorter laughs and says, “Now that’s funny.”

Suzanne Berger, a Toronto producer, says she loves our scripts. Describing SKULLDUGGERY as a cross of James Bond and DUMB AND DUMBER, Suzanne agrees to be Executive Producer. We apply for funding, rewrite our scripts, then wait.

MAY 1999

Telefilm says they’re in for a huge chunk of funding! Kellie and I dance and sing, “We have a TV series! We have a TV series!” I go back to sorting mail.

JUNE 1999 - CASTING

First day of auditions at Casting Works downtown. I lock my bike to the falafel shop railing next door. The falafel guy cuts my lock and takes my bike hostage. “We are not stupid people!” he says and demands $10 for its release. An actor helps me call the cops. I reward him with a part as a security guard.

Our casting director says she’s never seen auditions like ours. During callbacks, Paul McGillion and Randy Schooley kiss a corpse, pry an eyeball from its socket, then strip down to matching gonches. Their characters’ names are printed on the waistbands. We howl. They get the parts.

We cast five leads: Randy and Paul as the super-burglar Carlson brothers. Lori Triolo as the luscious femme fatale. Tom McBeath as Muldoon the low-budget inventor. And Brendan Beiser is Jimmy the furry corpse.

JULY 1999 - PRE-PRODUCTION

We need 35 interior sets, two weeks on location, and tons of costumes. We’re competing for crew with mammoth U.S. weepies-of-the-week who have money to burn and do. By contrast, our entire art department budget is under $10,000. Kellie and I seek out low budget designers; Sally Ann wizards who’ll make beautiful sets out of string, glue, and magic.

We meet with an art director and his prop assistant. They look at the budget and laugh in my face. The art director says he thinks he can get us a deal on $65 pillowcases. The prop guy looks us up and down and says “How did you get this show? I guess The Comedy Network will take any pitch these days.” I’m floored. Nobody wants our Canadian money.

AUGUST 1999

We rent a Gastown warehouse on junkie row. In the needle-strewn alley, somebody has painted ‘NO FORNICATING’. We hire a Production Designer who looks like a ROAD WARRIOR extra in his Columbine trench coat and steel motorcycle boots. His creative ideas are amazing. We’re blown away. This show will look great.

SEPTEMBER 1999

What’s with Road Warrior? Where are the sets? I still don’t hear nails being hammered. All I hear are junkies in the alley, gazing up at their dealer’s window and moaning, “Dion. Dion. Dion! Dion? Diiiiiiiiiiiiiiii-onnnnnn!” They wait and wait, hopping from foot to foot. But, like our much-promised sets, Dion never comes.

Road Warrior slowly clinks up three flights of stairs to interrupt a casting session. He says he’s thought about it and he thinks the motel set should have wallpaper. Looking at the empty warehouse, I think, “What the hell are you talking about? We’re 10 days from picture and you haven’t constructed a single god-damned set.” Suzanne asks, “Ken, do you want to go to jail? Because if we don’t fire this guy, you will eventually kill him and spend the rest of your life in prison.”

In a tactical strike, we fire the Road Warrior’s underperforming assistant. He quits in protest and we replace him with John Taylor. Organized as hell, John and his team work round the clock to build the sets and save the show.

SEPTEMBER/OCTOBER 1999 - THE SHOOT

DAY 1 - Gastown Studio

We’re ‘block shooting’ so similar scenes are scheduled on the same days. Kellie and I take turns directing scenes from all six episodes. It’s a continuity nightmare and a huge challenge.

For the hostage tape scenes, we stuff Lori into an egg-like pod, point the camera at her and roll tape. She’s wearing adult diapers, a fecal hose, and a steel-tipped Madonna bra. As Lori screams and boots the pod, we splatter her with Coke and potato chips. Lori stays in the pod for three hours. It reeks of glue, sweat, and potato mush. I hold my breath then pop my head in to give Lori direction. I’m on top of the world. After a year off, I’m directing again.

DAY 2 - Aldergrove

Kellie has the crew on location. Everybody’s late then the picture car overheats. They fix the car then Randy drives it into a fence and it sticks in the ditch. Damn. Randy is supposed to drive in every episode. By 2 o’clock, the crew is 4 hours behind schedule and our line producer quits from nervous exhaustion. Suzanne is on the next plane out. Brent calls me from Toronto: “I hear you crashed a car.” I reply: “Wasn’t me, man.” Kellie makes up the time by changing the car chase to a foot race.

DAY 5 - Boundary Bay

Kellie’s Episode 5 cliffhanger was supposed to end with our heroes trapped in a car that’s whizzing towards a mob of anarchists. Since we can’t afford a car, Paul and Randy are now trapped on used bicycles with broken handlebars. Instead of a big angry mob, I get five extras and one is a senior.

Later, I direct my first stunt scenes with two stuntmen riding a scooter and a motorized skateboard. They play the Renegade Couriers of the Apocalypse, so naturally they’re dressed in kilts and Rastafarian dreadlocks. Their job is to ride up beside a moving car, throw a video inside, then roar off into the night.

We borrow a car from our First Aid & Coffee lady. Randy’s driving so we restrict him to 20 kmh and will speed up the footage later. It’s super cold but the fog looks amazing. Mike the Gaffer fires a spotlight through the mist and Chris Oben, our Director of Photography, captures a cool blue sci-fi look. I call ‘Action’ and we get the shot in two safe takes. I’m such an action film geek, every shot is an homage to a famous film scene or director. Tonight I ‘homaged’ RAISING ARIZONA, X-FILES, and STARSKY & HUTCH.

DAY 7 - Woodlands mental institute

Even though it’s scorching hot, two extras moan about not getting a hot breakfast. Unbelievable: I haven’t had a hot breakfast in three years.

Today I try to direct an entire chase scene with a stolen shopping cart, a homeless drunk, and an old banana peel. Unfortunately, we’re in the monstrous shadow of a Hollywood film: SCREAM IF YOU KNOW WHAT I DID LAST SUMMER. Our cast and crew are distracted by the sight of Keenan Ivory Wayans, the hottie from AMERICAN PIE, and a dozen cute little 17-year old cheerleaders who flounce past our shopping cart.

All afternoon their truck convoy plows through our set. Incredibly frustrated, I sing, “Hooray for Hollywood.” I’m so tense, my stomach’s going to implode. An actor tells me he’s never seen a calmer director.

DAY 8 - Woodlands mental institute

Dear Dad: Today I blew up a puppy with a heat-seeking land mine.

DAY 9 - Woodlands

It’s 3 a.m. and I’m freezing on the lawn of a near-empty mental institute. I blow an hour on a 3-second establishing shot. As penance, I get 15 minutes to shoot a fight sequence that should normally take a day. Paul and Randy pretend to punch the lens. Then we spin the camera around and shoot security guards getting bopped in the face. Add goofy kung-fu swishes, cut to two guards chanting “Fight, fight, fight, fight!” and voilà: instant fight scene. This scene was supposed to parody THE MATRIX but our tight schedule is turning my homages into fromages.

DAY 10 - Studio

Rained out, we move inside to shoot motel scenes, sans wallpaper. It’s 4 a.m. and our generator operator’s snoring ruins two takes. The warehouse is terrible for sound: we stop for sirens, screaming drunks, and rats scuttling in the walls.

DAY 14 - Woodlands

We dress my sister up as a hooker then throw her in front of the camera. She cries. My parents will hate this show. And so will yours.

DAY 18 - Studio

Dear Dad: Today I convinced a top national actor to play a mentally challenged CBC programmer.

DAY 22 - My Bedroom

Somebody wakes me up to apply for a P.A. job on “Skull Buggery”. “Good title,” I mumble then fall back asleep.

DAY 25 - Studio

Last day, last shot. We’re hideously overtime. The special effects guy can’t get the exploding glove to work. I smell pot. Either the wrap party’s started or somebody is stoned. Who’s high? Actor? Crew member? Dion?

“Cut! That’s a wrap.” Rick the Grip whips out a turntable and transforms the set into a rave. A box arrives filled with miniature Comedy Network footballs. Magnificently drunk, Brendan and I run around the dark warehouse, dodging oak beams and chucking footballs at each other’s heads.

Somebody finds Episode 4’s mushroom soup-filled motorcycle helmets. We grab a sledgehammer and smash them to bits, splattering mushroom soup everywhere. I chuckle and stumble home, knowing we have people to clean that up.

DAYS 26-28 - Gastown

Turns out I’m the people to clean that up. After three days of mopping up the warehouse, I have to return 12 sandbags to a building nearby. The bags weigh 200 lbs so I dump them in the shopping cart and head outside.

Steering past rubbies pushing carts filled with beer cans, I bump into an ex-girlfriend who clearly hates my guts. She doesn’t ask how I’m doing, so I blurt, “Guess what? I just directed three episodes for a new Comedy Network series.” She looks at my T-shirt slathered in puke-ish soup, and my bleeding hands clutching a filthy, wobbly shopping cart. She smiles, taps her watch, and hurries off. Hooray for Hollywood North.

-30-

Published: The Vancouver Sun’s MIX, February 5, 2000