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The Film Crew: Mike Nelson Interview
We sit down with the former MST3K alum to talk comedic commentaries!
by Christopher Monfette
July 10, 2007 - You may remember Mike Nelson as the lone human on the oft-celebrated, cult television show Mystery Science Theatre 3000, mercilessly mocking decades-old b-movies that, in truth, deserve to be mercilessly mocked. The VHS-era progenitor of what would eventually become the DVD commentary, Nelson was joined by a pair of misfit robots - Tom Servo and Crow - voiced by Bill Corbett and Kevin Murphy, respectively - and the trio reveled in several seasons' worth of camp cinema, providing a steady stream of non-stop sarcasm and equally endless laughs.
So when the phone rings and the cheerful voice on the other end says, "Hey, it's Mike Nelson," any film-geek worth his or her salt is bound to get a little excited.
Discussing the group's latest project - The Film Crew - a direct-to-DVD series of films in the MST3K commentary tradition, Nelson explains the origin behind the crew's odd cinematic selections.
"It's a kind of archeology," he says. "You start with a baseline of finding films that nobody is really going to care about; asking which of these would be fun to bring to people. There has to be some element of goofiness to the project…something that people haven't seen before. And, of course, you have to be able to get - and keep - the rights. Fortunately for us, nobody quite makes films like these anymore."
The process for vetting a film for its inevitable verbal castration is more intense than one might initially imagine. The crew gives the chosen film a single pass, going through once to make sure that the movie will provide them with the appropriate amount of material. A few additional passes and the writing begins - and if you find yourself confused, assuming that the comedic commentaries were free-form, you'd be wrong.
"You have to figure out, quite precisely, that a joke needs to go here, or there," explains Nelson. "It takes time to figure of if something will even fit. It's all a bit meticulous, but you also have to make it sound as if it's not worked on over and over. Believe me, it takes a lot of effort to make it sound effortless."
There is improvisation, however, so purists needn't worry, but when the audio is rolling and it's do-or-die, the improv is less for the audience and more for each other.
Nelson laughs. "The improvisation, frankly, tends to be an attempt to get the other guys to screw up, or saying something a little different to catch somebody off-guard. It's not so much free-form, but more in the performance. An attempt to keep things fresh."
Having pioneered the concept of audio commentary in a time before the advent of DVD, Nelson pauses a moment to consider if he even has a personal philosophy on the subject of modern audio tracks.
"I don't know that I've ever hung in for a whole one," he admits. "Not being boring is really tough. People think they're going to sit down and watch it in real time and be interesting, but that's difficult to sustain for two hours or more. Of those that I've heard that are any good, they tend to be more edited and produced, which most people don't want to take the time to do.
"I think that all films have some element that could be exploited," says Nelson, musing over a selection of more modern films. "But so few movies bring all of those key elements together. There are a few, I think. The Star Trek and Star Wars films. There's such a love/hate with those movies and people tend to enjoy when we rag on the bad ones and do a kind of meta-commentary on the good ones."
But does Nelson - having seen hundreds of b-movies spanning dozens of genres - have a favorite kind of film on which to pile his particular brand of snark?
"Honestly, I really love the formula of 80's movies. It was just a time when they made almost-perfect films," he says with a chuckle. "They made them the right length - about 90 minutes - and they didn't punish you any longer than necessarily. And they always took care to include some good Kenny Loggins music, which was nice. But mostly, we turn to movies of the 50's and 60's because they just don't look right to our eyes anymore."
He stops for a moment to consider the most memorable of the all the films. "We did one for MST3K called The Girl in Gold Boots that was a bizarre genre film that moved along nicely and had some incredibly goofy characters. And one for the Shout Factory coming up called The Wild Women of Wongo - a strange fable about two warring cavemen. A strange film with even stranger narration. I liked that one quite a bit."
As our time begins to wind down, the inevitable questions of a return to television arises and Nelson, who seems perfectly comfortable with his current gig, seems dismissive of the idea.
"I can't imagine that anyone would want us back on TV," he replies. "It seems like television has changed so much in the era of reality TV. I wouldn't mind doing it, of course, but it's just that with the internet and DVD, being able to reach the people who want this kind of thing directly seems to be working perfectly well for me."
And with the The Film Crew prepping three more releases in the upcoming months, there's plenty more from the MST3K guys on the horizon.
"There's a ton more movies out there," says Nelson excitedly, "so we keep can keep turning these out for forever and ever."
One hopes that they do.
EDIT: Oh, and since the interview doesn't really explain the premise too well, here's a snip from the
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In ten seasons and one feature film Mystery Science Theater 3000 skewered over two hundred of the worlds worst movies, shorts and educational films from 1988 to 1999 before being canceled for the second and final time. MST3k fans launched petitions, websites and even bought a full page ad in the Hollywood Reporter in hopes of resurrecting the show on another network, a strategy that had worked previously when the show moved to the Sci-Fi channel in 1997, but to no avail. Rhino Home Video has been releasing the back catalogue of MST3k in DVD box sets for some time now, but with only 51 episodes out of 199 released (and some already out of print) there's still a sizable hole to be filled in the marketplace for MST3k-like content. Enter The Film Crew, a new straight to DVD project from Shout! Factory and Mystery Science Theater 3000's three main stars; MST3k head writer and former host Michael J. Nelson, Tom Servo himself Bill Corbett and Kevin Murphy who took over the voice of Crow during the show's Sci-Fi years.
The basic framework of The Film Crew is simple enough; three average men have been hired by media mogul Bob Honcho and given the task of recording a commentary track for every film ever made. Naturally it's a conceit to get Mike, Kevin and Bill back to doing what they do best; tearing the film industry's lesser children to ribbons. The structure of each Film Crew release is similar to MST3k in most respects, the only main difference is the lack of commercial breaks and less interstitial sketches - which most MST3k fans never considered to be that essential anyhow. The films are divided in two sections by a "lunch break" sketch which the guys sit around, you guessed it, the lunch table. The main difference of The Film Crew is the lack of the signature character silhouettes at the bottom of the screen while the movie plays, not a huge loss overall but it does mean that they can no longer interact with the on-screen action when the verbal jokes run thin.
