Episode six, “Commentary”, is the start of a theme in Franks and Beans that I love but perhaps no one else does. This is evident by the fact that “Commentary” and similar episodes (such as “Mailbag/Bloopers”) are viewed only half as much as episodes uploaded in a similar timeframe. Does this mean that we’ll stop making episodes like these? NEVER! Does this mean you’ll have to deal with it again and again? We’ll, kind of, but not as much as you, our faithful viewing audience, apparently fears. Let me explain.
Franks and Beans follows a very loose set of rules. The show is loyal to the joke above all else, but beyond that there are only a few simple themes that we try to keep in place. The show has continuity – not a very strong sense of it, but it is there. It deals with Larry and me in a very “third person” kind of way, in that we both inhabit our own “universe” when the camera is rolling, where characters can return and leave between episodes and there is some notion of the passing of time.
When we break the “fourth wall,” then, is in episodes where we talk directly to the camera, such as in “Commentary”. Because I don’t want this style of episode leaking over into the “real” Franks and Beans universe, and because I don’t want to bore everyone with every single episode, I made the unbreakable rule that Larry and I must create five “regular” episodes for every one that plays out like episode six.
This has become more difficult to keep with than I had anticipated, but we’re sticking to it because of our strong moral upbringings.
The idea behind this episode came from the many DVDs I’ve bought. I admit that I’m something of a sucker for bonus features on movies and TV shows; I’ll watch featurettes and listen to episode commentaries even if they are boring or have nothing to say. Maybe I’m trying to get my money’s worth, I don’t know. One thing that always catches me by surprise, though, is when actors providing commentary are so obviously completely different than the characters they portray. This should seem apparent because this is what actors do…they create an illusion and memorize scripts they had no hand in writing. Of course Nathan Fillion will be different than Mal Reynolds. Of course the cast of Entourage won’t be as cool as they are when the cameras are rolling. But I still get caught off guard when something like this happens.
Larry and I tried to create something like this in “Commentary,” and because we didn’t do any actual speaking (other than a quick introduction and conclusion), and because you had to actually see us during the entire episode, we had to get that across in the way we looked. All Larry had to do to change his entire appearance was pull his hair back in a ponytail – which worked better than I could have ever imagined. When one sees Larry with a ponytail, the obvious question of why he doesn’t do that all the time is raised, because he instantly becomes more intimidating. Larry’s answers to this have all been shallow and unsatisfactory, so we may never know for real. My own looks were altered with two methods: the first was a turtleneck sweater, the second was a beard. The turtleneck, I think, makes me look oddly intellectual, but the beard just looks awesome. I had been growing it for episode seven, “Mustache”, but it served a great purpose here.
The difficulty in editing this episode is in the double shot we employ for most of the running time. Because of Funny of Die’s size restrictions on files, Larry had to cut down on the picture quality more than he would have for other episodes, as playing the “High School” episode on top of the screen took up more space than either of us had anticipated. There’s not much we can do to prevent this, except maybe lobby FoD for more space, but that might be like looking a gift horse in the mouth. Still, Larry did a great job with the overlap.
The sheer length of this episode is probably to its detriment, but commenting on any episode other than the first just didn’t make a lot of sense to us. This is not saying that four and a half minutes is a long time, but when the two of us say absolutely nothing for three and a half of those, it does tend to run on. Even so, I really do hope that people got the joke – the episode is titled “Commentary”, the whole point of the episode is for us to comment, we SAY that we’re going to discuss it, but in the end we don’t say a thing. Not one word while the episode is playing. There’s something – at least to me – inherently funny about that, and if you look up the definition of irony in the dictionary, well, we followed it pretty closely (as opposed to that Alanis Morissette song…which doesn’t).
So, like it or hate it, this episode remains a part of Franks and Beans. I, for one, like it, and that’s why we’ve got episode twelve, “Mailbag/Bloopers” and why episode eighteen will again follow in this direction. It’s already written, as a matter of fact! Be afraid.
That about wraps this session up…episode five, “Grapes”, is next as we continue our trek back in time toward episode one. See you then!
- Jeff M.
P.S. Go see “The Dark Knight”. Do it.
Mustaches. You never can trust ‘em, and that’s the subject of this entry’s look back at our illustrious seventh episode, titled…well, “Mustache.”
There are flaws to this episode, and I know it. But the underlying hilarity of mustaches was just too much for me to pass up, and I’m glad that Franks and Beans was able to cover this controversial subject with tact and tasteful detachment. Or whatever.
The joke behind this episode stems from my theory about men who have mustaches – but only have mustaches: no beard, no muttonchops, no deluxe van dyke – just mustaches. To test out this theory of mine, go ahead and turn on the news. It doesn’t matter which channel, just find a devoted news program and watch until the inevitable piece on child molestation sees the air. Note the particular features of the perpetrator, keeping in mind that this is almost always a “he.” Does this criminal have any distinguishing characteristics? Any…facial hair? Like a mustache? Of course he does. That’s because while not every man who only wears a mustache is a child molester, every child molester wears only a mustache. It’s like that whole square-rectangle rule, and it is 100 percent accurate. It is! I mean it.
Regardless of my libelous allegations, the mustache-only look just has something creepy about it, like someone is trying a little too hard to either A) catch some soup from falling out of his mouth, or B) look like a porn star straight out of the 1970s. And in either case, you don’t want this guy to be shoveling out your popcorn at the movie theater. Have you seen Jason Giambi’s new ‘stache? I rest my case.
Because of my feelings on this subject, I naturally didn’t want to have to walk around for two weeks trying to grow my own version of Dr. Strange’s mustache (look it up) for what would amount to a two-minute episode, no matter how funny the end product would be. Thankfully, being lazy has many benefits, one of which being a wonderful-looking beard every now and then. And since Larry and I were going for different looks in the previous episode (“Commentary”), which was filmed on the same day, I had the perfect hiding place for the mustache you see in this episode.
Obviously, to pull this stunt off, we filmed this episode back to front – that is, I shaved to the point where all I had was a mustache, filmed the ending “Hey mustache buddy!” scenes, and then shaved the rest of my face and filmed the first kitchen scene. It’s an easy trick that I’m sure everyone picked up on.
I am the type of filmmaker who loves opening a scene with an extreme close up (you’ll notice that the episode “Grapes” has a similar opening). Larry is the type of filmmaker who likes to incorporate his ravenous appetite into anything he can think of, and so our opening shot was born. Oddly enough, we had trouble getting it exactly how we wanted it, and by the time we figured out the best angle on which to shoot, Larry had taken his tiny tomatoes to the other side of this sink. Because of this, he’s seen picking up his snack with one hand in the first shot, but when we cut to the second shot he’s holding it with the opposite hand. I reconcile this gaffe by thinking that he somehow flipped the tomato from one hand to the other in the picosecond it took to go from an extreme close up to the medium/wide shot of the two of us. If anyone else can come up with a better excuse (THAT FITS IN CONTINUTIY!), I’m open to hearing it.
The tomatoes, by the way, were stuffed with some kind of (I think) tuna mix. Or was it crab? Either way, it was delicious.
I am a big fan of Michael Cera and pretty much anything he does. I first saw him on Arrested Development and couldn’t get over how this kid who’s eight years younger than me could be so funny, and he hasn’t disappointed me since, from SuperBad to Juno to some of the videos he has uploaded to this random website called Funny or Die. So I’m doing my best to channel his nonchalant, whimsical attitude in this opening “Did you ever think about growing a mustache?” scene.
I tried to go back to that awkward time in high school when the prospect of growing facial hair was seen as a way to solve all of your problems. If I could only find a way to separate myself from the rest of this pack of losers, you’d think, I could finally stand out to that girl in the back with the huge breasts and I’d be HOME FREE! Ah, youth. What if you took that 15- or 16-year-old version of yourself and took him ten years into the future – what would he think was cool? Well, waking up with the scratchy stubble of a beard would probably be on that list.
Larry deserves a lot of credit for editing the next scene together, if for nothing else than in meshing the mustache close up in with the rest of the mix. I don’t know if anyone else picked up on this, but he’s using the audio from one take and overlapping it onto another, and I think it is all quite seamless.
The beginning of the second scene is the payoff, the funniest part and probably where we should have stopped. The mustache itself fills our quotient for physical comedy, and we throw in the tossing of the stack of papers (which were actually finals for my Communications 101 course that I had been avoiding grading to that point) for good measure.
To drive the point home, we have our first appearance of the character known as “Larry’s Mom,” who must be deaf if she didn’t hear me screaming the phrase “I look like a child molester!” just seconds before. I had originally intended to have someone come in the door from outside – to presumably help people understand that this person would not have heard my earlier rant – but instead we have someone walking in from around the corner. Why? I’m not sure, I think it’s just because she didn’t want to go outside (I’m pretty sure it was raining or had just stopped), and when it comes down to it, sometimes you just have to give in to an actor’s demands. We were running short on available extras that day, anyway, heh.
So in the end, this was not a perfect episode, if there even is such a thing, and much of that blame lies with me. But it was a good episode with a funny premise, and it’s something that I think we built upon in later episodes. It’s good to see progress, and there is some here.
If nothing else, the “No!” ending with this episode is one of my favorite variations and also one of the simplest…maybe because it’s one of the simplest. I was hoping for an even more drawn out display by Larry, but you’ll notice that he runs out of steam with about a second left to go, which, in and of itself, is also pretty funny.
Since we’re continuing our backwards path, next week we’ll talk about episode six, “Commentary.” That polarizing bastard.
See you then!
- Jeff M.
While Franks and Beans takes a little break from production (WE’RE ONLY HUMAN!!), there’re still episodes to discuss, so while we labor thorough this little hiatus, the blogs will continue and give some insights on the production of the show. Since we started these entries with episode nine, we’ll work our way back to the beginning. Episode nine, “You’ll Never See It Coming,” is simple in its own right but deals with what I think is one of the most important aspects of comedy – timing. I know I’ve talked about this before, but I can’t stress it enough. Telling a joke – even the simple act of punching someone in the stomach – is worthless if the timing is off, which is why I stress it so much. The semi-long pause to begin the episode and the snap-quick cut at the end are both examples of what I think are crucial to the timing process. Nothing’s happening, nothing’s happening, and then – boom! – the joke is told and finished without anything left lingering. True, it’s just my interpretation of it, but I think it’s something that works. I wanted to call this episode “The Punch,” but Larry (and everyone else I talked to, for that matter) didn’t want to give the ending away, which in hindsight was the only way to play this. By calling this episode “You’ll Never See It Coming” you still expect to see something, but just what that something is is still a mystery up until the last second. Our fake preview for some phantom “next time” finally begins to noticeably break out of its familiar role with this episode (though episode eight’s ending is still one of my favorites), as the joke is maybe a little obvious, but still pretty fun. There are a number of variations of the joke where a man denies his dyslexia by saying “on!”, and this is just another of those, but just to make it completely obvious as to what we were doing, we put the title phrase backwards as well. The best part about this particular sequence, which I think some people might miss, is the fact that Larry actually walks back through the doorway and shuts the door behind him. Again, it’s the timing that makes it work. Even though this episode registers under a minute in length, a number of people have commented that “You’ll Never See It Coming” is their favorite, or at least it was up until the point where it was the most recent episode on the block. This follows a similar theme with “The Gift” where the humor was almost entirely physical. It also follows the theme where I feel bad because some of the better dialogue-based jokes go under the radar. But those are the sacrifices we make, I suppose. One thing that a break affords is more time to think and write, and even though the act of creation lends itself to more creation (I thought we were really hitting our stride with episodes 12 and 13), the time away can be a good thing. Episodes 14 and 18 are already written, with episodes 15 and 16 in the planning stages. As to what happened to episode 17, well, this is how internet rumors start. See you next time when we continue to travel back in time and discuss episode eight, “Mustache”! - Jeff M.
It’s said that necessity is the mother of invention, and newly uploaded episode 13, “iChat”, bears that out. This latest collaboration between Larry and myself came about due to the unavoidable circumstance of our distance apart from each other. But don’t cry for us, faithful viewer – we get by just fine.
I am currently living in the wonderfully congested city of Wilmington, North Carolina (look me up sometime) while Larry hides out in Somewhere, Pennsylvania, which puts us roughly 600 miles apart. We film our episodes on my sporadic visits, usually cramming in as much camera time as we can stand before eventually strangling each other. After episode 12, though, the well was dry and another trip to lovely PA won’t happen for at least another week or so.
As I am now the happy owner of a brand new MacBook, complete with the iChat application, and as the character known as “Larry’s Mom” has a similar model, we knew that we had the possibility for a long-distance episode.
Larry did a tremendous job, I think, of hiding the camera in this shoot. Because don’t let his fancy disguising techniques fool you – we didn’t magically record the computer images on the new program iRecordmycomputerscreen. No, the angle is just right to capture the action without the pesky camera sitting behind Larry’s shoulder or anything like that. So kudos go out to Larry for his work here.
The episode starts out innocently enough – I once again admit my apparent ignorance of technology, in which I must disclose that here I channel a little of my dad’s prevailing sentiments. “Why would anyone want to use something like this?!” It’s an honest question, I suppose, but I imagine that many technological programs that are used today, at least the ones used primarily for communication, are their own answer. You use them because you want to use them. But I digress. For whatever reason, my character is growing into one with an unavoidable fear of technology, and I accept that.
Larry and I filmed a good number of takes with this episode. Most often we’d have to stop because unlike some other episodes, “iChat” is really just the one shot and takes several minutes to get through. I’d usually get tripped up on a word or forget what to say and fall back into my regular routine of laughing at my own jokes – and we can’t have that here. But every time someone would screw up, the next take would get longer, incorporating something from the previous take that worked and/or was funny. Larry’s out-of-the-blue “So, they’re prosecuting tomorrow” is genius and every bit unintentional. It started out as “So, I’m getting a hysterectomy tomorrow” and worked its way to the more acceptable.
Another pat in the back goes out to Larry for his job in editing in that pesky black censorship bar. No matter how much I embarrass myself with these episodes, broadcast online for the whole world to see, I don’t want to show up naked on the Internet. I just don’t. And even though everyone else would probably like to, it’s just not going to happen. At any rate, this is just another example of how censorship can actually be funnier than if I had been shown free swinging on camera for all to see. If that were the case, the shock value would have been there, but that would have overshadowed anything else in the episode. With that saintly black bar, we still maintain some façade of humility while letting the overall joke – “Jeff’s taken his pants off!” – slip through.
Our ending scene, the familiar “No!” that accompanies every episode in some way or another, was also a difficulty considering the distance between Larry and myself. We discussed a number of different ideas, many of which will be kept and used later, but it seemed that every one involved me intervening in some foolish way. We ended our conversation without reaching any conclusions, but then, late at night as I hung on the edge of sleep, I said to myself, ‘say it in Spanish.’ And thus this ending was born.
I’d like to point out that I don’t speak Spanish, nor do I know any second language well enough to use it in any meaningful way. So take that into consideration when watching my butchery in interpreting “Next time on Franks and Beans.” It’s interesting when I think about the programs being implemented in schools today, focusing on teaching a second language early on. In forty years, when both Larry and I will be pushing seventy, I imagine that my monolingualism will be a source of ridicule and probably rightfully so. Of course, I could take the initiative and learn a second language any time I’d like, but…maybe tomorrow.
You’ll notice that Larry’s sombrero is teetering carefully on top of his head in this cut. This is, I’ve been promised, not because Larry’s head is so big (though it is), but because this hastily borrowed sombrero was much too tiny. But Larry does a good enough job of pulling it off, big head and all.
With this episode, we’ve officially come to the end of our backlog of completed features. It is a shame, because we’ve been having so much fun these past few weeks with the continuous stream of new material. There may be a lull, but Franks and Beans is far from gone. My hope is that filming of new episodes will take place in as little as two weeks, and July will bring that elusive 14th episode and beyond.
In the meantime, thank you to everyone who has taken their time to watch our stupid little internet show, and a special thanks to anyone who has taken extra time to comment and give feedback, which is what we thrive on. Well, that and sandwiches. Mmm.
See you in a few weeks!
- Jeff M.
Back when Larry and I made the much-underappreciated “Commentary” episode, I decided to limit the number of episodes where we’d speak directly to the camera/viewers. The idea was that Franks and Beans primarily derived its humor from interaction between Larry and me, and any derivation from that deviated from its core concept. The self-imposed rule, then, was that I had to create at least five ‘regular’ episodes before going back to the well for one that featured some sort of audience interaction.
This was a difficult rule to follow, as it turned out, because I had the idea for the newly uploaded “Mail Bag/Bloopers” stewing for a long time. Now that I see it edited and on the screen, I’m really pleased with the end product.
You’ll notice that Larry’s hair is once again pulled back in a ponytail, his signature look for these ‘extra feature’ type episodes. To be honest, I’m a big fan of Larry’s ponytail look. It’s somewhat intimidating and makes him look like a professional wrestler, which for a bachelor are not bad things. Since I didn’t plan ahead to grow a beard again (it worked on “Commentary” because I was preparing for the episode “Mustache”), my trusty Pirate hat made its second appearance, although now that I rewatch the film, it’s apparent that I don’t put my hat on straight when I wear it. I’ll keep this in mind for future life events.
Our bookend scenes are rather boring to look at, even though they serve their purposes – it’s just the two of us sitting on stools. If anyone really wants to know, I decided on the Ft. Wayne, Indiana location because I had just watched Planet of the Apes for maybe the tenth time, and as any fan of the original (not that terrible remake) knows, Taylor’s home city was none other than Ft. Wayne. But if there are any viewers out there named Josh from the same general area, then hey, we chose it entirely because of you. Isn’t that great?
The real action takes place in our so-called “blooper,” which turned out better than I originally imagined. Okay, that’s not entirely true. When I envision skits or certain takes, I always imagine them with incredible effects and true-to-life visuals. For instance, if I would write something where Larry would mysteriously fly across the room, I imagine him doing just that with cinematic realism. Since we have a production budget of exactly zero (although sometimes Larry does make sandwiches), I try to keep the big special effect-type shot out of our show, but I hope you do understand what I’m trying to say when I claim pleasant surprise with this particular scene.
Not that anyone can’t figure this out by just watching the scene and applying common sense, but Larry and his prized Jeep are backing over one of those cement beams they have in most parking lots, not actually maiming me in some horrible fashion. We shot this scene in a lot of one of the local colleges, and by this time the semester had ended so we were mostly unimpeded in our progress. We did need to work on our timing, though, and on one take I did just manage to skip out of the way before Larry truly ran me over. My hand on the back of the Jeep was a fortunate break for us, as it came at just the right time and got across the idea that I was being gruesomely mangled under the wheels of my best friend’s car. Hilarity!
Also, when I am in supposed terrible pain and Larry is panicking in a ‘what have I done’ moment, you can hear Larry’s best impression of Kermit the Frog. Way to go, Muppet Larry.
In retrospect, this might be my favorite episode of the whole bunch, which will make it even more difficult to follow my five-to-one rule. I do also have to point out that both Larry and I seem to do a better job when at least one of our characters is angry at the other, which, again, I’m not sure what to make of something like that. Maybe we would work better in real life if we punched each other every so often. It’s worth a try.
It’s a filming day today, so expect the mysteriously titled “episode 13” to air early next week. See you then!
- Jeff M.
Why is episode 11, “Message Board”, so much longer than any of our previous Franks and Beans offerings? Perhaps it is because both Larry and I now love you THAT MUCH MORE…but then again, it could be because of our new approach to scripting. As I mentioned previously, we’ve both found it a lot easier to work from a much looser script, and hopefully the difference shows in this and subsequent episodes. Speaking for myself, it’s a much more natural process, and although there are some hiccups involved (Larry says “You’ve got to get some bed”; I use “logo” instead of “lingo” and I say “um” WAY too much), I think that the payoff shows up in the overall flow of the episode.
Naturally, we are getting our inspiration for this episode from real life, from which all humor springs. I find it particularly hilarious that we’ve taken a technological advance such as the internet – one that could literally serve as a means to unite all of humanity in the bonds of friendship and love – and we use it for porn and to yell at each other about last night’s episode of “Dancing with the Stars.” I mean, the porn I get…but message boards? Holy crap, shouldn’t we be beyond that?
This is not to say that I am above any of this nonsense, as I enjoy reading about things like Spider-Man’s dissolved marriage and the Pirates’ continual misery from my fellow fan and as such, some of the topics we lampoon in this episode come from actual conversations found on online message boards. Let’s take a walk through, shall we?
When Larry and I begin our first internet-related conversation (right after the very funny second appearance of the character we like to call…Larry’s Mom), the message board you see on the computer screen is none other than our very own Funny or Die message board, opened to a random page that had a good number of replies. The idea of a “welcome to the internet!” topic is culled from any number of similar sources, and are, in my opinion, a good way to size up your electronic opponents on a given board.
We then move on to our sports conversation. The gist of the rant I talk about comes from an amalgamation of two messages from the ever-popular Pittsburgh Steelers message board. I love the Steelers, Larry loves the Steelers, and you, discerning reader, love the Steelers as well, but apparently affection doesn’t stop one from blowing things way out of proportion when it comes to such a topic. The Steelers drafted an injured quarterback in the 5th round, which caused some debate to begin with, but when you mix in the possibility that this player might be considered for some “trick” plays, a la Kordell “Slash” Stewart of ten years ago, and people lose their minds. I improvised the rebuttal with the “you have a disease that makes you pee in your pants” line, and I am particularly proud of it.
The idea of a Captain America movie apparently gives people fits. I understand that the United States is not the most popular country on the international stage at the moment, regardless of whether that notion is deserved or not. But wow, the boards over at newsarama.com explode every time the whereabouts of such a film is discussed. The tragic part about all of this is that with this topic we’re given such an opportunity to open an actual dialogue on America’s electronic image, but instead we say things like what I mention in this episode. I suppose that tragedy can be funny at times, too.
Without a doubt the best part about internet slap fights is when someone challenges someone else to a physical fight beyond the boundaries of their keyboards. It’s like, yeah, fella…I’m going to take a plane to Arizona just so I can beat you senseless. Such brave words; I can just imagine people tearing their hair out over some witless fool’s egregious comments about their collective mothers.
In short, what (hopefully) makes this episode succeed is our ability to relate to it. Everyone knows what I’m talking about…and if you don’t, feel free to leave scathing comments right here at the bottom. I’ll be sure to send you my address so I can knock your brains out…and the brains of your mom, too. Ha!
See you next time for episode 12: “Mail Bag/Bloopers”!
- Jeff M.
