The upcoming MST3K Reunion Show (June 28th) was the brainchild of creator Joel Hodgson, who led the most well-received and successful Kickstarter campaign in history to revive Mystery Science Theater in a new season. The new season will feature host Jonah Ray, along with new iterations of riffing robots Tom Servo and Crow T. Robot. Last week host Jonah Ray (The Nerdist podcast) was joined with former stars Trace Beaulieu (Dr. Forrester/ Crow 1.0), Bill Corbett (Crow 2.0/ Observer), and Kevin Murphy (Tom Servo) on an hour-long phone interview where they answered a few questions from several different outlets.
On what makes short, and educational, films so attractive for riffing:
Kevin Murphy: I think I love them because they’re just so – they seem at this point in time to have come from another planet and it’s like Lost or How To Live Your Life that is imposed by creatures from another civilization or another time. So, they also end up sounding very silly and very weird and filled with rules on how you should or should not run your life. And they’re so serious that they’re, like, the perfect straight man for us.
Trace: I like that they’re short.
Bill Corbett: Yeah. That is no small matter to me. I have to say, for someone who has a limited attention span, that is kind of a perfect unit for my wandering mind. Yeah. Kevin’s right. They’re like little archaeological digs to mid-20th Century America, and they are pretty tight-assed. I think they are really micro-managed aspects of life. As well intentioned as they were, they really dig in and they’re fun because exactly that; they’re good fodder because they take themselves seriously.
Trace Beaulieu: And they’re short.
How long Jonah will be host?
Jonah Ray: Until they pry it out of my cold dead hands. I will go until I overstay my welcome and then I’ll stay for as long as I can after that. I can’t imagine – it’s literally the job I wanted when I was a kid. And so, I can’t imagine ever getting sick of it, ever wanting to leave it. The first, like, kind of Hollywoody-type of meeting I had when I started doing comedy was in, like, 2002 or ’03, and they asked me what I wanted to do. And I said I wanted to be the host of Mystery Science Theater. And then, they laughed at me. And then, I said under my breath, “One day,” and, of course, that was to make myself feel better about myself. Because the thrill is gone, so there’s no chance of it ever being back, in my life, and why would I be in a situation where I get to do it? So, yeah, I’ll do it as long as I can.
On the development of the Rifftrax app:
Kevin Murphy: So far, well, from what I’ve heard so far, people love it. The idea that you don’t actually have to, like, rent a DVD anymore and synch up the DVD player that your phone or your tablet will automatically synch the thing up and you can do the same thing in your living room or at your computer or wherever you may have or find the movie. The success of that is something we’ve been hoping for for a long time and the feedback so far has been, “Let’s get this thing out of beta and get it launched so that we can put your whole libraries onto the riffing app.” And, hopefully, it’s going to be soon, because people are very excited about it and we’re trying to get it officially launched as soon as we can. So, I’m saying, “Hang on, folks. Hang on. It’s coming.”
On why Time Chasers is getting the RiffTrax Live treatment:
Bill Corbett: Well, it’s finally an old movie. When we did it, it was just like about two years after they filmed it, which was the weirdest thing, because the previous questioner was right. Like, they got in touch and wanted to hang around. But we’ve gotten a lot of material from David Giancola now for retro-tracks and always had a special fondness in my heart for this one, because it is a weird combination of competence on a bunch of levels and then just utter madness on another few and there’s a lot of room for jokes. So, we do try to do a top to bottom re-write. Like, we don’t look at the old version at all, and then we actually go back and look at it and try to make sure we don’t have anything that’s very similar. Every now and then we’ll make an exception – we’re double-dipping like that. But, like, when we did Titanic, we kept the line of the captain on the deck as it’s pulling out to sea in Liverpool, “I’m going to sink this bitch.” My favorite line of all time. But, yeah, that’s about it. It’s a fun, colorful, easy-to-watch movie, and it’s dopey as heck.
On whether the live shows or recorded riffs are more attractive to perform:
Kevin Murphy: Well, I love them both, but for different reasons. The studio versions that we do are not nearly as terrifying as doing it on stage. And doing the live event like we do, it is live and it’s going out to 600 or 700 theaters in the States alone and 100 or more theaters in Canada, and anything could go wrong and it could go off the rails. And once the film starts, there’s no stopping the train. It’s really a crazy thing. And so, that’s rather terrifying, but at the same time, it’s incredibly energizing and it’s really fun to do what we do on stage. It’s gratification from doing – the interaction with the audience makes it more like a drug than doing it in the studio. And doing it in the studio is like a nice cup of herbal tea; whereas, doing it on stage is like pure black heroin. It’s that much fun.
Bill Corbett: I love the live shows, even aware as I am that they’re actually live live. The first time we did that, that was weird because nothing is live live these days. But I just love it. It’s a chance to kind of come out of the musty stinky studio with the other dudes, and sorry, Kevin. I’ve been meaning to tell you one way or another, so I’m glad it’s out.
Kevin Murphy: Hey. I have to clean my studio.
Bill Corbett: And, yeah, and just interacting. I get really energized by a live audience’s laugher, and it’s really gratifying on probably healthy and unhealthy levels. But that said, I really do love the recording studio, too, even if it is a little stinky, just refining the thing and just hanging out with Mike and Kevin. So, the writing part is the part that we really spend the most time on and it’s pretty painstaking, and I’d say as much as I love it, it’s the least enjoyable, just because it’s a little bit isolated, but that is sort of the reward at the end is recording it and then especially doing it live.
On whether there were shorts or films that were rife for comedy, but potentially offensive or depressing:
Kevin Murphy: Oh, yeah. There are tons of those. There’s a whole realm of mental health ones that we won’t touch, just because they’re just – and either too sad or too weird. But a single audience seem to really said, and there’s a few we’ve run across that are actually they show realistic depictions, or like verity, actual shots of car accidents in order to scare people at driver’s education courses. And that’s kind of hard to make fun of that.
Trace Beaulieu: Yeah.
Kevin Murphy: There’s also one we struggled with…oh boy…this was a tough one, because it was about the darkest of subjects, about child abduction and ultimately a child murder, which is awful. On the other hand, about the first 70 to 80 percent of it was so funny in how badly it was done, and the girls’ mother, who is played by, like, a 75-year-old woman and she’s, like, supposed to be a six-year-old kid. So, right off the bat, that’s good fun. She seems mildly irritated by the whole thing, but not really that upset. Not a very good actress. In the end, we passed on it, but we really struggled with that, because it was funny as hell for a lot of it, and then it just got so heart-wrenchingly ugly that we couldn’t put it out there.
On the reaction of the cast and crew to the overwhelming success of the Kickstarter campaign:
Jonah Ray: They were ecstatic. Let me tell you for them, they couldn’t have been overjoyed more. It was pretty incredible. It was pretty incredible how it was done. I don’t think anybody, myself included, could have imagined that many people getting that riled up. So, yeah, it was pretty crazy.
And here is my complete questioning of the quartet, an event of which found me giddy as all hell:
JL: This is a more general question for Trace and Kevin and Bill. Having been away from the franchise for over a decade and a half, what was it like collaborating with each other once again? And, for Jonah, I’m wondering seeing that you’ve never participated in the previous incarnation and series, do you have any expectations that were met or exceeded? And just, in general, what expectations did all of you have working once again together?
Bill Corbett: It’s going to be rough. I won’t lie to you.
JL: It’s quite all right.
Trace Beaulieu: I don’t think we ever stepped away – we all carried it with us. We all got that DNA on us from the same womb and we’re now carrying it with us into other projects that are all very similar.
Kevin Murphy: It’s true. And it’s funny, when I talked to Trace or Mary Jo or Bridget or Frank or any of the folks involved, there’s a kind of shorthand we have when it comes to actually doing the stuff that we all know. So, I think we haven’t really actually collaborated yet for the show. So, it’s hard to comment. But when we do, I anticipate that it’s going to be kind of easy, because we all know sort of each other beasts and each other’s shorthand.
Bill Corbett: Yeah. So far, we’ve collaborated on a bunch of emails to agree basically.
JL: Got it.
Trace Beaulieu: And I’m looking forward to seeing what Jonah brings to the whole thing. I’m hoping for food.
Kevin Murphy: That would be great. If he can bring some snacks, that would be great.
Jonah Ray: Yeah. I’m going to be Team Mom; that’s the title I’ve given myself.
Trace Beaulieu: Awesome.
Jonah Ray: Some Chee-Tos.
Trace Beaulieu: And Fritos.
Jonah Ray: Yeah. This is all still very surreal to me, even beyond a phone call with these guys that have – especially shaped my sense of humor. I’ve never had so many – I don’t think anyone has had as many surrogate fathers as me from the Midwest. I find myself – the way I joke around my friends and the way I like to write jokes and the comedic stuff I do, it’s all really based off of the rhythm that I learned from watching Mystery Science Theater. So, it’s going to be really exciting and surreal for me. Also, waking up, just to let you know this is an odd thing for these guys. I’m not sure if you know this, but my most watched movie is The Mystery Science Theater for This Island Earth. I had it on VHS and I watched it all the time. And then, it became one of those things where I knew it so well that I could turn it on and then fall asleep to it because I knew it so well. And so, you guys have put me to sleep more times than my mom. And so, to come, to start, and I’ve riffed on movies and stuff before with friends or shows and stuff like that, but the work that goes into it is now, like, I’m more in awe of all the guys, just because it’s such applause. It’s, like, no one ever told me that the idea, like the whole concept of the show is also what you go through while making the show. And so, you’re really just slogging through these cheese balls and I’m really excited that, even just to get to go to the show in Minneapolis, so it’s very exciting.
Trace Beaulieu: I wouldn’t have known that.
JL: I look forward to seeing the show and thank you so much for your time.
Kevin Murphy: Thanks, JL.
Tickets for the Mystery Science Theater 3000 reunion show, on June 28, can be purchased here.