Witness… The Double Trouble

My first stab at writing this entry was not good. It branched off into the nature of criticism vs. judgement and overall turned into a defense for my ACAB stance, which, frankly, I don’t think needs a defense as it’s pretty self-explanatory. Despite some anecdotes detailing my internet arguments against both a misogynist Oscar-prognosticator who continuously insulted Diablo Cody for her past work as an exotic dancer and a pair of rampant Malcolm McDowell fans who took issue with me even questioning why such a renowned actor would sully his career by appearing in a straight-to-DVD Home Alone sequel, as well as an unnecessary jab at the woefully miscast Timothee Chalament in Wonka (which I guess can be considered a mini-jab right there), six paragraphs before even talking about the goddamn episode I was supposed to be talking about felt like a bit much. So, we’re starting over!

In short, one of my goals for this episode was to not continue a trend of writing cops as good guys. Sure, Detectives Crane and Rodman are our heroes, but by the end I feel like neither of them has a long future in law enforcement thanks to moral qualms (Crane) and an undiagnosed personality disorder that disqualifies any participation as a police officer (Rodman). But as this was the second episode in this series where police were the front and center characters, I wanted to be sure that all the problems with policing were front and center as well, or at least visible under the surface. Hence, the whole duality theme. And that’s all I’ll say on the matter.

One of the other goals for this episode was to get Annie MacMullan and Jeff Walsh in a room together to take advantage of their undeniable comedic chemistry. Both Annie and Jeff were teammates on The Confessional, an Endgames Improv show which takes inspiration from the confessions and dirty, little secrets of audience members (the ones they’re willing to share, anyway; nobody’s confessed to murder yet, thank goodness). When Endgames came back from Covid lockdown, those who were on house teams before the pandemic were kind of mish-mashed into two teams that would perform The Confessional in an alternating fashion. I was tapped to be the coach for both these teams, and Annie and Jeff wound up on one together. I forget if they really knew each other at all before this show assignment, but one thing became clear as the rehearsals and performances went on: they were hilarious together. And I needed to snatch them up for an episode.

Initially, the writing process proved rather difficult. I went into the first draft truly knowing where the story would go, except that it would probably end with one of those cliche “It’s me! No, it’s me, they’re the imposter!” scenarios because, well, isn’t that how all twin/clone/doppelgänger stories conclude? Sure enough, that draft did end with two of the Fazio triplets trying to convince Crane they were her true lieutenant, and Crane just fed up with the whole ordeal and quitting right there on the spot, talking about opening up a bakery as her next profession. Some of those ideas transferred over to the final product, as I’m sure you heard, but overall, I decided not to use that cliche because, well, it’s been done, and the story, as it shaped itself in subsequent drafts, didn’t really call for it anymore. Plus, I did a sort of version of that already in Season 1’s “The Eurydice Rescue,” and I hate to repeat myself (but acknowledge I do it often).

What really tripped me up was trying to pin down what Crane’s and Rodman’s respective motivations were, since there are essentially two versions of them walking around in the story. Why would a volatile detective try so hard to come off as polite and respectful to a suspect? And why would a meek wimp go way overboard when trying to play the agressor? Obviously, the whole “good cop/bad cop” dynamic involves role play and pretending to be something you’re not (that’s how it is in the movies and Law & Order, at least), but I still needed it to be something more. I needed motivations that really spoke to the core of who these people were.

So a lot of starting and stopping occurred until I finally just sat down at my laptop, opened up my show bible Google doc and stream-of-consciousness wrote out what I was looking for and what was holding me back.

Twelve more paragraphs follow these.

I also originally wrote it in 12 point font, but made it smaller after the episode was done so I could easily breeze past it. Or something.

And then, like so much development in writing, I realized I was overcomplicating things and decided the good cop/bad cop play-acting was all I really needed. After all, it was just going to be a 45+ minute episode! I needed to calm the fuck down!

The lovely Dylan Garcia (Adrian and Augusten Velko/producer)

Recording took place during an evening in early June, 2023 at Dylan Garcia’s place. Since he was pulling double-duty (appropriately so?) as producer and performer, playing both Velko brothers (so would that mean triple-duty?), we only awaited the arrival of Annie, Jeff and Alana Kern, who would be playing Lt. Fazio. However, as I would discover with a subsequent recording, the Google calendar invites I send out can sometimes be misleading or hard to decipher. Google seems to set on having people use Meet that they include a giant link in the invite, even when a physical address is added as the location of the event, which is relegated to tiny, easily missable font. Suffice to say, Annie did not realize the recording would be happening in person (so much for getting her and Jeff in the same room). She also lives far from the Bay Area, so it likely would have been a hassle to make it to Dylan’s anyway, so she made the right choice. Still, what followed was a good twenty minutes or so trying to expertly figured out how we could incorporate Annie on Zoom so she could see the other actors, while making sure they could also hear her, while also making sure that her audio didn’t bleed into the others’ or echo annoyingly due to multiple sources. Long story short, we figured it out.

Clockwise from left: Alana Kern (Fazio), Jeff Walsh (Rodman), me, Annie MacMullan (Crane).

No idea why I appear so angry in this photo.

While I like my performers to adhere to the scripts as best they can, I do allow room for improvisation. After all, they, like myself, are improvisers, so what fun would it be to hold them back? However, a lot of those moments for improvisation usually come during the pick-ups, which happen after the initial read through. And, more often than not, those improvised moments tend to be just making my friends make weird fucking noises into their microphones, much to my amusement and great shame. Whatever the thing I’m looking for, they sometimes wind up with amazing gems, such as the outtake used as the coda for this episode featuring Jeff’s various battle cries, or this one, with Jeff getting more takes of his attempts at a British accent:

Now, finally, eight months later, the episode is available for public consumption. I don’t have any real final words to end this entry (I could say ACAB again), except maybe, the next time you look in the mirror, ask yourself: am I me? Or am I pretending to be me? I’ll do the same thing, only I’ll ask: am I pretentious? And how pretentious am I?

*ponders incessantly*

—Andy