This is a strange case of accidental symmetry. Last year, when we made six shorts in six months (as part of Group101), we made a five-minute short called Nonhuman Resources. It starred Stephen Brophy, Jenna Fischer, and Rachel Kann. It was a documentary-style comedy about Grimm Brothers, a corporation that places storybook characters (witches, elves, fairies, the three little pigs) in appropriate jobs. I hadn't yet seen the BBC's The Office (though I had heard about it and it sounded great), but my impression was that we were doing something similar. In our short, the jokes were played very, very realistically, and the acting was really incredible. Afterward, I watched The Office and completely loved it. What we did with Nonhuman Resources was, indeed, very similar to the BBC's The Office.
NBC was going to remake The Office (set in America), and Jenna had auditioned for it. She actually got the call while we were shooting that yes, she was probably going to get a "series regular" role on NBC's remake. Now it's official. NBC's The Office premieres this month, and Jenna Fisher is a regular cast member, alongside Steve Carrell (Anchorman, The Daily Show) and Rainn Wilson (he was the amazing Arthur on Six Feet Under). Jenna also shot an upcoming Six Feet Under episode. Hopefully, Nonhuman Resources will start showing up at festivals this summer or fall. Or I may break down and just post it here much sooner than that. Not sure.
As for The Black Lodge, a few promising things have not materialized and now there's little chance we'll shoot the feature in Texas this summer. I may actually shoot a horror short in California (as a way to keep away the Non-Shootin' Blues) instead. I've made two horror shorts so far, but both were made quickly and sloppily, and neither one is especially good. Group101 is a great learning tool, but I found that most of my output from that hectic program is more valuable to me as a lesson than as a finished work. It could really help The Black Lodge move forward faster if I had a concrete (and directly-related) example of what kind of movie it's going to be. I haven't decided much about the short so far -- other than the fact that I need and want to do it -- so I'll have to post here again once the details are a little more solid.
