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By
Suzanne
Interview with the writers and
producers of "Fringe" on FOX November 18th, 2009
I love this show. It is really
great. It is similar to the older FOX show "X-Files", yet way
better. It was created by J.J. Abrams, who also did "Alias"
and "Lost". I was not able to participate in
this call, but I am posting it here for your enjoyment. I know you will
love it!
SPEAKERS
Josh Governale
Jeff Pinkner
Joel Wyman
PRESENTATION
Moderator: Ladies and gentlemen, thank you for standing by and welcome to
The Fringe conference call. At this time all lines are in a listen-only
mode. Later, there will be a question and answer session and
instructions will be given at that time. As a reminder, today's call is
being recorded. At this time, I'd like to turn the conference over
to Josh Governale. Please go ahead, sir.
J. Governale: Thank you, Ken. Good afternoon, everyone, and thank you for
your time. As a reminder, tomorrow night is a special Observer episode
of Fringe, titled August, airing at 9:00 on Fox. Without further delay,
I'd like to turn the call over for questions and answers to Fringe
Executive Producers and Show Runners, Jeff Pinkner and Joel Wyman. Thank
you very much.
Moderator: Great, thank you. Our first question comes from the line of
Joshua Maloney with Niagara Frontier Publications, please go ahead.
J. Maloni: Hey, guys, thanks for your time today.
J. Wyman: Thank you.
J. Maloni: The show is really terrific. It's definitely one of my
favorites.
J. Wyman: Thanks.
J. Maloni: In the season finale, the Peter storyline, obviously it's kind
of a large bombshell, it's kind of been on the back burner though a
little bit his season. When can we expect to have that revisited?
J. Wyman: This is Joel Wyman, I'm talking, we're definitely, definitely
going to revisit it this season, and we're going to get into all, some
details, and we're going to follow that through.
J. Maloni: Alright. Any sort of specific timeline or just this season?
J. Wyman: I would just say it's slowly unraveling throughout the season.
J. Maloni: Okay, and Jeff, when you look at Alias and you look at Lost
and you look at Fringe, in my mind these are three really, really
brilliant shows, but they've all had sort of rating issues. Is it the
time slot, is it the complexity, what do you think people are looking
for, and why do you think people are not tuning in, in larger numbers?
J. Pinkner: I think that, it's funny, JJ Abrams and I have had this
conversation on more than one occasion, and I think that Fringe, Lost,
Alias, absolutely there's a time slot issue, but at the end of the day,
it's more important to us that people fall in love with the shows. I've
said before that these shows to me are like licorice, not everybody
likes licorice, but the people that like licorice, love it.
And I think it's always been more important to us that we create shows
that people can get passionate about. And the truth is, there's only so
much time in the day to get passionate about something, and there's a
lot of really great shows on. We never take it as a indication of the
quality of our shows, how many people watch. It's more important to us
that the people that watch, really care about it deeply.
J. Wyman: Yes.
J. Maloni: Alright, great, thanks, guys.
J. Pinkner: Thank you.
Moderator: Great, thanks. Our next question comes from the line of David
Martindale with First Newspaper, please go ahead.
D. Martindale: Hello, guys. Thanks for doing the call. I don't like
licorice, but I do love the show.
J. Pinkner: We'll find another metaphor for you.
D. Martindale: I said this to Josh recently, but I'll repeat myself, I
recently saw the Observer at my softball game and I was very concerned.
He's getting out there.
At this point, it's pretty clear that Josh and Anna and John are perfect
for what they're doing, but did you see in them early on in the process
of putting the show together that made them the right people for you?
J. Wyman: You mean as far as actors?
D. Martindale: Yes. Well, as actors and those people, yes.
J. Wyman: But you don't mean the character, right, you're talking about
the—
D. Martindale: I'm talking about the actors for filling the characters,
yes.
J. Wyman: I think that we were attracted to April Webster who is our
casting agent as a genius and she has worked with JJ for a long time,
dating back to Felicity, and his features in Alias and Lost and Fringe.
And she knows that we're attracted to actors who aren't necessarily
like, "TV stars" or like a certain look or a certain type, but that
we're actually looking more for like actors who can convey a lot, a lot,
a lot of back story and life and depth in a sense of real life, in a
sense that there's a lot going on before the show starts and after it
ends.
And then we tend to, there's a pilot script, but the voice of the
characters develop over those first few weeks when the role becomes more
the actor and the actor becomes more the role. There are times where J.
Wyman and I will talk to John Noble over the phone and we'll look at
each other, because we're not sure whether we're talking to John or
Walter, and at times it's a little bit disturbing too.
D. Martindale: Okay, that's cool, yes, he did a call last year and he's a
lot of fun. He's a piece of work.
J. Pinkner: Yes.
J. Wyman: He's fantastic.
J. Pinkner: Yes.
J. Wyman: And we shouldn't leave out Lance Reddick and Blair Brown and
Jesika Nicole, these are spectacular actors who can do anything we ask
of them.
J. Pinkner: Yes.
J. Wyman: We can write really crappy lines and they somehow ... Somehow
they make ...
D. Martindale: Don't start ...
J. Pinkner: ...
J. Wyman: Jeff, I think your phones ...
J. Pinkner: Yes, no, I'm back now.
J. Wyman: Okay.
D. Martindale: It's one of you alls. Anyway in regards to The Observers
... the shop together. What was the process of developing the Observers
and how they look and how they act and whatnot?
J. Pinkner: I'll take this, because this proceeded J. Wyman:, but the
development of the character, J. Wyman:, has been deeply involved in, but
sort of the initial notion proceeded him a little bit.
We were looking for something that was sort of iconic and at the same
time, we were fascinated with the idea of all the little things that go
on under our nose every day. The construction workers, the guys working
on telephone poles, those like weird marks on the sidewalk and you don't
quite know what they're for, the last couple of remaining payphone
booths, when all the rest have been removed. We wanted The Observer to
have a quality of being invisible.
And we put him in the first three episodes of the show and then finally
revealed him in the fourth, and people look back and went, "Oh my God,
he was right there, he was right under my nose and I didn't see it." And
then the notion of some of his characteristics, the bald head, the no
eyebrows. We imagined how it would be that somebody who wasn't of our
world would end up in our world and what sort of like the process of
getting here would entail; and the fact that his senses were largely
deadened and so it took a lot of stimulation for him to feel anything,
so that led to the hot tempers and some of these other characteristics
of his character.
D. Martindale: He's a lot of fun and I won't worry when I see him at the
next game.
J. Pinkner: No, don't.
D. Martindale: He's not seeing anything important at our game, I promise
you. Thank you so much, I'll let other people talk.
J. Pinkner: Thank you.
D. Martindale: Goodbye.
Moderator: Great, thanks. Our next question comes from the line of Kathie
Huddleston with Sci-Fi Magazine, please go ahead.
K. Huddleston: Hello, guys.
J. Wyman: Hello, Kathy.
K. Huddleston: Hey, so now we have a episode called August and we had an
Observer named September. Are we going to find out where this is going
to lead us and what this means?
J. Wyman: Yes. You definitely will. I mean it's funny, because Jeff had
pointed out on several occasions that Josh Jackson did an interview last
year where he actually let it slip of the name of one of The Observers.
Our fans are so great at figuring things out, kind of heading us off at
the path, and I think they're going there, but nobody really got it, so
it's sort of out there already last year. You could search that if you
could fine it, I'm not going to say where.
K. Huddleston: Well, there's already theories that I'm reading about why
they'd be called one month over another.
J. Wyman: Yes.
K. Huddleston: What is truly special about this episode that is coming
up, why should we tune in?
J. Wyman: ...
J. Pinkner: It's free.
K. Huddleston: I'm sorry?
J. Pinkner: It's free.
K. Huddleston: Who is this?
J. Wyman: That was Jeff.
J. Pinkner: It's free entertainment.
K. Huddleston: It's free entertainment.
J. Pinkner: I think what's special about it is, well what's special about
it to us, and when we talked about it, what became really important to
us is in the world of like the mythology of the show. There's all kinds
of things that had just been hinted at or alluded to. We've seen the tip
of the iceberg and now we see a lot more below the waterline in this
episode.
What makes this special to J. Wyman: and I certainly is that it's a story
driven a hundred percent by emotion and it's a story where this
character who in many ways is unknowable in other, is driven by emotion,
and at the end of the episode hopefully you feel something. If you tune
in and by the time the shows over you felt something, then I think J.
Wyman and I feel really satisfied that we've done our job, and then
everything else that you learn along the way of the little, all the fun
things, the surprising things, the troubling things, the disturbing
things, the intriguing things, are greater.
J. Wyman: Yes, it's definitely, for people who are interested in
Observers, it definitely gives us, it qualifies them to a certain degree
for everybody. It will definitely open up a whole other line of concept
and a whole other line of understanding for the viewer to sort of say,
"Oh, my gosh, that's really interesting."
Part of the thing that we struggle with on a weekly basis, to us that
the best science fiction sort of deals with very human conditions, like
Isaac Asimov and a great writer like that, the more out there on Sci-Fi
it becomes, the more it reveals human condition.
And this is one of those episodes that we feel very passionately about
in that regard, because the entire episode reveals itself to be about a
very human emotion. And the way we chose to tell this episode is through
the eyes of somebody who's not human and we tried to really reach for
that, which we try to do on a weekly basis, but I think we're very
successful in this one.
K. Huddleston: What kind of a journey are we on this season?
J. Wyman: It's a journey of self actualization for our characters, that's
kind of what separates last year from this year. Jeff and I always refer
to last year, specifically as a prolog for the series, where you get to
understand the characters initially. You get to understand what's going
on, you learn something about the pattern, and you learn everything that
you would need to sort of situate yourself and enjoy the series.
In this season, we're really looking to get deeper into our characters
and have people sort of really participate with them and watch their
evolution, whether it's Walter's emancipation this season and how he's
having more of his own awakening; whether it's Peter and discovering
things about himself and about the others that he works with and his
place in the world; and Olivia, in the same regard.
You get to really see the cases a little bit more this year through the
eyes of our people, whereas last year I think that if there were
subtleties that we would place in, a lot of people, they wouldn't really
be able to get it. Because they didn't have a point of reference or a
point of contact, whereas now, because we have so much contact that even
the smallest little lines could have a tremendous amount of meaning
which frees us up a lot to be a little bit more subtle and tell a lot
more story.
J. Pinkner: I think one of the first gentlemen who asked a question, I
apologize, I forget his name, pointed out how our characters have become
a family by now, I think—
J. Wyman: Yes.
J. Pinkner: In season one, it was sort of a family coming together, and
in season two, the family secrets come out.
J. Wyman: Yes.
K. Huddleston: Thanks, guys.
J. Pinkner: Thank you very much.
J. Wyman: Thank you so much.
Moderator: Thanks. Our next question comes from the line of Alice Chapman
Nugent with The Times Courier, please go ahead.
A. Chapman: Nuwgen Hello, guys, how are you doing?
J. Pinkner: Hello.
J. Wyman: Good morning.
A. Chapman: Nuwgen Great. I was wondering if you could tell us a little
bit about some of the upcoming episodes? Any particular episodes that
are, well they're all exciting, but—
J. Wyman: Yes, thank you. Sure, in the next handful of episodes coming
up, I think we deal with an outbreak type condition. We deal with one
our favorite scenes in the show that we constantly come back to is
perception, and what we see with their eyes might not necessarily be the
truth. It might not necessarily be, our eyes may blind us to certain
things and we tell an episode that's really sort of big and fun and
crazy about how and what it is that we think we're seeing isn't
necessarily the truth.
In a couple episodes, we sort of like drop a bombshell for our
characters and one is like the big dormant secrets. One of the bombs
under the table as to where it goes off, and it's sort of like, well,
perhaps it will blow apart our team and certainly it will change the
nature of their relationship.
J. Pinkner: Yes.
J. Wyman: We delve a little bit more directly with the fact of the
alternate universe and what's going on over there and how it may affect
our world.
A. Chapman: Nuwgen Yes, a little bit more of Nimoy on the show too.
J. Wyman: Little things like that.
J. Pinkner: Sorry?
A. Chapman: Nuwgen I love Leonard Nimoy on the show too.
J. Wyman: He's fantastic, right?
J. Pinkner: He is.
A. Chapman: Nuwgen Yes, he is. One more quick question, how did The
Observers come about, whose idea was this?
J. Wyman: As you say that real quick though, I failed to mention that we
also have a kind of really cool episode coming up that deals with
Walter's memory and William Bell specifically.
A. Chapman: Nuwgen Oh, good.
J. Wyman: How The Observers came up? When we first started imagining,
there was a pilot, and when we first started like ... blue sky and what
the series would look like, The Observers was one of the first ideas
that came up in our earliest conversation. And it was just sort of the
idea of, JJ said earlier today in a conversation, that when you just
start to imagine a world, you start to think what would be really fun,
and sometimes you just want to like surprise yourself, and give yourself
a really cool puzzle.
One of the one's that came to mind was what if there were these
characters who by all accounts all they did was watch, and our team,
Olivia specifically, and ... realized that there are these events that
seem significant to them. But suddenly when that is, they realize
there's a guy who seems to be at all these events around the world,
sometimes two, almost simultaneously watching that they take on a whole
new heightened significance, and of course he does, and part of it's
funny. We just thought this bald man in a black suit was funny.
A. Chapman: Nuwgen Okay, that's great, well thank you.
J. Wyman: Thank you.
Moderator: Great, thanks. We're going to take a question from the line of
Julia Diddy with Fancast.com, please go ahead.
J. Diddy: Hello, gentlemen. Thanks for your time today.
J. Wyman: Thank you for calling.
J. Diddy: ... your answer to the last question might of touched upon what
I would like to ask. I was going to ask if Peter discovers his true
origin before the end of the season?
J. Wyman: Does Peter discover his own life?
J. Diddy: Yes, I'm sorry, I know there's a little bit of static on the
line.
J. Wyman: Yes, I don't know, I think somebody's cell phone is really out
of control.
J. Diddy: Yes. Sorry, there we go.
J. Wyman: Oh, that's great.
J. Diddy: Yes, I'd like to know if he will definitely be discovering his
origin before the conclusion of the season? Can you reveal? Now I know
you've got bombs going off.
J. Wyman: I think without like—
J. Pinkner: It's funny, my wife likes to read the last page of a book
first and it drives me crazy, and she claims to still enjoy it knowing
the end. But she can't stand the suspense, and she sits me down and like
won't give me dinner until I tell her secrets about the show, and I
refuse.
So in this instance, I think it's best that, certainly we're in the
middle of the story and it's certainly one of the biggest hanging
questions, and I think if we gave you a definitive answer one way or
another, we'd rob it of a lot of attention.
J. Diddy: That's fair, that's fair. Okay. Well, my other question, can
you give us a glimpse of what story lines might be coming up in season
three?
J. Wyman: God willing, we'll have a season three, let's have this phone
call again.
J. Diddy: I'm being optimistic, you deserve season three.
J. Wyman: Thank you.
J. Pinkner: We have a plan, but we can't really—
J. Diddy: Oh.
J. Pinkner: Yes, I mean I wish we could, we really, if we're lucky
enough, we have six seasons that we're really excited about. It's such a
great show to work on, because we're only limited by our own
imaginations. Once you start to get into this wonderful framework of the
characters and stuff, it's so much fun. We're constantly saying, "Oh,
what about this?" And then all of a sudden, we're like, "Well, that will
be a season three thing, yeah," and then before you know it, there's so
many things on the season three pile that you realize that it takes
shape and you go, "Wow, this is really great," but I wouldn't want to
elaborate.
J. Diddy: Understood, that's fair enough. Well, let me ask this then, one
more try, you've got so many great things with a great cast and great
story lines, are there any creative elements that if you could go back
and change you would do them differently?
J. Pinkner: That's a good question, that's a really good question. This
is going to sound like, yes, of course. There are moments that we wished
we played differently, and maybe there's some small choices, but I think
we're really happy with where we are right now.
J. Diddy: Okay.
J. Pinkner: Yes.
J. Diddy: Excellent, well, all the best and thanks so much.
J. Pinkner: Hey, thanks for calling, dear.
Moderator: Unfortunately, that does come to the end of the time that we
had allotted for Q&A today. Ladies and gentlemen, this call will be
available for replay starting today, Wednesday, November 18th at 1:30
p.m. Pacific time, and it will be available through tomorrow, Thursday,
the 19th at midnight Pacific time. You can access the AT&T Executive
Playback Service by dialing 1-800-475-6701, and then entering the access
code of 124324, and that does conclude our conference.
J. Pinkner: This is Jeff real quick, thank you guys all so much for your
time, and I'm sure I'm going to ... off Josh Governale right now, but if
anybody didn't have a chance and has a burning question, if you guys
e-mail it to Josh, J. Wyman: and I will do our best to respond to you
guys.
J. Wyman: Thank you guys.
J. Governale: Thanks so much, I appreciate that, Jeff.
J. Pinkner: We have to make you work a little harder.
J. Governale: No, that's alright. Thank you guys, and if you do have any
follow up questions, please let me know and I'll facilitate them for
you, alright? Thanks everybody for your time.
J. Pinkner: Thank you.
J. Governale: Thanks, Joel and Jeff, goodbye.
Moderator: Ladies and gentlemen, that does conclude our conference, you
may now disconnect.
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