Top Plug of the Week

We think it’s fair to say that Season Three of Flop TV is a GO! But that’s all we’re gonna say for now — look for a fuller announcement with a full movie list sometime in July in advance of tickets going on sale in August! Thank you for joining us for the previous two seasons and making this fun, silly thing possible!

So, Like, How Did Any of This Happen?

People occasionally ask how we met and started the podcast — and it’s not like we’ve been secretive about it or anything (“…we met in the boneyard at midnight, where three witches appeared in our scrying mirror and said ‘see ye cursed fillums”), but the question still comes up enough to remind us that not EVERYONE has an unhealthy obsession with podcast lore. So: for the curious, I’ll spin you a tale.

I (Dan) met Stuart when we were both students at Earlham College, a small, Quaker-founded liberal arts college in Richmond, Indiana. Stu was a couple of years below me, but had a mutual friend, Bill Hickey, and both drew comics for the student paper, The Earlham Word. My comic “Consensus” was like a less-political version of early Doonsbury, and Stu’s comic “Beyond Sweet” was intentional nonsense he’d come up with by jamming on drawings with his friend Casey and adding dialogue to match the bizarre pictures.

When we both moved to NYC with our (at the time) respective partners, we were thrown together through mutual friends and a sense of “well, I kind of know this guy,” but quickly became close due to a love of watching horror movies together — usually bad ones.

I was drifting a bit. I wanted to work in comedy, but comedy’s a career path without a career… path. So I eked out a living doing a lot of temping and having a more-successful fiancee, while taking a stab at various comedy avenues on the side — I did a webseries. I wrote for a (now defunct, as all of them are) humor magazine. I did sketch comedy. I wrote for a talk show in a basement, where I once got to bring a cheese plate to Lisa Loeb. I took a bunch of improv classes at The Upright Citizen’s Brigade Theater. But it felt like there was no way to break through and cut through the noise of New York’s huge comedy scene (and for many years, I wasn’t ready anyway!).

Then, one day when I should be working, I read an article about podcasts — how they were designed to be these sort of decentralized and egalitarian radio shows. As long as you had recording equipment and set up an RSS feed, you could get them listed, and they would be shot out to anyone who subscribed. I became an avid listener of a few shows (also when I should’ve been working) — mostly, at that time, Filmspotting, You Look Nice Today, and Jordan Jesse GO!

In what I’ve often described as one of my only moments of foresight, I thought “Hmn. Maybe podcasts are a way to get noticed. They’re new. I can get in on the ground floor.” Surprising no one more than myself, I was right. This August, we’ll celebrate the podcast’s 18th “birthday,” making us definitely the longest of the big “bad movie podcasts,” (which I harp on just because we certainly aren’t the most successful one, so we gotta trumpet what we got!).

But wait. “Where’s Elliott?” you cry. You still haven’t mentioned Elliott! Well… Elliott wasn’t with us from the start. When I came up with The Flop House (name suggested by the hilarious Matt Koff) it was conceived as a way for me to do comedy doing something we already did (watch bad movies), but also as an excuse to record my funny friends who had no comedy ambitions — Stuart, but also Stuart’s friend, Simon Fisher, who co-hosted the first six episodes before becoming the FH’s very own Pete Best and retiring to Indiana.

We tried rotating guest hosts to replace him, but there was one guy who clearly needed to be our permanent third peach. Elliott. I met Elliott at Juvie Hall, the same basement comedy theater where I once handed the singer of “Stay” some cheese. (the owner/manager of Juvie Hall, our friend Erik Marcisak, later became a video game writer, which is why you’ll sometimes come across a Flop House reference in a game or two).

At Juvie Hall, Elliott had an amazing weekly show “The Midnight Kalan,” a totally impromptu talk show that (other than guests) was just Elliott speaking, with nothing prepared, for hours on end, and also the middle he would give the audience free pizza for coming. I’d get home at 2:30 am, but it would be worth it.

I used to think Elliott learned how to be so funny talking extemporaneously without a pause from The Midnight Kalan, but now I know… that’s just Elliott. Between his comedy talent and his (now lost to time) blog “The Oscars are Always Wrong” where he corrected the Academy’s tastes year by year, I knew I needed to make this man my friend. Fortunately, he was up for a friendship with this other grumpy pop culture weirdo!

Anyway, that’s most of the story. Lots has happened since. We got actual recording equipment (I don’t recommend listening to the very earliest episodes, both because the sound is lousy and some of the attitudes are lousy — we’ve changed for the better). We briefly joined the network All Things Comedy, and then left it for Maximum Fun, our home to this day. Our audience grew, and it all happened organically — we’ve never had a publicist, but many publications have been kind enough to write about us, including The A.V. Club, The New York Times, The Guardian, Entertainment Weekly, Parade, and elsewhere (it’s hard to get written about as an older podcast, though, so if anyone wants to write a NEW article, please do!).

We started doing live shows, first just in New York, then across the country, and then in Canada and England as well. Along the line, Elliott became a writer at The Daily Show, transitioning from PA at The Daily Show, and I also became a writer at The Daily Show, transitioning from being one of the worst office assistants in Columbia Architecture School history. Then we left TDS, Elliott for many other successes, and me for… hopefully some delayed additional successes. And Stu went from being an overalls-wearing bartender to being the stylishly sculpted bar co-owner we know and love.

Sometimes, when we’re watching, say, The Garfield Movie, I wonder what I’ve done with my life. Then I think… well, what I’ve done is sent hundreds hours talking with two of my best friends, and I’ve been fortunate enough to get letters from a ton of listeners who, improbably, have found that time meaningful as well. Thanks for being one of them.

And thank god I read that article about podcasts.

Next on the Show

RIGHT NOW - Max Fun supporters, check your MEMBER BONUS FEED for episode 2 of SlopTales. Things are getting more chaotic at the restaurant and gamemaster Stu keeps piling on complications. Will Dan, Elliott, and Zhubin be able to stay out of the weeds and keep the beloved vacation eatery from closing?

7/5- We welcome Josh Gondelman to discuss POOLMAN, a shaggy sunshine noir from Stuart’s fave Chris/style icon, Chris Pine. It got scathing reviews, but does it have something to offer? Arguable, but if you’re looking for some Inarguable fun, check out Josh’s new stand-up special, Positive Reinforcement.

7/12 - Stu made us watch some sort of Warhammer 40k nonsense, because he knows that annoying Dan and Elliott makes for good podcasting.

Plugging Away

Elliott’s still writing for D.C.’s sassiest antiheroine, Harley Quinn, and he hosts/writes a bite-sized quiz podcast, called Smartless Presents: Clueless. And check out his latest book for children, Sadie Mouse Wrecks the House.

Stuart paints Warhammer models/chats with viewers most Fridays on his Twitch channel.

Dan started a small Etsy shop with cards featuring his artwork and wrote a silly comedy piece about fantasy worlds for his newsletter, Special Interests.

You Made it to the End!

Here’s a photo of this week’s guest, Josh Gondelman, at Dan’s birthday karaoke — mere moments away from entering “Vampire Time” and draining the whole room of blood.